Ascension

Ascension is the eighth Zombie map that appears in the First Strike map pack, which was released on February 1, 2011 for Call of Duty Black Ops on the Xbox 360 and will be released a month later on the PS3 and PC. A release date has yet to be given for the Wii. It takes place in an abandoned Soviet Cosmodrome. The map includes Tank Dempsey, Nikolai Belinski, Takeo Masaki, and Edward Richtofen and includes new weapons like the Gersch Device and Matryoshka Dolls, as well as new perks such as PhD Flopper and Stamin-Up. A new enemy (space monkeys) also appears in this map, replacing the Hellhounds and the Pentagon Thief.

Weapons

 * PM63 (Off-wall)
 * MPL (Off-wall)
 * MP5k (Off-wall)
 * M14 (Off-wall)
 * M16 (Off-wall)
 * Olympia (Off-wall)
 * Stakeout (Off-wall)
 * Claymore (Off-wall)
 * Sickle (Off-wall)
 * AK-74u (Off-wall)
 * Dragunov (Mystery Box)
 * CZ75 (dual wield) (Mystery Box)
 * Commando (Mystery Box)
 * SPAS-12 (Mystery Box)
 * AUG (Mystery Box)
 * FAMAS (Mystery Box)
 * Galil (Mystery Box)
 * L96A1 (Mystery Box)
 * China Lake (Mystery Box)
 * Ballistic Knife (Mystery Box)
 * Crossbow (Mystery Box)
 * G11 (Mystery Box)
 * FN FAL (Mystery Box)
 * HS10 (Mystery Box)
 * HK21 (Mystery Box)
 * RPK (Mystery Box)
 * Ray Gun (Mystery Box)
 * Winter's Howl (Mystery Box)
 * Thundergun (Mystery Box)
 * Matryoshka Doll (Mystery Box)
 * Gersch Device (Mystery Box)
 * Spectre (Mystery Box)
 * Death Machine (Powerup)

Doors

 * Centrifuge Floor 1 - Door (750)
 * Centrifuge Floor 2 - Door (750)
 * Stairwell Floor 3 / Base Level - Door (1250)
 * Lunar Lander B [ Б ] Access Door (1250)
 * Lunar Lander D [ Д ] Access Gate (1250)
 * Lunar Lander F [ Ф ] Access Gate (1000)
 * Lunar Lander F [ Ф ] Access Door (1250)
 * Pack-A-Punch Access Gate (1250)
 * Power Room Door (1000)
 * Power Room Gate (1250)

Pack-a-Punch Machine
To gain access to the pack-a-punch machine, you have to activate all lunar landers. Once you have ridden on all three, you can activate the rocket by pressing the button to the right of the power switch. After the rocket has taken off, the large doors to the underneath will open and the Pack-A-Punch Machine will be to the right. It costs 5000 points as usual. Unlike Kino der Toten and Five, players can stay in the Pack-A-Punch room for as long as they like. Also, there are zombie-barricades in the room, most-likely to prevent players from camping there.

Perks
Ascension features two new perks, both costing 2000 points; Note: There are 5 Perks-a-Cola Machines on this map and the player perk cap is limited to 4.
 * PhD Flopper; located outside near a lunar lander launch pad, this perk makes the player drop a small "nuke" when diving-to-prone or when the player is downed. The nuke kills all nearby zombies. It also acts as a "No Self Damage" Perk as holding a grenade will no longer damage you or give you any damage. It also takes away splash damage that you might take from the Ray Gun.
 * Stamin-Up; this perk gives the player increased movement speed, similar to Marathon or Lightweight. Since Ascension is a rather large map, it is more useful than one might think, especially during space monkey rounds where one might have to get to a perk machine being attacked quickly.

Space Monkey
Space monkeys are in fact the hellhound and Pentagon Thief round replacement. Similar to how the Pentagon Thief has the ability to steal a player's weapon, space monkeys have the ability to remove player's perks. This is done not by directly stealing a perk, as is the case with weapon stealing with the doctor, rather, the space monkeys navigate their way to one of the Perk-a-Cola machines that any player may have. Players can tell which perk machine is being attacked by paying attention to their perk symbols, at the bottom left of the screen; while a perk machine is under attack its respective symbol will begin pulsating. To prevent this from happening, the player must be in a team of four and all four players must have the same perks. the players must spread out to the perks they have and defend it until the round is over. After the monkeys temporarily disable the machine all players with the perk will be subject to lose the disabled perk. Defending the perk machine under attack by killing the monkeys is the only way to prevent the perk loss. Also, after the death of the last monkey, just like with the crazy scientist and hellhound rounds, a max ammo drops; however, a new power up drops as well, which assigns a random perk to each player in the party. The downside is that the new powerup only appears if you finish the monkey round without ANY damage to the perk machines you made purchases from. Also be careful while throwing grenades at these monkeys as they can and will throw them back at you.

Easter Eggs

 * Three teddy bears holding sickles are located around the map. Find these and the song, Abracadavre plays. (Remember to hold X or Square with your crosshairs on them to "find" them).
 * The first teddy bear is in the Centrifuge Room. When you go up the stairs, right and on the end of that walkway is the first bear.
 * The second teddy bear is behind a gate on the left, nearby the lunar lander with the claymore in the area.
 * The last teddy bear is nearby the "Speed Cola lunar lander", past the Speed Cola, when you have the wall in front of you. Turn right and on top of the wall there is the last teddy bear.
 * The song is called "Abracadavre" by Elena Siegman
 * There are Matryoshka Dolls of the characters scattered around the level, along with Teddy Bears holding Sickles. *A small easter egg is in the room below the area where the Mystery Box and Power Switch are located. If the player goes towards the damaged windows, turns left and looks at the table, there will be papers, a black binder, two other binders in the back, and a Matryoshka Doll. If the player aims their crosshairs at the black binder in front of them, there will be an alien like voice and their character will respond to it in a way, sometimes with the information about their past.
 * There is a red telephone similar to the ones in 'Five.' It is next to the mystery box spawn, in the room next to the power; A second can be found where the players first begin on the wall to the left looking at the Lunar Lander; A third can be found just to the right of the PHD Flopper Machine; there may be more. (Note: it is uncomfirmed what makes these phones rings, the second was found ringing after power, platforms, radio about black hole grenade and rocket have all been activated, but have not been able to duplicate).
 * A pair of car batteries found underneath a stairwell in the centrifuge/spawn room have "ЅРДЯКУ" written across the front.
 * When you launch the rocket, if you make your way to an area where you can physically shoot the rocket, you can blow it up by shooting the rocket with a Ray Gun as it launches.

Trivia

 * There are Matroyshka dolls modeled after Takeo, Nikolai, Richtofen, and Dempsey, hidden throughout the map. When you hold the "X' or Square button they will either insult you, or compliment you, depending on who you are playing as.
 * There is a rocket on the map, and it will take off when all 3 Lunar Landers have been activated and ridden on.
 * The rocket must be launched in order to activate/find the Pack-A-Punch Machine.
 * If you shoot the Rocket when it is lifting off, it may explode (Confirmed).
 * Game files suggest that Ascension was originally planned to be released on disc, but was later removed.
 * The spawn room contains a centrifuge which activates every couple of minutes by itself and kills zombies.
 * This zombie map is the largest yet.
 * There are three Lunar Landers that take players from one place to another.
 * After the usage of the three landers, players can launch the rocket in order to find the Pack-A-Punch Machine.
 * There are no Gas Zombies in this map, however the Space Monkeys do occasionally release the gas upon death.
 * The zombies in Ascension have new models, as they are soviets rather than Nazis. These models include spacesuited-zombies, gas-masked zombies and lab-coat wearing zombies.
 * The player must buy a perk before the Space Monkey special round initiates.
 * The Centrifuge Room is the starting room and contains the Quick Revive.
 * The sickle seems to be the replacement for the Bowie Knife on Ascension. It costs 3000 points, like the Bowie Knife, but it is unknown whether it has any different effects.
 * Some zombies arel wearing gas masks, and one could assume they were wearing it before succumbing to zombification.
 * Some zombies are wearing spacesuits with smashed helmets.
 * The four main characters' appearances have changed.
 * There are televisions next to each mystery box spawn to tell the player where the box is, just like in "Five"
 * The Lunar Lander platforms transport players back to the Centrifuge room.
 * The game starts off in black and white filter. It will remain in this filter until the power is turned on, only then full colour and visuals will come.
 * Space monkeys replace Hellhounds as round-exclusive enemies.
 * When the player begins the 1st round, a Russian voice can be heard saying "Please, help me! She's coming, the mechanism must be repaired!" They might be talking about Samantha Maxis
 * The person may be talking about the centrifuge, as if they are inside it, but this is vaguely possible.
 * The artwork cover for Ascension, seen on the promotional poster for "First Strike", is clearly based on Inglourious Basterds.
 * In order to get to the Pack-a-Punch Machine, the players must fly on all three lunar landers. This makes the rocket fly off into space and allows the players access to the Pack-a-Punch machine.
 * The PhD Flopper is the first perk to affect everyone (since it starts a nuke when you are downed).
 * The Space Monkey rounds will not appear until somebody gets a Perk-a-Cola.
 * It is the first map where zombies are seen jumping up to platforms. If a player is stood on the upper walkway of the first room, zombies will jump up onto the walkway to reach the player, this is possibly to discourage camping at the end of the walkway.
 * Zombies have also been seen doing forward somersaults into the player, injuring the player and stunning the zombie as it has to get back up, this is a rare occurrence and is unknown what causes this.
 * The G-Force machine in the starting room will begin to spin randomly, even if the power isn't on. If a zombie or a player gets under the spinning machine, he will be injured, as if a zombie has hit him once..
 * This map is the first Nazi Zombie map to take place in Russia/USSR.
 * The behaviour of the zombies appears slightly changed, now they can jump on higher surfaces (e.g. the upper walkway in the centrifugal room)
 * If a Space Monkey destroys the perk machine - at the end of the round/start of new round, you can re-buy the perk.
 * Takeo is often heard saying "The undead rack a disciprine" (The undead lack discipline). This is a joust of a Japanese stereotype of not being able to pronounce the letter "L" because of Engrish terms . It is also a reference to the South Park episode "Bloody Mary".
 * The Mystery Box will always spawn in the same place everytime, in the area with the power switch
 * Woods ONLY had a tattoo that says '115' (element 115) on the level Executive Order which is at a Soviet Cosmodrome also, which may have gave people a clue as to where Ascension will have taken place.
 * The screens that show the location of the Mystery Box may occasionally show the symbol of the Illuminati (pyramid with an eye on top), this shows that the Illuminati may have a hand in Ascension some how (perhaps the unknown voice at the start of the level).
 * There are 2 radios 1 talking about Project Gersch Device and the other about sending monkeys into space
 * Some gamers have claimed they've seen an 'alien zombie', a zombie that does not have a human-zombie appearance. This is not confirmed though.
 * Double Tap Root Beer is absent from this map. This is probably to don't confuse the player with the PhD Flopper and the fact that this is the least bought perk in the whole Zombies game.
 * The Space Program Announcer has a distinct voice sounding like Dimitri Petrenko.

Video
thumb|left|300px|Skip to 0:43 for zombies trailer. Note: G force test machinethumb|300px|right|Musical easter egg song 'Abracadavre'thumb|300px|right|Gameplay of the map 'Ascension'