It’s been quite a while since the last good round-based Zombies mode in Call of Duty. Vanguard introduced zombies with miniguns for some reason, while Modern Warfare 3 ditched the round idea entirely to really advertise WarZone to a bunch of people that are going out of their way to buy Call of Duty already. It was to my surprise that I found the pseudo-sequel to Maid of Sker, Sker Ritual, which is actually a round-based Call of Duty Zombies type game. There are many ways to play Sker Ritual, you can aim for a high round, you can try to complete the story, you can suck entirely with a team of random people online and let them carry you through the game. Whatever your choice is, there’s quite a lot of fun to be had, if you’re willing to overlook some bits and pieces of the game.

Take that Slenderman! That’s for all the times I just wanted to collect some pictures!

First off, at launch, we have four maps to play. I hate to keep harping back to Call of Duty but for anyone keeping track that is twice the amount that any game with Zombies had at launch, and equal to where most games finish updating. Now yes, there isn’t any sort of additional campaign, or multiplayer, but the point still stands. There are also a variety of battlepasses, all themed around the different maps. They are also free, so that’s another point to Sker Ritual for the die hard Zombies fan in me.

Now let’s jump into the big negative for me right away, the controls. Your character, for as slim-built as they are, feels so heavy all the time. I have tried playing around with sensitivities and the lot, but I just could not find a spot that felt comfortable, which can be annoying for a first-person shooter. The other big complaint I would say I have is the brightness level. I understand this is part of a horror franchise, but do the maps need to be so consistently dark?

Red. A whole lot of red.

Moving onto the actual maps themselves, they are expansive. As someone who has played that other game since its first iteration, sometimes I get surprised by the size of the map you can pull off in a game like this and have it still be unique. Leaning back into my complaint about the darkness though, and yes, again, I fiddled with the brightness in the game, but finding a good spot was still very difficult, sometimes the overly dark areas can make it easy to lose track of where you are in the map. Brightness aside, the maps are really interesting, and diverse from each other. Each takes a section of Maid of Sker and makes it into its own map, filled with its own story to follow. Basically much like the big easter eggs in Zombies, but a little easier to follow because you’re actually given directions and indication of what’s needed from you.

Now onto the monsters, which there are a variety of. There are your basic husks that go down pretty easily. Then you start to deal with heftier enemies like the mariner who shoots lasers at you, or the blazeslinger, who as the name suggests, throws fireballs. The nice thing is, the fireballs do actually damage the other enemies if they hit them. On top of that, the blazeslinger explodes when killed, which will wipe out pretty much every regular enemy around it. It’s very handy for conserving ammo. Last up we have bosses, and if you played Maid of Sker you’ll be (un)happy to hear that our good friend Abraham is back as one of them. Each map has its own problems to deal with, so when it comes to playing for fun to level up your battle pass, you’ll want to find which one works best for you.

While everything within the game is cool let’s talk about between matches. One thing you’ll be able to do is upgrade the miracles that you can buy during them, such as extra health, fast reload, and more. All upgrade requirements are simply earned by playing the game, so that’s nice at least. You’ll also be able to customise your character. You have access to different emblems that you can use to customise your experience, but even more importantly, you’ll be able to change your mask. As mentioned, there are battle passes that you can work towards completing, all of which have a variety of masks that you can unlock. I would suggest just looking through the different passes and finding what customisation items suit you best.

Rudolph didn’t prepare me for this reindeer.

Last thing to mention is the actual audio. If there is anything Call of Duty fans are used to in zombies, especially past the first few maps, it’s a lot of voice acting work, and some great music. As far as I can tell there is no “easter egg song” which is fine, but it would be interesting to learn that I was wrong and it’s just really well hidden. The actual in game music is kind of relaxed. It definitely portrays horror/spooky vibes, but overall its nothing crazy. Last up is the actual voices, which are great. These are some very talented voice actors that do a great job at stressing urgency in the situation through their tone, but are still clear and understandable.

It’s fun to be able to build your character based on how you play.

Overall, Sker Ritual was a lot more of what I wanted and way more than I could have expected from it. Is this going to be a Call of Duty: Zombies killer? Maybe not as of now, but it’s clearly a really good step in the right direction, as that series simply doesn’t care about having to improve anymore. Even though it’s completely different from its predecessor, Sker Ritual is a pleasant surprise, a well-polished game, and something I definitely plan to continue returning to often, especially if there are any big content updates in the future.

Sker Ritual is available now on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X and PC.

Reviewed on Xbox Series X.

A copy of Sker Ritual was provided by the publisher.