If there is one constant in life, it's that every year brings with it a new main series Call of Duty game. This has been true since 2005 and the launch of Call of Duty 2, and thanks to this annual release schedule, a common criticism has been that the franchise doesn't evolve enough from one game to the next. While the recently released Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 doesn't exactly reinvent the wheel, it does manage to shake off any lingering feelings of franchise fatigue and deliver an incredibly polished and consistently entertaining first-person shooter that stands as one of the best games of the year.

Like past Call of Duty games, Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 is segmented into different modes that cater to different tastes. This time around, players can dive into the standard online multiplayer mode, fight on the franchise's largest map ever in the Blackout battle royale mode, or take on hordes of the undead in Zombies. Each mode is well-rounded and content rich, easily offering numerous hours of enjoyment for FPS enthusiasts.

Some longtime Call of Duty fans may notice no mention of the campaign, and that's because Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 doesn't have a single player campaign. Much has been made about Black Ops 4's decision to ditch a traditional campaign, but the game is honestly better for it. In lieu of a campaign, players instead play tutorial missions designed to teach them how to properly utilize the abilities of the multiplayer Specialists, capped off with an increasingly difficult skirmish battle against AI-controlled bots to give them a proper taste of how to use their abilities on the battlefield.

Taking cues from Overwatch, Black Ops 4 fleshes out its playable characters with animated shorts that give each Specialist an interesting backstory. These backstories do wonders in giving each Specialist a defined personality, and they no longer feel like the generic mercenaries from Black Ops 3. More cut-scenes are unlocked by completing the skirmish matches, depicting an overarching storyline that ties everyone together. These scenes are well-acted, well-written, and beautifully animated, and while the story relies heavily on shocking violence over character development, Black Ops 4 still manages to have one of the best stories in series history - and that's without a dedicated campaign mode.

By ditching the single player campaign, Black Ops 4 manages to do away with a lot of the issues that have plagued Call of Duty campaigns for years. No longer are players forced to follow NPCs in cramped hallways, listening to boring exposition and participating in unimaginative military operations. One could argue that Treyarch could have focused its efforts on improving the Call of Duty campaign formula, but starting from scratch and delivering something completely different, and better, works just as well.

After experiencing each of the Specialist stories and trying out their character-specific gadgets and abilities, players should have a pretty good idea of who they want to play as in Black Ops 4's online multiplayer arenas. The multiplayer is typical Call of Duty, but the removal of jackpacks and wall-running helps it feel closer to a classic Call of Duty experience as opposed to Black Ops 3 or Infinite Warfare.

It's true that Black Ops 4's multiplayer plays like classic Call of Duty multiplayer, but that doesn't mean it's too afraid to try some new things. The biggest additions to multiplayer come in the form of two game modes. The first is Control, and as previous reports indicated, it is clearly inspired by Overwatch. In Control, one team has to defend two points on the map, and the other team attempts to take those points. The attacking team has to be mindful of the timer, which forces them to constantly be going for the objective, and both teams have limited lives to work with, keeping the action plenty intense from one moment to the next.

Control is one of the best new Call of Duty multiplayer modes since Kill Confirmed, and it will hopefully become a franchise mainstay. It's not the only fun new mode, though. Black Ops 4 players can also check out Heist, which mixes things up by stripping players of their usual weapons and perks at the start, and then giving them a small allowance to buy some of them back. Depending on their performance in the match, players can get more cash that can be used to replenish ammo as well as purchase new weapons and perks that can help them do better in the next round. It's not quite as intense and exciting as Control, but it's still a highlight and helps keep the multiplayer feeling fresh.

Black Ops 4's multiplayer also benefits from a genuinely great lineup of maps. Hacienda and Icebreaker are standouts, with Icebreaker especially impressive. Set in a snowy environment, Icebreaker shows off Black Ops 4's visuals the best, and it also features some remarkable audio design, as players move across the battlefield and can hear the snow crunching underneath their feet. As far as multiplayer maps go, it truly stands out and we have a feeling it's going to be Black Ops 4's breakout map.

Speaking of breakout maps, Black Ops 4's lineup of multiplayer maps is boosted by its retention of classic multiplayer maps from the original Black Ops. Players can check out remade versions of Firing Range, Jungle, Summit, and more, and better yet, the maps are more or less exactly how players will remember them. The Call of Duty franchise has a bad habit of bringing back old maps and then changing them beyond recognition, but Black Ops 4 leaves well enough alone, so nostalgia-minded gamers can relive the glory days of the original Black Ops by once again playing on some of the best maps in franchise history.

Of course, Black Ops 4 has a lot more to offer than just the standard online multiplayer. In an effort to compete with games like PUBG and Fortnite, Black Ops 4 features its own battle royale experience called Blackout. And we're happy to report that Blackout is improved since its beta test and it helps make Black Ops 4 an even more complete package instead of coming across as Treyarch just chasing a trend.

Anyone familiar with the battle royale genre will know exactly what to expect from Blackout. Players drop out of a helicopter onto a huge map and try to be the last one standing. The start of a match is all about looting for resources, like guns, items, and armor, but players can't stay in one spot too long as they have to deal with the threat of a storm that is constantly closing in on them, forcing them to the safety of the "circle."

Black Ops 4 delivers a polished battle royale experience for the most part, but we still experienced our fair share of glitches, particularly when it came to wingsuit animations. The map itself is somewhat bland, and while players will get used to it, being restricted to first-person feels limiting compared to other battle royale games on the market. Additionally, the perks players can pick up in a match are virtually indistinguishable from one another and players may find themselves wasting time in their inventory trying to figure out what everything does. Color-coding the perks and the weapons in the game based on usefulness, like we've seen in titles like Fortnite, could potentially alleviate this problem, but it's not in the game at launch.

For these reasons, Blackout's battle royale experience isn't perfect, but it's still pretty high quality and has enough new ideas to make sure it doesn't feel like a shameless clone of other games. The map itself is made up of some of the franchise's most popular multiplayer maps, like Nuketown and Firing Range, which is a nice touch, plus it has a greater focus on vehicles. Most notably, Black Ops 4 has helicopters that spawn around the map, making it one of the only games in the genre to feature land, sea, and air combat.

Blackout also shakes things up with its PvPvE elements. Zombies can be found in certain parts of the map, and they can actually be fairly deadly, taking a decent chunk of ammo to kill and capable of murdering anyone they manage to get the jump on. Zombies also drop some great loot, so it's worth hunting them down.

The incorporation of elements from the Zombies game mode in Blackout is a great idea, and gives Blackout a distinctly Call of Duty flavor. Besides the actual zombies themselves, players can also make a beeline for the mystery box or collect the powerful Raygun wonder weapon to use on their opponents. These are small, but clever touches that work to make the Black Ops 4 battle royale experience immediately distinguishable from other battle royale games.

Zombies aren't just restricted to Blackout, though. In fact, one of Black Ops 4's biggest selling points is the fact that it launches with three Zombies maps in the base game in the form of the Ancient Rome-themed IX, a map set on the Titanic called Voyage of Despair, and a reimagining of Black Ops 2's Mob of the Dead called Blood of the Dead.

Zombies doubles down on the progression introduced in Black Ops 3 so players should always feel like they're working toward something, even if they struggle to complete the ridiculously complex easter eggs. The maps themselves are all well-made, with IX being the visual and gameplay standout, and Blood of the Dead playing like a throwback to Zombies maps of old. Zombies is as fast and frantic as ever, and while it's more of the same, it's still a lot of fun with friends.

And that is the biggest caveat with Black Ops 4. It's a blast with friends, but solo players may come away with a different view entirely. Yes, Black Ops 4 technically has some solo player content with the Specialist HQ, but it can be fully completed in short time. The increased need for communication with high quality teammates in Control makes the multiplayer more frustrating for lone wolves, and Blackout, like other battle royale games, derives much of its entertainment from causing chaos with buddies online. Zombies, for its part, actually manages to take some major steps forward in catering to the solo player by letting players add AI-controlled teammates, but otherwise it's easy to see how solo players may not be as enthusiastic about Black Ops 4 as others.

Some people may be in the situation where they don't have anyone to play with online, but they do have people they can play with on the couch, and luckily Black Ops 4 continue the series' tradition of keeping split-screen for its various game modes. Even Blackout has split-screen, which is impressive considering the other major battle royale games are online-only. The downside is that the text in split-screen is obnoxiously small, making it virtually impossible to read most of the words on the screen, and we couldn't find any settings to change the text size. Still, having a somewhat flawed split-screen option in the game is better than having no split-screen at all.

And that's part of the reason why Black Ops 4 is a truly great game, and arguably the best Call of Duty since Black Ops 2. It simply has more options than many other first-person shooters on the market, and even though it's lacking a campaign, it doesn't feel content deficient at all. Between the multiplayer, Blackout battle royale mode, and Zombies, players will more than get their money's worth with this game, and Treyarch's ambitious plans for post-launch support should ensure that it remains a go-to title for FPS fans for some time to come.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 is out now on PC, PS4, and Xbox One. Game ZXC reviewed the game on Xbox One.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 was released in 2018 by Treyarch. It was notable as being the first Call of Duty release to not feature a prominent single-player story-driven campaign. Instead, players were given access to missions that would help them discover lore about the title's Specialists.