Post Patch Testing:
The best thing I can say about Black Ops after the patch is that the server browser now functions correctly and connections actually hold. This was the same on both machines. The max spec machine still ran smoothly after the patch geared toward dual and quad core systems. I saw less questionable replays from the kill cam. Single-player continued to perform well on my new system.

The min spec machine performed slightly better in some cases during online matches; however, the game tended to slow to a crawl as the game progressed and more action was thrown onto the screen. It's not as bad as a slideshow anymore but sometimes kicks into a weird flip-book cycle. Which basically translates to a faster slideshow in some spots. Single-player, however, still hangs for my on my old machine. As I'm playing, the game doesn't have as many issues but when the game takes control of my camera (and still in cinematics) the game pauses frequently. On the subject of lag spikes, someone at the FPS Admin forums claim that the reason the game continues to have some issues is due to real-time stat streaming. The solution, according to the poster, is to set your game's priority to high in Task Manager. Also, it is noted that a high upstream helps. I'm connected to cable internet with a 50 Mbps downstream and a 2 Mbps upstream.

It's becoming increasingly apparent that multiplatform games, when released on PC, are being scaled back to match the console version. As I'm speaking specifically to the game's launch, a lot of the PC-centric content added to Black Ops that was removed from Modern Warfare 2 didn't work. Server lists wouldn't update correctly. The game wasn't scaled properly for a variety of PCs--oddly, many of the people claiming they have no issue at all are running i5 or i7 processors.

I should also note that, for me, the Theater mode does not work at all (pre or post patch); however, Brian says that the feature works just fine on his machine. According to both machines I used for this test, I had no recent games to pull video from. I'm not entirely sure what the issue is, as it works fine for me on console. Additionally, and this has nothing to do with any particular version or the game itself, the Call of Duty website is broken. This is why I could not provide any detailed per game breakdown--I wasn't aware it was broken until after I had played the game for ages.

Having played the game on PC and Xbox 360, I will say that I feel more comfortable playing it on PC. There are a few reasons for this, but primarily the game just looks better on PC. On console, the single-player component looks great but the multiplayer looks so washed out. Playing the game on the same monitor on console and then on PC using max settings, I just find myself performing better with the clarity the PC version provides.