Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Zombies: Top 5 Positives and Negatives

With so many differing opinions surrounding Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, let's look at my list of the five most significant positives and negatives in Treyarch's latest round-based Zombies Mode. Our list will break down what the series excels at and what still needs some fine-tuning.

5. Positive: Crews are back!

Crews are back! Since Black Ops Cold War, the Zombies mode has had the lifeless operators as the playable characters. This was a somewhat big downgrade from previous games in the series, which all had tons of unique map-specific dialogue with their crew. It's great to see the crews are back! Though it's weird Liberty Falls doesn't have a playable crew...

5. Negative: Manual Armor Plating

Armor has been in a few Zombie modes, such as Call of Duty: World War 2 and Black Ops 4, but Cold War was by far the best of these armor systems. Armor plates could be found on the ground to repair your armor automatically, or you could repair your armor from an armor stand with salvage. While not flawless, it at least didn't have any downtime, as it auto-plated for you when finding an armor plate. In Black Ops 6 Zombies, they have taken a more Warzone-like approach, and now manual equipping is required each time you find an armor plate. It's not the biggest deal in the world, but in a game mode where you'll probably be getting hit often, this is a questionable decision that should be changed.

4. Positive: 8 perks at launch, including 1 new perk

Most Zombie modes in the past have a more limited pool of perks in the first couple of maps. TranZit was missing key perks by only having six, Shadows of Evil had seven, The Giant had six, and Cold War had six at launch. Black Ops 6 doesn't have this issue since there are eight perks at launch, including a new melee perk, and PHD Flopper.

4. Negative: Good perks removed

Though it has a good number of perks, with many returning from Cold War, I just can't help but notice some iconic perks are missing from the other games in the series. Why Mule Kick was removed is anyone's guess, but discussions online seem to think Mule Kick is unnecessary because you can just buy ammo. But maybe these players have never experienced the glory of having multiple guns with alternative ammo's. Having three guns, or one Wonder Weapon and two guns with ammo mods, was great on any map in Cold War. Mule Kick also had unique effects that only added to its usefulness, like doubling the equipment you crafted or the equipment having a chance to have an extra use.

And let us not forget the continued absence of Double Tap, not Double Tap 2.0. For some reason, everyone thinks we want a double damage perk when talking about Double Tap's potential return. But what most are after is the classic perk that only increases the fire rate! So many guns in Cold War could have used a fire-rate boost, in particular, many Snipers were incredibly painful to use even with their rapid-fire attachments. Speaking of rapid-fire attachments, they are not an excuse to not have this classic perk back. If Speed Cola and Fast Mags can coexist, so can Double Tap and Rapid-Fire, and they did exist together back in Black Ops 3.

3. Positive: Weapon Kits are back!

Gone are the days of needing to navigate the pause menu for your weapon builds in Cold War Zombies, back are the days of being able to set all your builds before a match like Black Ops 3 Weapon Kits. Now called Zombie Builds, you can set up your guns the way you want them before the match starts and if you receive that gun it will have all the things you put on the build, exactly how it was in Black Ops 3 and 4. I'm not sure why weapon kits were removed in Cold War, but it's fantastic news that they're back.

3. Negative: Map Atmosphere

You've probably seen people online complain about Zombies turning into Warzone or Multiplayer, and that's mainly because the maps and even the HUD lack the atmosphere and care that every other Treyarch game before Cold War had. The switch to the Cold War engine has not been great for Treyarch as the Zombie maps just look extremely bland in comparison to Black Ops 4 and all the way back to World at War. Liberty Falls is probably their most generic-looking map to date, beating out all the round-based maps from Cold War in how generic a Zombies map can look. It genuinely looks like a multiplayer map with some outbreak features being incorporated into it. Now, I will say Terminus looks significantly better than Liberty Falls at least, but still, this is a fairly prominent negative and could easily be the number one negative.

2. Positive: Gobblegums are back!

Love or hate them, Gobblegum added another layer to how you play Call of Duty Zombies, and they're back! While Black Ops 3 had a very flawed GobbleGum system as some gums were mode-breaking, as long as we don't get those same mode-breaking gums like Power Vacuum and Round Robin, it sounds like this could be the best GobbleGum system to date. In Black Ops 6 they are altered to how they work in Black Ops 3. For one, you no longer have to earn and spend currency out of match to get Mega GobbleGums which is an improvement. You now just earn the gums themselves by playing rounds and you can also carry up to three at a time to use whenever you like.

2. Negative: Mystery Box Remains Pointless, especially in Early Rounds

The mystery box seemingly works the same way as it did in Cold War, which is a disappointment, as Loadouts and the Trials made the Mystery Box irrelevant. Why waste points on the box when you can just upgrade the best Loadout Weapon to the Highest Rarity and get the wonder weapon through trials? Not to mention, the odds are worse in the early rounds, making it even worse to be spending your points this way. The mystery box is in severe need of an overhaul.

1. Positive: Augments

Augments are the most interesting and potentially most worthwhile new addition in Black Ops 6 Zombies. Essentially, each Perk, Ammo mod, and Field Upgrade will have their own Major and Minor Augments with one Major and Minor Augment being selectable for each of them. These Augment abilities range from turning PHD Flopper into PHD Slider and giving Juggernog a Dying Wish effect. Overall, it sounds great and is the perfect replacement for the tier's system from Cold War by giving each player their own unique builds. An auto-repairing minor Augment could be a cool fix to my earlier manual-plating critique, the potential is endless.

1. Negative: Point System

The point system from gameplay that we've seen is not only worse than the classic point system that was seen in older Treyarch titles but is also worse than Black Ops Cold Wars. I haven't seen many discussions about it, but in Black Ops 6, Melee kills will no longer grant as many points as headshots. Instead of 115 points for melee kills as you got in Cold War, you earn 105 points. I know it’s only 10 points but it introduces a new unnecessary problem. Why melee at all in Black Ops 6 if you get fewer points than using a gun that doesn’t have the same risk of losing armor as meleeing does? What makes this an even weirder decision is the fact they introduced a melee perk which the point system now gives you less incentive to buy.

Ultimately, this is number one on the list because the classic point system from the older games was the better point system. Point building was part of the fun in old Zombie modes, with every weaker gun having a use for point building, but since Black Ops 4 Zombies it's pretty much had no depth and killed all weak weapons from ever seeing play besides camo grinds. I don't hate the Cold War point system in particular, as it's much better than Black Ops 4's with the advantage of having assist points. But overall, It's still a boring point system in comparison to the Classic point system and I wish they improved it based on fan feedback from Black Ops Cold War.

Final Thoughts

So, what do you think about my list? Which do you agree with or disagree with? There are a couple more things I didn't mention or forgot to include, so tell me if you want to see maybe a part two. I'm still excited to play Black Ops 6 Zombies regardless of the negatives, and with the power of Game Pass Ultimate, I will likely play on day one! Thanks for watching or reading!