Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 won’t be judged solely on its campaign, as multiplayer is the main reason fans play. However, early reviews are absolutely savaging the single player experience, which is sounding like the worst solo mode in the series’ history – yes, even worse than the maligned Call of Duty: Ghosts.
We’re going to bring you our full review once we’ve been able to play multiplayer as well, but IGN describes a dreadful experience, which reportedly runs around four hours. “Modern Warfare 3’s campaign commits the biggest sin possible for a globe-trotting action thriller: it's boring,” the site’s conclusion writes. “It's a pale imitation of the past, made up of underbaked story moments that clash with attempts to introduce new open combat missions designed to encourage player freedom that instead fall flat on their face”
It scathingly adds: “If this is the quality we've come to expect from Call of Duty campaigns, maybe it's for the best if a year or two is taken to reset and raise this low bar back to the heights of old.”
Of course, the rumour is that this Call of Duty was originally intended to be released as an expansion pack, but has been repackaged and flogged as a full game instead. That’s evidenced by the title’s PS5 Trophy list, which lists Modern Warfare 3’s gongs as DLC for Modern Warfare 2. We’ll bring you our full review soon, but this one ain’t looking good, folks.
[source ign.com]
Comments 105
Such a shame, maybe the time is right to separate the campaign and sell as a standalone title that is released every 2-3 years
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There was nothing wrong with Ghosts campaign at all, it was actually decent.
The issue was it was supposed to be a next-gen showpiece for PS4 and reviewers said it didn’t move the envelope if you will. And because of the fish AI meme they just rinsed it.
Ghosts defence out of the way, MW3 is by far the worst cod campaign. The reviews aren’t lying.
This isn't the worst. The previous game has that title because there's a game breaking bug in one of the last levels (right at the end too!) that they never patched.
@Jacko11 Ghosts campaign just sucked. It had potential with the "Ghosts" title and being all stealth like but it is literally nothing like that except for like a single mission which was in the beginning.
So it's not a remake of the PS3 mw3?
I didnt think people hated Ghost so much. The sequel bait ending sucked since we didnt get one but it had the dog lol
This campaign sounds worse than the Battlefield 5 campaign, which also reused multiplayer maps
CoD Ghosts had a great campaign and even the multiplayer modes were great too.
The problem was that the series hadn't tried to evolve and was still the 'same' game reskinned, same movement, same modes, same structure and people were 'tired' of it. Games like Titanfall were showing 'Advanced' movement.
The Multiplayer too wasn't helped by such a split in the communities. The game was split on Consoles between those on PS3 and those 'few' who bought the game on PS4 in the first few months. On XB1, that was perhaps worse with fewer hardware sales - no multi-platform MP back then.
It was a cross generation game with the community split across too many consoles and people were getting a bit fed up with what often felt like a reskinned MP bolted on to a 'similar' campaign that no longer was 'shocking' or really doing anything that new with the Campaign...
But then we got Advanced Warfare and the run of Advanced Movement games before the Community wanted CoD to return to Boots on the Ground - even had to bring back Modern Warfare to steady a sinking ship...
What? Are you telling me people don’t like doing DMZ for the campaign…but I thought using the warzone map for most of the campaign was the best idea EVER made!! Side note it’s a joke, just playing DMZ warzone with cutscenes in between is some super lazy ***** and I’ve seen some lazy ***** from Activision already
If people want improved games, then stop buying them until they are improved. Gamers are solely to blame when it comes to these issues. Why would devs work harder when the trash they make sells like crazy to the masses. I've avoided cod since the original mw3, been trash ever since
Have played a few hours of the campaign and just like MW2 story it's very diluted. Some might say its for modern audiences. The original trilogy can't be beaten. It was full on action movie type stuff. Back then you couldn't wait for the next one to release. At one stage in MW3 I thought they were going to recreate the airport scene, but no. I can't see Treyarchs installment skipping a campaign mode.
My last one was COD 2019 the new MW remake and after that I just skipped everything after that.
Honestly we have to vote with our wallets other wise these companies will continue to rob us blind, they dont care about gaming, it's all about greed. The problem is, kids will continue to uphold these deplorable practices, by asking Mummy for the new cod (ahem £70 dlc) this xmas...
@Flaming_Kaiser The last COD game I bought was Cold War and while the multiplayer wasn't that good, the campaign was fantastic overall.
Although I stopped buying these games, I did watch a livestream of the campaign yesterday and it didn't feel very satisfying at the end.
From what I have heard as well, the infamous "no russian" scene is a step down from the original, and felt more like a glorified cutscene. It definitely feels activision went for a safer route for this game, at the cost of making it boring than the og MW3.
I stopped buying CoD once it decided it wanted most of my SSD space. Hopefully going forward MS can sort this series out.
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They should be ashamed of themselves. Always boils down in wanting people's hard earn cash!. Think its game over for COD.
@GreatKwyjibo Well it is actually shocking to see critics review a terrible AAA game as if it's actually terrible, to be fair.
Well look on the brightside ,xbox will want to shove this garbage on gamepass, as soon as they can ,then they can release a statement saying its got 1 million players ,for a week at least
For once the "this was meant to be DLC" criticism seems apt.
And here was Microsoft saying that they had the greatest first party AAA lineup because of MW3 for the holidays that they have ever had. (They actually said that). Also, what in the heck has happened to the PS5s Platinum trophy??
This franchise reached its critical and cultural peak with the original Modern Warfare 2 in 2009. It's now almost 15 years later and has not even come close to regaining that status. Even though it continues to sell gangbusters it's been nothing but a downward spiral in every other aspect. And with Microsoft now at the helm you can definitely expect it to sink to even greater depths when they begin to enforce a "design for Gamepass" philosophy to future titles.
Asking a question..no discussion please learn the difference.
@themightyant
That's because it was meant to be DLC and it is DLC, MW2 was meant to have a two year cycle. When have you seen everything from one COD game carry over to the next COD game? Never. All Operators, Operator skin's, weapons, camos, blueprints, attachments etc everything from MW2 is carrying over into MW3. SO everything you've unlocked in MW2 will be unlocked for you in MW3, camos, operators, weapons, attachments etc.
I know Microsoft had nothing to do with this one but it is funny that technically the very first COD that will be released post acquisition is a dumpster fire apparently.😂
I've had a bad feeling about this one ever since it was announced. It's a shame as COD's campaigns generally speaking are at least pretty good. Plus it's one of the few shooters that still has a campaign as well as the multiplayer. I appreciate that but unfortunately it sounds MW3 didn't have the stuff.
love to see it . enough of this franchise 🙂
@CutchuSlow no , these rehashes will never compare to the original trilogy . infinity ward CODs ended after MW3 2011.
The original Modern Warfare 3 was kinda rubbish too. This being DLC but is £70 is totally egregious.
For the price it's quite a let down, it's definitely not my favourite campaign :/
I'm reading that the campaign maps are actually spec ops maps being reused
The Ad campaign is even worse
My favorite part is how there has been every indication (for months) that this was DLC spun into a full release for shareholders, and now the COD faithful will lap it up at $70 and then in a few weeks/months (whenever the honeymoon period ends) they will bitch and moan about how they were deceived. All with zero sense of self awareness or ownership of their own decisions.
Please! Someone remove Sledgehammer game from the franchise!!!!!
It makes even more sense that PlayStation are trying to give the game away for free in a bundle, lol.
Cod games the guns go pew pew, and pew, pew some more. I love Cod for John Wick levels of death.
Microsoft, this is the fastest we’ve ruined a franchise.
And the worst part about this is.... It will still be the biggest money earner and biggest seller this and next year.
@Geep I liked Ghosts too. I don't play much CoD though TBF.
DUSK has been shadow released recently on PS Store, it's 20 bucks and I bet the campaign is 10 times more fun
I play CoD for the campaigns only, enjoyed Black Ops from two years ago but last years Modern Warfare was a slog trough and through...
Microsoft will axe the single player eventually anyway.
The original MW3 was stale, so what's the surprise?
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The comments for this article prove how subjective these things are. I really liked the campaign for Ghosts. And it seems a lot of others do too.
I'm sure there will be lots of people who adore this campaign too.
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@GreatKwyjibo even a low iq guy like me can tell ur nit shocked. So y u lyin'?
'Four hours'. Warzone is free so it's basically $70 for multiplayer. I doubt enough people will vote with their wallet nonetheless.
Multiplayer isn't why people play anymore it's warzone, cod mp is dead since warzone and ghosts was great.
People are predictable...it's probably no better or worse than any cod campaigns....but we have once again after a mini resurgence at the point where it's the norm to hate on cod
Annual soulless game make even worse (Activition you did it!). It makes money sure, but soulless nevertheless.
The Twitter/Reddit/Forum bubble people keep complaining about it, but the Real world people don't care.... and the cycle continues (will it end? probably sometime in the far future, but not right now)
How could they mess up the best villian in Cod? Kind of a shame that they couldn't make a good story with Makarov in the remake. The orginal Mw3 was insane so I was hoping they would make this just as good.
Maybe it's time to stop using Sledgehammer, they have consistently made the worse Call of Duty game. Hopefully Xbox have some kind of idea what they're doing and bring the series back to how is it used to be.
@GreatKwyjibo Call of Duty games normally review pretty well actually.
I would've preferred if they just remastered the original MW3 campaign to complete the trilogy
Recently I have played through the CoD Black Ops Cold War campaign as it was free on the subscription. And I think it was a very decent experience, the devs did really took care to make the missions diverse.
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I'm sure Microsoft will fix them. Right?
Imagine paying for this xD
I will say that I'm not a fan of using another outlets review as a source of news, reviews are subjective and only really matter once you have a feel for how your tastes line up with the writers.
Between stuff like this, click baity titles, and fuelling stupid fanboy rage, I'm starting to become tired of Push Square(and Pure Xbox).
@Bionic-Spencer didn't we also see Sony saying they can't survive without this
@Mauzuri it's not ign though it's just one persons opinion who works at ign
Hahaha is it any surprise that COD is garbage? I’m sure the bro crowd will still buy it
(Being partially facetious)
Phil Spencer at it again.
(Being serious)
It would be a great justice if the STEEP decline in sales Call of Duty deserves happens now that Microsoft owns the property (and I'm not talking about merely the negative effect on sales of Game Pass).
@__jamiie aww did I hurt your feelings,calm down buddy ,I dont care how much money it makes Sony, its a steaming pile of hot shi*e, you believe cod makes more money for Sony than there first party games...dont be ridiculous,nobody buys a ps5 for cod.
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@GreatKwyjibo Twenty-two points. Plus, triple-word score, plus fifty points for using all my letters... Game's over, I'm outta here.
"Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 won’t be judged solely on its campaign, as multiplayer is the main reason fans play."
First part is true, yes it won't be judged solely on its campaign.
Second part is not true however. Even internal activision data does not reflect this.
CoD is evaluated by its fans as a complete package. Its true a good MP in CoD can save the game, but the same can be true of the campaign. There is a sizable portion of the player base that spends little to no time in the multiplayer. Don't get me wrong there is a dedicated online player base, the fans of the MP will certainly way MW3's accomplisments of that mode as to whether or not this game was a success. Equally so CoD has alerady lost those people who were interested in playing the campaign. Who were lead to believe this DLC, masquerading as a premium product worthy of a vault edition was somehow supposed to live up to MW2, CW, or MW1. Not to mention live up to those games' namesake.
Hopefully for Sledgehammers sake, this doesn't impact them too hard.
I've never liked CoD games. I never understood the hype around it either. But that's probably just me. The only time I play CoD is when it's free on PS Plus and then only the single player. Anyway. To anyone who enjoys CoD, enjoy. Personally, I think it's all a faded glory.
@Mephisto2869 better check your facts, and 3rd party revenue is really important to Sony, what do thinks funds the making of all those Sony 1st part games??
I've not got MW2 so if I buy MW3 will I be able to play it
@Mauzuri oh it is bad.it cobbled together missions from spec ops missions and warzone.
@Drago201 you'd be correct plus bits from warzone as well
@Rocky1972 yeah it doesn't matter all the games going forward launch off of Call Of Duty app on what you will be using
This year cod have the Microsoft quality sealed of approval. All jokes aside this is why I dislike abk deal cod was already kind of bad the last few years the franchise about to get worse under Microsoft.
A real shame that this series is still as popular as it is given how Activision handles it. I get that people are dumb enough to keep buying it every year, so that would be millions and millions of dollars (probably billions) they would be giving up by not releasing a CoD each year.
The series continued success is kind of a representation of how people are nowadays, but it seems clear that Activision has finally completely milked CoD dry. The campaigns were at least a decent 5 hours or so that you could play once the games went on an extreme sale (or on PS Plus), but now there's not even that.
@Jay767 I don't think a series could get any worse than crappy multiplayer and the series' worst campaign in the history of the franchise.
I actually hope Microsoft steps in and forces them to actually take a year off. It's not like the current CoD couldn't make them millions and millions in the meantime, nor is Microsoft in a financial position to need to milk a franchise to get by. I'm not saying they will, but it'd be nice if something positive came from them buying Activision.
@InvaderJim I don't need to check facts ,to know that sonys first party games make more money for Sony than cod,who said anything about 3rd party games not being important to sony.
@KilloWertz have you played a little game call halo infinite cod will and can get worse under Microsoft.
@PixelDragon I like game pass ,there's some good games on there ,but its 90 percent rubbish ,full of games you only play for a few minutes and uninstall,of course they are going to get high number of players on the day of release of a major game ,but they never sustain them.
@Jay767 It is bad, but is it really worse than Modern Warfare 3? At least Halo Infinite has a good campaign.
I'm not saying it will get better under Microsoft. I was just saying it would be nice if it did under them so there'd at least be something positive from them buying Activision.
So they’ve ruined the franchise…that has to be a record - even for Microsoft.
Microsoft paid 70 billion dollars for that 4/10.
@JohntheRaptor Never had an issue 🤷🏽♂️ sucks you had a rare bug, but that doesn't mean its worse than a bad 3hr campaign in a $70 title
It's a shame they changed the product rotation years ago with each developer having their own third mode like zombies one year then spec ops/survival & extinction the following year, it gave me a reason to buy it but people just wanted zombies constantly in the early 2010s & now look at, regurgitated garbage that has no soul but here we are now with warzone, I hope that fades away soon.
I guess it's a thing of personal taste. I disliked MW1 campaign, than I didn't expect anything from MW2s campaign and was surprised, it was way better in my opinion.
A friend already said, the MW3 campaign was alright.
The most hours will be spent in Multiplayer either way.
@Leonhart I would buy the singleplayer campaigns alone as long as they are not a launcher on a disc.
@Nintendo4Sonic I loved Farah in the new modern warfare reboot I hope to see her again it's something else besides the America is the best snooze fest.
Does it really matter? Thats like saying the new Madden/FIFAs campaign sucks, it will sell billions regardless.
I was hugely disappointed with the last COD, no way I was going to buy this one.
@Mephisto2869 name a Sony game that has generated 1.5 billion in a single year, that's with no development costs either. In addition to the revenue they get from the.cod game sales, Sony added that from 2019 to 2020 the revenue from cod players spending on subs, hardware etc was worth 15 billion.
Last COD game I played was the one with Kevin Spacey in it
All of my 13 year old son's friends from school on Playstation preordered this. Roughly 15-20. I couldn't believe it when I saw it. Not a single one preordered or bought Spider-Man 2 though. I'm so happy he's the opposite.
@DanteDevilHunter Still asking full price for it so I will see it like a full game which its clearly not.
@Flaming_Kaiser gotta agree with you. This is an expansion so if it was say £25 i'd be interested but not for £70 as thats just sending the signal that its ok to give us less game for more money. Thats not a message we should be sending to these greedy publishers.
@InvaderJim you see now your just moving the goal posts ,the debate (the one that you decided to join by the way) wasn't a single game made by Sony, but by first party games in general ,generate more money for Sony than cod as a whole,maybe next time understand what people are talking about before gegging in 👍
@Toot1st
I really don't think a reviewer plays the game, writes a review, and then posts the review directly to the website without any oversite. There are editors who look at the content and they then have discussions (probably many) with the team about the score and the content of the article. Others who are playing in the office also have some opinions that influence the score as well. Maybe I am way off base here as to the inner workings of a review/news website but I really don't think these reviews are an individual effort. Correct me if I'm wrong here.
@SgtTruth
This is something that I have been noticing lately people who actually watch and comment on the gaming hobby. We want new IPs, just not THAT new IP. Everyone also wants lots of content in their game, just not THAT bloated Ubisoft content. Or they want a great narrative and then complain the game is too much like playing a movie. Or maybe we want developers to innovate the gameplay in an interesting way but then complain that it's not the same as other games in the franchise.
Don't get me wrong, being able to have strong opinions on something that you love is part of the hobby. I know D&D players argue about which rules are better, or model train builders as to what scale is best for realism, and don't get me started on sports enthusiasts. I just find it funny that no matter what these developers/publishers do the social media mob is exploiting them for clicks one way or another.
Game Pass building its legacy.
They still managed to payoff Metacritic to hide the reviews pre full launch....
@Vega37 Rare? It's all over the internet. If it affects even one person and it's gamebreaking it should be patched. A campaign that can't be finished is still worse than anything.
I Only play MP
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@JohntheRaptor Not saying it shouldn't be patched but just because you looked it up and found other that had the same issue doesn't mean it was widespread. I've never even heard of it until you said it, so it's clearly not "all over the internet" or common. Even without finished it you still got more out of the campaign than you can with MW3. Guess that 3 stands for 3 hours, which is far worse than a 6-8hr campaign most people enjoyed and finished bugged or not. All MW3's campaign is, is a tutorial for warzone. That's not a campaign, it's a slap in the face to their consumers who they've been disappointing for over 2 years now.
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