Black Ops 2 Zombies Video Review (PC)

[Shawn Zipay]

Here is the final video in our three part look at Call of Duty: Black Ops 2. We saved the worst for last with a look at Black Ops 2's Zombie mode!

And here I had such high hopes for the Zombies mode prior to the game's release.

In case you missed parts one or two, have no fear. You can either watch all three parts on YouTube thanks to this handy playlist, or you can check out the news posts for the Single Player review and the Multiplayer review.

[Anarchy1]

This is definitely the worst installment of zombies in the series

As you said, the maps are just too small. Tranzit as a whole is very big, but each individual section is pathetically small. The bus depot (first stage) has one room and a small outside area. The diner has two real buildings and a small outside area. The power station has one building that has one entrance and one exit, on opposite sides. The Town has four boring buildings. The farm has a barn and one home. These are pathetic compared to some of the sprawling maps in the old games like the Pentagon and the theater from BO1 or Shi No Numa or the factory from WaW.

Another problem I have is that the gamemode is just getting too complicated for what it is. Good luck figuring out how to build everything and find all the parts and essential items without looking up a guide on the internet. Hell, I still don't know how to get into the Pack-a-Punch room, as apparently you need to put turbines in two separate locations on opposite sides of the map, blow something up, and do a ritual dance in order for the door to open. And since you have to travel around on the slow moving deathtrap bus at least once to do all this, you are likely at a point where you are about to die anyway. And many of the essential powerups and upgrades to survive on the later levels are spread out in random locations in the map. If you miss it, you have to survive the long ride back around on the bus until you get back again, and by then, as I just said, you are probably dead.

It's also much harder to survive in this zombie mode because there is nothing to help you survive. Only about half the zombies actually go through the repairable barriers. Now most of them come from the ground or jump over fences or climb through windows that can't be boarded up. What's the point? I don't even bother repairing windows anymore except on the first few levels because if they are boarded, there are still 50 zombies coming in that you can't prevent. Not to mention the fact that there is almost no strategic places to hide. Think you've found a good spot that forces zombies into a choke point? Nope, they can actually jump over the invisible barriers that you can't jump over and ass-rape you anyway. Movement is very limited. You can't climb over objects like broken cars that you usually can, but zombies can. Good luck getting away when there is a car in the way. And many of the actual "buildings" in the map are just one long hallway. The power station is the worst. If you are down there, the zombies just stream at you because that's the only way in. Eventually, you will be overwhelmed, and so you retreat further down the hallway, only to be blocked off at the other end by more zombies. There are no saving graces here like the zip line or traps, you are just fucked.

All in all, the zombies is terrible in this game. They need to go back to what made WaW, and to a lesser extent BO1, so successful in the area.