The series is located during the identity crisis, with its coherent stream of crossover skins. We are on the abyss of a modern one Battlefield The title, which was extremely well received in two record bets. In addition, this year’s post in a long series is a continuation Call of Duty: Black Ops 6which was released less than 12 months ago.
The last time took place with the release of Sledgehammer’s Call of duty up-to-date warfare 3 In 2023, the entry was critical of the snack in the brutal campaign and the tribute, which seems to be a step from the rest of the re -image of the trilogy. So what stops Black Ops 7 From meeting the same fate?
The answer is that both Black Ops 6 AND Black Ops 7 They were developed in parallel by the same studio. I had the opportunity to sit with Miles Leslie, an associate original director in Treyarch and Natalie Pohorski, the main narrative producer at Raven Software, in Gamescom 2025, to find out about it.
We discussed Black Ops 7Related to Black Ops 6Restoring the franchise to the future, a modern end game mode, Avalon and its inspirations, and, according to their own words, Pohorski, the possibility of creating a “disturbing mountain queue based on characters.”
Return to the future
Call of duty He took a long break from futuristic entries from the series. The last time the series in the future took place from 2018 Black Ops 4And you have to go back to 2016 Infinite war To find a full campaign in this environment.
During this period, fatigue with jet backpacks and vertical gameplay led to a challenging time to move the series to a more conventional game for almost a decade. So why is the right time to return to the future now Black Ops 7?
“I think it makes sense, where we are going with history,” says Pohorski. “We talk a lot about Black Ops 2,” Which Black Ops 7 serves as a direct continuation. “When we began to focus on David Mason, he was a figure to which we always wanted to come back. A lot happened to him in 2025, so where did it put him in 2035?”
While David Masion serves as the main character Black Ops 7The game also sees the return of Mike Harper (played by Michael Roker) with Black Ops 2 and Troy Marshall z Black Ops 6Effectively Hal-of-Offam Black OPS Characters to some extent.
Pohorski continues “a lot of time has passed, so I think that it was interesting for us, from the perspective of telling stories to learn more about these characters and more about what they are dealing with Mnendez attacks in 2025.”
Developing both Black Ops 6 AND Black Ops 7 Together, Raven Software and Treyarch allowed the narrative with greater intention than he usually Call of duty Studies when there is several years between each entrance.
Black Ops 7The main threat, the guild, was set in the process Black Ops 6Initially, the campaign as an organization of a washing weapon for armament of underground criminal organizations in the fictitious city of Avalon. But since then Sevati Dumas (SEV), one of the crew of Frank Woods during Black Ops 6 The campaign led the guild and developed it into a huge technology company, promoting her protected Emma Kagan, who is now the general director of the Guild.
This kind of intertwining knowledge and building the world is something that we haven’t really seen before Call of dutyBecause characters or locations are often not returned only after years and rarely never planned from the very beginning.
“You’ve already met the Guild, you’ve already met Avalon,” says Leslie. “Now there is a payment for what happened in the world. And then we can connect it with a return Black Ops 2 And say “Remember all these characters in the world.” We love building the world and we hope that players fall in love with it. “
Embracing madness
Black Ops 7 It also means a significant change in the series, because it is strongly based on more disturbing aspects Black OPS Underground. The future surroundings give a studio a lot of luxury to play with what is credible, but how is it to achieve the right balance between narrative twists Black OPS Fans love and their expectations from a military shooter?
For the team, this phrase was hallucinations that acted in the whole series, but directly confrontation with their own fear and regret in the world, which is in a constant conflict in 2035. The inspiration came from the whole team, what they looked like Memento and presenting fear in Orderly for ideas.
“It’s a layer in the whole game,” emphasizes Leslie. “I think it makes it special, that we like to say: embrace madness.” This slogan acted as a leading principle during development.
He continues: “The band was excited about this kind of mantra … so we have maps. We have equipment in this. We have enemies in this who bend into it, and it is between the campaign and multiplayer, and that’s just good.”
New game, modern risk
One basic theme that runs through Black OPS The games are that I was never afraid to take risks with gameplay or narrative. Is it so Black Ops 1 AND Black Ops 2Campaigns, Treyarch zombie mode and story telling, or Black Ops 4 Taking a lot of bold risks when it comes to multiplayer, including removing automatic health regeneration.
This final game is described as “completely new, possible to recreate the experience in which you and your team will have to survive overwhelming opportunities, adapt under pressure and break the rules of what you think and Black OPS The campaign can be. “
After reaching the mission, you will unlock operators for utilize and equalization using their combat assessment. You can also bring your unlocked campaign abilities and create non -standard equipment. However, the lack of survival in the mode would mean resetting consumption and evaluation of the fight.
Leslie quickly emphasized that if you play in a linear campaign to the end, you will still achieve a satisfactory end of history. However, this “continuation of history” is completely optional if players want to jump into it.
Leslie says that the genesis of the mode came from the previous work of Treyarch with an explosion and the fact that the studio “built a library with all these funny moments, enemies and content.” At some point, the studio was asking himself: “I want all this in a different way.”
So while Black Ops 7 It can follow the same release model as 2023 Modern Warfare 3It seems that he will not fall into the same traps. This time there is a lot more meat in the bones, and the development of the game seems to be much less swift than the latest Sledgehammer trip.
Is it enough to pay attention Battlefield 6 And a busy season of the autumn releases of the game, we will have to wait and see on November 14, 2025.
