Infinite Warfare just came out, and while that game is great, it lacks what COD had before Ghosts came around. Ghosts started a bland era of COD games- still great shooters but lack the initial passion that we had from COD1 up until BO2. I'm not saying the studios don't work hard on them (their work shows in the fantastic control, great production values and good plots) but they feel soulless now- "get the next one out! Make it futuristic again!". Again, they're still great games but you get my point. Going back to Black Ops, it holds up extremely well almost 7 years (holy shoot...) later. Three game modes- Campagin, MP and Zombies, and each is executed in what feels like flawless execution, though this review is going to go over the campaign.

BO's campaign is still the most interesting thing about the game. You play as a Black Ops assassin named Alex Mason through a series of flashbacks during a torture-interrogation by Unknown indivuals. The interrogators are seeking out Mason's apparent knowledge of "The Numbers", which Mason cannot remember. You experience the interrogations from Mason's POV, as he's reminded of events leading up to where he is now, and these flashbacks are where the gameplay takes place.

BO has the second best story of the series, after BO2- all of the main characters stand out from each other and are all wicked likable, thanks to the great writing and superb performances by the cast, including Sam Worthington as Mason, Gary Oldman as Reznov(reprising his role from WAW) and James C. Burns as Woods. Even Ice Cube does a good job as Bowman.

As with every COD, the missions are loaded with cinematic explosive set pieces. The series has been called the Micheal Bay of video games and that's not wrong- explosions at every corner, constant gunfire and the most impossible narrow escapes. The action is balanced and well paced thanks to the cutscenes and a few quieter stealthy sections. There are some gameplay variations as you get two helicopter sections, a boat section and a short RTS style section in one mission, but most of the the time will be spent on the ground with guns in hand. Plus it's a globe trotting adventure- you'll be going from Cube to a Russian labor camp to Vietnam to the rooftops of Kowloon to Soviet Missle silos etc. Each location looks amazing and the level design stays interesting throughout. The shooting action can get mind numbing a few times but thankfully the many cutscenes, above mentioned stealth and vehicle sections as well as the varied and great level design keeps the game from getting boring.

You have a large variety of weapons from the usual AK47 and M16 to the lesser used FAL and PM63. Each gun looks and sounds fantastic plus the shooting action itself is very satisfying. The gore and violence isn't as brutal as WAW but it's still a really violent game, especially during the Vietnam missions. The soundtrack also adds a lot to the game, including a few hit songs of the time as well as good original soundtrack as the background to your gameplay.

My complaints are basically the same I have with all COD games- unskippable in game cutscenes. The interrogation scenes were done with the game engine, and sometimes skipping them doesn't work. You can always skip the pre rendered video cutscenes but before and after a mission starts, you'll get first person dialogue and actions to start off the level before you get control. Sure when you first play you'll want to see them, but when you're replaying the missions for fun or on different difficulties it's annoying having to sit there and watch. They're super well motion captured and choreographed but being forced to view them even after beating the game is annoying. My other complaint is, as mentioned above, it can get mind numbing at times. I mean that may have been the intent, but it can take you out of the game for a sec. My last complaint is the main villain, who is pretty bland and underdeveloped. He's a stereotypical rogue Russian general from countless 80s action thrillers. He's said to be a horrible person, and is said to have powerful influence but when he's on screen he doesn't really do anything memorable to live up to his title as main villain. He does horrible stuff but he seems more evil off screen. Thankfully this was fixed in BO2, which definitely has the best villain of the series.

Overall, this is still one of the best of the series after all these years. Zombies is wicked fun and the multiplayer is great, giving the game what feels like endless replay value, but the single player is what the game is most well known for. Great gameplay, graphics, performances, story, level design and variety. BO2 did improve and is the better single player experience, but BO1 still set the groundwork for it. If you just want a great single player FPS experience, get this game. If you want great multiplayer and a game full of varied game modes and tons of replayability, et this game.

**UPDATE** The game was patched within 24 hours and online is very smooth with the occasional stutter. I have not had one crash. Graphics are beautiful, and the variety of weapons available to you once you level up are fantastic. In my honest opinion, all the 1, 2, and 3 star reviews were unwarranted in light of how the game plays today Nov. 14th. It is simply an undeniably fun and smooth online experience. I originally rated 4 stars at launch, but recent improvements have warranted another star.

I'll start off by saying that I have only played multiplayer, and only for around 3 hours.

-Though a bit laggy at times, I found this game to be completely playable. And not anywhere near MW2 for me.

-Friend invites that you used to have to tab out of game to send on the Steam interface have now been incorporated into a menu in-game. Thank Christ! This was a major pain in the ass in MW2. It seems that all you need for interaction with your clanmates is within the game menus, including your master list of friends and whether they're online or not.

-The devs have clearly spent ALOT of time working on the level design, and I find them to be utterly enjoyable with a great balance of larger med-long range engagement maps and smaller frenetic run 'n gun that the Rambo types love.

-I like the combination of having to level grind AND buy new weapons and loadouts. I think it adds something different.

-Although I have only leveled up to 8, I'm looking forward to the avatar customization available to the higher levels. I think it's cool that you can more or less know who it is that you're killing, or being killed by. Adds a personal element to the MP frenzy.

-Dedicated servers. 'Nuff said. They missed the boat on this one last go around.

-The graphics are good, though I think they were a little more slick visually in MW2. I'd put them on par with WAW, and that ain't too shabby.

-The weapons so far are awesome with a great variety of new weapons not seen before (to my knowledge) in a shooter. And the supply of rockets and nades for the tubers is finite, thank god!

-I am not sure why this game is currently rated so low. To be honest, it's pretty darn good on release, which virtually never happens, so in my book, as they continually patch it and add a mod kit to the mix(hopefully). it can really only get much better.

Worth a try in my book!

So, I started playing this game in the usual Single player mode. The story this time around was fantastic. Full of plot twists and action, this is easily the best single-player story to date. Aside from that, sound is excellent. Voice acting is right on the mark, and the soundtrack really fits the game. You will absolutely enjoy this mode.

Zombie mode is novel for a while, but quickly grows stale. JFK, Nixon, and Castro make a cameo in this mode, but it is still more of the same. Unless you are playing with a few friends, this mode won't attract any attention.

Finally, that leaves the multiplayer, easily the most important component of any COD game. The game is more balanced than previous iterations. Killstreak kills do not go towards new killstreaks, and shotguns are no longer secondaries. Recoil is far greater, which is great if you think that COD catered to much to "newbies." The addition of COD points is welcome, now, instead of grinding for attachments, you merely purchase them. You gain COD points through regular games and leveling up, as well as through Wager Matches. Wager matches are a great addition. They are fun, and CERTAINLY balanced. But that leaves the lag. The lag in this game is horrible. Treyarch says that this will be fixed in the future, but as of now, this is a huge problem. I can't go 30 seconds without hitting a horrible lag spike. This is a great game now, but when they fix the lag, it will be a magnificent game.

Update: Recently, this game started to crash ever few minutes in multiplayer, hence the one star. It really is a shame, because there is a lot of great content to be enjoyed.

First off, I am not sure (like other reviews have said) why this game for the PC has gotten such a bad rating. My only gripe about the game is the fact that I have to use it with Steam, but that is a super minor gripe and not worth hurting the overall score of the game itself. Otherwise, the game installed just fine. I had no issues with shuttering, lag or drops in frame rate on my current machine. Initially, when I had tried to run this game on my previous machine (core 2 duo, 8gb ram, and 1gb nvidia graphics card) I did suffer lag even with the settings on medium and all other stuff turned off. My assumption was the "minimum" settings are as they are..it allows you to run the game but doesn't say it will run NICELY, lol. I think folks out there read the minimum system requirements and think they can have the game run buttery smooth with 60FPS. They get aggravated and decide to write a bad review because its the games fault YOUR machine can't handle the game. If you have a current generation PC, you should have NO issues with the game so long as you have a decent video card.

As for the game itself, I mainly play the campaign modes and thus far have not experienced anything out of the ordinary. Graphics are great, acting..is as good as it will get (but its nice to know that there are legit actors doing the voice overs - Sam Worthington and Ice Cube). The AI does get a bit quirky at time, be it your AI team members or enemies. Still enjoyable if you are a fan of the CoD series.

My advice, don't go off the "minimum" system settings and make sure your machine specs exceed that and you should be good. Sit back and enjoy a great game!

I can't believe I was dumb enough to pre-order this STEAMing pile of Manure.

Apart from the horrid user interfaces, the inability to cancel an attempt to join a server which is clearly not connecting, and all the other bugs/glitches mentioned by others. My complaint is NO REAL co-op, I passed on MOH-T1 simply because they didn't include a co-op option. Thanks to all the 15y/o players who have 80 hours available to play a game per week (which I don't have) I can't compete in standard multi-player. After a long work day I'd much rather hop on and work with friends to accomplish a mission (and blow some crap up) than deal with endless re-spawns and trash talk. I was ecstatic when the pre-release literature said "2-4 player co-op" and immediately placed my pre-order. Little did I know that they were referring to the SINGLE zombies map (which is really just a mini-game). I did love the original zombies and I'm glad that it has returned from the dead, but it is clearly just an excuse to put "co-op" in the description to mislead customers. Thanks to this stinker I'll be sure to NEVER pre-order a game again. If co-op and other items are addressed in patches I will happily continue to purchase the COD franchise, if MOH or some other dev picks up this niche I'll be perfectly content never buying another COD title.

Edit: After playing through the single player campaign you do unlock a second "zombies" map, still not enough when advertising co-op IMO. As for my thoughts on the actual single player mode... It was painful, I gutted through to try for unlocks but it was horrible, there is no room for any deviation, it's like one long cut scene where they let you pretend to be in control on occasion, and when you screw something up you have to suffer through all the cinematics just to get back to try again. You are offered a "left click to skip" but only the last 10 sec of the scene, the first 30 sec - 1 min (depending on which scene it is) is a mandatory watch every time through. I might eventually find something I like about this game after they patch it a couple hundred more times. But for now the only thing they've gotten right was the release date.

The 'Call of Duty' franchise has made gaming history. 'Black Ops' is the current rendition of the series, set at some time in the near future where mercenary troops battle terrorist groups. Most of the modern day small arms are represented as choices for use depending on how far up the level ladder you go. The more experience you gain, the better the selection and effectiveness becomes.

The best entry in the series was 'World at War' based as the early versions were on World War II. Superb graphics, intense gameplay, and very well done maps. 'Modern Warfare' improved on the graphics, but lacked the hook that got the player really involved. 'Black Ops' carries the theme of 'Modern Warfare 1 & 2' farther, and overall is better done, but still not up to 'World at War'.

As I said, graphics are excellent, probably the best you'll find in this type of game. The makers, however, forgot (or ignored) the fan base that established and carried the series through the first 5 versions -- PC players. Multiplayer gaming is the way to go, and 'World at War' saw millions of gamers form into 'clans' to play. The structure of the game was such that it allowed clans to take things to the next level by tweaking game specs to suit their style of play. Since 'Modern Warfare' they have dialed back on the PC side in favor of the console side of gaming. Not only have they hamstrung the ability of clans to adjust the game to their style, but they have made the current versions less fun and less playable because the majority of players are what we call 'run and gunners'. All they are interested in is racking up points, killing as many opponents (and even teammates) as they can manage. They give no thought to playing tactically (yeah, I know, its just a game so who cares, right?), but there is very little sportmanship and decorum shown to others.

In the end, it is better than 'Modern Warfare' but not as good as 'World at War.' I wish they would go back to the World War II story line emphasis. And I would like to see a nod to functionality to enable clans to regulate things for their members. The only major issue they need to address is spawn points. There is apparently little thought given to that part of the game. Spawn camping is rampant. It not only is annoying but it makes a hash of trying to follow any kind of strategy when playing with a group.

I give a 4 out of 5, barely, primarily because of the excellent graphics, and the improved game play.

While I gave this game 5 stars, I will admit it's not the BEST game I've every played. However, it amazes me how many people want to totally slam this game on the first day. The reality is, gaming developers make games across all platforms and the PC sales represent a very small chunk of their revenue. In other words, the developers will never make PC gamers the priority. NOT ONE game ever comes out at launch bug free. While the game does have a small stuttering/lag issue, it's already been documented and a patch is in the works as we speak. If the majority of people keep expecting a 99 rated game at launch, inevitably PC gamers won't get squat for new games. I don't know about you, but after being a PC gamer for decades, I certainly don't want to play FPS games on a console have have to aim with a nubby stick.

So contrary to all the crap people are slinging, I am going to focus on the good since I've been a COD fan since game #1

Maps - Fantastic. Much better than MW2 in my opinion. They are a little bit bigger and there's more depth to them in terms of having to look everywhere to see if someone is near you.

Killstreaks/Leveling - Better than and always has been better than Battlefield anything. BFBC2 is so mundane. Level up, get a weapon. In COD BO, leveling up brings not only weapons, but different abilities, different rewards for killstreaks and is much more complex than other FPS games out there today.

Hit Detection - This is where COD has always shined and that doesn't change with this game.

Multiplayer Modes - On top of already having Team Deathmatch, Domination, Sabotage, Catpure the Flag, and Free For All, now brings Wager Macthes, One Bullet Mode, and Random Weapons mode. Tons of replay value here!

Team integration - Maps actually have a grid with labelled letters and numbers for teams working together to call out 'sections' where their enemies are instead of saying "Over by that building with the plant thingy in front"

True to Scale - Players are life size instead of the mini figure look in BFBC2.

Creativity - While Treyarch didn't get the graphics quite as good as MW2, they did add neat effects in the multiplayer maps whether its the train going by, or the conveyer belts, or the moving targets in the range map, it adds to the tension, and a weclomed change.

Dedicated Servers for PC Players - Yes! It's finally back and THANK YOU Treyarch for listening

Cons? Of course there are but nothing that makes me not like the game or not want to play it.

You negative Nillys need to get off your high horse and enjoy what is being published for you to buy. If you can make something better, I'd sure like to see it.

WOW. I am shocked to see so many horrible reviews! I seriously thought about holding off on this game for awhile to see how all you other gamers rated it...despite your reviews, I am glad I bought it.

I am very impressed. The game installed fine. Loaded fine right off the bat. For me, I usually just play single player mode and BO has worked fine on my rig. My rig is a EVGA 780i motherboard running on a Q9450 at 2.66 gHz, 6 Gig's of memory and one nVidia 8800GTX for graphics. As I played more and more, I was blown away by this game. Yes, it did briefly stall a couple of times, so I made a few minor adjustments and increased the resolution to super high setting and so far I got through the entire game without a hitch.

A few of you commented to me that I needed to play it in high resolution multiplayer and see what happened. So, I did. At first it would not launch at all...but then I discovered that the main server was temporarily down. So, I waited a few more hours and when I launched it again it popped up and ran very, very well...well enough for me to really enjoy it on multiplayer.

So, all I can say is that here on my rig this game plays extraordinarily well.

I do get a bit bored when you have to wait for the game to move through the flashbacks, etc, but then again, I think this technique of playing out the stroyline is a necessary element for understanding the underlying history behind the war(s), fighting, etc.

Overall, Black Ops is a game I will enjoy playing many time over and is worth every penny I spent.

Good gaming all!

PN

Good game. Bought here because I didn't want to pay $40 on steam.

COD fans will but it anyway. To the rest its a good game.

The Multiplayer of the game is really great and nostalgic campaign is awesome and rememberable one of the all time best Call of Duty's from this era the package was good when it came in just use the steam code and in I went into multiplayer

Paid 50$ for this game on here.. and the cd was scratched and code was already uses..

Disc was original ,packaging was good