‘Call Of Duty: Black Ops 7’ Returning To More “Authentic” Experience, Drops Support For ‘Black Ops 6’ DLC Skins And Weapons
In a rare instance of a Triple-A video game developer picking their player base over easy cash, a desire to make Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 “feel authentic” has led the developers Treyarch and Raven Software to walk back their previous decision to allow the use of previously purchased Black Ops 6 weapon, operator, and skin-related DLC in the upcoming sequel.
To say that Call of Duty has lost the plot when it comes to its real-world military identity would be an understatement on par with ‘Suicide Squad (2016) was kinda bad’.
While the franchise had been no stranger to both fictional and real-world crossovers – primarily by way of the Black Ops series’ Zombie mode, whose every iteration has featured celebrities among its playable cast ever since actors Sarah Michelle Gellar, Robert Englund, Danny Trejo, and Michael Rooker fought for their lives in the first game – things started going completely off the rails beginning with 2022’s Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II.
Therein, rather than being relegated to an explicitly comical gameplay mode (as anyone who has played Zombies with friends can attest) thn-series developer Infinity Ward unleashed a barrage of crossover cosmetics for use in the game’s regular multiplayer mode.
And to make matters even more annoying, few of them had any thematic relation to the first-person shooter franchise, with skins offerings running the gamut from popular streamers TimmTheTatman and Nickmercs, to rappers Nicki Minaj and 21 Savage, to sports stars Lionel Messi and Kevin Durant, to Starlight and Homelander of Amazon’s The Boys adaptation, to Todd McFarlane’s Spawn, famed Masters of the Universe villain Skeletor, and even Hellsing protagonist Alucard.
Staying the course for Modern Warfare III, the threequel not only featured these same skins (thanks primarily to its original development as an expansion to Modern Warfare II rather than an outright sequel), but introduced a bevy of new ones, such as Paul Atreides and Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen from Denis Villeneuve’s Dune films, Rick Grimes and Michonne of The Walking Dead fame, WWE wrestlers Cody Rhodes, Rey Mysterio, and Rhea Ripley, the comedy duo of Cheech & Chong, horror slashers Michael Myers and Art the the Clown, and a trio of Mobile Suit Gundam‘s eponymous machines, the RX-78, Char’s Red Zaku, and The Witch From Mercury‘s Aerial Gundam.
Things only got worse with the recent Black Ops 6.
On one-hand, the game’s single-player campaign presented players with the ‘realism inspired, Hollywood action-fantasy enhanced’ gameplay experience that many have come to expect from the Black Ops series, in doing so arming them with actual real-world weapons and pitting them against regular human enemies wearing real-world (or at least real-world believable) gear.
But when it came to its multiplayer offerings, things grew evermore ‘out of pocket’ right out of the gate, with its Season One battle pass rewards including a number of ostentatious, brightly-colored weapon blueprints and a new Operator by the name of ‘Goliath’ – who himself wasn’t even human, but rather the living embodiment of “pure molten fury” (as described by his in-game bio).
Unfortunately for fans, rather than Goliath being the ‘upper limit’ of Black Ops 6‘s more non-standard character designs, the walking volcano instead turned out to be the ‘starting point’, as subsequent seasons would barrage players with an endless torrent of crossover skins, many of which were rendered in a ‘psuedo-cel-shaded’ style in an attempt to emulate their source material’s art styles.
Released in October 2024, the last 10 months have seen the addition of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Jay and Silent Bob (as well as their Bluntman and Chronic alter-egos), the eponymous Beavis & Butthead, Stan and Roger Smith from American Dad!, and Seth f–king Rogen.
Unsurprisingly, the relentless Fortnite-ing of the series has led to constant criticism from its player base, many of whom have urged the Call of Duty team to return to its more grounded visual roots.
And even more unsurprisingly, developers Treyarch and Raven Software, the former of which returns to the a lead developer role after dedicating their post-Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 attentions to the franchise’s multiplayer, Zombies, and Warzone battle royale modes, have actually agreed to rethink their design directions.
As announced by the studios in their August 2025 Call of Duty Community Update:
“Operators, Operator Skins, and Weapons from Black Ops 6 will no longer carry forward into Black Ops 7.
“Black Ops 7 needs to feel authentic to Call of Duty and its setting. That is why Black Ops 6 Operator and Weapon content will not carry forward to Black Ops 7. Double XP tokens and GobbleGums will still carry forward, because we recognize your time and progression are important.
“This change applies only to Black Ops 7. Call of Duty: Warzone is not affected, and all your Black Ops 6 content stays usable there.”
“In Black Ops 7, bundles and items will be crafted to fit the Black Ops identity. We hear the feedback. We need to deliver a better balance toward the immersive, core Call of Duty experience.”
All in all, whether the two studios can deliver on their promise will ultimately be revealed when Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 goes live on November 14th.
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