Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare

The best series entry in years almost hits every target

- Ian Dean

There’s a moment early in this game when we need to crawl under some lorries and then silently drag ourselves across a pile of dead bodies to remain undetected by a Russian patrol, and we can feel the developer winking at us through the code. “Remember All Ghillied Up?” it’s asking. “So do we.” Recollection is a theme that resonates through the game at regular intervals, playing as a constant reminder that this game shares its DNA with Call Of Duty 4.

Thankfully this doesn’t overshadow everything in Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare, and while the story has problems, it’s still one of the best Call Of Duty campaigns in a generation.

Bringing in former Naughty Dog talent has clearly paid off. Where past Call Of Duty narratives have felt disjointed but functional, here it’s focussed and well-paced. But it’s not the sharp analysis of modern warfare the developer was aiming for. It’s more A-Team than Sicario as series icon Captain Price gathers a band of brothers, and a sister, to take down a zealous Russian general and his paint-by-numbers Middle-Eastern terrorist accomplice.

BOOTS ON OUR GROUND

The campaign is varied and lively, never failing to keep you on edge. The standard huge battles that make up Call Of Duty’s footprint are pulled back to reality by tense stealth missions and covert breach assaults. Storming a London townhouse using night vision is genuinely unsettling as the reality of war comes to a quiet street near you. It’s the appalling possibility of accidentally shooting innocents that anchors these, and many, of the new Modern Warfare’s missions.