Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is well into its first season, and that means it’s time for the mid-way Season 1 Reloaded update to shake things up. This seasonal batch of content will bring three new Multiplayer maps — including a reimagined Hacienda from Black Ops 4 — as well as the highly-anticipated Citadelle de Morts Zombies map, a festive makeover for Liberty Falls, the return of a classic Zombies perk, and will see the release of Urzikstan Ranked Play for Warzone.
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All of that is just the tip of the iceberg for Season 1 Reloaded. Multiplayer fans can look forward to the arrival of Hacienda, as well as the new Strike map, Racket, which pits teams against each other in the heart of a close-quarters bank vault. Additionally, get ready for some extra holiday cheer with Winter Nuketown. The familiar halls of the nuclear testing zone will be decked with boughs of holly while teams duke it out as normal. Infected will also receive a similar makeover in the Infectious Holiday playlist.
Our lone new game mode is Ran-Snack. This one keeps with the Holiday theme. Players battle for possession of snack crates to loot and return to their base. Enemies drop their snacks on death, making it a mad dash to hoard the biggest pile of winter treats. If you remember Fracture/Stockpile from earlier Black Ops games, then you’ll get the gist right away.
Further still, a new Perk and Wildcard are hitting the scene. Equipping the Shrapnel Radar perk means “Blast damage dealt from area-of-effect Lethals, Tacticals and Field Upgrades mark the injured target on your minimap.” The High Roller Wildcard allows you to add a fourth killstreak to your loadout. This should fit right in with the Dispatcher perk, as it reduces the cost of non-lethal killstreaks.
It’s a whole different ballgame for Zombies. Not only is Citadelle de Morts set to make a splash, but there’s a new enemy type, Perk-A-Cola, Field Upgrade, Support Streak, and Limited Time Mode coming to shake things up. First, up is the map. Citadelle de Morts is a French cathedral overrun by the hellish creatures we’ve all come to know and love (and the new two-headed Doppleghast special zombie).
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Blowing away the hordes will be easier than ever thanks to the lightning aura of Tesla Storm. This field upgrade calls up a jolt of elemental powers and chains off of friendly players to freeze all normal Zombies in place. Clean them up with the new high-caliber Hand Cannon support streak to maximize your fun.
This is all made sweeter by the return of the Vulture Aid Perk-A-Cola, which adds even more loot to pick up after every kill. A Vulture Aid machine can be found natively on Citadelle de Morts, but the perk can still be obtained via Der Wunderfizz machines on the other maps.
Finally, Ranked Play returns to Warzone’s big map in Season 1 Reloaded. Urzikstan launched shortly after the release of Modern Warfare 3, and while the competitive community was chomping at the bit to get back into Ranked, that dream never materialized. Raven Software opted for a year of Ranked Resurgence instead. Now, Battle Royale fans will get to make up for lost time.
The mode will work very similarly to years past, but the same tweaks made for Multiplayer Ranked (no rank restrictions for four stack, and SR protection adjusted to three losses per promotion instead of three matches per promotion) all apply here.
Additionally, there will be no more Skill Divisions (ex. Bronze III). All players will be sorted into flat ranks from from Bronze to Iridescent. This Mode requires all players to place Top 15 in Battle Royale or the Top 6 in Resurgence across a total of 30 matches. All of your wins and placements from Season 1 will count towards this goal.
Ranked grinders aren’t the only ones feasting, though. Area 99 will play host to Holiday Rush. This quick-hitting experience shrinks the storm, adds snowball coolers around the map, and channels the essence of both Supreme Resurgence and Mini-Royale modes of Warzone’s yesteryear. The fan-favorite Slay Ride Resurgence will also be hitting the streets of Urzikstan during Season 1 Reloaded.
All of this is bolstered by the arrival of new weapons. Treyarch’s latest batch of goodies is headlined by the AMR Mod 4. This show-stopping Sniper Rifle is the spiritual successor to the Barrett 50. Cal (or Rytec AMR) This is the kind of gun which lets you take enemy Operators out with one shot to the torso, re-center your crosshair, and continue to wreak havoc until the cows come home.
Unfortunately, all of this content may not be a strong enough bandage for Black Ops 6‘s current problems. The game has been scorched by waves of criticism since the launch of Season 1. Not only have cheaters infiltrated Ranked Play, completely ruining the competitive experience for players in Diamond rank and above, but RICOCHET, Activision’s signature anti-cheat is roughly as a snowball thrown at Krampus. Meanwhile, hit detection issues are bad enough in Warzone some players are making a full exodus from the game. All in all, getting the game fixed has to be priority number one. Otherwise, these seasonal set pieces may very well melt on arrival.
