Black Ops Review

Black Ops multiplayer is simply brilliant

Treyarch has finally usurped Infinity Ward as the premier Call Of Duty multiplayer developer, and the secret to its success doesn’t just lay in innovating what went before. With the all-new Wager Matches, Treyarch has introduced something approaching greatness into the already brilliant multiplayer series, crafting what could be the most addictive shooter game type on Xbox Live in the process.

 

Wager Matches are a series of four six-player game types, each with very different rules. Gun Game sees players advancing through weapon classes with every kill, starting with pistols and ending with the ballistic knife via everything from sniper rifles to rocket launchers

One in the Chamber starts players with three lives, a pistol and one bullet per life. The upside is that it’s a one-hit kill anywhere on the body; the downside is that missing your shot leaves you with only the knife for company

Sharpshooter cycles through the vast swathes of weapon and attachment combinations as the round plays out, plonking random variables into players’ hands

Sticks and Stones is simple: you have an explosive crossbow, a ballistic knife and a tomahawk. Killing your enemies with the former two armaments gives you points, but hitting a foe with the tomahawk bankrupts them, resetting their score to zero.

you’ll soon find yourself relying on mind games as much as the twitch reflexes that have defined the series so far. Missed with your shot in One in the Chamber? Fake that you’ve got another bullet, gained by knifing an opponent rather than shooting them, or pretend that you’ve not got one and lure opponents in close before shooting them.

Sharpshooter and Gun Game are equally dramatic, producing ebbs and flows of action as players react to their new weapon sets, adjusting their skills to the dynamically changing weapons

Sticks and Stones turns into an all-out tactics-fest. The splash damage of the exploding arrows is offset by the low velocity and slow reload time of the weapon, meaning that bouts are characterised by frantic fighting tinged with the fear of being bankrupted at any time.