If you’ve never experienced Call of Duty: Black Ops 2, now is a great time to jump in: the 2012 shooter is now backward compatible with Xbox One, meaning that the player base will probably jump up significantly. Good thing, because it’s one of the best Call of Duty entries in years.
The single-player campaign followed a father-and-son storyline across two drastically different time periods. Alex Mason returned from the first Black Ops to fight in the Cold War in the 1980s, while his son David Mason fought a futuristic Cold War in 2025. It wasn’t the strongest Call of Duty story ever, but it’s still worth playing — it’s not every day you get to shoot rocket launchers on horseback! — and even features multiple endings.
Of course, the real draw is multiplayer. Black Ops II had some nasty server issues that might crop up again here, but when it worked, it was excellent. Developer Treyarch set a high bar here. The first stroke of genius was ditching Killstreaks in favour of “Scorestreaks.” This gave players much more incentive to actually play the objective rather than trying to rack up kills. (Is there anything worse than playing Domination with randos who won’t help capture objective points?)
Black Ops II also introduced League Play, which matched players together based on skill and featured all the rules and modes used in Major League Gaming, letting anyone practice what it’s like to play like a pro. This was a huge leap forward for competitive COD.
And since it’s a Treyarch game, don’t forget the zombies! While Black Ops II featured many ways to re-kill the recently dead, the best was Grief, a four-on-four competitive Zombies mode in which teams of players fought each other for perks and map control while also attempting to survive the undead hordes.
Back in the day, I had so much devious fun with friends as we sabotaged the other team by disabling the perk machines or sending hordes in their direction. So between battling in the real and fictional Cold Wars, testing your skills on an esports level, and experiencing the best way to fight zombies, Black Ops II was a pretty compelling package. I can’t wait to dive back in.
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2 responses to “There’s A Reason Black Ops 2 Still Has So Many Fans”
It was the three lane map system and tight gun-play without being over the top or not good enough (MW2 vs MW3) that made Black Ops 2 the best multiplayer of the series. And what further elevated it was (as already mentioned in article) was the League Play which was so well integrated so that it blurred the lines between pros and amateurs. Definitely the peak of COD multiplayer and I’m eagerly looking forward to jumping back in for another go at it 🙂
I loved the story of Blops and Blops2 – and the way they tied Blops’ story to World at War, which is probably my favorite in the franchise.
I love black ops 2 so much that I just bought an Xbox 360 soley so i coukd play bo2. (I know you can play it on Xbox one, but I already have a PC and ps4, I’m kind of pressed for money)