Call of Duty Zombies Bracket Round 2!

[RadZakpak]

Hey everyone, this is Round 2 of the Call of Duty Zombies Map Tournament! For more info on the results of round 1, click here: 

 

So, time to vote on who proceeds through round 2! Just reply in this format:

1. [Your Pick]

2. [Your Pick]

3. [Your Pick]

...

15. [Your Pick]

 

On Friday April 12th at 11:59 AM CST, votes will not longer be accepted.

For those that can't view the image, here are the options: 

1. The Giant or Shi No Numa

2. Ancient Evil or Nuktown

3. Shadows of Evil or Buried

4. Moon or TranZit

5. Kino der Toten or Verruckt

6. Ascension or Shangri-La

7. Classified or Der Riese

8. Call of the Dead or Origins

 

 

Feel free to discuss and justify your picks!

[RadZakpak]

My votes:

1. The Giant: I have great memories on both, but The Giant I played to death grinding all of Black Ops 3's weapons, and I could still play it today! Great tribute to an all-time classic, and the opening cutscene blew my mind (And Richtofen's). This set Primis' journey in motion and really got our heads spinning regarding the storyline.

 

2. Ancient Evil: With time to play it, I absolutely love this map. It may be the best of BO4's offering, and has to beat out Nuketown.

 

3. Shadows of Evil: Though I love a lot about Buried, in the end it bores me every time I play it at some point in the game. Shadows has so much to do and so much to see, it can't get boring no matter the strategy.

 

4. Moon: My all time favorite! TranZit just doesn't compare in this category.

 

5. Kino der Toten: My first zombies map and will be remembered fondly till the end of time. I love Verruckt too, but nostalgia wins the day.

 

6. Ascension: So many great memories on Ascension, and I actually like the monkeys! Great new perks and great setting overall.

 

7. Der Riese: This was a tough choice to make. But I have to pick Der Riese  Der Riese is a fantastic map that kept people in love with the mode for a year of downtime, and set in motion the story as we know it! The foundation here that is still used today is immense.

 

8. Origins: Again, a tough choice, and I fear Call of the Dead may be forgotten by many as it hasn't been remade. Origins just switched it all up, and was so interesting it kept people going for 2 years, doubling that of Der Riese. Features in this map are reused time and time again because they just work so well.

 

[Electric Jesus]

1. The Giant. 

 

2. Ancient Evil. Demolished the easter egg with my bud yesterday, great map. It’s like BO4’s Eisendrache, maybe slightly less so. Gauntlets are insanity. 

 

3. Buried. A very difficult pick, but if I had to go and pick one map to play right now, it would be Buried. As an overall artistic endeavor SoE is a masterpiece of aesthetics and narrative, but as Jason Blundell often reiterates, zombies is a Game first and foremost, so I gotta go with what I’ve had the most fun playing. If I had only ever played through buried and SoE one time each, Shadows would win, but there’s a lot of tedium that reduces replayability. Much like MotD, if you had to turn a map into a Feature Film, Shadows would probably be the obvious pick, but i don’t feel like getting re-betrayed by the shadowman every time i wanna pack-a-punch. I think Treyarch sorta crammed a lot of the easter egg / narrative / scavenger hunt content into the early-game setup in order to force newb players to get acclimated to that kinda thing. Like, 75% of the shadows easter egg is just getting your class set up, because they took things we were used to getting more easily (PaP, relevant wonderweapons) and hid them behind a bunch of rituals and stuff. Great map for just one big playthrough, like a movie. There’s a bunch of weird setup stuff in Buried with using Arthur to break the barriers, but you can go for that gnarly challenge Awaken the Gazebo, “pack a punch on round 1” which is way more fun than a SoE PaP speedrun. 

 

4. Moon. If only we could have aimed all 3 missiles at Hanford, Washington State, USA. Then no goddamn bus driver. 

 

5. Kino Der Toten. Layout wise and atmospherically Kino and Verruckt are pretty similar actually, Kino is just Verruckt on steroids. The projector room is the shit. 

 

6. Ascension. I wish I could see a master list of all my hours played on every map, because I suspect BO1 ascension might take the cake for me. Just dude, the OG strategy of only buying to PhD, and you and your bud defend QR and PhD against the monkeys, til you get all the perks with all the doors still closed. oof. 

 

7. Classified. Frankly, even if it was between The Giant and Classified, I’d go with Classified, but seeing as how “The Giant” blows the original der riese out of the water IMO, it’s really no contest. I know it’s the “Stairway to Heaven” of zombies maps, but again, it’s a matter of what I’d wanna hop on and play right now, and frankly i don’t wanna lose my jug to the jank-ass OG wunderwaffe. I’m addicted to classified too because I’m on the dark-matter grind. 

 

8. Origins. Call of the Dead was very much so another BO1 map, and a spectacular one at that, but Origins was the beginning of an era, where the story really kicked off into the multiverse, the standard for future wonderweapons was set, and it was the first map where they were like “alright from here on out we’re gonna fuckin drown every map in aesthetic” and it’s awesome. Like, Treyarch loves taking 2 aesthetics that are basically unrelated, and smashing them together, and Origins is where they got the courage to do that. Chicago noir + lovecraftian horror? Dieselpunk WW1 + ancient archaeology? Siege of Stalingrad + Dragons and Robots? HELL YEA. 

 

I remember during like the BO1 season, it was super common to guess what a future map location was gonna be. There were obvious ones like “Paris” or “Atlantis” or whatever, but people were always generally like “oh I bet there’s gonna be a map in a hospital / school” and stuff like that. Or like ooh, what if there was a map that took place entirely on a boat. Now Origins and the Multiverse blew our horizons wide open. So now we can speculate where a map’s going to take place, when, and what other ridiculous anachronistic twist they feel like throwing in there. 

 

This is a tangent, but here’s my pitch for Zombies Chronicles 2: Call of the Dead, TranZit (plus bus depot, farm and town), die rise, buried, nuketown. 

 

although i’ve heard murmurs that the next Aether map will be like a Blood-style expansion of Nuketown. So we shall see what maps remain when this season is over. 

[Lenne]

1. The Giant. Of course this one wins, cause it has way more to offer than Shi No Numa. The only thing Shi No Numa did better is "The one" I really, really don't like the remix of BoA. haha

2. Nuketown. I just love this one way too much, up until years after Origins came out, it was my favorite on BO2. Also the Galvaknuckles are the best. haha

 

3. Shadows of Evil. Shadows looks better, plays better, sounds better, tastes better, smells better, feels better.

 

4. Moon. NML>

 

5. Kino der Toten. Like EJ already said it is a better Verrückt and like RZP already said Nostalgia wins the day. If I could go back to the days of me coming home from school and just playing KdT over and over again I certainly would.

 

6. Shangri-La. My favorite map of BO1, but it pains me to choose between BO1 maps. haha

 

7. Der Riese. Know your roots

 

8. Call of the Dead. You know this one is hard, but I gotta go with CotD it just wins my heart. ^^

[Schrödinger]

1. Shi No Numa : Because it reminds me Karda Nui.

2. Nuketown

3. Buried

4. Moon

5. Verrückt

6. Ascension

7. Der Riese : Where's the dragon for the beauty of annihilation ?

8. Call of the Dead

[jiipee95]

1. Shi No Numa - I have to keep in mind we're comparing the BO3 Der Riese aka Giant and not the WAW one for this one. It is a remade map and I think it's a downgrade from the WAW and BO1 versions (well not graphicwise). Shi No Numa is a solid map so I'll give this one for that.

 

2. Nuketown - There's not really competition here for me. I haven't played the new map a lot and while the first impression is good I just can't let it go further based on that. It takes time to form my final opinion on that map and Nuketown, while not being my favorite map, isn't my hated maps either so for me it makes more sense to give this one to Nuketown.

 

3. Shadows of Evil - It's more frustrating to get going but I gotta pick this one over Buried. Buried has lots of cool unique features, but it all just feels like a group project where everyone did one part separately and then in the end slammed it all together. It's fun to play though. Shadows Of Evil on the other hand happens to be one of the maps in BO3, I like the visual style of the map a lot (I don't really like margwas and the flys design for this map though), you can also explore the map in any order you like which is nice (A bit like Shi No Numa actually).

 

4. Moon - Well Moon is one of my favorites and THE EPIC map for me. Tranzit on the other hand... well we all know what Tranzit is like.

 

5. Kino der Toten - Well this is tough choice. I love both maps, but I'm gonna let nostalgia decide and give this round to Kino. This could have been either one, some other day I would have picked differently probably.

 

6. Shangri-La - Visually more appealing, much more interesting gameplay wise since it's pretty hard. I like Ascension too but in my ranks Shangri-La is higher.

 

7. Der Riese - Another tough choice but I'm gonna go with the old map. Classified is a remake made right though, but I just can't say I'd like it more than Der Riese.

 

8. Origins - Origins is a fun map, Call Of The Dead is not for me. I just really dislike the George Romero chasing you the whole game. Maybe if you could get rid of it at somepoint it wouldn't be a problem, but since he comes back even if you kill him, it's an easy win for Origins.

[anonymous]

1.Shi no Numa: I kinda agree with Jiip on this one. Next to this, I like Shi no Numa's setting as well as the fact it sparked the Ultimis story.

 

2.  I love Nuketown. But as I never played Ancient Evil, I find it unfair to make a choice, and so I leave this one empty/neutral

 

3. Tough one. Shadows of Evil has it charms, a great layout and countless posibilities, and tbh, this map actually is better. Yet, I personally enjoy playing Buried more, and since it's mystery still keeps us going theorizing relatively much, I'm going for this map. (Shadows has alit of mysteries as well, though, most of all BO3 maps)

 

4. Tranzit. While Moon fits in my top 3 maps as well, it didn't cost me alot of time to choose Tranzit above.

 

5. I like playing both Kino and Verrückt. Kino has alot of great memories and mysteries, but Verrückt was just as revolutionary as Ascension and Origins: It was also a sign Zombies was becoming something more than a one bonusmap feature. I'll go for Verrückt.

 

6. Ascension. While Shangri La is much more pretty and challenging, Ascension was, as said earlier, a map revolution. And kinda what @Electric Jesus said in previous Bracket: It showed the enormous new potential story wise, as it was the first leap in the Cold War era.

 

7. Der Riese: The start of the Nazi science and Vril mythology. Without this map, the story would've gone a way other direction.

 

8. As I sadly never played CotD (out of all never-played maps, I desire to this one the most) I won't vote for this one either.

 

 

[RadZakpak]

Voting will end tonight, so be sure and get your votes in if you haven’t already!

[RadZakpak]

Votes are in! Let's see who advances and who gets left behind to Zombies history...

 

Here are the results:

 

1. The Giant (3) vs Shi No Numa (3): Ahhhh, a tie! Time to consult the ethereal coin toss... Tails! Shi No Numa takes the win!

2. Ancient Evil (2) vs Nuketown (3): Nuketown takes it over the brand new Ancient Evil. Perhaps it has stood the test of time better than one would expect.

3. Shadows of Evil (3) vs Buried (3): Oof! Another tie. Flipping... and... Tails! Buried narrowly leads the path!

4. Moon (5) vs TranZit (1): A near landslide victory, Moon advances to round 3 with pride.

5. Kino der Toten (4) vs Verruckt (2): The Black Ops classic Kino der Toten advances once again to the big leagues.

6. Ascension (4) vs Shangri-La (2): Two Black Ops Legends square up, but the cosmodrome manages to eek ahead.

7. Classified (1) vs Der Riese (5): It's widely regarded as THE fan favorite for a reason... Der Riese squashes the competition.

8. Call of the Dead (2) vs Origins (3): A narrow, triumphant victory for Origins!

 

I will be posting round 3 shortly. Excellent voting everyone!