Nihilistic Want Zombies In Black Ops Vita, But It’s Up To Sony And Activision

The PlayStation Vita Call of Duty – dubbed Declassified – is out next month, and is seriously struggling to gain much in the way of positive reception from fans after some relatively lacklustre conference showings recently.

From “improved but not really” visuals and a limited multiplayer, this is a Call of Duty that seriously needs to impress, and quickly. One of the cool things it could have done was feature Zombies mode, but that’s not likely.

“Only Activision and Sony have the power to greenlight Zombies mode for CoD Vita,” the studio said on Twitter recently. “We would love to do it if they ask. But its not our call.”

As to why Nihilistic haven’t made the suggestion: “we absolutely have,” they insisted.

It sounds like they’re fairly hamstrung as to what goes in and what doesn’t. Another tweet says that they “don’t dictate what sort of things might get added in the future” when asked whether the player count online could get higher.

I really hope Declassified ends up being good, at least for the sake of the platform it’s exclusive to, but a lack of 60fps and a stripped back online experience (along with those visuals) suggests a potentially unsatisfying experience – not a huge surprise given the Californian devs were only brought in less than a year ago.

Hopefully we’ll get preview code soon.

16 Comments

  1. Im glad i read this as i was gonna get it for the zombie mode didnt realise it wasnt included.

  2. Probably wasn’t green-lighted because at the rate these guys are going it would take another year for them to implement it. I mean, the Vita is easy to develop for compared to home consoles, but these guys are still struggling to get an appealing game out and as such should not be allowed to be creative with things like zombies etc.
    Overall, why didn’t Sony just get Bend/Zipper to rush this project? At least then they could use assets from great games…

    • Considering they have only just released Resistance for Vita the time frame for this game is very low.

      It clearly shows that all activision have done is lent Sony the COD/Black ops name and sony’s own studio are then doing it.

      Pity it’s the same studio who did resistance and from all accounts are just re-suing assets.

      Now look at Guerrilla games Killzone Vita game and you can see that Nihilistic are 3rd grade :)

      But going back to your statement it may be easier to develop for but seriously 6 months.. with I’d imagine a smaller studio – if anything this is a rush job :)

      • Yeah I get this is a rush job, that much is obvious. What I don’t get (and what I should’ve been clearer about before) is why Sony didn’t give it to Zipper, for example, instead of closing them down; Unit 13 was developed in a small time frame, worked on the same premise of short spec-ops style missions and was for the Vita, yet Sony chose this incompetent studio that they don’t even own! Even if Zipper (or any other first-party studio, for that matter) had re-used assets like Nihilistic have done, it still would’ve turned out better than this…

  3. I can see this game being a massive disappointment from what I’ve seen, and i’m not sure if this is THE Vita shooter, Killer App that Sony want it to be. I guess they could develop the zombies mode as DLC? or even a separate game on PSN.

  4. Hold on a minute, it’s got those visuals and it’s not even 60FPS? I just don’t see this being any good.

  5. Let’s not pretend Nihilistic are useless, that’s not true. Resistance wasn’t great but it was hardly terrible and Sony needed CoD turning around in six months or so.

    It’s only recently become a ‘game’ and Nihilstic have had what, 6 months? What did we expect?

    The issue is that Sony needed a CoD game, Activision didn’t want to handle it, and everyone else was busy/too expensive/closed.

    My fingers are still crossed.

  6. Why hasn’t Activision cashed in with the zombie mode meaning to create a spin-off out of it. Surely its instant $$$.

  7. Why’s zombie mode up to Sony?

    It’s an Activision game. Maybe they’ve filled up the game cart and can’t fit zombies? Strange.

    • Yet criterion by all accounts are able to manage the full phat version of NFS:Most Wanted from ps3 onto Vita (with obviously slightly less graphical detail and less players online). But fully function open world as opposed to a few spec op style missions and 6 maps.

      I just call it – they just haven’t had enough time.

      Going of pre-orders on Vgchartz it’s not even registering – hell persona a niche japanese rpg is getting far more. Anyway went off topic :)

      • But that doesn’t explain why it’s Sony’s call…

  8. PRobably because Activision can’t be arsed.

  9. I might be alone in this but I’m looking forward to playing it. Probably won’t be a world beater but as long as it works ok and is enjoyable that is fine with me. I liked Burning Skies (offline and online) despite the flaws it had.

    I’d rather play a decent, ok-looking game than a graphical powerhouse that only has it’s looks going for it.

  10. I feel sorry for those who will buy this game not knowing what it will truly be like.

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