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Call of Duty HQ houses many game series with unique gameplay styles and stories. However, the two dominant majesties in the franchise are Modern Warfare and Black Ops games series, with the first being rebooted and the second still running with Call of Duty 2024, AKA Black Ops 6. Treyarch’s magic has lived through two decades, starting with World At War, leveling up Call of Duty as a whole in terms of story, gameplay, and visuals. Now, with 5 Black Ops games and the World At War on the table, which Treyarch outputs did best in all three fields?
6. Black Ops 3
Black Ops 3 was another one of the futuristic Call of Duty attempts that ended up relying a heavy task on Zombies mode. Following the story of the previous games, Black Ops 3 Zombies features some of the best maps with a memorable narrative with our beloved characters. On the other side, however, not a single atom of the Black Ops 3 Campaign was related to the Black Ops series storyline, and the Multiplayer didn’t bring it home even by implanting the Specialists system.
5. Black Ops 4
Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 was the last wonderous ride for the Zombies fans, ending the story that started with the classic horrors of Nacht Der Untoten. This was the first game in the Call of Duty series to feature a Battle Royale game mode called “Blackout.” And for some reason, Activision had decided not to include a Campaign mode for Black Ops 4, leaving it weak on the story side of things. As for the multiplayer, it was only a re-skinned version of Black Ops 3 with better-optimized visuals.
4. World At War
Considering its story and impact on Black Ops 1, there are more reasons to list World At War here than not. This is where the tale of Victor Reznov starts to later pass his ideology to Alex Mason. The Multiplayer is a dusty version of the successful Call of Duty 4, featuring a well-balanced experience with different game modes and maps. But don’t forget: this was the first game to introduce the Zombies mode to Call of Duty, giving us some of the best maps like Shi No Numa and Nacht Der Untoten that are still getting remakes in new CoD entries.
3. Black Ops Cold War
Black Ops Cold War was a direct sequel to the 2010 Black Ops 1, delivering a fine story, engaging Multiplayer, and some of the best Zombies maps like Die Maschine that revived the game mode. We got to see the main Black Ops characters like Mason, Woods, and Hudson in action again, before the tragic happenings of Black Ops 2.
2. Black Ops 1
After the immense success of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, it was the Treyarch’s turn to impress. And right when we were expecting a World at War 2, there came the Black Ops, one of the best Call of Duty games of all time. The game was literally designed to level up everything from World At War, upgrading the Zombies and Multiplayer modes to one of the best in the series. As for the story, the super-innovative tale of Alex Mason breaking the code of the numbers is unforgettable.
1. Black Ops 2
To think how World At War and Black Ops 1 games succeeded in many ways, one would easily doubt that the third game will come out to be a banger. With Black Ops 2, however, things changed — drastically changed. Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 brought chaos into Zombies, innovation to Multiplayer maps and loadout system, and a layer of fear from the villain as big as Menendez to the Campaign. The game followed a new story with Alex Mason’s son, but Woods and Hudson were still there in the flashback missions, building a perfect mix.
Judging by the ongoing story of Black Ops games with the upcoming BO6, it’s safe to assume that this series has become the core of the franchise. No other Call of Duty series has survived for more than a decade without a reboot, and that just proves how strong Treyarch’s craft is.
