From a story standpoint, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Zombies seemed to have everything going for it. An iconic figure in Dr. Edward Richtofen was finally set to be explored further, while the return of a fully voiced cast of playable characters meant that players would get a more immersive experience on each map. The ending of Terminus brought about some genuine excitement from players, too, with elements from Black Ops 4’s Chaos story being properly merged into the Dark Aether universe to give fans hope of a continuation. Sadly, that good will players had after launch has been fading, and after The Tomb it has all-but-disappeared.
While Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Zombies fans are continuing to debate over whether The Tomb is an enjoyable map from a gameplay standpoint, fans of Zombies’ lore have been left stunned by the final cinematic – and for all the wrong reasons. While the audio logs scattered throughout The Tomb feature some genuinely fun developments, like the SAM AI and Richtofen having a war of words or the Chaos characters being name-dropped, the core story of The Tomb feels painfully unfinished. While the likely cause for this is out of Treyarch’s hands and falls squarely on Activision’s shoulders, if nothing changes, the rest of Black Ops 6’s storytelling could turn out to be just as disappointing.
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Before release, one strength of Black Ops 6 Zombies’ Tomb map is already clear, though it serves as a reminder of the game’s biggest issue.
The AI Strike Has Likely Caused Black Ops 6 Zombies’ Story to Stumble
Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Zombies fans were first tipped off to the strangeness regarding the game’s voice acting when Citadelle Des Morts released. While nearly everything about this map was well received, it had one glaring issue: Samantha Maxis’ longtime voice actor Julie Nathanson was quietly replaced, apparently due to her affiliation with SAG-AFTRA. Fans were quick to take issue with this change, not only because Nathanson’s work was beloved, but because the new actor sounded very different from S.A.M. and did not properly capture the character’s accent or tone. As if that was not enough, Nathanson’s Samantha was also replaced on Liberty Falls and Terminus, with all of her lines re-recorded.
Black Ops 6 Zombies has also recast the returning Black Ops Cold War character Peck, assumedly because of the ongoing actor strike against AI in video games.
Fans were understandably disappointed upon the realization that such a beloved actor had been replaced, and it did not take long for the outrage to get loud enough for an official response to be necessary. In response to GameDeveloper’s coverage of the recasting, Activision stated that it “respects the personal choice of these performers” and will not provide further comments until the ongoing negotiations with the actors are complete. Obviously, this is not what fans wanted to hear, and following a leak from Call of Duty dataminer @TheGhostOfHope, concerns only grew. According to the leak, nearly all members of the Black Ops 6 Zombies cast pulled out of working on the game until companies like Activision agreed to add protection against AI voice acting into their current and future contracts. Sadly, The Tomb has proven this rumor to be all-but-confirmed.
The Tomb May Be Proof That The Actor Strike Could Kill Black Ops 6 Zombies’ Momentum
An entire cast of characters stepping away from a live service title was bound to have consequences, and The Tomb shows the impact of the actor strike clearly. Not only is there no intro cinematic for The Tomb, with players simply thrust into a dig site and a major new ghost character in Sir Archibald going unexplained, but the final cinematic is painfully awkward. None of the characters speak despite acquiring an item they have been chasing across multiple maps, only robotically reaching toward it as if they were generic Operators. Then, the recast version of S.A.M. delivers exposition about where Zombies fans will be going next, with the entire scene feeling painfully awkward.
The scene’s quietness is highly reminiscent of Dead of the Night’s intro, another map that experienced a strangely rushed launch.
Sadly, if the strike goes unresolved for much longer, this could be the future for every other Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 Zombies map that gets added to the game. While much of The Tomb’s in-game dialogue was seemingly recorded during the older sessions, the actors not being able to return for the cutscenes that are meant to deliver the bulk of the mode’s storytelling is hugely problematic. Treyarch is likely stuck between a rock and a hard place at the moment, as it will either need to recast everyone and risk outraging fans like it did with its Samantha Maxis change, or it will need to keep skipping intros and delivering anticlimactic final cutscenes where the playable characters say nothing. This is a genuinely tragic turn of events for Black Ops 6 Zombies’ story, as fans were getting properly invested in the narrative for the first time in ages. Now, likely as a result of the companies behind big games like Call of Duty embracing AI, and failing to protect actors from it, BO6’s story is at risk of falling apart when it was previously firing on all cylinders.
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.