So it's out. How is it?

I am just wondering what different opinions on the game are... I haven't even finished the second campaign mission and I love the SP (decided to check out multiplayer). I absolutely love using a few certain weapons at the moment (MAC 11 Extended Mags ftw!)and I'm actually at least decent at this game.

I rarely use classes other than my smg and assault rifle classes actually haha

i've heard mixed things about it, so i'm still on the fence. on one hand, it's still too much like WaW, and some weapons are just blatantly better than others in multiplayer. that balance and variety doesn't seem to be there.
on the other hand, most of my friends are playing it, so i hate to miss out.

yeah some weapons are overpowered... but I am hoping TA fixes that in the next patch

I've finished most of the campaign, and all I can say is that it is AWESOME. It gets real messed up later, with him getting more and more broken with the drug that's they're using to interrogate him, and the numbers are starting to drive him mad.

There's one point where the interrogator asks him:

"Why did you do "it" (so as not to spoil)

and he responds, "I HAD TO! THE NUMBERS MADE ME DO IT!"

I don't think they actually did, I think he's just going mad, cos he says some pretty wierd shit after that.

Also, zombie mode is excellent. Playing as Kennedy, Castro or Nixon is hilarious. Not so much as McNamara cos I don't really like him. Kennedy's epic line before the Zombie's burst in says it all:

"Gentlemen... pray not for easier lives... but pray instead... to be stronger men!"

yeah the campaign is the best I've ever play for CoD games (out of four)...

1.) Black Ops
2.) MW2
3.) Classic
4.) CoD 3

I have 3 last just b/c I didn't like TA much back then and I hated the way they did things then... and also CoD 1 was just so awesome to me.

I think the shottys actually have a bit too much range (I can hit and sometimes kill someone from across a room easily (like a room in Grid).

And I love the classified guns so far, although I only have the Stoner and the HS10 as of now... I would have the PSG1 but I just don't snipe much in the game...

The shotgun's range is more or less accurate. In RL a target 20 - 30 metres away can be staggered with a shotgun, and games always seem to only give shotgun's a range of 5-10 metres for some reason. When I go hunting, I can hit a target almost 50 metres away with a shotgun. I have never understood why the gaming world makes them so short range, so it's kinda nice to see their range extended.

However, I do agree with you. It is a surprise to see their range, but at least for me, it's a pleasant one.

@Killak: Yes, it's always nice to see games more accurately portraying the range of shotguns! (GTAIV was another game where you could hit people on the other side of a room with a shotgun.)

The game's very balanced overall, which I'm very happy with, and Treyarch seems serious about patching multiplayer and dealing with hackers/glitchers.

And the story is brilliant -- I've read maybe one bad review of the game, and I've been left wondering... how could that reviewer think that Modern Warfare 2 had a better story than Black Ops?

Modern Warfare's story is possibly more explosive in nature to that of Black Ops, and BO does tend to be more balls to the wall, while some people like a mix of Hollywood and Action.

It's just style. For me, MW will always be the pinnacle of dramatic FPS storytelling. Blackops is different in so many ways, and is so incredibly badass in it's own right.

*ALERT: THIS POST IS SPOILERIFIC [mostly regarding Black Ops]! PLEASE DON'T READ IF YOU DON'T WANT TO BE SPOILED.*

*BEGIN SPOILERS*

If by MW you mean Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, then I'd agree. That was the pinnacle of CoD's explosive action storylines. Modern Warfare 2's story was something along the lines of, "You got through a mission? Well, good job. Now your character's dead."

Black Ops was just. Wow. It had such an amazing plot. They really developed characters and story so much better than any previous CoD installment. I mean, from the first sequence in the game -- tied down to a chair, interrogated, having various drugs injected into you -- to the end of the game, you really get inside Mason's head, what he's experienced. Treyarch keeps you interested right through to the end of the plot, which is vital for a good story, and they don't let you know any more (or any less) than Alex Mason knows.

Mind control experimentation? Viktor getting inside your head? The Numbers? The Rat Tunnel where you talk to Viktor and the marine says, "What the f*ck's wrong with you, Mason?" Or the post-WWII scenes, the Nova 6 Gas Chamber experiment...

I realize it's all subjective. But for me, at least, Black Ops is the definition of amazing storytelling. It's gripping, it keeps you wanting more, it's full of subtle twists and references (seriously, I completely missed the importance of that one, tiny, seemingly insignificant section in the Rat Tunnel until someone else pointed it out). And then there are not-so-subtle references, like all the throwbacks to World at War (characters and otherwise).

*END SPOILERS*

There's action, there's violence, there are some pretty cool QTE's (interactive cinematic sequences). But, possibly most importantly, the story in Black Ops is pretty much the perfect length. I feel that if it were any longer, it would feel protracted and might have started to get boring. Yet, if it were any shorter, they would not have been able to work as much story/plot into the game.