Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 Strips Players of Difficulty Selection

The campaign of Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 won’t let players choose the difficulty, as revealed in a recent interview with the game’s associate creative director, Miles Leslie, for IGN.

Playable in solo, duo, trio or a team of four, Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 has none of the franchise’s common difficulty options, such as Recruit, Normal, Hardened or Veteran, to choose from, as the difficulty now scales based on how many individuals are playing and cannot be adjusted in the settings.

”We’ve baked it in because you have to approach a co-op campaign differently, and we wanted to make sure the missions felt right for solo players — we’re not forgetting about you, we love you — but also because it is a social experience we want to make sure it’s fun, but the right amount of challenging for two, three, and four players as well,” said Leslie.

Besides the narrative campaign, just like previous Call of Duty titles, Black Ops 7 will also include a multiplayer component and the cooperative round-based Zombies mode.

Co-developed by Treyarch and Raven Software and published by Activision, the 22nd installment of the franchise and the eighth main entry in the Black Ops sub-series is slated for release on Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and Windows PC on Nov. 14, 2025.

Set in 2035, the story of Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 will follow the team codenamed Specter One, led by JSOC Commander David “Section” Mason, as they investigate the apparent return of deceased Nicaraguan terrorist Raul Menendez and his threat to “burn the world” in three days.