What you need to know
- Treyarch Studios and the Call of Duty team have announced changes to the game following player feedback during the Black Ops 6 open beta.
- The team also revealed eight new maps that players will see when the game goes live on October 25.
- Changes to spawn logic, headshot damage, bullet penetration, perks, and movement have all been implemented.
Treyarch Studios has unveiled eight new multiplayer maps for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 along with a laundry list of changes coming to the game following player feedback of the open beta earlier this month. Changes include spawn adjustments, bug fixes for performance hitches, and adjustments to perks and equipment.
Among the change log was also a reveal of eight new maps for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6's multiplayer mode.
- Lowtown
- Payback
- Protocol
- Red Card
- Subsonic
- Vault
- Vorkuta
- Warhead
The eight new maps detailed included small and medium maps for both 6v6 and 2v2 play modes. Locations include a bombing test site called Warhead, a desert estate complete with a trophy room on Vault, and the entrance to a soccer stadium on Red Card. Players can also take their omnimovement skills to the snow-covered Vorkuta mining station, the Black Ops safe house tucked away in the Bulgarian Mountains, or to a dockside neighborhood complete with a fishing shed and boathouse on Lowtown. Protocol will offer an offshore training course on an island citadel, while Subsonic opens up a bomber training facility with destroyed aircraft.
"Map size and game flow are critically important to us, and we look forward to seeing you all jump into all 16 maps at launch, with many more to follow in our live seasons." Treyarch staff writes in a Call of Duty blog post.
Changes to Beta maps and gameplay
The open beta for Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 was a record-breaking event and the biggest beta in Call of Duty history. However, it wasn't just an opportunity for players to get their hands on the game. For Treyarch Studios and the rest of the Call of Duty team, it was a vital look at how players will interact with the overhauled FPS when it launches on October 25. In an interview with Treyarch Studios at Call of Duty: Next, Treyarch Studios director of production Yale Miller said of the beta: "I think the thing that keeps me up is: What are the things that we didn’t even think about? That we missed, right? And that’s why the beta is so important for us,” Miller said."
Player feedback from the open beta has resulted in changes to the maps that were available for players to test at that time. With two weeks' worth of player data from the open beta, the Call of Duty team has made significant changes to the spawn system across the game in preparation for launch. Bullet penetration, too, has been improved with players noticing fewer extreme cases of bullets doing too much damage when firing through various materials. Snipers hiding behind the radar dish on Scud are likely to notice this change the most.
Sniper fans will also notice changes to fluidity when aiming down sights, while all players will notice improved fluidity when swapping weapons during sprints. Weapon balancing also continues with lifts to shotguns and adjustments across all weapons to better keep up against those oft-overpowered SMGs.
Other changes to gameplay are below:
Winners Circle
- Shortened overall duration of Winner’s Circle
- Mitigated emote spam
- Improved usability of emote wheel
- Improvements to fidelity and lighting
Kill Counter
- By popular demand, Treyarch has added a Kill Counter on your HUD that will track your progress toward Killstreak Medals, including those who are chasing the coveted Nuclear Medal and Nuke Scorestreak.
Camera motion
- The team is reducing overall camera motion on sprint, tac sprint, and slide
Kill Order
- Increased 'Kills as HVT' team score to 3
- Reduced 'HVT Survival’ score to 20
- Increased Score Limit to 150
- HVT will no longer drop their pistol when they are eliminated
- Improved notifications when player is selected as HVT
- mpty list
Sleeper Agent
- Removed the time added when earning Eliminations while Sleeper Agent is active
Equipment
- Stim Shot has been changed from Inventory Based to Cooldown Based by default.
- Quartermaster (Strategist) will decrease the cooldown time of Stim Shots.
- Resolved an issue where the Combat Axe would not deal lethal damage at round start. It wouldn’t be a Black Ops game if you can’t hit those cross-maps at match start!
Perks
- After assessing Perk data from our time with the Beta, we’ve made a few updates to ensure compelling decisions are being made:
- Assassin (Enforcer) and Bruiser (Enforcer) moved from Perk 1 to Perk 2
- Dexterity (Enforcer) and Gung Ho (Enforcer) moved from Perk 2 to Perk 1
RC-XD controls
- Updated to classic BO view-based control by default, with an option to switch to gas/brake; on controller, detonate swapped from R2 to R1 so accidental mistakes aren’t made.
Movement
- Continued improvements to animation fluidity and fidelity throughout
- The team identified several areas for improvement to our 3rd Person animation fidelity across slide, dive, jump and supine prone. Treyarch's goal is that what you see in 1st Person is representative of what others see in 3rd Person in order to maintain immersion and predictability.
- Adjustments to slide for improved predictability and fluidity
- During Weekend 2 of the Beta, Treyarch increased the time before you could enter supine during a slide. After further assessment based on feedback, that has been reduced.
- Reduced the minimum time to slide after sprinting to prevent accidentally crouching when intending to slide, also known as a “dead slide”
- Slight increase to initial slide speed and slight reduction to maximum slide duration.
Intelligent movement
- The suite of Intelligent Movement settings in the Movement tab under the Controller or Keyboard & Mouse settings. These settings are broken down by Sprint Assist, Mantle Assist and Crouch Assist with the intention of letting you fine-tune your experience with the result of requiring drastically fewer inputs with basic movement and Omnimovement in Black Ops 6.
- Treyarch identified an issue in Beta with the additional settings for Mantle Assist that allows for further tuning of directional mantles. These have been resolved and should now behave as expected.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 launches on Xbox and PlayStation consoles, as well as PC via Steam, Battle.net, and the Microsoft Store on October 25. It is also the first title from the annual blockbuster franchise to launch day one on Xbox and PC Game Pass. There will be two editions to choose from at launch, so you may want to check out our handy guide on which version of Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 you should preorder.
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