Highlights

  • Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's campaign is being criticized for covering familiar ground and lacking a strong story, which may disappoint fans.
  • The game expects players to have prior knowledge of Call of Duty: Warzone and Modern Warfare 2's Raids, which can leave newcomers confused and disconnected from the narrative.
  • While synergy between Call of Duty projects is fine, it should never lead to confusion for players, and this trend of requiring external knowledge needs to stop.

Call of Duty campaigns have always been short but fun affairs. Even at its worst, a Call of Duty single-player campaign has at least one or two missions that are worth the price of admission, usually delivering a huge, bombastic, high-octane set piece that only Call of Duty can do. That being said, the story has never really been the series' strongest suit, and by all accounts, that's more true than ever with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.

Though fans have been waiting for Makarov's return for years now, even his reappearance can't save Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's rough campaign. Currently, a sparking no shortage of debates, Modern Warfare 3's campaign has been panned by both critics and fans alike, and a big point of criticism is just how much familiar ground the game covers. But while Modern Warfare 3's campaign is definitely basic, those who haven't kept up with every last shred of Call of Duty content over the last few years might end up walking away needlessly confused.

RELATED: Why Call of Duty's Trophy Problem Could Continue After MW3

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's Campaign Is Far From Standalone

The whole point of Call of Duty is that it's a franchise based around a more casual, general audience. While there are some avid fans out there who consume every piece of CoD content they can get their hands on, most fans grab the yearly release, play for a month or so, and drop out again. For the longest time, Call of Duty's developers have known this, and have made their campaigns largely standalone affairs that can be enjoyed by even the most casual players, even if they're technically a sequel.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, however, goes against this in a number of ways. With this being the third entry in the rebooted Modern Warfare series, it's fair that the game expects fans to have played through the two previous entries before hopping into this latest campaign, but that's far from the only thing Modern Warfare 3 asks of its player-base. Instead, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's campaign expects players to have kept up with both Warzone and MW2's Raids.

Modern Warfare 3's Campaign Requires Knowledge of Warzone to Understand

Much like most other battle royale games, Call of Duty: Warzone has had some major story beats in the last few years, but it really isn't at the forefront of the experience. Instead, most of Warzone's story is told through minimal in-game cutscenes and dialogue, most of which only appear during specific timed events, and if players miss one, then that's it. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, however, expects all players to have kept up with all of these little tidbits of lore.

During Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's campaign, players will be reintroduced to Alex Keller, a character first introduced in the 2019 Modern Warfare reboot. For those who have only played the mainline campaigns since, Alex has been dead since the end of that game, sacrificing himself to save the day. Naturally, this leads to a lot of confusion if fans haven't played Call of Duty: Warzone, where it was revealed back in 2020 that Alex had actually survived the explosion.

To make matters even worse, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's campaign also expects players to have experienced all of Modern Warfare 2's Raids as well. These Raids bring Alex back into the fold once more and also confirm that Graves never actually died during Modern Warfare 2's campaign, and that he was no longer hostile to Task Force 141. Those who haven't played these supplementary Call of Duty experiences are going to be pretty confused, especially as MW3 doesn't do a good job of explaining these appearances to new audiences. While it's fine to have synergy between Call of Duty projects, it should never lead to confusion on the player's part, and it's a series trend that needs to stop.