While Black Ops 4 (opens in new tab) doesn’t have a story as such (just narrative-lead tutorials) fans are zeroing on a potential Specialist HQ Easter egg that points to… something on the Black Ops 4 Blackout map (opens in new tab). Whether it unlocks skins, gear or something else entirely, it appears the few bits of in-game clues there are might be leading players towards some sort of secret, hidden in the game’s battle royale map.
- Black Ops 4 Blackout tips to know before you play
To access the start of the potential Easter egg you have to complete every single Specialist tutorial with one Bronze star. When you do, you unlock one final clip called “It’s YOU in the box”, which sees Frank Woods visit a wheelchair bound Mason in Blackout’s Asylum area (made from zombies map fave Verrückt, originally from Call of Duty: World at War) and look at a noticeboard on the wall. As Mason rambles incoherently (“Angola” seems to be the only word everyone agrees on right now) Woods states that “No, it’s you in the box, It’s always been you. Don’t black out man. I’m on it.”
I’ve added the emphasis on “black out” there just in case you missed the clue.
Now, that cutscene noticeboard does exists in Asylum on Blackout and, once you’ve completed the tutorials and watched the final clip, it shows four specialists with their names wrong, as shown here by Redditor DanSpurr (opens in new tab):
This apparently isn’t on the board before you get that final Mason/Wood clips and, as the big red arrows show, the names are wrong. It also seems to show younger versions of the characters.
This is the focus of the Easter egg hunt right now. The current theories (opens in new tab) point to clues involving the Intel you can unlock for various Specialists, as well as things Woods says to you when you complete different Specialist tutorials. Some think (opens in new tab) it requires certain things to be done at specific map locations, or that the numbers you can hear in some of the intel means something. One likely theory suggests that you have to play as a four man squad using those noticeboard characters to achieve anything.
The main thing is that there are a lot of ideas right now and not a lot of progress. Developer Treyarch loves a good Easter egg and previous ones have taken ages to even discover, let alone solve. If this does go somewhere it could be weeks, if not months, before anyone has a Eureka moment. Until then it’s fulling ‘does that tree look funny to you?’ levels of conspiracy madness among fans.
If you want some help surviving long enough to get to the Asylum and see for yourself then here are the best Black Ops 4 weapons (opens in new tab) to increase your chances.