On Friday, Oct. 12, Treyarch released the fourth game in the Call of Duty Black Ops series, and it could reshape the franchise’s future. Following the explosion of popularity in the battle royale style game, Fortnite, Treyarch knew there was a lot a pressure to draw in new players, and keep the followers they have received through fortnite. Seeing how Fortnite’s battle royale style of play drew in a record breaking amount of players, Treyarch decided to incorporate their own battle royale mode called blackout with the hope to pull in Fortnite fans to purchase Black Ops 4.

This version introduced Blackout-  a 100 players battle royale game mode. Players start by flying over a massive map that has multiple marked landings that are scattered with loot. The objective is to loot weapons and equipment to fight off enemies to be the last one standing. Blackout was the biggest addition to the Call of Duty franchise, which continues drawing in many new gamers, but it still offers multiplayer and zombies that the returning fans of the franchise will come back to play. Freshman Thomas Hanson said, “I feel like Blackout is to much of a copy of Fortnite and Treyarch should have stayed to their roots with campaign. But I know from a business perspective this was a smart move because the Call of Duty franchise has very loyal followers and will only gain popularity .”  

The Call Of Duty franchise is looking to regain control over the video game community, after their drop in popularity the last few years. With all the changes that Treyarch have made, they decided to make Black Ops 4 boots on the ground to give that more realistic and strategic gameplay that fans of Black Ops and Black Ops 2 are used to playing. Call of Duty Black Ops 4 is available as a hard copy or a digital download for $59.99.