Call of Duty: Black Ops Will Have 4-Player Co-Op, Crossbows

Cooperative gameplay, or the option for cooperative gameplay, is a game mechanic many titles are jumping on board with.

Everyone saw how well Epic Games pulled it off with Gears of War 1 and 2, and Bungie beginning with Halo: Combat Evolved and continuing today.

Today, Treyarch, the development studio (not embroiled in nasty litigation) behind the latest war-time struggle, Call of Duty: Black Ops, confirmed and detailed the co-op experience to be had in the upcoming shooter.

Treyarch’s studio head Mark Lamia, speaking with USA Today’s gaming blog GameHunters, said the game’s campaign will allow two to four players.

Image credit: USA Today

Additionally, some vague story elements were unveiled. Lamia said the game will follow the point of view of “at least two characters” in multiple theaters of war.

“Our writers are focused on telling an epic story,” Lamia said. “You will see the evolution of some of these characters through time and the conflict.”

Missed the teaser trailer? Here it is.

As far as weapons are concerned, according to Treyarch and the GameHunters story, the studio spoke with Maj. John Plaster, a veteran of the Studies and Observations Group (SOG), which was a multi-force black operations unit to paint the best picture of the war-torn scene.

A military-grade crossbow was one of the named weapons and Lamia believes it accurately depicts this black ops unit.

“[the crossbow] is a great example of how elite black ops teams were permitted to equip themselves for whatever job they had at hand, which means that they could get a hold of anything and modify it any way they wanted to accomplish their missions objectives. The specific crossbow in the game is based off the design of a military grade crossbow. The use of the our crossbow was inspired by a story we heard about from Major Plaster about a member of SOG who would equip himself with a bow for some of his real-life missions, and our research, which showed its use by indigenous warriors in Vietnam that fought with special forces. In our case here, it served this mission as a dual-purpose weapon used for stealth, and one which when modified, could stealthily and precisely place a lethal explosive at range,” Lamia said.

As great as Infinity Ward and war games set in the modern setting are, my tendencies might just tip in Treyarch’s nostalgic battles instead.