I’m not a big fan of annualised sports games, but I imagine playing Call of Duty is similar to playing a new Madden game. You look for the (small) handful of changes made in the latest entry and hope you can articulate the differences to those who have kept up with the series every year, as well as the people who may be new or lapsed fans. Sometimes distinguishing what’s new, what matters, and more importantly why, can be difficult depending on how the annualised game highlights the new features and changes for that year. But so far the jump from last year’s Modern Warfare III to this year’s Black Ops 6 doesn’t feel like Activision splitting hairs to justify the continued annualisation of Call of Duty.
There is a confidence and vision of what Black Ops 6 is and how it has evolved from the days of the first game on PS3 and Xbox 360. Confidence is all well and good, but annualised games are at their best when they underpromise and overdeliver. I hope Microsoft continues with that philosophy for Call of Duty in the future because it seems to be working for Black Ops 6. You may already feel like you know if Black Ops 6 is the game for you, but during my time with the beta I think Black Ops 6 is shaping up to be one of the most exciting Call of Duty games in years, and all of it has to do with one big change; Omnimovement.
During the game reveal Treyarch described the new system as:
For the first time ever, players can sprint, slide, and dive in any direction (forward, sidestepping, and backpedaling) and move like a true Black Ops action hero. This innovation immediately allows the player to move like never before and seamlessly chain combat maneuvers together, like sliding, diving and a newly enhanced supine prone, all with a full 360-degree range of motion.
What can I say? I like to Omnimovement, move it. As I mentioned, your mileage may vary depending on your experience with the previous games but from a gameplay perspective Omnimovement offers some of the most fun I’ve had in Call of Duty since the Modern Warfare reboot and is one of the most satisfying changes to the movement system since Advanced Warfare.
The new movement system is a lot of fun to use offensively like when diving into a tightly contested area to capture a point in Domination. However, Omnimovement is just as effective when it comes to playing defensively like when sliding past openings while providing covering fire, or lying on your back prone as you react to enemies behind you, those moments can be just as fun as using the movement system for offence assuming your senses and reaction are as quick as your trigger finger.
Call of Duty has always been a pretty fast game, even as other shooters have begun to feel the need for speed. It’s maybe not Quake fast and may pale in comparison to the endless amount of boomer shooters out there today, but with the introduction of tactical sprint Call of Duty has felt this consistent sense of speed for some time now and it’s pretty fast. With the addition of Omnimovement, I feel like Black Ops 6 is perhaps the fastest Call of Duty has ever felt by combining raw sprinting speed with the new freedom of movement.
The new system takes a bit of time to get used to, even after playing the training mission I still needed a few matches to get my handle on the new 360 movement. I only experienced Omnimovement in multiplayer but I imagine it would work pretty well in the single-player campaign where your enemies won’t be as smart and would be less likely to use the new movement system against you. Black Ops 6 and Omnimovement still feel like Call of Duty, but it’s an exciting interpretation of how Call of Duty plays, and based on my time with the beta I’m pretty excited to see how the final game turns out.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 will be released on October 25, 2024, for PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. Xbox Game Pass subscribers can also play the full single-player campaign on launch day.
