Call of Duty MW3 Is One of 2023’s Worst-Reviewed Games

Call of Duty has sunk to a new low point in 2023 with the recent release of Modern Warfare 3. For the better part of the past 15 years, Call of Duty has been what is likely the most consistent franchise in all of gaming. Not only has each new installment sold at an incredibly high rate, but every new Call of Duty game has been more often than not of a pretty great quality. In 2023, though, this hasn’t proven to be true as MW3 is now being dubbed one of the worst video games of the entire year. 

Following the launch of Modern Warfare 3 at the end of this past week, reviews for the title have slowly been appearing online. When looking at the reviews aggregate site Metacritic, MW3 currently boasts a dismal 53/100 score after nearly 40 total reviews from critics. General audiences haven’t been much kinder to this new Call of Duty game on Metacritic, either, as the title’s user score currently sits at an abhorrent 1.6/10. By all accounts, this doesn’t just make MW3 one of the worst-reviewed games of the year, but it now sits as the lowest-rated Call of Duty title on Metacritic by a gap of roughly 20 points. 

To put into better context just how low this aggregate score is for Modern Warfare 3, the latest Call of Duty game has received a lower overall score than Redfall, Everybody 1-2 Switch, and Forspoken, all of which have been considered major disappointments this year. Obviously, more reviews for MW3 will surely continue to trickle in within the coming days and weeks, which means that this aggregate score could still go up. For now, though, the consensus with Modern Warfare 3 seems to be quite clear and it’s that this isn’t a good Call of Duty game. 

Is Call of Duty in Trouble?

Moving forward, it will be interesting to see what Activision does in response to these low ratings for MW3. Notably, this year’s Call of Duty game was reportedly made in a much shorter period of time than normal, which suggests that Activision could look to let the series breathe a bit before coming back with a new game. Currently, Call of Duty has been an annualized franchise for well over a decade, but with Modern Warfare 3, it looks like this release schedule has started to impact the quality of the series. 

Regardless of what Activision decides to do in the future, this isn’t going to impact MW3 from continuing to be updated and expanded upon in the months ahead. Beyond this, despite the low review scores, Modern Warfare 3 will almost surely end up becoming a huge hit for Activision in terms of sales, which means that long-term, this franchise won’t end up disappearing for long, if at all.