While the main focus of the Call of Duty franchise is currently being placed on the inbound Black Ops 6, rumors and reports have already begun to paint a rough picture of what next year's entry to the franchise might look like. 2025 is set to be a big year for the FPS genre, with Battlefield aiming to release a new entry alongside the annual addition of a new CoD title.
These rumors suggest that 2025's Call of Duty title will be a direct narrative sequel to Black Ops 2, set five years after the fan-favorite 2012 game. If these rumors are true, then Call of Duty will be releasing two consecutive Black Ops titles, similarly to how Modern Warfare 2 and Modern Warfare 3 recently released in 2022 and 2023. This kind of two-year focus on the same sub-franchise is still quite unusual for Call of Duty, with MW3 drawing a lot of criticism due to how similar it was to its direct predecessor, but a Black Ops 2 sequel would have a lot of wiggle room in differentiating itself from the themes of the upcoming Black Ops 6.
Battlefield Would Be Wise to Avoid One Area of Competition With Call of Duty
There are many ways in which the next Battlefield can match the experiences of Call of Duty, but one popular multiplayer mode is better off avoided.
Call of Duty 2025's Rumored Setting Would Avoid the Burnout of Modern Warfare 3
The rumors around 2025's Call of Duty entry may compound a new era for the franchise, with it potentially becoming more common for single sub-franchises to receive consecutive years of attention. 2023's Modern Warfare 3 may have started this trend, but it was done so in a way that felt rushed, with some players likening the game to a fully-priced DLC for MW2 as opposed to its own standalone experience.
This was not helped by the infamously short campaign for Modern Warfare 3, or the carry-over system of its multiplayer that bolstered itself with a huge amount of pre-existing Modern Warfare 2 content. The similarity of the setting, gameplay, maps, and themes of MW3 created a huge amount of burnout for many fans, with the launch map pool for the title even being entirely made out of maps from the original MW2.
Despite the constant release of annual content for Call of Duty, the franchise usually at least explores different settings between releases, something which MW3 could not afford to do as a direct sequel with such a short development time, but the rumors around 2025's CoD paint a different picture. Supposedly as a direct sequel to Black Ops 2 set in 2030, next year's Call of Duty would feel entirely different to the upcoming Black Ops 6, despite both projects belonging to the same franchise and being narratively linked.
A Black Ops 2 Sequel Would Open the Door to a Major Gameplay Shift
Black Ops 6 is set to largely take place during the 1990s, shedding light on the blurry narrative between the past and future story segments of the likes of Black Ops 2. This will allow fans to get a closer look at the lives of iconic Black Ops characters like Frank Woods and even Russell Adler, while still maintaining the gritty dated feel that the franchise is largely known for. Of course, as a rumored sequel to the near-future setting of Black Ops 2, 2025's CoD will hopefully go back to the story of David Mason following the resurgence of Raul Menendez.
Going even further into the near-future, a Black Ops 2 sequel could then lean even more into the zany game mechanics and themes that made the game so unique and memorable, providing wildly different gameplay to the grounded 1990s themes of Black Ops 6. Not only will this rumored setting for the next CoD feel like a logical carry-on from the upcoming narrative of Black Ops 6, but it will be able to feel completely fresh and removed from its predecessor, hopefully avoiding a lot of the fallout that MW3 recently faced over its obvious similarities to Modern Warfare 2.
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 83 /100 Critics Rec: 91%
- Released
- October 25, 2024
- ESRB
- Mature 17+ // Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Suggestive Themes, Strong Language, Use of Drugs
- Developer(s)
- Treyarch, Raven Software
- Publisher(s)
- Activision
- Engine
- IW 9.0
- Multiplayer
- Online Multiplayer, Online Co-Op
- Cross-Platform Play
- Yes - PlayStation, Xbox, PC
WHERE TO PLAY
Forced to go rogue. Hunted from within. This is Call of Duty: Black Ops 6.
Developed by Treyarch and Raven, Black Ops 6 is a spy action thriller set in the early 90s, a period of transition and upheaval in global politics, characterized by the end of the Cold War and the rise of the United States as a single superpower. With a mind-bending narrative, and unbound by the rules of engagement, this is signature Black Ops.
The Black Ops 6 Campaign provides dynamic moment-to-moment gameplay that includes a variety of play spaces with blockbuster set pieces and action-packed moments, high-stakes heists, and cloak-and-dagger spy activity.
In a best-in-class Multiplayer experience, players will test their skills across 16 new maps at launch, including 12 core 6v6 maps and 4 Strike maps that can be played 2v2 or 6v6.
Black Ops 6 also marks the epic return of Round-Based Zombies, the fan-favorite mode where players will take down hordes of the undead in two brand-new maps at launch. Post-launch, players can look forward to even more exciting maps and groundbreaking experiences dropping into both Multiplayer and Zombies.
- Franchise
- Call of Duty
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, PC
- Genre(s)
- FPS
