Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 reminded me of something I’d forgotten since 2022: I actually like Call of Duty. For years, the series has been lost in a hell of goofy, self-referential plotlines, open-world gameplay, and characters returning from the dead. The experience got more bombastic but less interesting. Safety replaced grit, and mass-market appeal took priority over telling a good story. Not even multiplayer was safe. What started as light jeering over Nicki Minaj skins ended with a mass exodus during the Beavis and Butt-Head event. The vibes have never recovered.
I was wary of this year’s COD. It’s difficult to get excited about the fourth game in what was supposed to be a trilogy when bloat is what you’re sick of. But something felt different almost immediately.
The story opens with a group of regular people: four South Korean conscripts and two American advisors. They’re not supermen hunting stolen nukes in an Arctic base; they’re grunts shopping for ramen in a corner store. But before they can eat their noodles, the lights go out, rockets rain down from the sky, and a named character dies. North Korea is invading, and our heroes have to answer the call of duty. Which is the thing from the name!
“Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 reminded me of something I’d forgotten since 2022: I actually like Call of Duty.”
It’s been a long time since this franchise has told a story about people. I can’t fully express what a breath of fresh air it was. The writing, blocking, and action were so tight in those opening moments that I would have been invested even without the gorgeous graphical improvements. The story wouldn’t stay measured for long, but the plight of our new Korean friends kept the stakes firmly on the ground.
The campaign does not belong entirely to its Korean characters, though. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 is the finale to Captain Price’s globe-trotting saga. One complaint about this iteration of Modern Warfare is that its story is ambiguous: deaths are impermanent, and nothing ever seems to get resolved. There’s no ambiguity this time. Captain Price, John Wicks his way through moody set-piece maps, exacting revenge one brutal boss fight at a time. Each score is settled with a horrific act of violence, and a bullet in someone’s forehead. The camera lingers, just so you know they won’t be resurrecting anytime soon.
It was a lot. The pulped faces and broken bones after some fights were more graphic than what you’d find in a Resident Evil game. Call of Duty games are M-rated, but are generally seen as young-people-friendly. Modern Warfare 4 earns its M rating.
The story cuts between the before and after of the invasion. Captain Price’s before levels are inspired by Hollywood action-thrillers, with the after feeling more like a nationalistic war drama. The pacing and tone aren’t always as exciting, though. The most notable break in the action is an Outlast-style hide-and-seek level where you skulk around the North Korean leader’s palace. It’s unintentionally hilarious for five minutes but then drags on for another ten. Other levels are little more than interactive cutscenes, and there are plenty of regular cutscenes, too.
“Despite those shortcomings, this really is the best Call of Duty campaign we’ve had in years. I’d argue it’s one of the best in the franchise.”
The gameplay itself is pretty much in line with earlier Modern Warfare titles. The levels are mostly linear shooting galleries, heavily scripted from start to finish. If you’re looking for depth or strategy, this isn’t it. The experience is more like riding a rollercoaster while watching Black Hawk Down on your phone. Thankfully, there’s no Omni-movement, but Warzone mechanics like treasure chests and armour plates return. Treasure chests, however, appear only in the game’s one open-world level.
Open-world levels have always been the weakest link in the Call of Duty formula. This one improves on the format by adding fast travel, effectively making the open world optional. If you use it, the mission becomes a series of sub-levels that converge at a forward operating base. It’s still an awkward break in the pacing, but less of a slog than all of Modern Warfare 3. I get the feeling Call of Duty’s open worlds aren’t long for this world, because if the designers are improving the gameplay by removing the gameplay, chances are they’re sick of it, too.
Despite those shortcomings, this really is the best Call of Duty campaign we’ve had in years. I’d argue it’s one of the best in the franchise. But as good as it is, the campaign is short and serves a prelude to multiplayer and DMZ.
Multiplayer
Multiplayer picks up roughly where Modern Warfare 3 left off, continuing the trend of each new game being faster and sweatier than the last. Movement is more grounded than in last year’s Black Ops 7, but smaller, hyper-congested maps have ramped up the pace. One concern during the beta was the ridiculous spawn shifting that threw matches into utter chaos. That issue has mostly been resolved. It now takes more than one guy pushing into the enemy spawn to flip it.
Two major changes reshape combat: volumetric smoke and the elimination of weapon bloom. Smoke clouds now react to explosions, gunfire, and player movement. Like in Counter-Strike 2, shooting through smoke clears a small path, allowing you to see what’s on the other side. Removing weapon bloom means hipfire shots follow the cursor instead of deviating randomly. Not only does this make point shooting a viable strategy, but it also removes some of the arcade feel that has crept into the series over the past decade.
For me, the highlight of multiplayer is the return to messy map design. Since this reboot began, and throughout the last two Black Ops games, maps have been meticulously groomed and balanced. There were very few blind spots, cheeky corners, or murder holes. It made for balanced play, but flat action. The new maps are filled with obstructions and one-way vantage points.
This is a good thing because it lets a single player defend a lane. If teams want to push a point, they’ll have to work together to dislodge defenders. Having to do attrition calculus and strategize is way more fun than endless head-to-heads. That’s the real reason I think this design works; it has nothing to do with the schadenfreude of hearing the enemy mentally unravel when I find a BS camping spot.
A new addition that gained way more traction than I expected is Kill Block. This self-contained map rotates through different configurations, swapping out sectors between matches. At launch, it’s restricted to 3v3 and 10v10 Gunfight, a mode that gives players random loadouts and no respawns. Once a team is wiped, the players switch sides and run the map again before it reconfigures. In total, there will be 500 different combinations of map layouts. I’m usually not a Gunfight guy, but with this setup, I couldn’t get enough of it.
DMZ
DMZ, on the other hand, is nowhere near where Modern Warfare 3 left it. Call of Duty’s experimental extraction shooter is now fully realized, with missions that continue the campaign, character progression, crafting, and an upgradable base.
The main problem DMZ had to overcome was standing out. Since its beta launched in 2022, games like Arena Breakout and Delta Force have built on its free-to-play, semi-casual foundations. The new DMZ doesn’t just surpass its imitators; it carves out a place of its own in the genre. Its PvPvE and looting mechanics fall somewhere between ARC Raiders and Escape from Tarkov, combining the former’s mission-focused social balance with the latter’s gritty atmosphere. What makes it unique is its addition of Far Cry-style stealth and Destiny-style raids.
DMZ’s loot economy also has a novel twist: you’re not just risking your gear; you’re risking your character. You have three operator slots, each occupied by a character who levels up independently. If an operator dies, you have to pay to get them back. The higher their level, the more expensive the rescue—and cash is rarer than it used to be. If you run out of money, you may have to abandon an operator to make room for a recruit who can grind enough cash to buy back the others.
“This isn’t a corporately sanitized experience designed to appeal to everyone; it’s a Modern Warfare game for Call of Duty fans.”
Weapons are expensive, too. A basic rifle costs only a few thousand dollars, but adding a single attachment can cost thousands more. Each additional attachment costs more than the last. A five-attachment gun can run over $100,000, making it more valuable than the operator carrying it. Your gun alone is reason enough to extract, giving rare weapon drops some real significance.
What makes all this worth doing, though, is the new map, Hajin. Call of Duty has been doing big maps for years, but rarely have they come together this well. It’s a sprawling, three-sector map that combines North Korean, South Korean, and Russian zones, each with its own style, vehicles, and AI.
Aside from being one of the largest maps in the franchise, it’s also the most cohesive. Al Mazrah and Verdansk have always felt like themed playsets pushed together. Each section was cool on its own, but the stitching felt contrived. Hajin feels like a real place. There’s a logic to why everything is where it is, with gradients between urban and rural, industrial and agricultural, North and South. The Russian sector will unlock in Season Two.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 is the end of a story arc that’s gone on too long. But in its closing chapter, it has rediscovered what made it great in the first place. It’s tense, ugly, hilariously earnest, and unashamed to be the power fantasy that it is. This isn’t a corporately sanitized experience designed to appeal to everyone; it’s a Modern Warfare game for Call of Duty fans.
