Call of Duty fans who retreated to the classics to escape the modern era of the franchise just got a rude awakening. A newly released update for the Ps5 versions of Call of Duty: Black Ops 1 and Black Ops 2 has turned the beloved retro shooters into a marketing channel for Modern Warfare 4, proving that no corner of the franchise is safe from Activision’s promotional machine.
What the New Black Ops Update Actually Does
According to GamesRadar, the latest patch for the PS5 ports of Black Ops 1 (2010) and Black Ops 2 (2012) injects promotional material for Modern Warfare 4 directly into the classic games. That means players who boot up these decade-plus-old titles to relive the campaigns, the iconic multiplayer maps, or the original Zombies experience are now met with advertising for the franchise’s newest upcoming entry before they even reach the main menu.
For many, this defeats the entire purpose of returning to the classics. The PS5 ports were embraced precisely because they offered a time capsule: an era of Call of Duty before battle passes, bundle shops, and relentless cross-promotion dominated the experience.
Why Fans Are Frustrated
The Classics Were an Escape Hatch
Modern Call of Duty has become an enormous, interconnected ecosystem, and not every longtime fan is on board with its direction. Plenty of players have voiced fatigue with yearly releases, heavy monetization, and the constant presence of Warzone integration. For that crowd, Black Ops 1 and 2 represent the golden age — tight multiplayer, memorable campaigns, and Zombies at its creative peak.
Dropping Modern Warfare 4 ads into those games doesn’t just feel like an interruption. It feels like the modern franchise chasing them down even in the one space they had left. As GamesRadar put it, FPS fans sick of modern Call of Duty can’t escape Modern Warfare 4, even in their old favorites.
The Bigger Picture: Every Call of Duty Is Now an Ad
To be fair, this move is part of a well-established pattern. Activision has increasingly treated every touchpoint in the Call of Duty ecosystem — including older titles — as prime advertising real estate. With Modern Warfare 4 positioned as the next major installment in the series, the publisher is clearly maximizing awareness across its entire player base, including the millions who recently picked up the classic Black Ops ports on PS5.
From a business standpoint, it makes cold, hard sense. The Black Ops ports attracted a huge nostalgic audience, and that’s exactly the demographic Activision wants to win back for its next big release. But from a player-experience standpoint, it’s easy to see why the reaction has been negative. There’s something distinctly cynical about selling players a return to the past, then plastering the present all over it.
It also raises a question worth watching: if ads can be pushed into games that are more than a decade old via a simple update, what does that mean for game preservation and the idea of “finished” classics? Games as live platforms may be the industry norm now, but titles from 2010 and 2012 were never designed with that expectation.
Grab Your Call of Duty Codes and PSN Gift Cards at TURGAME
Whether you’re diving back into the classic Black Ops campaigns or planning to jump into Modern Warfare 4 at launch, you can pick up PSN gift cards, Call of Duty points, and game codes at TURGAME.com at competitive prices, with instant delivery so you can get straight back to playing.
The Bottom Line
The new Black Ops 1 and 2 update on PS5 may be a small change on the surface, but it symbolizes something bigger: in Activision’s vision of Call of Duty, there is no offline, no retro, and no refuge — only the next release. Fans of the classics will have to decide whether a few seconds of Modern Warfare 4 branding is enough to spoil the nostalgia trip.
Source: GamesRadar