Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Campaign Review: One of The Worst COD Stories

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 continues to disparage the Modern Warfare brand with yet another disappointing campaign. Modern Warfare 2 was mediocre, but Modern Warfare 3 is genuinely a bad story. It's rare that the Call of Duty series has a total misfire with its campaigns, but this is one of the few.

This is a franchise known for brief, but unrivaled campaigns every year that take us on an over-the-top ride with non-stop spectacle, badass characters, and satisfying levels Unfortunately, Modern Warfare 3 really lacks in just about every department this time around. 

No Shock, No Awe

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 places us back in the shoes of Task Force 141 as they embark on a manhunt against Vladimir Makarov, a Russian ultranationalist hellbent on tearing the world apart with acts of terror. Those that played the original 2009 Modern Warfare 2 will get a sense of déjà vu from this story as Makarov's plans are identical in both games, with a few tweaks. Instead of trying to frame America for a Russian airport massacre, Makarov is trying to frame the fictional country of Urzikstan for various terrorist attacks such as a plane hijacking, a chemical attack, and more. America would have some culpability in all of this as Modern Warfare 2 revealed General Shepherd supplied the country with weapons, but the story doesn't pull on this highly lucrative narrative thread very much. Makarov is actually successful at some of his attacks, but all it amounts to is some news channels commenting on how tragic this is and questioning the reputation of Urzikstan.

In the original Modern Warfare 2, "No Russian" happens, and almost immediately, Russia invades the United States. There's an instant sense of escalation and consequences as Makarov continues his game of 4D chess. There are stakes. The same can not be said for Modern Warfare 3, despite multiple successful terrorist attacks, it feels like it doesn't really matter because nothing spawns from it. By proxy, it makes Makarov look far less threatening and removes any urgency to stop more attacks from happening.

The shocking moments mean nothing either since they're quickly moved past. "No Russian" had a ripple effect that stretched across two games and made you feel culpable in that bloodshed. Modern Warfare 3 would rather not linger in uncomfortable moments, being too afraid of having something to say in such a massive, big budget game that all it does is tease you with larger ideas without actually having the guts to say what those ideas are. 

Modern Warfare 3 contains a mission where Task Force 141 has to stop an active mass shooting, and it feels more and more like these games want the shock factor while being too cowardly to go far enough with it to mean anything. Modern Warfare (2019) had its issues with this too, but it did a far better job by comparison. You could kill civilians if you weren't careful enough. Modern Warfare 3 doesn't allow this. I'm not arguing that we should be able to mow down pedestrians at our leisure, but anytime you even wound a civilian or throw a flashbang (a non-lethal device) in their proximity in Modern Warfare 3, it's an instant fail. It strips the moment of any stakes or weight. 

It would be much more tense and upsetting if I was responsible for a stray bullet hitting a civilian while trying to kill an enemy. Instead of instantly failing the player, the game should recognize that if you kill too many innocents in quick succession that you may be doing it on purpose and punish you.

Failing to Innovate

Modern Warfare 3 features a promising opening with a prison break that feels more in line with the flashy missions the series is known for. Unfortunately, any momentum generated by this opening is quickly derailed right away. A large portion of Modern Warfare 3's campaign missions are the "Open Combat Missions," something Activision has been pushing pretty heavily for the past few months as its big new feature for the campaign. 

These missions put you in a small sandbox with vehicles and loot boxes containing weapons and other gear to help you decide how you want to complete your objectives. You can go loud, stealthily, or a mix of both. The unfortunate thing is these are glorified Spec Ops missions with all of the clunkiness you'd expect. For starters, the story almost always grinds to a screeching halt during these missions as you're just there to do something very generic like defuse a few bombs quickly and then evac. You go in alone while you listen to some radio chatter, but it's usually just a way to deliver exposition or have commands spouted at you. It loses a lot of the charm of Call of Duty missions where you have camaraderie with your squad or engage in some big set piece.

Instead, it's just soulless gameplay with AI that are dumb as rocks.There were multiple moments where an enemy would spot me and shoot me, but guards who were visibly just feet away would not be alerted. Similarly, they lack any kind of nuance beyond spamming grenades at you when you're behind cover, so they're very easy to predict and manipulate even on harder difficulties. This is not what you want in a sandbox-style campaign.

On top of that, the "sandbox" gameplay feels very limited. It's more a case of "What guns do you want to use, and where do you want to use them?" than it is having a bunch of different opportunities. This is by no means Hitman or even Far Cry where there are numerous dynamic systems blending together to create unique, circumstantial instances of chaos every time you play an Open Combat Mission. Those worlds have a bit more life to them with NPCs roaming around, doing certain tasks, and windows of opportunity. Everything in Modern Warfare 3's Open Combat Missions is static – the most amount of change that happens is when you break stealth and set the enemies on alert. The most creative I felt was when I strapped C4 onto a truck and drove it into a helicopter, but I ripped that off from a gameplay trailer.

The one notable highlight from the Modern Warfare 3 campaign is a mission where you climb multiple floors of an apartment building with various different paths that give it a maze-like feel and include a feeling of danger akin to the film The Raid. It's the most interesting level design in a Call of Duty campaign level in years, but it's the only flicker of hope for a more compelling game throughout the entirety of Modern Warfare 3.

But even when you are in a more traditional Call of Duty mission, it feels like they forgot what makes these campaigns stand out. It's supposed to be more than just running down hallways, shooting at whatever pops its head up. That's a piece of it, but every mission should have some kind of spectacle. By comparison, the original Modern Warfare 2 has you taking back the White House, pursuing a terrorist through a claustrophobic favela, escaping an enemy air base on snowmobiles, and more.

Modern Warfare 3 does not pack that same kind of punch – it's all quite forgettable. These tasks feel more like half-baked tutorial missions for a multiplayer mode like DMZ with bots that are meant to be nothing more than fodder for content you'll only play once. Modern Warfare 3 seems to think you'll be back to play these missions again, when in reality, I never want to see these again in this game nor any other Call of Duty game for that matter.

The Crushing Weight of Nostalgia

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 offers a hastily, haphazardly assembled, and often nonsensical story with no guts. It takes no new risks, has nothing to say, and most frustratingly, it abruptly ends right when the story starts gaining some traction. Any attempt to innovate comes across as clunky, misguided, and cheap. It may not quite be the worst Call of Duty campaign, but it comes pretty damn close. 

The story attempts to hit a lot of familiar beats, but instead ends up feeling like someone copied the homework of the original trilogy without showing their work. Modern Warfare 3 seems to think nostalgia will carry the load of this story and that players may project their love for the original onto this one without it doing anything to earn that. On one hand, I commend Call of Duty for taking 20 years to deliver a campaign this messy. On the other hand, I hate that it happened to a story that revolves around characters and storylines that fans like myself have so much affinity for. The Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 campaign is not a celebration of 20 years of Call of Duty – it's a cry for help.

Rating: 2 out of 5

A PC review copy was provided by Activision for the purposes of this review. A full multiplayer review will also be coming after it releases on November 10th.