Call of Duty Black Ops 4 Revealed, Coming to Xbox One October 12

Earlier today at a community event, Activision and Treyarch pulled back the curtain on Call of Duty Black Ops 4, the latest and most gaming changing entry in the Call of Duty franchise where they showcased a wide variety of multiplayer features, an expanded zombie campaign, as well as the first details on a new battle royale mode.

One of the biggest reveals was the Call of Duty Black Ops 4 won’t have a traditional single-player campaign. Instead, Black Ops 4’s narrative experience will be told through each of the unique Specialists you can play as, each with their own unique toolset to bring to the battlefield — like the medical specialist Crash who can heal and resupply teammates — as well as each of the multiplayer scenarios players will encounter.

It’s in these multiplayer battles where players will see some of the biggest changes to the franchise’s core “boots on the ground” gunplay, doing away with wall-running and other techniques and keeping it focused on teamwork and precision. Weapons are also getting a makeover, with a wide range of customization features, allowing each weapon to have its own set of attachments for the player to customize to their liking. Black Ops 4 will also be the first game in the franchise to use a “true predicative recoil pattern system,” where players will have to make micro adjustments while aiming and shooting.

Situational Awareness has also received some attention, with the introduction of “Fog of War” which shows only the area immediately around your player. This is intended to create more opportunities for teammates to rely on each other to share info on their surrounding area, calling out enemy positions. This is also an area where Specialists can utilize sensor darts to reveal even more information about enemy locations.

Another component that is changing is that healing will no longer be automatic in multiplayer matches. Instead, it will be tied to an in-game button command and will require you to resupply it as needed (e.g. relying on the Specialist Crash). This is designed to create some new tactical decisions during your matches, increasing the pacing of battle, and letting you choose when to heal as needed.

Call of Duty: Black Ops Zombies is also receiving a significant amount of attention and detail with three new campaigns launching with the release of Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 on October 12. Two of these sci-fi, fantasy-themed campaigns were shown off at the event, one taking place in an ancient gladiator area appearing to focus on melee weapons, while another was shown onboard a soon-to-be-doomed ocean liner full of infected guests.

The zombie mode will also bring a wide variety of customization features so players can tweak to their preferred style of play in this mode, with adjustable settings like zombie speed, health, player damage, etc. There will also be bot support to control the other narrative-based characters for those who prefer to game on their own.

Finally, we got our very first details on Blackout which will be Black Ops IV’s unique take on the battle royale genre, featuring characters and weapons from across the Black Ops universe. Described as a “crazy collision of fun” with land, air, and sea vehicles with playable characters such as Hudson, Mason, Reznov, Menandez, and Woods. We hope to have more detail and gameplay impressions to share on this mode in the near future.

These were just the first of many details to come on Call of Duty: Black Ops 4. We’ll have more impressions and details to share here on Xbox Wire in the coming months and at E3 2018. For now, keep it tuned to Xbox Wire for all of the latest news on your favorite Xbox One games.