What you need to know
- Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War's Onslaught and Onslaught Containment modes will finally be hitting all platforms on Nov. 2.
- The Onslaught mode was exclusive to PlayStation players from launch.
- PlayStation exclusivity deals have been standard since the Modern Warfare reboot in 2019.
With just days until the launch of Call of Duty: Vanguard, Treyarch announced in a tweet that Nov. 1, 2021 is the final day for the exclusivity agreement surrounding Onslaught and its sister mode, Onslaught Containment. The newly unlocked modes will launch as part of an update for Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War on Nov. 2 at 9 p.m. PT for all platforms.
Onslaught will launch on Xbox and PC with 23 maps. The update is also expected to introduce the Hammer & Sickle melee weapons as one of Cold War's final store bundles, and new 100 percenter challenges.
Despite Call of Duty's status as a multiplatform juggernaut, the premium releases from the franchise are no strangers to timed exclusivity deals. During the Xbox 360 era when players still had to purchase additional multiplayer maps as DLC packs, Xbox players typically enjoyed a window of early access to map packs and other game add ons that was typically limited to 30 days or less.
That changed with the release of 2019's Modern Warfare reboot, when Infinity Ward locked away a Survival playlist for their cooperative Spec Ops mode behind PlayStation exclusivity for an entire year. Call of Duty cycles annually with the franchise's premium releases, meaning a good portion of the player base would move on from Modern Warfare to 2020's Black Ops Cold War release less than two months after gaining access to Spec Ops Survival.
Continuing the trend of exclusive modes, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War sliced off a mode from their wildly popular Zombies segment to create the Onslaught mode for PlayStation players only. Unlike typical round based zombies gameplay that took place on maps designed specifically for the mode, Onslaught brought traditional multiplayer only maps into Zombies. Players band together as a squad to eliminate an endless swarm of the undead along with occasionally spawns of elites zombies, while their mobility is limited to a zone of protection courtesy of a Dark Aether orb. Similar to Spec Ops Survival, Onslaught has been limited to Playstation exclusivity for a year.
