Black Ops 6 proves that CoD’s nostalgia act has run its course

Nostalgia is a powerful tool in gaming, and Activision has used it to great success in Call of Duty, bringing back classic content such as weapons and maps to take fans back to the golden days of the franchise. After Black Ops 6’s CoD Next reveal, however, it seems gamers are more interested in looking forward than back.

Call of Duty‘s annual showcase gives players their first real look at the next installment of the FPS behemoth, with September 28’s edition revealing the new Global Weapon Builds feature, Warzone quality-of-life changes, and widely popular changes to the prestige system, bringing it back in line with classic CoD.

It’s no surprise, then, that fans are excited to get their hands on any information related to BO6. However, the sheer outpouring of interest has been staggering and proves that, despite the popularity of Modern Warfare 3, a game built on multiplayer maps from 2009’s MW2, CoD fans are ready to move on to fresh ideas.

Nostalgia in Call of Duty was a huge success

First, let’s be honest—focusing on nostalgia has been a huge win for Activision, and breathed new life into Call of Duty. While rebooting the Modern Warfare franchise in 2019 was controversial among long-time fans of the series, it proved to be a smash hit, selling over 30 million copies.

Activision doubled down on that success, releasing Modern Warfare 2 in 2022, and then following that up a year later with Modern Warfare 3, which launched with remastered versions of the maps featured in 2009’s ultra-popular MW2. This has proved to be a masterstroke, with Activision telling Forbes that player engagement is up in 2024 compared to 2023.

Black Ops 6 destroys MWIII’s reveal

Despite the reverence that the original MW2 is held in, Call of Duty Next has proved that looking to the past is not what fans of the series want to see anymore. This is revealed in the viewership numbers that their respective reveals recorded.

Take 2023’s CoD Next, which took place on October 5. On YouTube, the broadcast has amassed 662,000 views in 10 months. Compare that to the Black Ops 6 edition, which has pulled in over 1.5 million views in less than 24 hours, and you can see that the difference is staggering. That’s a 126% increase in audience in an incredibly short amount of time.

According to original Dexerto data research, X, formerly Twitter, users mentioned Black Ops 6 7.2% more than MW3 during their respective CoD Next events, showing that not only were more fans watching the content, but an increased number engaged with it too.

Black Ops 6 strikes a balance

While Black Ops 6 moves away from nostalgia as its big selling point, that doesn’t mean that Activision is scrapping the notion completely. In Warzone, the return of the battle royale’s original map Verdansk has been met with widespread acclaim, and players are already desperate to jump back into the legendary location next spring.

BO6 also sees the return of Call of Duty’s classic prestige system, which players have been begging for. Players will now reach Rank 55 and have the option to enter Prestige, where their level will reset back to one, earning you a special icon to show you’ve reached that milestone. This is a marked change from MW3’s system, where you continue to level up once you’ve surpassed Level 55.

Verdict

There’s always a place for nostalgia in Call of Duty. In fact, when you have over a decade of history and legacy to pull from, it would be almost negligent to ignore everything that came before you. The trick is finding a middle ground.

As the statistics show, players may have loved the idea of classic maps returning in MW3, but that didn’t translate to eyeballs when it came to CoD Next. With Black Ops 6, there’s a feeling of freshness even though it’s set in the early 1990s. A belief that we’re going in a new direction while bringing back fan-favorite items and systems from the past—and that’s proven to be a hit with fans.

We’ll just have to wait and see if that translates into copies sold come October.