Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 was one of the most played online console games of the last generation, with over 100 million players engaging in virtual combat. Even today, two-and-a-half years after it launched, the game gets over a million unique players. Treyarch studio head Mark Lumia believes his company can bring its unique brand of fun to many more people with Black Ops 3. The three years of development that Activision scheduled for development of this sequel essentially gave Treyarch a blank canvas to work with, so they decided to experiment, iterate and (they hope) push the COD franchise forward with a variety of new gameplay innovations.
“We want you to feel like a bad-ass action soldier,” said Lamia. And to achieve this, the studio used its 10 years of knowledge from developing Call of Duty games to “revolutionize” the Treyarch gameplay experience.
Black Ops 3 changes some of the core principles of the game and was designed around a tight balance across core combat, player movement, and map design. The new combat movement system was built with a “guns up” philosophy, which accelerates the action and opens up how players will explore levels, as well as multiplayer maps. The momentum-based, precision-focused, chained-movement system allows players to fluidly move through the environment with finesse. New abilities added to the mix include thrust jumps, power slides, and fast mantling capabilities, all of which can be chained together for fast and frenetic action. Players can aim and shoot at any time and from anywhere as they run along walls, jump onto second floor structures and even swim underneath levels.
Dan Bunting, Treyarch game director, said the multiplayer game has a constant forward momentum, although it’s easier than ever to aim your weapon at all times and have 360-degrees of motion through all maneuvers. Maps are designed from the ground-up to give players a feeling of power over how they use the environment for advanced tactics, while at the same time pushing strong head-to-head engagements for classic Black Ops boots-on-the-ground action.
“With the new Traversal we took apart the mantle feature step by step,” said Bunting. “Whenever we could get rid of barriers to playing, we did. This extends to forward motion, side strafing and backwards motion as well. You have unlimited sprint, so you can mantle over ledges and you’re free to navigate and shoot while in the air.”
The game’s new Thrust Jump is different from Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare’s EXO jump because it keeps the gameplay in frame. You can’t jump more than one story and all of the levels have been designed with that in mind.
“It’s not about verticality,” said Bunting. “Ladders suck. Just double tap on the jump button and you can jump in any direction and you’ll auto-mantle if you’re near a ledge. A meter appears in middle of screen that shows how much power you have, which lets players decide if they want to do one huge boost or several smaller jumps. It’s a resource to manage.”
Players can Power Slide feet first, keeping their gun up and staying in the fight. Tapping the crouch button brings on the slide, which can be queued up in mid-air and performed in any direction. Like the Thrust Jump it has a power meter.
One of the elements that adds a sense of Parkour to the gameplay experience is the Wall Run. Bunting said Treyarch adjusted map design guidelines to make this work in multiplayer by treating core paths as wall run opportunities. Players can sprint and thumbstick toward a wall and jump. They can aim down sites while wall running and reverse direction on a dime. Some levels offer walls that can be jumped from level to level successively. There’s a lot of skill involved with these new features, so expect pro gamers to take this to the next level when eSports grabs hold of this game in the fall.
Another new area of gameplay, and a first for Call of Duty, is fighting underwater. Players can swim in maps that have pools, ponds and other bodies of water. Bunting said every gun, piece of equipment, and animation has been custom made to work under water. In addition, the maps have been designed so that these underwater areas become part of the strategies that can be employed in multiplayer. Having played three multiplayer maps, I can say there’s no learning curve for shooting enemies or navigating underwater. It’s a seamless experience and a fun new way to play, especially if you use the water to hide and then surprise enemies.
An important piece to the massive customization options in Black Ops 3 is Gunsmith. David Vonderhaar, studio design director at Treyarch, said the new weapon customization system allows players to simultaneously equip up to five attachments and an optic. Once a weapon has been fine-tuned to their liking, players can customize and personalize them with next gen camos and an infinite number of user-generated content possibilities with the Paintshop.
Also adding a new layer of customization and depth to multiplayer is the Specialist system, which lets players choose from one of nine elite Black Ops soldiers. Each soldier has their own look, personality, voice and battle-hardened weapons and abilities. These Specialists can be ranked up, which adds a new level-progression pathway alongside global XP and weapons XP. Vonderhaar said the Specialists system fundamentally changes the way players will engage in combat at key points throughout a match, as each weapon and ability is designed with a role that makes your Specialist a unique force in the field. Adding strategy to the mix is the fact that each weapon or ability (and you can only choose one per match) is a timed power up that can be unlocked.
In Campaign mode, Black Ops 3 introduces four-player cooperative gameplay to the mix for the first time. Up to four friends can join up and engage in “off the rails” action in much larger battles against enemies that come in human, robot and cyborg forms. There are over 20 enemy types that players will go up against in campaign, and Treyarch has designed the game with layers that will enhance replay.
“Next gen graphics allowed us to get these larger spaces with more human players moving around at different positions in the battlefield,” said Jason Blundell, campaign director and senior executive producer at Treyarch. “Cyber Cores and Cyber Rigs are cybernetic modifications that allow an added degree of player customization. Cyber Cores provide a variety of skills from remote hacking and controlling drones, to chain melee strikes. Cyber Rigs are passive upgrades to the soldiers that allow them to use advanced movement and defensive capabilities. All of these options allow teams to construct a variety of differently configured soldiers to tackle engagements in a variety of ways.”
Although they’re saving details for later, Black Ops 3 will once again have a Zombies mode. Lamia said fans have grown to love this mode since it was first introduced in 2008 in Call of Duty: World at War. Lamia believes this mode is so popular because Treyarch designs it to be easily accessible.
“We wanted to bring more replayability and depth to Zombies so we added a full XP-based progression system for players,” said Lamia. “We’re introducing a highly creative and totally different gameplay setting that’s totally different from the Campaign and multiplayer experience. Zombies is its own game.”
With multiplayer Campaign, multiplayer Zombies and, of course, multiplayer, the entire Black Ops 3 game experience has been designed with friends in mind. That includes a new social overlay.
“We’ve developed a social system layer that overlays this entire game, making it easier for you and your friends to move throughout all of these experiences easily,” said Lamia. “We looked at stats of how people were playing and in a single session they’d player both Zombies and multiplayer, so we made it simpler for them connect with friends and play the game in any multiplayer mode.”
With its futuristic backdrop that sets up a world in which having boots on the ground is a requirement, and cool new Direct Neural Interface (DNI) technology and cybernetic enhancements, sci-fi blends with where real world combat is headed. Treyarch still has plenty to reveal about Black Ops 3, but judging from the three multiplayer maps they’ve revealed, this game is shaping up to be another massive hit. And E3 will be the coming out party with multiplayer gameplay available on the show floor for all attendees to play.
Here are the three multiplayer maps Treyarch has revealed:
- Combine — Set in the remote Egyptian Sahara, this vertical farming and sustainability research facility plays fast and frenetic with tight interiors, an open middle and a dangerous flank path.
- Hunted — This big game hunting lodge is situated beneath a waterfall in the lush mountains of Ethiopia, where rugged terrain opens up to long sightlines and a stealthy underwater pathway.
- Stronghold — A high-tech Swiss chateau in the frozen, mountainous Alps, Stronghold has an asymmetrical design with a mix of exposed sightlines and tight, close quarters.
