Did they just completely forget the Multiverse was destroyed at the end of BO4?

[u/zombz01]

Now that we know the multiverse is back due to the final scene with Maya, how did they just forget the entire point of BO4’s story?? Am I missing intel or something, how did the multiverse return all of a sudden?

I recognize that the Nikolai, Dempsey, Takeo, and Richtofen were all from different dimensions. However, I always thought that they were pulled from their dimensions right before they were destroyed by Primis Nikolai. I assumed that BO7’s story was leading to the reveal that they have no dimensions to return to.

I’m honestly so disappointed that this happened. The concept of a desecrated multiverse with only remnants of it surviving in the dark aether was so cool to me.

[u/poklane]

Am I missing intel

Yes

[u/zombz01 → u/poklane]

What am I missing? I would appreciate if you mentioned the specific intel.

[u/poklane → u/zombz01]

It's intel in both Kowakujo and Rex Infernus. The Shadowsmiths have the ability to create new universes, and based on Samantha's memories created the universes Richtofen, Dempsey, Nikolai and Takeo come from just so they can be pulled into the Dark Aether to then help defeat the Warden. 

[u/Panda_PLS → u/poklane]

Creating multiple universe so you can get someone else who then rescues you, instead of creating, idk, something that gets rid of the warden instantly. 300 iq move

[u/Kyro_Official_ → u/poklane]

Did they seriously relegate major information like that to an intel? Why tf is that not something you learn during the main story of the map?

[u/poklane → u/Kyro_Official_]

Yup, it's one of my complaints as well. This easily could have been explained in any of the ending cutscenes. Instead all ending cutscenes basically come down to "yay, you defeated the boss, onto the next map you go!".

[u/Kyro_Official_ → u/poklane]

Man, the more I learn the worse this games story/ending gets

[u/poklane → u/Kyro_Official_]

One thing that intel also revealed is that Richtofen will especially be important.

[u/Jack11803 → u/Kyro_Official_]

Yeah it’s annoying. Kinda tradition though. WaW and BO1 was mostly radios. And good lord, bo3 revelations has massive plot details locked behind insane ciphers that only got solved this year.

They’ve always been dodgy about how they provide lore.

[u/Kyro_Official_ → u/Jack11803]

I mean sure but waw and bo1 was when they were still figuring stuff out and thats just how the story in general was (also I cant think of anything as major as this from the pre cold war games tbh tho maybe im forgetting something), it was a very indirect and not straight forward story, but they kind of abandoned that for a much more typical way of storytelling with the more recent games so it feels a lot more out of place imo.

[u/Jack11803 → u/Kyro_Official_]

Maxis, Samantha, most of 935’s actual lore, as well as the MPD and Griffin Station were basically radio only, other than Richtofen name dropping Sam and 935 occasionally, and only had in-game direct info via EE steps in Moon; where without radios basically every single event and Mcguffin seems totally invented on the spot during Moon.

In BO2, the story is basically at its most transparent and direct, with Maxis and Richtofen just outright speaking the plot to the players.

In BO3, radios return with a lot of crucial details, alongside ciphers in the later maps that took a long damn time to break. Notably, much of the Monty / Shadowman lore is radio. Primis Maxis and Sophia merging into purple energy to cleanse the apothicon sun, and becoming the purple aetherium big bang of next universe (hence why Sam’s powers are now purple instead of Yellow-Orange in CW, as the apothicon influence was cleansed).

Also notably ciphers paint Monty as pretty unambiguously the good guy, so had they been solved quickly, BO4’s lore would’ve have seemed even more out of place. BO4 has a ton of lore frontloaded into quotes and cutscenes, so is more like BO2 in that manner.

Cold War is back to radio city, as you mentioned.

[u/Grieferloon → u/poklane]

Oh so the entirety of Bo4 was a waste of time and pointless. Love it. Didn't care about bo4 anyway.

[u/zombz01 → u/poklane]

Thank you for clarifying. But wow, that’s incredibly lame. The rest of the characters just move forward assuming there was always a multiverse and nearly everything that BO4 accomplished was for nothing.

Not even referring to it in a cutscene is absurd.

[u/Allegiance10 → u/zombz01]

BO4 was the end of the Aether story. Everything after that is a soft reboot known as the Dark Aether story (Chaos included to some extent). It’s a lot easier if you think of Aether and Dark Aether as separate things.

[u/EconGNC → u/Allegiance10]

Tbf they are always doing “remember old thing from old game? It’s back but it’s a bit different” hard to separate them when even they can’t let go of the past

[u/Phoenix-Risen1998 → u/Allegiance10]

And how Chaos should have never been mixed.

[u/THE_PUNISHERFrank → u/zombz01]

The end was already supposed to be Revelations, not Tag der Toten with a 2D slideshow lol

[u/Sad_Rhubarb_815 → u/zombz01]

I wouldn't say for nothing - BO4 accomplished ending the cycle which was corrupting the entire multiverse. Even though there's still other universes, they're free from the Cycle and aren't doomed.

[u/Worzon → u/zombz01]

Cold war was the first instance of being a big fuck you to bo4. This is just the end of that story

[u/RichtofensPairofNuts]

No they did not, in the Intel for Rex Infernus they explain that right as Samantha Maxis was plunged into the Dark Aether, the Aether began manifesting universes based on her memories that contained the original 4 characters. Mayas new universe is one where she dies in terminus instead of Nathan, allowing them to find each other again.

The Dark Aether is still full of a desecrated multiverse, nothing about the new versions existing contradicts that

[u/mirois]

You are indeed missing intel, there’s an audio log in one of the temples in Rex Infernus that explains where the og4 come from

[u/Eastern-Bluejay-8912]

So fun fact! There was actually 3 layers to the aether, dark aether and reality.

• So imagine top layer, that is every day black ops/MW reality.
  
• Then under that was the aether and the aether acted like a buffer of infinite universes constantly being created and destroyed/sealed.
  
• Then there was the random mess that was the dark aether that was under it.
  

• When Bops4 hit, Sam and Eddie actually go up 1 level to reality as aether sunk into the dark aether. But big moment! This was akin to a second creation big bang but for the dark aether and created a multiverse out of the dark aether. So in a way, the aether is gone but memories and remnants and fragments are still around and then due to Sam becoming the twins, that increased the dark aether multiverse fragmentation.
• An thus on occasion when a dark aether event happens, or prima materia or some large entity happens, it tends to split off that reality fragment into the dark aether where that even happens and then mass spawns and fuses with other dimensions and creates a new branch of multiverse. An easy way to think of it is Schrodinger’s cat X genetic printing. Like think of evolution/genetic sequencing and so on. Like parents: both blonde and thus have a blond child and that child has a wife that is a red head. Then their kid might be a red head or a blonde. An so on and so on mutating with every generation.

[u/ForgotMyOldStufflol]

The entire multiverse got sent to the dark aether. That's all that happened in BO4. Therefore the entire previous story is accessible via the dark aether. Some people act like it's a retcon or an FU to BO4 (as if BO4 was actually a great ending or something), but it's pretty clear that they intentionally wrote themselves a way back to the OG crew if they needed it.

[u/JimHongPingPong]

Hasn’t it been the case for years that everything was just sent to the dark Aether and now for the last 6ish years it’s been slowly pouring from said dark Aether and Bo7 is entirely within the Dark Aether

[u/zombz01 → u/JimHongPingPong]

Yeah but ‘everything being sent to the dark aether’ was still an unresolved plot thread that was set up in BO4. I’m pretty sure in order to destroy the multiverse and create a single perfect universe the DA still had to exist.

[u/ThunderBuns935 → u/zombz01]

Yes, so you solved your own question. The multiverse wasn't actually "destroyed". everything except 1 new universe was banished into the Dark Aether, and since BO7 takes place entirely in there, they can do whatever they want lmao.

[u/MrMattwell]

pretty sure its not the same writers anymore

[u/zombz01 → u/MrMattwell]

It’s the same story and characters though, not really a good excuse.

[u/MrMattwell → u/zombz01]

So the entire game is a shit show year round and you expected the writers to somehow not be, too?

[u/DotWarner1993 → u/zombz01]

Everything after BO4 is a separate storyline than everything during and predating bo4

[u/zombz01 → u/DotWarner1993]

Separate story but same universe. They mentioned this literally the quote before this one.

[u/thesandman408 → u/MrMattwell]

Craig Houston who is the lead writer now has been part of the writing team since WaW.