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Call of Duty: Black Ops III Awakening is the first of four DLC announced for the latest release, and guess what? It’s got multiplayer maps!

It’s fair to say that the Call of Duty release cycle is a little predictable.

First, you throw darts at a board to decide which of the Advanced Call of Modern Ghost World Ops Warfare suffixes the next game is going to take, then make the announcement in summer, around the time of the major gaming expos. You release some really brilliant trailers, and everybody momentarily forgets that it’s just a re-hash of last year’s release and gets quite excited. Then, six to eight weeks before the holidays, you release the game; it’s the one thing every teenage boy wants, and it probably tops the Christmas charts in most countries – in fact it’s just this moment been confirmed that Black Ops III is the UK Christmas number one.

And once the game is out, you punctuate the year with precisely four DLC releases, roughly every three months or so – containing mostly maps and multiplayer trinkets – until the next release comes around. Lather, rinse, repeat.

It’s no surprise then that this morning Activision have announced the Call of Duty: Black Ops III Awakening DLC, the first download pack for their latest release, and it’s coming on February 2, 2016 – almost exactly three months after the initial release.

So what’s in the Black Ops III Awakening DLC, then? Multiplayer maps, of course – four of them to be precise – and you can watch the video above for more information. Even I have to admit that the one set in a water park, complete with slides and flumes, is a surprisingly good idea. Fans of the series will also be pleased to see ‘Skyjacked’, an aerial re-imagining of the classic ‘Hijacked’ map from Black Ops II.

The Black Ops III Awakening DLC also includes the next chapter in Shadows of Evil, otherwise known as Black Ops III: Zombies mode. It’s fair to say that the star-studded and imaginative Shadows of Evil has been one of the real highlights of this year’s release, and given that single-player or campaign content is usually sorely under-represented in Call of Duty DLC, it’s a welcome addition.

Please note however, that the Black Ops III Awakening DLC will not be available for PS3 or Xbox 360.


You can pick up Black Ops III from Amazon now, but in order to play the Black Ops III Awakening DLC you might want to grab a season pass.

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