On paper, the new Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III appears completely standard. Story campaign, zombies, extensive multiplayer with a large number of maps and modes. Nothing out of line, nothing to make players unhappy. However, it cannot be overlooked that this year’s Call of Duty was not exactly flattering in the past months, there were rumors that the game was originally supposed to be just an expansion for last year’s Modern Warfare II and that behind the scenes, problems related to the Sledgehammer Games studio were to appear again. If you were hoping until the last moment that everything would be normal, I have good news for you, but for now I’m just going singleplayer. Yes, as the news from the end of last week already indicated, the campaign is short, traditionally confusing in its storytelling, and mainly represents a novelty that the authors could excuse themselves to shove up their ass.
Everything different
We can probably agree that in terms of durability, the campaign has never been the highlight of the Call of Duty series. Nevertheless, I can understand that some players coughed up multiplayer and wanted – perhaps even as an annual ritual – to jump headfirst into a frantic action story, enjoy over-the-top cinematic cutscenes and go through a handful of spectacular missions where the number of killed enemies is counted in the high hundreds. It may be a bummer, it has nothing to do with reality, but scripted Call of Duty missions simply belong to video game culture and, with minor exceptions, have been returning every year for twenty years. But it’s appropriate to start talking in the past tense, because the people at Sledgehammer Games, for some reason, decided that it was necessary to change the established style and remove from the game what defines it. About half of the scripted missions in the campaign are replaced by so-called Open Combat Missions, which lack a script and give you only boredom and frustration in exchange for freedom.
Unless you’ve spent the past few days out in the wild without the internet, you’ve probably already joined in the grumbling that Modern Warfare III’s campaign is largely an offline knockoff of Warzone. And although you’re not fighting for your life with a hundred other people here, I basically agree with the DMZ comparison from Warzone. Immediately after the introduction, which is fully in the spirit of traditional missions from Call of Duty campaigns, the game opens up an imaginary sandbox in front of you, assigns you several tasks that you have to complete in a slightly looser order, and sends endless spawning enemies controlled by artificial intelligence at you . Pre-arranged tense moments are a no-brainer. Silácké announcements in the sub-parts of the mission are all over the place. And paradoxically, there are also more frequent checkpoints that can be relied on in traditional missions if something fails. No, all of this, which makes many players put off the campaign in Call of Duty, is taken for granted in Modern Warfare III, and I don’t understand why. I mean, I’m trying to understand, but in that case, I’d probably prefer if Activision decided to just not include the campaign and bother the obviously down-to-earth folks at Sledgehammer Games. It wouldn’t be the first time and it would be less of a shame.
And this flavor? Prime plan!
The problem with open missions is that they really have their origins in Warzone. Places borrowed from the map of Verdansk, crates with weapons, repetitive tasks, vehicles,… But it doesn’t fit the story of Call of Duty at all, especially when the second half consists of scripted missions. It made me feel like the game couldn’t decide what it really wanted to be and who it was targeting, because I can’t imagine something without obvious screenwriting care can please the annual single player. Unfortunately, even those standard missions don’t work very well, they only bring a handful of really good moments and, for example, the variation on the infamous No Russian level literally screams that it’s included just for the sake of being included. The emotional impact is paramount, you don’t get to it through the goddamn shocking gameplay, and it’s just obvious from the start that it only serves to explain what the main villain Vladimir Makarov is capable of. But you can already sense that by then, which makes the feeling that everything was sewn with a hot needle and under great pressure even stronger.
Choices and apparent freedom
At some points, Modern Warfare III will try to convince you that how you respond to someone matters. But it is only a trick and only a virtual feeling that you, as a player, are playing a role. So whether you answer Makarov’s question about who rules the prison, whatever, or say that the bear in the picture looks more like a dog, the game will handle it and not lead you to a dark or otherwise interesting moment. On the contrary, sometimes he will hold you hostage – especially in the mission with Laswell, where you are not allowed to shoot – and drag you through the practice of moving stealthily through the next part of Verdansk.
On the other hand, I don’t want to focus only on the fact that the campaign throws up a different style of missions at the expense of the ones we expect. For example, I have to admit that the films between the missions look even better than last year and the year before, they do not lack a great camera, dramaturgy and dialogues, and even if because of the above they make you only a spectator of the most interesting moments, you cannot deny their high production quality. The gunplay is also traditionally very good, if we are talking about an arcade shooter or simply Call of Duty. Even on the console, the proven gameplay works more than satisfactorily and you will enjoy it in combination with the sharp sounds of flying projectiles and nice graphics. The game runs on the same engine as last year’s Modern Warfare II, handles lighting, various weather effects and movement animation very well, and suggests that a lot could be conjured up with a more relaxed approach and perhaps even longer development time. Not this year, though, especially when I’m once again driven by the mind-numbing repetitive template of open missions, in which one hesitation and the whole map is after you, which usually results in a complete restart even after ten or fifteen minutes of the game, oh Yeah.
Makarov!
Nor is the story at all, which once again aspires to the award for the most overcombined narrative in games that you can come across. Everything is intertwined with everything, perhaps every character has some dark or unspoken past, some missions will take place retrospectively so that you know what actually happened and the motivation of the main characters will not be completely clear to you even after a very rushed ending. That’s also a big problem with this interlude, because when it seems like something is going to happen, the credits appear and it’s over. I don’t want to divulge the details unnecessarily, but Modern Warfare definitely doesn’t end here. What’s more, you actually reach the end in record time, which in my case didn’t count as three hours as discussed last week, but under five hours is still one of the shortest Call of Duty “footage” I can remember.
I don’t want to operate on the fact that you can get this for 70 euros, because it will also include a zombie mode and full multiplayer, but this is clearly a warning to all of you who are not interested in these modes. No, the story part isn’t worth this amount, you’ll be disappointed and you’ll regret why you didn’t spend the seventeen hundred for a present at Christmas. Even for yourself. Nice graphics, sounds, a few familiar favorite characters and one or two solid moments just don’t make a good game, sorry.
2023-11-05 20:40:51
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