User blog comment:Damac1214/Black Ops 2 Uprising DLC Trailer Released + Double XP on April 12th to April 15th/@comment-5610200-20130404184004/@comment-76.241.123.123-20130405183208

Granted, amost any time you run a circle anywhere, you're almost always putting yourself in danger constantly. But that just seems like overdoing it. I know he's not really the end-all be-all zombies player, but even Syndicate doesn't stay in that room. It's just really hard for me to say a main component of these maps is optional. Even though you COULD ignore them, if you're playing to try and create the least dangerous situations for yourself in later rounds, you'll use the optional bits. Like in Kino. Sure, you could stay in the spawn room if you wanted to, just to challenge yourself, making opening doors optional, but if you're playing a bit more serious, it becomes a necessity over optional.

With that thought process, I think I've come to a conclusion. Whether or not something is optional is going to change based on player opinion at the time. Different situations call for different necessities. I'm gonna take a guess and say you don't always use that Sliquifier room, and you probably don't prefer to. Yeah, in general, these things are optional, especially to someone who doesn't see the importance of them. But actually sitting down and being serious about getting farther, unless you're a tad crazy, will more than likely make these things far less optional.

Also, by playing serious I mean using what the entire map has to offer as best as you can to increase chances of survival. I realize you can challenge yourself and still play serious. Challenges I've seen usually include staying in one part of the map exclusively.