Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 is all in on Modern Warfare 2 nostalgia

polygon.com:

Activision and developers Sledgehammer Games, Infinity Ward, and Treyarch revealed Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 on Thursday, during an in-game event in Warzone. This year’s Call of Duty will feature a number of firsts for the franchise: It’s the first back-to-back direct sequel in Call of Duty history; the game’s multiplayer will carry over “a vast amount of content” from last year’s game; and the beloved Zombies co-op mode will be playable in a Modern Warfare setting.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 will be released on Nov. 10 for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows PC (via Battle.net and Steam), Xbox One, and Xbox Series X. Here’s what Call of Duty fans can expect from this year’s entry.

Narratively, Modern Warfare 3 will pick up right where Modern Warfare 2 left off, with Russian ultranationalist Vladimir Makarov dragging Task Force 141 (Price, Soap, Ghost, Gaz, et al.) into a new conflict. Mr. “No Russian” himself was teased as MW3’s big bad during a credits sequence in MW2, and Activision put a face to Makarov’s name earlier this month, with actor Julian Kostov (Shadow and Bone) taking on the role.

Activision and lead developer Sledgehammer Games promise “a new innovation that empowers player decisions” in the Modern Warfare 3 campaign. These Open Combat missions, Activision says, will emphasize player choice with “numerous additional paths and choices to complete objectives.” In practice, that sounds like a stealth vs. guns-blazing approach in portions of the campaign. In the gallery above, you might get a sense of how those player choices will be presented — particularly from the stealthy, let’s-attack-from-under-the-ice side perspective.

While the campaign side of Modern Warfare 3 appears to be leaning into