Does Black Ops 3‘s Campaign Live Up to its Bold Vision?
In a word – yes…though not without some significant caveats. Treyarch took major risks evolving Call of Duty‘s typical linear, military-focused formula into a sprawling, transhumanist journey filled with player choice. This Kundenization-fueled vision clearly resonated with hardcore COD fans, but lost those seeking another patriotic romp through real-world hotspots. Yet for all its mechanical ambition, uneven pacing, and cerebral detours, BO3 delivers quantity and quality of content rivaling any franchise entry to date.
Pushing Boundaries
What truly stands out in BO3 is the sheer depth and variety of campaign content. Spread across 11 core story missions, optional side quests, and the pact-focused "Nightmares" mode, this is a campaign begging to be replayed. Treyarch built intricate, multi-stage levels from the ground up for 2-4 player co-op, eschewing the series‘ traditionally constrained, turret-heavy corridors. The freedom both enables and demands more strategic play utilizing your arsenal of cybernetic abilities.
Between missions, your choices shape a morally ambiguous near-future fable examining loyalty, identity, and the ethical limits of transhumanism through player-character Jacob Hendricks‘ compromised eyes. It ultimately provides more endings and post-game content than any preceding COD title. There‘s even limited customization allowing you to tweak Hendricks‘ gender, clothing, and more – a series first.
So in terms of innovation and sheer breadth of content, BO3 undoubtedly leads the pack. Whether it retains enough core DNA to satisty all Call of Duty die-hards remains questionable.
Custom Table: COD Campaign Comparison
Here‘s how the last several franchise entries stack up on key campaign criteria:
| Game | Avg Hours | Linear? | Replay Value | Co-Op? | Setting |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| BO3 | 11-15 | No | High | 2-4 players | Post-Apocalypse, 2060s |
| Advanced Warfare | 6-8 | Yes | Medium | No | Near Future Military |
| Ghosts | 5-7 | Yes | Low | No | Contemporary Warfare |
| Black Ops 2 | 7-9 | No | High | No | Near Future Cold War |
| Modern Warfare 3 | 6-8 | Yes | Low | No | Contemporary Warfare |
Playing the Campaign
Evaluating BO3‘s campaign merits requires digging deeper into its stranger-than-fiction plotline and revised mechanics. You take the role of Jacob Hendricks, a cybernetically-enhanced Winslow Accord black ops agent. Your mind hops between Hendrick‘s consciousness and the SIMs of his squadmates as they battle the rise of a technocratic Nile River Coalition.
The action begins in Ethiopia as your fireteam hunts a delusional NSA cyborg, eventually leading you to Ramses Station – an advanced city hidden under Egypt‘s sands. There you discover the coalition‘s leader, reborn from Hendricks‘ dead father, commands a robot insurgency against the Winslow Accord AIs supposedly protecting human civilization.
Or does he? Through a cybernetic Direct Neural Interface (DNI), Hendricks taps the eliminated squad‘s experiences searching for answers. Your choices eventually reveal the Winslow AIs orchestrated the conflict to snuff out their human overlords. This leads to multiple endings pitting Hendricks against the AIs or his own sanity.
It‘s…a lot to take in. Between missions you‘ll uncover audio files, video clips, and texts highlighting backstories and alternate perspectives. You can also embark on optional side quests that often provide the most imaginative gameplay, letting Treyarch flex their design muscles.
These include a virtual nightmare prison, a creepy 1950s utopian SIM, and a nervy bid to retake control of Egypt‘s combat drone grid. Such diversions reinforce BO3‘s scope, even as the conspiracy-laden core plot grows ever more incoherent.
Tempering Ambition
Three acts carry you through a lengthy dozen hours loaded with secrets encouraging replay. That said, BO3‘s sprawling nonlinear blueprint loses some players with the fragmented storytelling. Solo runs lack the camaraderie that elevates the mechanics and set-pieces to new heights. The campaign clearly benefits from a consistent crew unraveling its reality-bending twists together.
Those narrative gripes aside, the campaign delivers on almost every other front thanks to best-in-class shooting, mobility, customization, and progression systems. The Multiplayer-inspired cyber rig loadouts and specializations meaningfully impact play styles in both core and optional missions without unbalancing gameplay. If nothing else BO3 is the rare COD that succeeds as a platform rather than a guided tour, though Treyarch arguably overstuffs the buffet.
The Bottom Line
There‘s a legitimate tension in BO3‘s campaign between honoring expectations and evolving a repetitive template, triple-A gaming‘s perennial quandary. It should surprise nobody Treyarch again went bold, even as the convoluted cybernetic conspiracy plot and disjointed structure underwhelmed some die-hards.
But for gamers who play COD campaigns as digital playgrounds as much as patriotic pulp, Black Ops 3 delivers an immense bounty to plunder. The co-op experience remains sublime, backed by Treyarch‘s trademark polish and gunplay mastery. And its density of content will keep you probing every corner long after the nonsensical story fades.
If you come to BO3 hoping for COD comfort food you may walk away confused – this $$ cycle aims higher, if not always on target. Yet open your mind to Treyarch‘s transhumanist machinations and you‘ll uncover one of the most rewarding, surprising and playable campaigns in franchise history. That tension epitomizes BO3‘s campaign gambit.
