Summary
- Call of Duty: Black Ops games range from the dreadful to the best of the best in the series, each with its own unique gameplay experience.
- Black Ops titles on different platforms offer varying stories and gameplay mechanics, with some entries being more worth players' time than others.
- The series has evolved with each new entry, introducing new features like Battle Royale mode, advanced movement mechanics, and wider multiplayer options.
Making a family tree of the Call of Duty games would be a nearly impossible feat. It all started from one great World War 2 game, but since then it has branched off into numerous subseries, some of which take place in the same continuity while others stand completely on their own.
Call of Duty: Black Ops - Cut Content You Probably Didn't Know About
Concept art, in-game audio, and unfinished coding reveal that Treyarch was cooking up many ambitious ideas that never got implemented in Black Ops.
Players who want to follow one path would find plenty of interesting stories in the Black Ops games, but not all of these titles are made the same. As the list below shows, the Black Ops subseries goes from the best of the best to the bottom of the Call of Duty barrel.
While World at War takes place in the same continuity, it is omitted from the list since it is not a proper Black Ops title.
Updated on December 12, 2024, by Jason Wojnar: Most of the Black Ops games were easy to follow in the continuity until 2020 came along and decided to destroy the numbering convention with Black Ops: Cold War. The 2024 Call of Duty game made things even weirder by being Black Ops 6. Black Ops: Cold War is the fifth Black Ops game but for some reason they decided not to call it that. Those two games are still directly connected, however. Weird names are not important, though. What really matters is where Black Ops 6 sits in the rankings of the best games of the Black Ops subseries.
10 Black Ops: Declassified
Two Analog Sticks Could Not Save This Game
- Release: November 13, 2012
- Developer: nStigate Games
- Platforms: PS Vita
The PS Vita was one of the most powerful handhelds of the time, but power means nothing if the base game is not worth writing home about. Black Ops - Declassified is a dreadful game on its own and looks even worse when compared to the rest of the games bearing the Black Ops name.
The single-player campaign feels like it was put together with duct tape, lacking any of the excitement one would come to expect from the series stories. The multiplayer does its best to give the tried and true CoD suite on a handheld, but people were better off waiting until they could play on their console at home.
9 Call Of Duty: Black Ops Mobile
Before Mobile Games Rivaled Consoles
- Release Date: December 31, 2010
- Developer: Glu Mobile
- Publisher: Activision
In 2010 mobile phones were not quite powerful enough to recreate console experiences. This could be a blessing sometimes, since at least one could play an entirely different game on a phone. Black Ops Mobile takes place in Vietnam and the gameplay is a throwback to top-down shooters.
It looks and feels like an SNES or Genesis game, an interesting perpective for the Call of Duty series. Unfortunately, gameplay often suffered on these older mobile devices. Black Ops Mobile is far from an ideal gameplay experience.
8 Black Ops DS
Different Game With A Similar Name
- Release: November 9, 2010
- Developer: n-Space
- Platforms: Nintendo DS
Though it has the same name, Call of Duty: Black Ops on the Nintendo DS is a different game than its console counterpart. It tells a slightly different story and the handheld's unique capabilities fundamentally change the way players engage in combat.
Best Open-World Games On The Nintendo DS And 3DS
The Nintendo DS and 3DS may not be the most powerful consoles, but the handheld devices still feature some truly great open-world games.
The handheld games were all handled by the same developer, and the titles got progressively better with each entry. Black Ops DS is not really worth anyone's time now, but it was definitely one of the better FPS games for Nintendo's unique handheld.
7 Black Ops Zombies
A Great Mobile Adaptation Of The Zombies Mode
- Release: December 1, 2012
- Developer: Glu Mobile, Marmalade Game Studios, Ideaworks Game Studios
- Publisher: Activision, Activision
In the same way that Capcom released a standalone Mercenaries game for the Nintendo 3DS, so did Activision make a separate Zombies game for the iOS. Black Ops Zombies is a shockingly complete version of the popular game mode for mobile devices. It came out in 2012 so the graphics are not up to the standards of modern high-end mobile titles, but that should do little to detract from its quality when the gameplay feels this smooth.
The game launched with Kino before content updates added a couple of more maps. As if that is not enough, Dead Ops Arcade was included in the package as well. The only thing standing against it is the older hardware and the fact it is one game mode where all the other games have a campaign, multiplayer, and Zombies.
6 Black Ops 4
No Single-Player Hurts Its Quality
Call of Duty: Black Ops 4
The fourth numbered entry in this subseries took a unique approach in that it completely eschewed the single-player story mode. Being a multiplayer-only title did not hurt its sales, but it did alienate a small portion of the audience. Black Ops 4 also introduced the Battle Royale genre into the series with the Blackout mode.
Blackout was successful but lacked some of the modern conveniences Warzone would eventually implement, and it did not get updated as frequently. While the lack of a single-player is disappointing, there is still plenty of great content for those who are solely interested in multiplayer and Zombies, even if the latter lacked enjoyment in terms of story elements and map designs.
5 Black Ops - Cold War
Bringing Black Ops Into The 1980s
Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War
- Released
- November 13, 2020
- Developer(s)
- Raven Software, Treyarch
- Platform(s)
- PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, PC
- Genre(s)
- First-Person Shooter
- OpenCritic Rating
- Strong
The 2020 entry in the series was something of a return to basics for the series. It does not dabble in any future storylines and plants itself firmly in the Cold War era, fully taking advantage of the aesthetic with missions once again set in Vietnam and some covert missions behind the Iron Curtain.
The multiplayer offers a particularly wide range of options for all types of players. The mainstays are here but there's also Face Off, a three-on-three mode with maps tailored for the smaller player count that would delight fans of older, more hectic FPS games like TimeSplitters or Quake. The more modern gameplay mechanics suited this title, even if there was some disappointment from how easy the zombie mode was, and how short the campaign was.
4 Call Of Duty: Black Ops
The Debut Black Ops Game
Call of Duty: Black Ops
The first Black Ops introduced more espionage into the series with a more cerebral story that focuses on characters rather than world-ending stakes, not to say that the stakes are not still high. Looking back on it with a modern lens, the gameplay does not feel as refined or polished as future entries.
However, the story is still intriguing and it introduces many iconic characters like Frank Woods and Alex Mason. It was also the first time the series covered the Vietnam War, evoking the era by using the popular yet still effective tropes of iconic classic rock tunes of the time. On top of an incredible thriller story, the zombies content was also the beginning of some of the best.
3 Black Ops 3
Jumps Into The Future With A Cooperative Campaign
Call of Duty: Black Ops III
Black Ops 3's takes place in the future and players have access to advanced movement mechanics that change the way they approach combat. This, along with the ability to play through the campaign cooperatively with three other people online (one other person locally), make the title unique even to this day.
Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 - Cut Content You Probably Didn't Know About
So many game modes, weapons, and perks were removed from Black Ops 2, and some of them sounded very fun and ambitious.
The story's combat encounters are more open than usual, and the ability to jump, dash, and wall-run opens up the gameplay possibilities, these mechanics translate into the multiplayer mode for high-octane action and frustration. The story does not have anything in common with the prior Black Ops games, which is somewhat of a letdown, but the game makes up for it with the best zombie content in the series.
2 Black Ops 2
An Ambitious Campaign
Call of Duty: Black Ops II
Black Ops 2 rides the line between taking the series in a radical direction while still maintaining the Black Ops identity. Most of the characters from the first game come back and certain plot threads continue, but it also jumps back and forth through time, hinting at the future aesthetic some later games would run with.
The single-player also features optional missions and multiple endings. It was a great Call of Duty game for anybody who might have been growing tired of the series by 2012 and arguably stands the test of time as one of the best multiplayer COD games thanks to the meta, maps, and modes.
Depending on one's opinion of Avenged Sevenfold, the band's cameo at the end of the game might either be the icing on the cake or the thing that ruins an otherwise solemn and dark ending.
1 Black Ops 6
A Varied Single-Player Campaign And Fast Multiplayer
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6
- Released
- October 25, 2024
- Developer(s)
- Treyarch, Raven Software
- Publisher(s)
- Activision
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, PC
- Genre(s)
- FPS
- OpenCritic Rating
- Strong
The 2024 game comes after the dud that was Modern Warfare 3. Even without this significant quality uptick from a bad year, Black Ops 6 stands as one of the finest Call of Duty games of this generation. The single-player campaign makes sure every level feels different. Many missions introduce new mechanics to keep players interested before moving on to something new in the following level.
The multiplayer is incredibly fast-paced thanks to the introduction of the omnimovement system. Zombies brings back the easter eggs of the past and is more approachable than the harder wave-based modes from prior games.
Call Of Duty: Saddest Deaths From The Campaigns
The action-packed and over-the-top franchise still provides plenty of somber and emotional moments.