Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War Reviews

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is ranked in the 63rd percentile of games scored on OpenCritic.
7 / 10.0
Nov 25, 2020

Moreover, the visuals are outdated, and some technical issues should have been fixed before launch. We expected more from Black Ops Cold War, but I am sure that Activision will rake in enough money from the players to have another Call of Duty next year.

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6 / 10.0
Nov 25, 2020

My best recommendation is to wait on Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War.

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Unscored
Nov 25, 2020

While I wouldn’t call myself a Call of Duty enthusiast in any shape or form, I can say for sure that I’ve enjoyed playing through each of the entries that I’ve gotten to review over the years. Compared to 2019’s Modern Warfare, I would say that I’m having more fun this year mostly due to the time period that it takes place in and how closely it sticks to the flavor of movies I grew up watching. It’s ridiculous, all over the place and surely dumb, but at the end of the day, a fun ride. Just try and don’t take anything about it too seriously.

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85 / 100
Nov 25, 2020

Another year, another Call of Duty. And the first of the new generation of consoles. We return to a spectacular and vibrant campaign with grateful adventure additions, along with a solid, direct and full multiplayer, full of game modes and content that will increase as the 'season' passes. Hours and more hours in front of the screen to which the insertion of Wargame within the same game is added to make the multiplayer experience more complete.

Review in Spanish | Read full review

7 / 10.0
Nov 25, 2020

The single-player and campaign modes are actually really great stuff. But like nearly all Call of Duty games, that is the content you'll breeze through within your first week playing if even for just a few hours a day. The bulk of the ride ends up being multiplayer and zombies and that is where the problems really lie. This is a game that I'm sure will eventually get the extra content, balancing, and bugs worked out along a series of patches and end up being much better than it is today. But unfortunately the buggy, laggy, unbalanced, and content-sparse game we get at launch is the only one I was given to review. And the balance of the excellent single-player with below average multiplayer ends up for an average overall experience.

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8 / 10.0
Nov 24, 2020

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War does very more-of-the-same in places — it’s the franchise’s 17th instalment, after all — but when a formula has been so fine-tuned, it’s hard to expect the developers to monkey around with it too much.

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Unscored
Nov 24, 2020

On their own, all of these things would have been significant improvements over the Zombies modes from the recent past. But when added together, they feel like a massive leap forward for the whole mode. By streamlining the overly complicated mechanics this time around, Treyarch is placing the focus back on the mode’s bread and butter: killing zombies.

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Heavy
Top Critic
Unscored
Nov 24, 2020

There’s a lot to enjoy here, and if you’re a person who’ll just check out the game in your free time versus grinding it for hours on end, you’ll like it. If you are somebody who likes to dedicate whole days to playing CoD with your friends, then you might quickly find yourself wanting to find something else to play.

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85 / 100
Nov 24, 2020

From Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War’s extremely flashy, yet ultimately shallow, campaign; through to its back-to-basics multiplayer offerings and reimagined Zombie modes, the game is great. While multiplayer is very subjective it is easy to see Cold War’s multiplayer becoming the next benchmark for frantic battles and firefights among friends and online communities. The game also looks incredible and loads like a breeze. For the first time in a long time, there is a Call of Duty game worthy of the attention it has received in the weeks leading up to its release. It may not be a profound title challenging personal philosophies, but it is most definitely worth playing even if just for its single-player narrative.

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Nexus Hub
Sheree Buchholz
7.5 / 10.0
Nov 23, 2020

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War takes some getting used to. There are various bugs that will need to be patched, weapons, and equipment that need to be balanced, skill-based matchmaking tweaks to be done, spectator mode has some improvements to be made and there are occasional glitches on the Theatre Mode for older generation consoles, but all in all, Treyarch have delivered a smooth, enjoyable base game that should get better and better with updates.

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7.5 / 10.0
Nov 23, 2020

Don’t worry if you think that Cold War veers too far off from that exhilarating element of Call of Duty you have grown up with, it is still there in heaps!

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8 / 10.0
Nov 23, 2020

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War takes you back to the past, not only in setting and theme, but in its gameplay style and more. It all feels so classic. Between multiplayer, Zombies, and the return of a proper (and surprisingly less-linear) campaign, there is plenty of value for the soldier in all of us.

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8 / 10.0
Nov 23, 2020

Black Ops is back and darker than ever. With a rich story and plenty of super-spy moments, this game keeps you gripping down on your controller. Always going to be compared to past titles, this iteration stands up to the challenge and delivers a whole new experience on what a Call of Duty title should be.

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Nov 22, 2020

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is a game that wears many hats, but doesn’t fit any of them quite right

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7 / 10
Nov 22, 2020

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War managed to balance two sides of the weights: if you play Call of Duty because of the campaing, you'll be undoubtedly satisfied. Singleplayer brings inovations, that transform classical „run and gun“ missions to think-through spy operations, that looks on Call of Duty beautifully. It doesn't depend if you look on choices, decryption or investigative puzzles or plesant stealth. Cold War breaks the unfortunate old concept used by older parts. On the other hand multiplayer and zombie mode go in the other direction. Instead of changes and inovations we get gunplay, which is still fun, but not that fun. All the inovations that were brought with Modern Warfare don't work in cold war anymore. Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War can be great part to the series. But in the same way it can be average. All stands on what you prefer better.

Review in Czech | Read full review

Nov 22, 2020

Despite not reaching the highs of its predecessor, Call Of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is still an engaging experience that will have you repeating “one more round” well into the early morning.

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8.2 / 10.0
Nov 22, 2020

Raven Software e Treyarch bring us a complete and satisfying CoD package, with a spectacular - even if fragmented - Campaign and many multiplayer modes. The new Zombi mode feels finally fleshed out and more integrated to the rest of the game and competitive multiplayer is more balanced even if missing some of last year's features, but the classical modes' maps are too few and sometimes limited. All in all, a solid CoD episode capable of keeping us engaged until the next one.

Review in Italian | Read full review

7 / 10
Nov 22, 2020

As solid as the package is, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War has to be one of the safest series instalments for quite some time. Multiplayer is seriously starting to show its age with tired ideas and even duller gameplay, leaving the campaign to rescue things. Its open-ended approach allows player choice to take prominence while Zombies is just as deep as ever. A passable effort for the start of the PS5 generation, but Activision must buck up its ideas for next year.

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Zoomg
Top Critic
7.5 / 10.0
Nov 21, 2020

As a single player experience, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War offers short but exciting story mode; one with cinematic action missions and new stealth operations that actually work well. But multiplayer is where Cold War falls short. especially after the successful Modern Warfare reboot of last year, the lack of variety in maps and game modes, makes it more of a step back rather that a evolution.

Review in Persian | Read full review

8 / 10
Nov 21, 2020

Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War is a good game that should be easier to stomach for franchise veterans than Modern Warfare. The campaign is fulfilling, albeit short. The faster-paced multiplayer is also easy enough to jump into and have fun with. It's just a shame that I can't shake that feeling that Treyarch's true vision has been held back by Activision forcing its ideals onto them.

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