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Another year, another Call of Duty - and, from a technological perspective, Black Ops 2 could prove to be the most ambitious yet. Treyarch's latest continues the company's tradition of expanding and improving upon the core Infinity Ward engine, with a host of new engine advancements revealed in the footage seen to date. The question is, at a time where many developers seem to be approaching the limits of current-gen consoles, can this ever-evolving codebase sustain the 60 frames per second update that the series has always aspired to?The best way to evaluate what we've seen of the game thus far is to take a look at the extended gameplay demo we saw at the E3 press conference. First impressions are positive - Black Ops 2 appears to be building upon the impressive character-rendering and animation tech pioneered in Treyarch's last game, and it's clear that the firm considers this a major element in its storytelling arsenal, as it's showcased extensively in the reveal trailer too (a 60FPS encode of which you'll find at the foot of this article). As the gameplay demo continues, it's immediately apparent that the developer has also made some major strides in size and scale - environments are immense, rich in detail - not just in terms of basic layout but also in the amount of animated incidental action. It's also believed that there will be multiple branches through each level as well, boosting the replay factor, and certainly giving the background streaming tech a more robust workout.
Also impressive are improvements to general effects work. Treyarch doesn't hold back on performance-sapping transparent alpha effects, with a real sense of volume to the effect, helped still further by a rich level of debris in high-impact explosions. Destruction - in the form of scripted sequences (such as the collapse of an elevated freeway in the demo) - also looks a class apart too. Realistic physics at high frame-rates simply look sensational, and whether it's collapsing scenery or downed jet-fighters, it's clear that Treyarch is really pushing the boat out with the COD campaign's signature set-pieces.
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