Call of Duty: Black Ops III: PS4 Preview

Call of Duty: Black Ops III: PS4 Preview

Studio: Treyarch Games
Platform: PS4

Earlier in August, the Call of Duty: Black Ops III Beta dropped giving long time fans of the franchise a sneak peek of what lies ahead with the latest release.

The sequel to the 2012 game series is highly anticipated and with PlayStation nabbing some of the exclusive content, the PS4's early sneak was entirely welcome, even if its fast paced nature meant plenty of respawns for those involved.

Last year's annual iteration, the release of Advanced Warfare certainly upped the game for those wanting to play smooth shooters and its execution meant the recent DLC for the series has been thrilling and exciting. This Beta showed the future of the series and to be frank, it appears to all be about pace.

Set 50 years in the future in 2065, and with a storyline that concentrates your forces more on the ground rather than allowing them into the air, it's clear that Call of Duty wants to hit the ground running. And it's not just the ground that gets the running too, as you can hurtle along the walls.

The multiplayer gives you a chance to choose a specialist area as well when it boots up, which gives you special skills and weapons, but more of that will be forthcoming when the game is released in November.

The games kick in with a real urgency and speed, and it wasn't long before others dealt to me very quickly, providing plenty of respawn opportunities. This is not a game to stand and admire the world around you - although, in the brief moments before being blasted again, there is more than enough to see, thanks to the wondrous world around it. It's kind of cool because there's plenty of space in the open world to both explore and hide in as well. But when push comes to shove, it's really about the action and it's fast-paced, occasionally hard to adjust to and worth simply getting your sights on.

One of the games I played was a capture the area type scenario, where weapons were good, but stealth was better. Simply put, this beta took some of the finer points of Advanced Warfare and ramped them up to 11. Speed is definitely an issue with this iteration of COD and I do hope there's some time to adjust to what's ahead before being thrown into the game, as you need time to adjust to skills and weaponry.

The beta was an enticing look at Call of Duty: Black Ops III and there's certainly proof that the maps offer up plenty of scope for gaming excitement. I'm intrigued to see what the game offers in November and expect that Treyarch will knock it out of the park when the time comes.