The worst campaign in perhaps all of COD? | Review - Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III Campaign
✨Overview
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III marks the continuation of the rebooted Modern Warfare series and picks up the story where the previous game, Modern Warfare II, left off. Developed by Sledgehammer Games, Modern Warfare III aimed to blend the best of Call of Duty's past with innovative new elements, such as the integration of Call of Duty: Warzone into its gameplay.
Call of Duty campaigns have consistently been celebrated as exceptional single-player experiences, distinct and detached from the intense multiplayer gameplay for which the franchise is also renowned for. These campaigns offer players a gripping narrative, often set in diverse and immersive environments, replete with cinematic moments and heart-pounding action. They serve as an excellent showcase of the franchise's dedication to delivering compelling storytelling, character development, and thrilling set pieces.
Well, this year, it's unfortunate to see that the campaign has not lived up to the high standards set by its predecessors, especially in this era of $70 AAA games. What's worse than Call of Duty: Black Ops 4's lack of a campaign? It’s Modern Warfare III’s campaign that has truly lost the soul and depth of the franchise. Sledgehammer Games dropped the ball on this one, likely because MWIII was released just one year after MWII, breaking from the usual three-year development cycle., which didn’t leave a lot of time for development.
🟩Pros
+Impressive visuals and audio design
+Smooth performance
+Best-in-class FPS gunplay
🟥Cons
-Campaign plays like solo Warzone training/tutorial missions instead of true Call of Duty missions
-Mission structure and story feels uninspired, missing the usual blockbuster-like set pieces
-Overuses the Verdansk map, which perhaps is the most overused region in Call of Duty history
⭐️Score: 3/10
🎨Graphics and Art Style
As usual, Modern Warfare III impresses with its graphics and art style. Gone are the days where COD has been consistently mocked for its aging Graphics when compared to its competitors. The game's visuals are sharp and detailed, offering a level of realism that enhances the overall experience. The environments are well-crafted, from the dark, rainy gulag to Verdansk's mountainous environment. Character models are lifelike, and the game's presentation when it comes to cutscenes and storytelling is top-tier.
📖Story and Missions
Modern Warfare III's story continues the saga of Captain Price's Task Force 141, who are now up against the major antagonist, Vladimir Makarov, from the original Modern Warfare franchise. The premise holds promise as it introduces Makarov as a ruthless extremist, presenting a direct threat to the world.
The story opens strong with Operation 627, a stealth mission into a gulag, reminiscent of the iconic Captain Price rescue mission from the original Modern Warfare 2. It sets the stage for that familiar traditional Call of Duty campaign experience, but then afterwards immediately sidetracks us to semi open world Warzone-esque missions that never reaches the same level of excitement as traditional Call of Duty missions.
These Warzone-esque missions are called "Open Combat" missions, which aims to allow players more freedom to complete objectives, including looting around containers and manning vehicles. While this is a novel integration of Warzone’s mechanics into the campaign, it disrupts the game's pacing, leading to a disjointed narrative that struggles to maintain cinematic tension.
Players can embark on a stealthy incursion through a military base as Kate Laswell or participate in a bomb-defusing mission on a bridge as Ghost. These missions rely heavily on the novelty of Warzone's Verdansk map, which perhaps is the most overused map in Call of Duty history, despite it being removed from Warzone last 2021.
The game also revisits a controversial mission similar to "No Russian," where you're placed in the middle of a terrorist attack. While this mission aims to be impactful and shocking like the original, it feels significantly inferior to the original.
The campaign is very short, and can easily be finished in under 4 hours in Normal difficulty. Overall, there's a lack of variety in enemy encounters, and the absence of iconic Call of Duty mission types, such as high-speed vehicle chases, huge action-packed set pieces, and stealthy sniper sessions, are missed dearly. This is a deja vu all over again with Battlefield V’s similarly lame take on its singleplayer campaign, before ultimately getting cut off in their next game Battlefield 2042.
🎮Gameplay
Just like modern Call of Duty games that started with the Modern Warfare reboot, the gunplay is smooth, responsive, and satisfying. You feel like in total control of you character, with high mobility and responsive controls, the immersive sound design and excellent positional audio adds to the overall immersion.
The aforementioned Open Combat missions aim to provide more player choice, but they compromise the traditional Call of Duty formula. While these missions offer freedom, they come at the cost of cinematic tension and atmosphere. It feels like I was still playing Warzone, instead of a action-packed Call of Duty campaign experience.
This game is absolutely the peak Warzone influence that it even affected the campaign. The focus on integrating Warzone overshadows the mission's core gameplay, making them feel more like a marketing tie-in or Training missions rather than integral components of the campaign.
📊Technical Performance
The game's graphics settings provide flexibility for PC gamers to adjust according to their hardware, with support for DLSS and is well optimized. I was able to run the game smoothly on my aging i7-8700k CPU paired with an RTX 3080. Although the game is quite annoying at first, requiring multiple restarts, initial long loading times, and shader cache updates to fully initialize the newly downloaded game.
⚖️Conclusion
The multiplayer and Warzone are undoubtedly going to be hits as always, but the campaign for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III falls short of the high expectations set by its blockbuster predecessors. While it boasts impressive graphics, sound design, and the signature fast-paced gunplay of the series, it suffers from major shortcomings. It’s perhaps the worst Call of Duty campaign I’ve EVER played, period.
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