Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 includes an arachnophobia setting that plucks all the zombie spiders' legs and leaves them as floating, horrible leeches

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I guess that's an improvement, sure.

A character punches a large, mutated zombie in the jaw in Call of Duty: Black Ops 6.
(Image credit: Activision)

Arachnophobia is an unfortunate burden to bear when spiders happen to be one of the standard stock enemy types that game designers reach for when they need to fill a cave or spooky ruin, even if we all might be getting a bit tired of dealing with the associated poisons, webs, and spiderling-stuffed egg clutches. Thankfully, it's only getting more common for developers to address spider concerns—whether with arachnophobia modes, or simply deciding to skip spiders entirely—and Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 is following suit.

I wouldn't be surprised, however, if the nightmarish results of Black Ops 6's arachnophobia mode end up feeding into entirely different sets of phobias.

(Image credit: Activision)

I haven't dabbled in Zombies since the distant past of Black Ops 2, but I'm told that spiders in following Zombies entries were pretty traditional arachnids—big black widows, essentially. The spiders in Black Ops 6 Zombies, however, are eyeless, fleshy things with grinning, toothy maws. When their legs are toggled off by the arachnophobia mode, we're left with a hovering, tumorous, flesh-tone leech. It sucks, man.

Still, even if it's more horrible for the rest of us, it's an improvement for arachnophobes. Think of it this way: Even if you're not an arachnophobe, you just gained an option to inject some extra horror into your zombie experience. Everybody wins.

Lincoln Carpenter
Lincoln Carpenter
News Writer

Lincoln has been writing about games for 12 years—unless you include the essays about procedural storytelling in Dwarf Fortress he convinced his college professors to accept. Leveraging the brainworms from a youth spent in World of Warcraft to write for sites like Waypoint, Polygon, and Fanbyte, Lincoln spent three years freelancing for PC Gamer before joining on as a full-time News Writer in 2024, bringing an expertise in Caves of Qud bird diplomacy, getting sons killed in Crusader Kings, and hitting dinosaurs with hammers in Monster Hunter.