Activision Addresses Campaign Pause Issue in ‘Black Ops 7’
The single-player campaign of Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 has drawn criticism, with one reviewer calling it “the worst Call of duty campaign ever made.” While the game introduced innovative features like full four-player online co-op and cross-progression-allowing players to level up guns, unlock camos, and increase rank applicable to both campaign and end-game content-these additions contributed to important functionality issues.
A key complaint centers around the inability to pause the campaign. Unlike previous call of Duty titles, Black Ops 7 lacks a pause function, mirroring the experience in multiplayer modes. Furthermore, the game does not save progress upon quitting or experiencing a crash, forcing players to restart missions. Players can also be kicked for inactivity,even while playing solo.
Activision released a statement explaining the design choices: “The Black Ops 7 Co-Op Campaign missions and gameplay are hosted on dedicated servers online with other players to facilitate global progression and XP earning,along with saves across multiple devices. this means pausing isn’t possible for the same reason it isn’t in Multiplayer, though there are mission checkpoints if you fail while playing.”
While mission checkpoints exist upon failure, they do not activate if a player quits or is disconnected. The reviewer noted that other online games, such as Dark Souls, allow players to resume from their last location upon quitting. They also suggested alternative solutions to address player inactivity, like a voting kick system or differentiated functionality for solo players, including the ability to save progress upon exiting a mission.
Despite potential fixes to these technical issues,the reviewer maintains that the campaign suffers from a disjointed and illogical storyline. While acknowledging “some fun missions” and “very creative boss fights,” they expressed disappointment with the overall narrative.
A full review of Black Ops 7’s multiplayer modes is forthcoming on the blog.
