Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 | Multiplayer

I chose to start off this new Call of Duty experience, as I often times do, with the multiplayer first. I do this, because campaign critique is often times based mostly on opinion, and not everyone is going to like or dislike the story. The multiplayer, on the other hand, is the mode most returning players will turn to. That and Zombies. For me, personally, I spend most of my time in multiplayer which makes it easier for me to breakdown. What I found in my playthroughs is the following ...

Black Ops 6, or BO6 for short, has a basic multiplayer experience built upon feature foundations set earlier in the series. It features an inclusive and diverse selection of operators with potential for future skins that have yet to be realized in the shop or elsewhere. Weighed against MWIII's character roster though they pale in comparison, especially by design. They are lesser quality models that seem generic, and without standout personality or flash. Even with a non-binary insert included they are surface level nobodies outside of the main characters like Frank Woods. 

In the way of maps they are larger, and with more camping and vantage points scattered about on a vertically layered level. It is camper, sniper & runner gunner friendly. With the omnidirectional movement options, and corner peeking capabilities a player can out-maneuver others in pursuit while positioning themselves in various prone/lying positions that give a slight advantage in situational circumstances. 

Along with these maps comes a loadout system filled with the usual gun, melee, tactical, primary, perks, field upgrades, and a wildcard. For equipment loadouts you get three equipment slots for weapons. One for a primary gun, a second for the secondary gun, and a third for the melee weapon. Guns, alone, get five add-on slots each with more attachments than that for the selecting. You've got scopes, silencers. lasers, mags, bullets, grips, stocks, sights, and underbelly types all returning to the core formula. 

Guns, themselves, have a max prestige level that is greater in number value than the last CoD's assortment making weapon, equipment, and field upgrade prestige rankings. Alongside this the earning of their new prestige stats emblems that can be applied to player profile for bragging rights to be more of a grind and clout worthy objective. Additionally earnable weapon camos which can be applied across the board come in three different categories including standard, special, and the prestigious kind. Each with the usual gameplay feat requirements in tow. Beyond gold, diamond, and those usual camos is dark spine, and some other new takes on prestige camo designs each complete with animated effects. You'll even find differing Zombies variants, as per usual.

When it comes to perks you can set up to three of three different colors/types that when color coordinated will add a bonus specialist perk to enhance that set of perk's mechanics. Among the perks are the usual gunplay enhancing assortment, wall hacks, and radar reducing/enhancing assortment. You can also mix and match perks, but you will not get the benefit of the fourth specialist bonus perk for doing that. This is where wildcards like greed can come in handy allowing for an extra perk to be added. Wildcards themselves also play into gunplay, and performance enhancement as well as team play allowing for a primary in the secondary gun slot among other things.

Field grades, and score streaks also return in a familiar format. You'll find ammo crates, SAM turrets, radar reducing/enhancing options, and other tools for timed use on the battlefield. Finally score streaks come with the usual suspects including RC cars, radar pings, UAVs, Anti-UAVs, a limited remote rocket launcher, a turret, missile barrage, and several different aerial streaks for dominating a map. It's nothing profoundly different from earlier entries in Black Ops or Call of Duty, in general.

New to the CoD and BO6 multiplayer experience is the detailed kill count, win/loss count, and overall performance stats shown before each and every match. Letting the player know how they are doing on each map, and within each mode of play. Modes of play also include some newcomers to the series, but are mostly your objective based team effort driven gameplay types. You can, as before, set your settings and preferences for mode types at the main multiplayer menu. Selecting those which you want to play, and those which you don't. Multiplayer does have standard play options as well as hardcore playlists, and ranked.

Prestige in this new BO6 grind is one that bypasses the seasonal reset, and is continuously upgraded via XP earnings for the lifetime of your commitment to the game, in turn, unlocking new attachments, equipment and features. Returning also are the usual XP tokens that can be spent to enhance the three different types of XP setup back in MWIII. I imagine, in the future, there will also be free 2XP weekends for the farming. This will allow for the unlocking of feat based, prestige based, and zombies based banners. That, and emblems. Stuff that you can customize your profile with. Speaking of which, you can once again choose a favorite operator skin for modeling, and taunts for won matches. It's a little something extra to add to your statistics display. 

The Verdict ...

Though my playthrough of the multiplayer is still ongoing I will say that the maps I've played on aren't the best. The change to the lane formula wasn't the right choice for many veteran players, myself included. I do get why they did it though as it incentivizes usage of the new omnidirectional movement mechanics. That aside the omnidirectional movement also seems more like a gimmick, and less like a must use meta mechanic. It's not necessary, but in some situations can help. 

The flow of multiplayer matches seems to be a bit drawn out, and lengthy compared to earlier iterations from what I've seen. Even with the point values remaining the same, and them being objectively similar it feels longer than most sessions I've played in the past years. The odd thing is that scorestreaks are easier to earn due to a quicker time to kill. With some scorestreaks stacked together these can be earned multiple times each within a match without much work being put into it, especially with the points earned from other loadout equipment. The current meta is to equip UAV and Anti-UAV plus a higher tier scorestreak along with certain score affecting perks and the use of tacticals like the decoy grenade that help increase score farming.

Overall, with current things weighed multiplayer is a bit lacking. I'm hoping the roster and skin economy improves as well as the maps. Those are my biggest issues at the moment. I'm also interested in seeing what the new battle pass system will look like when it arrives. Until then Multiplayer seems to be the middle grounds offering of the complete package with Zombies taking the lead amongst most players.