KitGuru Games: Omni-movement culminates 30 years of FPS innovation

Introduced to most people at the time through the seminal success of the 1993 classic DOOM, the first-person shooter genre has stayed surprisingly close to the rules set by John Romero and co. more than 30 years ago. That’s not to say that there haven’t been new and innovative ideas over the generations, with the likes of Call of Duty bringing first-person shooters to the top of the video games industry and even breaking through into the mainstream – allowing the opportunity for other devs and studios to experiment with the genre.

Of course, to remain at the top of the FPS mountain, Call of Duty has itself tried to evolve and innovate in a ton of different ways; for better and for worse. That said, with the release of Black Ops 6, it seems as though the team at Treyarch made sure to study the genre – perhaps more closely than ever – bringing us the new omni-movement system which, to me, represents the culmination of 3 decades worth of first-person shooter innovation.

First thing’s first: what is omni-movement? To give a brief description, this new traversal overhaul is said to have been ‘built from the ground up’ and will allow players to sprint in any direction; dive in any direction; adjust aiming freely while prone (known as supine prone), and slide in any direction too.

Of course, the intention behind the creation of omni-movement is for it to be greater than the sum of its parts – but we’ll get properly into the new system in a bit. Before that, we need to go all the way back to 1993.

While not the very first FPS game to have been created, DOOM was by far the catalyst which helped birth the genre into what it is today. Given its age and place in the timeline of first person shooters, the original DOOM is understandably quite dated in a number of ways.

With it not being a true 3D title, players had no vertical aiming, meaning any sense of height or elevation were merely clever tricks by the devs at the time. Still, even in a title as early as DOOM, you had the fundamentals: moving, aiming and shooting.

As established, aiming was rather rudimentary – and so was shooting – and while these two facets of the genre would be almost entirely overridden as technology improved, the movement in DOOM remains as smooth as the day it launched; a fact which Treyarch seems to have caught on to.

Just as with the aiming and shooting, movement in DOOM is incredibly simplistic: you can go forwards, backwards, diagonally or strafe from side to side. This style of movement has remained true for pretty much every first person game released nowadays, pushed into being the default in part thanks to the rise of dual analogue controllers and the like.

The one influence which a majority of devs moved away from in this regard however was the fact that in DOOM you moved at the same speed irrespective of your direction (this is certainly one of the reasons why DOOM speedruns are so fun to watch).

Unfortunately, aside from future entries in the DOOM series itself, most games moved away from this style of traversal. Thanks to the likes of Call of Duty and its own take on the FPS genre, what constituted a typical first person shooter was altered slightly.

Established rather early on in the franchise’s lifecycle, Call of Duty included many more variable elements which directly impacted the FPS experience. From aiming down sights; to crouching (and proning); to most importantly – sprinting – how first person shooters were played would fundamentally change over a few short years.

Many of these changes were well received and added an extra layer of complexity and choice when it came to each and every enemy encounter. 

As I’ve discussed in a previous KitGuru Games, over the past two decades Call of Duty has innovated and tried to evolve the genre in a bunch of different ways – for better and for worse. When it comes to gameplay however, the teams at Sledgehammer Games, Treyarch and Infinity Ward have thrown a ton of new elements and changes, with a solid number of them managing to stick.

As mentioned, there have been the likes of aiming down sights; crouching and proning; sprinting; dolphin diving; sliding and more. Interestingly over COD’s many entries, a number of these have been further iterated upon, becoming more useful, diverse and tactical.

Speaking of tactical, 2019’s Modern Warfare reboot saw the addition of the tactical sprint, letting you risk a further increase in weapon draw speeds (or a surprise enemy around the corner) in order to run forward at a much faster pace for a short while – allowing you to possibly reach an enemy objective faster, avoid gunfire and more.

Similarly, 2023’s Modern Warfare III added the tac-stance. Having gone much more in-depth HERE, this recent addition offers players an in-between for hip-firing and aiming down sights; giving you some of the benefits from both, while also a couple drawbacks. Essentially you can aim and shoot your gun faster but at the cost of a slightly wider bullet spread and less accuracy.

Being easily my favourite part of last year’s COD, I’m glad to see the feature being adopted into more games – from Black Ops 6 itself to the upcoming tactical shooter ‘Delta Hawks’. It seems like the tac-stance might be here to stay.

So, just as how the tac-stance seemed to take inspiration from both shooters of old and more modern releases, the omni-movement in Black Ops 6 represents a similar approach of evolving forward by looking back – but this time with the movement of first-person shooters.

Since it was popularised by COD itself, sprinting has mostly stayed the same, in that you click down the left analogue stick to move forward at a faster pace.

Unlike in real-life, where you can (for the most part) run in whatever direction your like independently of where you are facing, sprinting in Call of Duty required you to face forwards the entire time in order to maintain your speed – necessitating the use of the right analogue stick in order to turn in your desired direction at a less-than-optimal radial arc.

Of course, you could still move backwards, side-to-side and diagonally but to do so would immediately break your current sprinting speed and momentum, with strafing being by far the slowest followed by walking backwards.

What the tactical sprint did was add further forward momentum – which can and is beneficial, but only adds a new element of decision-making in the same northern direction as always.

2014’s Call of Duty Advanced Warfare took major swings with its movement and gameplay, with the addition of exo-suits letting you double jump, slide, boost forwards, backwards and side to side as well as being able to air stomp your opponents.

It was a highly fun change in my opinion and still holds some of my fondest COD memories. That being said, most of the changes/additions seen with Advanced Warfare were reverted with future iterations in the series.

Sliding forwards remained, but most of the other innovations were ultimately left behind. All this is to say that Call of Duty has consistently experimented with the first-person shooter genre: for better, for worse or simply for the same but different.

Black Ops 6’s omni-movement however seems to be the culmination of all of the series’ experimentation while also going back to the roots of the genre for inspiration on its core feel and experience. What do I mean by this?

Well, just as how back in the original DOOM you could move in any direction at the same speed, Black Ops 6’s omni-movement uses this as the basis of its gameplay – then applying the decades worth of its own evolution to create a system which functions as the best of all worlds.

Omni-movement allows you to walk in any direction (as has always been the case), but you can now also sprint in any direction. This, in combination with the new more dynamic aiming system allows for players to perform most if not all functions exactly when they want and how they want. You are no longer beholden to a stiff and rigid system which limited your tactical decision making by ensuring the safest way to escape or enter danger was by moving forward.

After all, not only was sprinting limited to a forward movement, but so too was sliding, as well as aiming/shooting (for the most part). Being able to stop sprinting on a dime and backtrack or reverse course – be it due to a surprise enemy or the realisation of a potential opportunity – not only makes for a more exciting experience overall, but a more dynamic and interesting one. Plus, Treyarch kept the tactical sprint for an even bigger boost of speed and choice (though understandably you can still only use it to go forwards). The flow of a typical Call of Duty match has been forever changed thanks to this new freedom of movement…and that’s just talking about the sprint.

In a similar fashion to the sprinting, you can now slide in any direction: forwards, backwards, sideways or diagonally – all the while aiming and shooting as you please. While yes, it is in no way the most realistic thing in the world, it is certainly fun and adds an extra layer of depth to this aspect of the gameplay. All the benefits seen with the running/sprinting apply to the slide, with the freedom of direction and unification of momentum making the gameplay toolset that much more useful and creative. Oh yea, you can also dolphin dive in any direction if that’s more your thing.

While in no way revolutionary, as the core idea behind the feeling of the movement harkens back to a 3 decade old game, Black Ops 6’s omni-movement takes the best of all previous attempts on FPS gameplay and combines them into one of the most slick, smooth, speedy and satisfying movement systems I’ve experienced. Essentially, it’s DOOM, but Call of Duty.

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KitGuru says: What do you think of Black Ops 6’s omni-movement? Is it a major step forward in your eyes? Or do you prefer the more rigid feeling of older COD entries? Let us know down below.

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