Pre-order bonus for Call of Duty: Black Ops II includes double XP weekend

Activision has revealed a new pre-order bonus for its flagship first person shooter (FPS), Call of Duty: Black Ops II. Those who pre-order the game will be getting the Nuketown 2025map for the multiplayer game mode, as well as double XP for the first weekend of play after release, which is November 16 to November 18. 

Here is the description of Nuketown 2025 by Activision: “An arena-style map with unique art design, Nuketown promoted the type of fast-paced action that Call of Duty fans from around the world have come to love. Now re-imagined in a 50's depiction of the ‘Model Home of the Future’ Nuketown 2025 is set to take that familiar close-quarters chaos into the future!”

Pre-order bonuses include a map and double XP for a weekend

The game got a trailer back in August that showed the multiplayer. While the basics don’t seem to have changed much from Black Ops or Modern Warfare 3 with the constant action and rewards for doing almost anything, there are some interesting things such as some of the sci-fi stuff in the game, including mechs, and what appear to be EMP grenades.

The previous game in the Call of Duty series was Modern Warfare 3, which was released last year. While gameplay stayed very much the same as previous iterations, the stakes had been raised significantly, as the game’s protagonists had to deal with the looming threat of World War III. If you have played previous CoD games, specifically the Modern Warfare series, Modern Warfare 3 will be familiar territory with non-stop balls-to-the-wall action and cinematic set-pieces.

The Call of Duty series originally dealt with events during World War II. After the unsuccessful Call of Duty 3, developers Infinity Ward shook things up by making Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. This game saw a large amount of success and sealed the fate of World War II based shooters.

After Modern Warfare, developers Treyarch made Call of Duty 5: World At War, which took the series back to its World War II roots. The game went for a more violent and gruesome depiction of World War II and added new weapons such as the flamethrower. The game also added a new game mode featuring zombie Nazi soldiers.

After World At War, Infinity Ward took back the reins of the franchise to create Modern Warfare 2. The game was released amid many controversies, like the No Russian level, which had the player take on the role of an undercover CIA agent infiltrating a Russian terrorist cell. The level consisted of the player and the characters walking through a Russian airport and gunning down innocent civilians and police officers. Another reason the game became infamous was for the PC version of the game not having many of the options gamers on the PC need or want, such as a developer console, a slider to increase the field of vision and the lack of dedicated servers for the game.

Call of Duty: Black Ops II is set to release on 12 November 2012 for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC. The game will also be available for the Wii U.