Call of Duty: Black Ops will be one of the biggest core games of 2010, and Treyarch’s doing everything it can to rise to the challenge, stepping into a nuclear-sized impact crater left by the recent Infinity Ward explosion. Call of Duty’s future could depend on this game: given the reaction to code showings this month, it appears the IP is in safe hands.

Demoing two levels from the Cold War shooter in London this week – one name WMD and a Vietnam level called Slaughterhouse – the studio left attending journalists breathless. Black Ops appears to be a whole new level for the team behind World at War.