When Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War launches later this year, it will feature a multiplayer mode that was cut from Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 over a decade ago. This information was revealed as part of today’s official unveiling of the traditional multiplayer suite coming to Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War. Fans of Team Deathmatch and Domination will be pleased to see a lot of the tried and true modes returning to the new entry, and that also includes Search & Destroy and Kill Confirmed. In addition, familiar modes aren’t the only thing returning from past games.
New to the Black Ops subseries are Field Upgrades, selectable in-game items that work on a cooldown. They carry over from Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, which featured such upgrades as the fan-favorite Tactical Insertion, the ability to move around the map quickly, and an EMP Drone that disables other electronic perks and killstreaks. One would expect that some of these abilities will change in the new game, particularly because of Cold War‘s 1980s setting. Field Upgrades slot right into the Create-a-Class system, with returns with the Black Ops specific Wildcards system from past games in the series.
Also new to all of Call of Duty in a manner of speaking is the VIP Escort mode. Originally planned for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (and playable via hacked lobbies in that game), Activision revealed the new mode in a blog post outlining Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War‘s multiplayer gameplay. Two teams of six will battle it out, with one player on the defending team becoming the VIP. This player will only get a pistol, a smoke grenade, and a UAV to protect them, so they need to stay close to teammates to fend off attackers. The mode is round-based, with teams attempting to escort their VIP to an escape point.
Other new modes for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War include Combined Arms, a big team replacement for Ground War that features tanks, snowmobiles, and wakerunners. The combat will be intimately familiar to anyone who plays games in the Battlefield franchise. This playlist will include several modes, including standard deathmatch and Domination. There’s also Fireteam, a game mode where four teams of 10 duke it out in specific modes. The first mode is called Dirty Bomb, but Treyarch has not given any details about this new mode as of yet.
It’s good to see the developers of Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War dig into the back catalog for new ways for players to get their multiplayer on. VIP did eventually make it into several other shooters, including the original Team Fortress and Halo 3. However, the mode has never been all that popular with players in those franchises, so Treyarch could be taking a risk by including it. Even so, it fits in with the game’s era, and Call of Duty is a much different game than those other two examples. It’s entirely possible that it could be a big hit in this version, so players will have to wait and see.
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War will release on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X, and PC on November 13th, 2020.
