Call of Duty: Black Ops III: Everything You Need to Know

April 27, 2015 11:19 AM EDT

Will Black Ops III be the best Call of Duty yet? Will it bring female characters to warfare in a way that doesn’t feel trite? Or meaningfully differentiate itself from prior installments, gameplay-wise? What about finally escaping the scourge of witheringly negative Metacritic user reviews? Will it be fun? There are lots of questions bracketing a space filled mostly with hypotheticals (and truckloads of publicity hype). Here’s what we know so far, fresh off Activision’s worldwide reveal.

It’s coming November 6

The first/second week of November’s been a Call of Duty mainstay since Call of Duty 3 nudged the series out of late October, when it launched on November 7, 2006.

It’s no longer a single-person campaign experience

Prior Call of Duty installments swapped out characters across their campaigns, but Black Ops III will be the first in series to emphasize multiple protagonists simultaneously experiencing the game’s story-driven modes.

Meaning up to four people can play for the same team, online or local

That’s “four-player cooperative” in gamer lingo, and it means up to four players can play the game together, on the same side, from start to finish, either online or locally with a split screen.

See The 15 Best Video Game Graphics of 2014

**Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare**. Activision's futuristic first-person shooter in which players take on a rogue private military company uses a brand new engine built specifically for PCs and new-gen consoles to handle its cutting-edge lighting, animation and physics. Sledgehammer Games/Activision

**Far Cry 4**. This pulled back shot of fictional Himalayan region Kyrat is in-game, believe it or not, rendered with an overhauled version of the engine Ubisoft used to design *Far Cry 3*. Ubisoft

The Last of Us Remastered — **The Last of Us: Remastered**. Naughty Dog's meditation on the worst (and best) of humanity is built on technology that reaches back through the studio's pulp-adventure *Uncharted* series. The graphics are so impressive, TIME recently assigned a conflict photographer to photograph inside the game.Ashley Gilbertson for TIME

**Alien: Isolation** Built from scratch, the *Alien: Isolation* engine's outstanding deep space visuals all but replicate the set design of *Alien* film concept artists H.R. Giger and Ron Cobb's work. The Creative Assembly

**Assassin's Creed Unity**. Ubisoft says it "basically remade the whole rendering engine" in its AnvilNext design tool to handle the studio's meticulous recreation of Paris during the French Revolution. Ubisoft

**Child of Light** Inspired by filmmakers like Hayao Miyazaki and artist Yoshitaka Amano, *Child of Light*'s hand-drawn artwork puts the lie to presumptions that graphical richness depends on shader support or polygon counts. Ubisoft

**Destiny** Built from scratch by ex-Halo studio Bungie, *Destiny*'s game engine was designed to scale across the next decade, says the studio. Bungie

**Mario Kart 8** Nintendo's kart-racer for Wii U reminds us that raw horsepower is just a facet of crafting a beautiful game world. Nintendo

**Infamous Second Son** Sucker Punch's freeform Seattle-based superhero adventure models all sorts of minutia, from the intricate wrinkling of an aged character's face to the way eyelids stick, slightly, before separating when characters blink. Sucker Punch Productions

**Monument Valley** Escher-like at first glance, Ustwo's mind-bending puzzler was also inspired by posters, bonsai plants, arabic calligraphy and filmmaker Tarsem Singh's *The Fall*. Ustwo

**Grand Theft Auto V** Rockstar's remastered crime spree opus was crafted from an in-house engine first employed in a game that simulated table tennis. Rockstar

**Forza Horizon 2** Turn 10's Euro-racer actually models light refracted through drops of moisture, the render tech plausibly simulating something as intangible but essential as the earth’s atmosphere. Microsoft Studios/Turn 10 Studios

**80 Days** Inkle's anti-colonialist vamp on Jules Verne's famous novel uses crisp art deco imagery inspired by travel posters to unfurl *80 Days*' tale of intrepid globetrotters Monsieur Fogg and his valet Passepartout. Inkle

Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition — **Tomb Raider** Crystal Dynamics' radical reboot of its popular series about an athletic archaeologist uses a modified version of the engine that powered *Tomb Raider: Legend* in 2006. Square Enix

It’s headed even further into the future

The Call of Duty series went science fiction back in 2012 with Black Ops II‘s cyber-jargon-laced near future jaunt to 2025. Last year’s Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare bumped the year out to 2054, and now Black Ops III looks to tour a grim-sounding cyborg-ish version of the 2060s, where “bio-technology coupled with cybernetic enhancements has given rise to a new breed of Black Ops soldier.”

Think soldiers with robotic limbs, in other words.

Yes, that makes it another triple-A game with an elevator pitch plot that lags at least half a century behind the best books, movies and TV shows, but who knows—maybe developer Treyarch will surprise us with its take on the “man vs. machine” trope.

You’re neurally connected to your squadmates

Activision calls it a “Direct Neural Interface,” and says you’ll play as black ops soldiers “that are interconnected, faster, and more lethal than ever.” With any luck, that’ll translate to something more novel than Ventrillo plus d-pad communication shortcuts.

Women will be just as common on the frontlines as men

Gender equality on the battlefield sounds like as huge step in the right direction, though it may court controversy if (and I stress if, since we don’t know yet) Treyarch’s rationale for doing so involves cybernetics-as-prerequisite.

There’s a new movement system that sounds vaguely Assassin’s Creed-ish

Activision describes it as a “momentum-based, chained movement system that allows players to move fluidly through environments and maintain constant control of their weapon.”

Call of Duty parkour?

You can customize up to nine soldiers

It’s called the “Specialist” system, and it’ll let you tweak their physiques, personalities, backstories, weapons and abilities.

There’ll be a Zombies mode

A signature Treyarch component, Activision says it’ll have its own story and experience point progression system.

It’s for PC and new-gen systems only

No surprises here: make that PlayStation 4 and Xbox One consoles, and you’ll presumably need a PC with a high-end GPU if you’re rocking a desktop or laptop.

Update: Activision contacted us to note that while the game has been announced for PC, PS4 and Xbox One at this point, the company hasn’t formally ruled out other platforms.

It spent three years in the cooker

Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg says this is developer Treyarch’s first thee-year project. Longer development times don’t always yield great games, but it’s a promising metric.

Treyarch’s saying it’ll be the best Call of Duty game yet made

To be fair, they always do.

Everything You Need to Know About Call of Duty: Black Ops III