I buckled and got Black Ops 3 yesterday. Having missed out on the last Black Ops and Advanced Warfare through lack of interest, I wanted to re-visit COD as it has been a number of years; while also curing my itch for a First Person Shooter. My personal taste means I'm not really interested in Fallout and although I'm sure Battlefront will be excellent, again (somewhat controversially I’m not a fan of Star Wars) it’s not a game I think I’ll be spending my cash on.
While it was installing the update I had about 30 minutes to waste so started the campaign mode to familiarise myself with the controls. It was very much a case of ‘as you were’, when the story started to unfold. The graphics were impressive, if not a little clunky – and the route in which you could take was more or less set to a particular way – a free roam game this is not. I’ll be honest, I will carry on with the campaign mode at some point, but I was a little relieved when the install was complete so I could go online (my interest had started to wain after 30 minutes of campaign mode – not a good sign).
One of the main reasons I was put off the latest CODs, as per an earlier post in this very thread, is because I didn’t like the idea of the boost jump and the futuristic route they’ve gone down. I prefer the idea of a WW1 or WW2 shooter. However, I am willing to concede that I was wrong. The boost jump, if anything, puts you in danger – rather than being used to attain cheap kills. I had it in my head that the game would just be full of wankers abusing the boost jump in order to kill from above – meaning I would just constantly be dying over and over again. However, this isn’t the case –it is a fantastic tool to get around the map quicker, including putting yourself in to vantage points where you can take advantage of the opposition (rooftops etc) and the ability to run on walls is a welcome addition. I’ll admit – the things I thought I’d hate about this game, so far I’m really enjoying.
In terms of the maps themselves, there’s a typical mix of large and small. It’s frustrating that there’s no limit on how many times you can re-select a map and I ended up playing the same game/map 4 times in a row last night before getting bored and going back to the menu to join another session. Hopefully they put a patch out for that. It’s a minor thing though, and I like the fact that, having not played a COD in about 4-5 years, I can just pick this up and get straight on with it. Equally, I can appreciate that for avid COD fans who buy every single game that comes out, it hasn’t changed a great deal and may come across as the same game repackaged for the umpteenth time. The one major addition I noticed from the older versions is being able to choose a ‘specialist’ power. I thought this would be rubbish but it’s actually pretty good.
All in all, I’m happy with the purchase. I just need to get better at it now!
