Call of Duty Black Ops is a test for game studio coming out of the shadows

Call of Duty Black Ops could very well be the best video game of the year, but the video game studio that made it has spent much of its history as a second-string team. Tonight, the game goes on sale at midnight at a bunch of stores across the country and fans will find out for sure if Treyarch, the game studio that built the game for publisher Activision Blizzard, has graduated to the big leagues.

Santa Monica, Calif.-based Treyarch Studios created Black Ops from the ground up. For much of the history of the Call of Duty franchise, Infinity Ward served as the premiere studio making what were regarded as the best combat games in the industry. Infinity Ward came crashing to a halt in March when Activision Blizzard — the owner of both studios — fired the two studio chiefs because they were allegedly plotting to set up their own independent company. The event made investors nervous, since Encino, Calif.-based Infinity Ward had created Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, the most successful video game in history, selling 20 million units and generating well above $1 billion in revenues. The loss of Infinity Ward’s leadership jeopardized a beloved franchise that had generated more than $3 billion for Activision Blizzard over a decade.

The firings instigated lawsuits, the founders Vince Zampella and Jason West set up their own rival studio, and they recruited dozens of Infinity Ward employees to join them. Activision Blizzard had to quickly restore the leadership of the studio and then set it on track to produce future Call of Duty games. There’s only a new Call of Duty coming out this year — Black Ops — because Infinity Ward’s sister studio stayed focused on its mission.

With more than 300 employees led by studio chief Mark Lamia, Treyarch’s turn was a long time coming. Typically, Infinity Ward produced a brand new Call of Duty game on a two-year cycle. Treyarch would pick up the slack with a derivative game in the off year. But early on, Treyarch was at a disadvantage. It had to make other games in addition to its Call of Duty titles, whereas Infinity Ward focused solely on Call of Duty.

For instance, Call of Duty 3 was a Treyarch title that came out in November, 2006. Lamia said in our interview this summer that the studio had less than a year to work on that game. The poor reviews of the title pretty much reflected the fact that the studio didn’t have enough time to make a high-quality game. After that, Lamia decided that his studio had to step up. The company managed to get rid of all of its other game responsibilities and focus solely on Call of Duty.

The result was a first-class title: Call of Duty: World at War, which debuted in November, 2008. That game sold more than 1.4 million units in the U.S. and received an average Metacritic rating of 83, which was a reasonably good showing but far short of Infinity Ward’s 2007 title, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, which debuted in 2007. That game had an average rating of 92 and sold millions of copies.

With Call of Duty Black Ops, Treyarch doubled down on its investment and departed from the World War II setting, moving into the Cold War era of “Black Operations,” or covert missions behind enemy lines. That was probably one of the best moves the company could have made, since it gave the Treyarch designers the freedom to travel over a lot of settings, from Vietnam to Russia, using fresh material that hasn’t been done to death. Treyarch also had the luxury of working only on the Black Ops game.

“For this game, having the entire studio focused on a Call of Duty game from the beginning has made all of the difference,” said Lamia (pictured) in our earlier interview.

Lamia, who has been at Activision Blizzard for 15 years, took charge of Treyarch in 2006 and will likely get the credit or the blame for this new title, depending on how sales go. But analysts are anticipating that Black Ops will sell close to the 20 million units that Modern Warfare 2 sold. Activision Blizzard chief executive Bobby Kotick said last week that pre-orders for the Black Ops game are actually better than any previous game. Last year, in its first five days, Modern Warfare 2 sold more than $500 million worth. The Los Angeles Times reports that the game’s budget was above $50 million, though Activision Blizzard hasn’t disclosed what it has spent. The marketing budget is likely to be extremely high as well, as TV commercials have aired nonstop advertising for the game.

I’ve already played a number of levels of Black Ops and it’s a first-class Call of Duty experience. I’m looking forward to playing the single-player campaign game all the way through and then taking up the multiplayer version as well. Last year, I was hooked on the game for weeks, largely because the multiplayer experience was so good. Like many fans, I can hardly wait to judge the outcome.

Already, Activision Blizzard is doubling down again, promising a new Call of Duty shooter game for the fall of 2011. That may come from either Infinity Ward, which has staffed up again, or yet another Call of Duty Studio, Sledgehammer games.