Will the early access New Zealand Trick work in Black Ops 6?

Prior to the launch of any Call of Duty title, thousands of players ask the same question: will the New Zealand trick work? The New Zealand trick, as it's come to be known, has essentially given players across the globe early access to the yearly Call of Duty releases. With Black Ops 6 arriving in a couple of weeks, players are once again wondering if the trick will allow them to play the game before they're technically supposed to.

Before we get into whether the New Zealand trick will work in Black Ops 6, let's fully understand how it works. Call of Duty has always followed a global midnight release schedule when it comes to the launch of a new game. This means that when the clock strikes midnight on release day in your region, the new game becomes available to play. There are some exceptions to this, as players in the CT and PT time zones of North America can start playing at midnight ET.

Given this release schedule, players in New Zealand technically get to start playing Black Ops 6 before anyone else, as the time zone in the region reaches midnight first. When it strikes midnight in New Zealand, it's still the early morning for most players in North America and the afternoon for a majority of Europe.

The New Zealand trick allows players to change their system's time zone and fool it into thinking the player is located in New Zealand. This has allowed players in the past to start playing when the clock strikes midnight in New Zealand even if they're located on the other side of the planet.

This trick only works on Xbox and PlayStation, as the PC versions of Call of Duty have always followed a strict release time of midnight ET. This means no matter where you live, the game won't unlock for you until midnight on the eastern coast of North America.

If you're on Xbox and PlayStation, you can simply change your console's region to New Zealand. This will mess up your clock and date, but it's worth it to potentially play Black Ops 6 several hours earlier than you normally could.

With the explanation out of the way, it's time for the big-ticket question. Up to this point in time, we have not heard anything from Activision or other sources that would suggest the New Zealand trick won't work for Black Ops 6.

While Activision has yet to formally announce the release schedule, it would be strange to see Black Ops 6 follow a different schedule than in years past. Call of Duty has followed the global release schedule for console and the midnight ET release schedule for PC for the past five years. If we go further than that, though, the New Zealand trick has worked on consoles for over a decade. For players planning to try the New Zealand trick, Black Ops 6 goes live on Oct. 25. So, to take advantage of the trick, be ready on Oct. 24 depending on your time zone relative to New Zealand's.

However, the trick has always worked better on Xbox than PlayStation. PlayStation locks your purchase of a game to the time zone of your account. To get the New Zealand trick to work on PlayStation, you need to make a new account, change its region to New Zealand, and then buy Black Ops 6. On Xbox. All you need to do is change your console's region and your time zone will be locked in.

We'll be sure to update this guide if any additional information comes out surrounding the release schedule of Black Ops 6. For now, though, you should be planning for the New Zealand trick to work.

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