Video Game / Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019)

"Bravo Six... going dark."

"We get dirty, and the world stays clean. That's the mission."

— Captain John Price

The one that modernised the FPS genre - again.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is a Continuity Reboot of the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare series, developed by Infinity Ward and published by Activision for the Playstation 4, Xbox One and PC. It was released worldwide on October 25, 2019.

The year is 2019. In The Middle East, the Russian-occupied country of Urzikstan enters another turbulent year in its endless Civil War. Radical Russian general Roman Barkov rules the country with an iron fist and maintains a supply of poison gas to strike down the rebelling locals. A Urzikstani terrorist group called Al-Qatala is formed in response, who aims to launch attacks on foreign soil and kill foreigners indiscriminately until all outsiders leave Urzikstan. As Urzikstan falls deeper and deeper into senseless violence, the world around it becomes more violent as well day by day.

Players play as a CIA agent codenamed Alex, SAS Sergeant Kyle Garrick, and local resistance leader Farah Karim as their missions to expose Barkov's oppression of the Urzikstani people and stop Al-Qatala's attacks intertwine and escalate, and eventually becomes a mission to stop the world from collapsing into World War III.

In addition to the campaign, the multiplayer has seen some adjustments as well. In addition to the class system being reverted to something similar to that of the original Modern Warfare trilogy, a new feature, Gunsmith has been introduced to allow for more extensive weapon customization than ever before in the series, offering modifications for just about every aspect of a gun. This game also introduces two new game modes: Gunfight, a close-quarters focused 2v2 mode with an emphasis on skill, and Ground War, a large 20v20 and 32v32 objective matches similar to Battlefield's Conquest mode.

The Zombies mode from prior installments sits this game out in favour of the returning Special Ops mode from Modern Warfare 2 and 3, and it too has seen some changes - allowing for four players to a team instead of just two, along with bringing in multi-stage Operations rather than one-and-done missions.

Also, for the first time since World at War's PC version 11 years prior, Modern Warfare foregoes the business model of paid map packs entirely in favour of releasing new Multiplayer Maps and Operations at no extra cost. On top of that, in a series first Modern Warfare also has cross-platform play between all three platforms, bringing the community closer together than ever before.

On March 10th, 2020, Call of Duty: Warzone, a free-to-play standalone release of the two Battle Royale modes, the titular Warzone and the heist-inspired Plunder, also added in the main game, was released.

On May 25th, 2022, Infinity Ward announced a sequel, Modern Warfare II, released on October 28th, 2022. A second sequel, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III, was announced on August 7th, 2023 for release on November 10th, 2023.

Not to be confused with Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare from 2007.

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Call of Duty: Modern Warfare contains examples of the following Tropes:

• Ace Custom:
  • Per series tradition, many weapons in the game have variants of certain rarities. These typically boast pre-attached accessories and can be used at any time, even if the player hasn't unlocked their base variants or the attachments they come with yet. That, and they also look nice, since these weapons usually have custom part models that aren't available when replicating their builds with a base weapon and the corresponding attachments. That being said, these variants are not unique in any way gameplay-wise, as the attachments they come with could be unlocked eventually with enough effort. The only benefit they grant is that their users can have early access to some weapons that otherwise might take a bit of grinding to unlock.
  • Hadir has his own HDR that he tricked out for his own use. It too is a Legendary variant usable in multiplayer, though there it is chambered in 12.7x108mm ammunition rather than the .338LM rounds Hadir's rifle uses in the campaign.
  • The player could create their own by saving a weapon's attachment loadout as a blueprint, and even name their custom guns if they so choose.
• Action Bomb: At certain points throughout the campaign, the player, usually while playing as Kyle Garrick, will come across Al-Qatala members with bombs strapped to their bodies, who will attempt to bumrush them and detonate, killing both parties instantly. These foes can be prematurely killed, but they will still blow up regardless, so keep a healthy distance away or they'll take you with them.
• Actor Allusion: LaMonica Garrett, the voice of this game's version of Griggs, previously portrayed a marine in the two-part NCIS episode "Engaged".
• Action Girl: More than all previous Call of Duty games combined. In addition to La Résistance leader Farah, she also has an Amazon Brigade who help her escape from a Russian prison, and there's also a number of Al-Qatala fighters that are women. This is in addition to two female officers on the American side of things. And in the Multiplayer mode, seven of the total twenty-nine playable operators are also female (Charly, Domino, Alice & Mara for the Coalition and Syd, Iskra & Roze for the Allegiance)
• Adaptational Diversity: Starting with this game, there's more diversity on the protagonists' side, as the protagonists in the original Modern Warfare trilogy were mostly Caucasian males from the Anglosphere and Russia. For starters, the game is notable for featuring a female protagonist through Farah Karim, who is Middle-Eastern. In addition, Gaz, known as Kyle Garrick, gets a Race Lift and is black as opposed to Caucasian in the original trilogy.
• Adapted Out: The end of the Campaign reveals the existence of Imran Zakhaev, his son Victor, and Khaled Al-Asad. But Vladimir Makarov, who was a major character in the original timeline, doesn't get mentioned until the very end of the sequel.
• A.K.A.-47: Zig-zagged, as usual with Call of Duty games. Completely fictional names like the Kilo 141 (HK433) and R9-0 (DP-12) rub shoulders with accurate names like the Dragunov and Origin 12.
  • This is in part due to how recognizable a weapon is by name - names like M4A1, MP7 or P90 are much more recognizable, having been used by this series for a decade, so much that the "M4A1" is actually a slightly different weapon (the shorter-barreled Colt Model 933, which is mocked up to resemble the MK-18 Mod 0) going by a name people are more likely to recognize. In turn, newer weapons like the HK433 and Standard Manufacturing DP-12^note Strangely, the DP-12 goes by its real name in the Campaign. It's not clear why two names were assigned for the same gun. are much less recognizable. Licensing issues are also part of the problem, though inconsistently; for the Model 933, for instance, it can be called the M4A1 because there is also legal precedent for the actual manufacturers of such weapons to not have any claim over the American military's designation for them, but the M14, which would logically be in the same boat legally and have a recognizable name (having been available in all three games of the original Modern Warfare trilogy), was renamed to the "EBR-14" in the released game. In the Origin 12's case, Activision may have secured the required license.
  • Even some returning weapons aren't safe from this. The Remington 870 is known as the "Model 680", despite appearing in previous games with its correct name. The FAMAS, a staple of the Modern Warfare series, returns as the "FR 5.56", and in early gameplay footage was known as the "FR .556", suggesting a completely different caliber before the name was updated. The Desert Eagle/".50 GS" is probably the most tragic case, since it has shown up in all Modern Warfare titles prior to this, yet here it has an almost fictional appearance, where it seems to shrink, as well as take on a more rounded and beveled look, making it seem much less like an actual Desert Eagle, and has even lost its real name which up until Modern Warfare Remastered was still being used verbatim. The MP7 is another example, having a completely made-up model that only looks remotely like an actual MP7 when looked at from a hundred yards or further (in fact, the model appears to be taken from an airsoft gun).
  • Strangely, while the .50 Action Express round is bland-named as ".50 Pistol", the .41 Action Express round, which is an available ammo conversion for the Uzi, is not, being simply shortened to ".41 AE". This is taken in an even stranger direction with the Sykov (Makarov PM with PMM magazine), as not only is the weapon's actual name is clearly shown in the ammunition being chambered (9mm Makarov), it isn't the only weapon in the game that chambers that round, the other being the Bizon.
  • The Glock 21 is called the "X16", despite not being a prototype or Glock even having a model that starts with "16" (their lowest numbered model is the 17).
  • The SIG Sauer P320 RX Compact is referred to as the "M19", which is one off from its actual military designation of M18, while the M17 is the full-size P320.
  • The Heckler & Koch MG5 is given the designation of "M91", which like the M13 assault rifle in game suggests this is a formal military designation.
  • The "Holger-26" light machine gun's name is a reference to the Heckler & Koch MG36 (hence the game treating it as an LMG), which never went into full production. By default, the gun is actually a quasi-G36K with the G36C's top rail and a drum magazine, with attachment options to give it the standard 30-round mag and a shorter barrel to make it resemble a proper G36C. Unfortunately, like the MP7 above, drastic changes were made to its model to skirt around trademarks, even the default drum mag and unlockable "integral" scopes are fictional, therefore it's not possible to create a true G36 platform through Gunsmith.
  • The "STRIKER .45" submachine gun available in Season 2 Battle Pass is LWRC's SMG-45, though with some Heckler & Koch UMP details like the selector lever. The "Undertaker" variant turns it into a more proper UMP45, though it keeps the SMG-45's ambidextrous bolt release and has completely different sights from the real weapon.
  • The ShAK-12/ASh-12.7 is referred to as "Oden" in the game for seemingly no discernible reason. And no, it's not related to the Japanese hot-pot dish of the same name. It's supposed to be a form of "Woden", as in the Norse god Thor's father Odin, but the rifle has nothing to do with Norse mythology.
  • The SIG Sauer MCX VIRTUS SBR is known in-game as the "M13", suggesting it has been adopted in formal military service.
  • In the open beta, the SCAR-H was known as the "FN Scar 17s”, which referenced the semi-auto civilian SCAR-17S. As of the full release, it is known as the "FN Scar 17", slightly more accurate than the beta version but still not quite hitting it on the nail, especially with the lack of capitalization. What's even more puzzling is despite featuring the "FN" trademark in both of these names, the markings on the weapon suggest it is instead being manufactured by the in-universe firearm company "Forge Tac USA".
  • The "Grau" assault rifle is a SIG SG552. It can be fitted with a rifle-length barrel, making it look more like the full-size SG550.
  • The launchers, save for the RPG, seem to be the most egregious examples.
    • The FGM-148 Javelin is known as the "JOKR" or "Joker", which isn't a name it has ever been referred to in any form, and like in previous Modern Warfare games it possesses the ability to lock onto points on the ground as a makeshift "smart mortar", a function it does not possess in real life.
    • The Carl Gustav M4 is known as the "Strela-P", which is a Russian designation for a completely different type of launcher (the M4 is a dumb-fire recoilless rifle, the Strela is an infrared anti-air launcher like the Stinger).
    • The 9K38 Igla (or "Needle" in Russian) is featured as the "Pila" which is the Russian word for "Saw".
  • Averted for once in the series with the Trope Namer, in that this is the first installment to feature an "AK-47" and have it be an actual AK-47, with the correct milled receiver, flat top, gas block, and muzzle. That being said, due to the game's increased pool of attachments, it is perfectly possible to modify the AK-47 into another variant and still retain the "AK-47" name, with possibly the most egregious case being one converted to use 5.45x39mm ammunition, which should rename it to an AK-74, but doesn't. Strangely, in the beta, converting it to 5.45mm did rename it - but it did so to "AKS-74U" (a series first for using that name), even if you otherwise didn't attach any of the other parts that would actually make it an AKS-74U.
  • The "AK-12" only found in the campaign. It is very obviously an AK-47, which also spawns in the same mission. Both weapons look identical in every way except for their attachment loadouts, as the "AK-12" is just an AK-47 fitted with a "Spetsnaz Elite" barrel and a "FORGE TAC Ultralight" stock. Neither of these mods makes it a true AK-12 - the only authentic AK-12 part is the pistol grip.
  • Season 3’s weapons, the Renetti pistol and Bruen Mk9 machine gun, are based on stylized versions of the Beretta M9A3 and FN Minimi respectively. However, this trope is averted for the SKS (although technically the weapon is modeled after the Zastava M59/66, a Yugoslavian version of the SKS rifle).
  • Season 4's new weapons, the Fennec SMG, CR-56 AMAX assault rifle, and Rytec AMR sniper rifle are, respectively, Kriss Vector (although the weapon is also visually modified significantly, shortening the receiver to the point it could look like a different weapon), Galil ACE and Barrett XM109.
  • While the ISO is based on the Brugger & Thomet APC9 (of the MP9 fame), this is averted for the AN-94, which not only was already adopted by the Russian special forces groups but was also discontinued in 2006.
  • Season 6 plays it straight with the "SP-R 208" (an M24), but averts it with the AS VAL (mostly, the real weapon's name isn't in all capitals). Like the AK, though, it's possible to modify the Val into a VSS Vintorez or an approximation of the SR-3, without changing the name. The later Season 6 weapon, the AA-12 shotgun, also goes with the pseudonym route by being presented as the "JAK-12".
  • The CZ Scorpion EVO 3 A1 and SIG Sauer MG 338 are represented as the "CX-9" and "RAAL MG", respectively.
• The Alliance: The Armistice, a combined forces of Russia's Allegiance and NATO's Coalition. They're the group both sides form in order to combat Al-Qatala after they take over Verdansk with the help of the Ascendant, and are the player faction in Spec Ops.
• Always Chaotic Evil: Let's just say that the Russian military under Barkov isn't portrayed in a positive light (though, admittedly, they have gone rogue at this point). They are shown commiting war crime after war crime, with gems such as beating innocent civilians begging for mercy, forcing civilians to watch the public executions of their neighbors, executing unarmed and surrendering civilians en masse, attacking children with intent to kill, nonchalantly executing wounded civilians, torturing helpless and innocent prisoners.
• Amazon Brigade: Farah is a severely starved and dehydrated teenage girl with zero combat experience, having spent the last 10 of her 18 years in prison enduring various abuses and tortures. She and a few other female prisoners (who are almost certainly in similar condition) are able to pick up rifles and fight their way through the Russian army to escape prison.
• And Now for Someone Completely Different: The game includes sections where you lead a helpless innocent bystander (Stacy) to safety around armed guards. It also includes a section where you play as a little girl (Farah) trying to survive the Russian occupation. And finally in the last mission you take control of Farah as she gets her revenge on Barkov.
• And the Adventure Continues: General Barkov is dead and his actions are disowned by the Russian government in the face of his gas factory being destroyed, but an Ultranationalist named Victor Zakhaev is aiming to take Barkov's seat in the military. Price tells Laswell he intends to form Task Force 141 to go after Zakhaev. Meanwhile, Al-Qatala has grown in numbers and is using tanks and armored vehicles against Russian forces, having rallied around a new leader that is heavily implied to be the reboot's version of Khaled Al-Asad, which leads directly into the events of the co-op missions.
• Antepiece: Several levels have an additional gameplay mechanic, but you're given information on the needed controls and often you're walked through how to work with the gimmick before the heavy action starts. For example, "Highway of Death" has you operate a long-range rifle and dealing with both bullet drop and wind effects. You're given the opportunity to practice on some dummy targets before you're expected to pop heads.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • Difficulty levels can be freely adjusted up and down as you play, and changes will take effect immediately after unpausing unlike in other games where a checkpoint or level restart is required. Whereas the previous titles only let you go down to an easier setting if you're getting stomped, the reboot lets you go both up and down to dynamically adjust your experience if you're having an easy or hard time. The only caveat is that the achievement for beating the game on Veteran or Realism cannot be unlocked in that playthrough if you reduce down to Hardened.
  • Taking up after Call of Duty: Black Ops 4, players are sometimes waived a loss that would have otherwise affected their win rate if they join a match after it has already started. The session must have been going for some time before this would register, though, as joining too early counts as a normal match and a loss will be recorded. This is to address the frustration many players get when joining a game in progress only to be shunted over to the side that's been getting steamrolled and is a minute away from losing.
  • Loadouts can be tweaked or even completely redone from the ground up while a match is going on, so that players won't be stuck with a suboptimal build when playing on certain maps against users of specific weapons. Field Upgrades can be changed mid-game as well. Killstreaks cannot be changed, though.
  • The reboot did away with the Prestige system entirely, in favor of the "seasonal rank" model, which is unlocked once the player has reached the soft level cap of 55. As such, players will no longer lose all unlocked gear and have to regrind from scratch and will get to keep everything they've unlocked so as to be competitively viable come the next season, though MW levels past 55 have to be regained all over again. An update in January 2020 later made up for the fact that this meant there was no way to unlock additional loadout slots past the initial five that are automatically unlocked at Rank 4, adding the ability to unlock another five as before.
  • Warzone handles respawns rather uniquely: When you go down the first time, you'll be sent over to the Gulag as a "Prisoner of Warzone", where you'll have to partake in a 1v1 duel against anyone who's also a PoW. Succeed, and you'll be sent right back in the action, giving an incentive to keep your skills sharp in the event of a Gulag trip.
  • In a first for the series, characters will automatically equip their sidearm when climbing ladders, meaning players are no longer defenceless when doing so.
• Artistic License – Biology: Farah stated she has been in solitary for 10 days without food or water. While she may have been able to survive that long without food, she would be dead in less than a week without water, as the timeline for death by dehydration for humans is much slimmer.
• Artistic License – Geography:
  • One of the multiplayer maps suggests that the Euphrates river flows through the game's Qurac, except it's supposed to be in the Caucasus, nowhere near the Euphrates. Also, a country in the Caucasus mountain range cannot have the same climate as Syria, deserts and all.
  • The Season 4 cinematic takes it up to eleven, showing Verdansk (an Eastern European city) to be located southeast of Urzikstan, and Urzikstan itself being a coastal country, presumably on the Eastern coast of Azov Sea.
• Artistic License – Gun Safety: In the "Old Comrades" mission, Kyle can pick up an RPG when you capture the Butcher and place him in the van. Firing an RPG in real life within the confines of a van is NOT a good idea, but the game doesn't acknowledge this.
• Artistic License – Military: Anyone familiar with small unit organization in the Marine Corps will immediately see that the Raider team in "Fog of War" makes no sense.
  • First of all, there would be no Lance Corporals, let alone Privates, in a Raider team; Marines normally have to be at least the rank of Corporal just to volunteer for Raider selection and would be at least the rank of Sergeant by the time they were qualified to operate in the field.
  • The presence of Specialist Gonzavi deserves special mention because that rank does not even exist in the Marine Corps; it's possible he was borrowed from the Army for having some special skillset critical to the mission, but no mention of this is ever made. Lastly the complete absence of a corpsman or any staff NCO's sticks out, as any Raider element would have at least one of each.
• Awesome, but Impractical:
  • Miniguns. While their damage output is unparalleled, Miniguns need to briefly spin up before they can fire, and slow the player down massively when they let loose. They also cannot reliably hit anything beyond medium range. This makes the user a juicy target for anything behind a cover, who will gladly perforate them in an instant, especially in the Campaign on Veteran and Realism. Most players pick up the Minigun, die a few times not managing to kill a single enemy, and then immediately drop them for something else. In Multiplayer, you can obtain the minigun in two ways: getting the Juggernaut killstreak, in which they are always bundled with; or randomly from the Weapon Drop Field Upgrade. Despite the former having some tactical use, the Minigun itself only serves to be a novelty at best or worse, dead weight.
  • Field Upgrade Pro. Sure, having two Field Upgrades at hand can help you deal with many types of situations, such as a Munitions Box for team resupplying, and then Dead Silence when things go sour and you need to beat feet fast. But the fact that it requires two separate button presses to activate a Field Upgrade and then choose which one you want takes up precious time, time that in most cases you likely won't have considering the game you're playing. This is less of an issue on consoles, where the Field Upgrades are picked by pressing the tactical/lethal buttons that are immediately opposite to each other, while PC has it better or worse depending on which keys you've bound to those functions. Not to mention muscle memory issues for players who were used to pressing one button and having their Field Upgrade usable immediately, who would press it and think they've activated it, then try to throw a grenade and get killed because they pulled out a trophy system instead.
• Back Stab: In multiplayer. Holding down melee while behind an unaware enemy produces an animation where your operator pulls out their personal melee weapons to strike the hapless victim down, netting you a kill. Doing this 25 times unlocks operator Kreuger. Beware, though, as neither you nor your victim are invulnerable during this, so another enemy could shoot you if they see you, or a teammate could yoink the kill from under your nose and it wouldn't count.
• Battle Royale Game: Call of Duty: Warzone was added as a new game mode and a stand-alone free-to-play title. It features up to 150 players in teams of three or solos dropping onto a large map and fighting to be the last team alive while a ring of toxic gas closes in. Downed players are sent to the Gulag and fight in a 1 v. 1 match with the chance to redeploy.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: There are a number of (Always Female) hostages who are actually The Mole and operatives of Al-Qatala. Identifying which one of these are real and which aren't is impossible until they draw a gun on you for killing their "captor." If you listen to the conversations inside the rooms before entering (subtitles help a lot), you can sometimes tell if a "hostage" will be a collaborator or noncombatant based on how they interact with the known AQ members.
• Black-and-Grey Morality:
  • While Al-Qatala and Barkov's forces are clearly morally reprehensible, the Western protagonists (particularly Price and possibly Garrick) are shown in a much more morally questionable light than before, allowing innocents to die in order to complete the mission, gunning down terrorists in front of their children, and being willing to threaten a man's family in front of him for information.
  • Nikolai who is on Price's contact is a hardened criminal who provides them with weapons to help with their unsanctioned operation to apprehend Butcher. He is also responsible for capturing the Butcher's family to be used as leverage.
• Black-and-White Morality: Farah's Arabic Urzikstan Liberation Force on the other hand is unambiguously good, as they only want to liberate their country from Barkov's army and do not commit any war crimes. Unsurprisingly, anyone looks good right next to the maniac developing chemical war crimes and slaughtering the local populace willy-nilly.
• Bland-Name Product: MW19 features plenty of this, not only with fictional weapons manufacturers replacing real-world ones, but also having a lot of fictional brand names in general plastered across the place, such as Rothwynn (Honeywell), Tanto (Sanyo) and Cronen (a combination of Hesco, SIG USA and Steiner Optics).
• Blatant Lies:
  • Several times in "Embedded", there are posters around the city of Barkov's face, saying he will bring "order and stability" to the people of Urzikstan. Even a cursory glance around shows that the reality is the exact opposite.
  • In "Hometown", when playing as a young Farah during the Russian invasion, the Russian soldier she's hiding from says he has something for her, and to "come out and [he'll] give it to you." This comes after he's been stabbed and fatally wounded Farah's father. Not to mention the radio chatter about having a "kid for the general".
• Bloodier and Gorier:
  • While not on the same level as Treyarch's (=Wa W=) or Black Ops series, this game is certainly more violent than previous Infinity Ward entries at least, as the game isn't afraid to perforate skulls and show you dead citizens or people being slaughtered with more gruesome detail than any of their prior titles. You even bash a Russian soldier's skull in with a cinderblock early on, caking the screen with blood briefly. In the campaign, high-powered weapons and explosives can dismember limbs and remove heads. Of course, all of this is optional and can be toggled on or off in the options menu.
  • This also carries over in multiplayer, as of Title Update 1.14. Certain powerful killstreaks such as VTOL Jet have the ability to shred enemy players into pieces with its machine gun. Even some Legendary blueprints are also capable to do this, as long as there is the word "Dismemberment" included in its Flavor Text description.
• "Blind Idiot" Translation: Some Russian signs in the Verdansk maps are off, either using incorrect cases or words in wrong context.
• Book Ends: Chronologically speaking, the game begins with you playing as Farah, crawling under things, and brutally stabbing a Russian soldier to death with a knife. It ends with you playing as Farah, crawling under things, and brutally stabbing General Barkov to death with a knife.
• Boring, but Practical:
  • The Kilo-141 and PKM are considered to be among the best weapons in the game at launch. Despite not excelling in any particular department, they make up for this by being very well-rounded overall. They are also level one weapons, meaning you will be sticking with them for most of your time in multiplayer anyway and unlocking scores of mods and perks for them while you're at it. The M4A1 edges into this territory as well, being a perennial favourite of the fanbase, due to its very agreeable stat spread and early unlock level and high level of customizability.
  • The tried and true Riot Shield. Sure, lugging it around means you need to sacrifice a primary slot, unless you're running Overkill as your Perk 1, you can't be zipping around the map getting mad killstreaks with it like you could using the 725 or M4A1, but it trades all of that for nigh-indestructibility even when blasted at by a minigun, Sentry Gun, or many different kinds of air support. Crouched down, and next to nothing could get through to you, and your only weaknesses are limited to explosives thrown around you, or someone taking an entire ATV or Wheelson to your face. Even when not equipped on hand, it could still block shots coming from behind, so those looking for cheap flank kills won't be so lucky. A lone player with a Riot Shield sitting in a tight corner could single-handedly turn the tide in a Headquarters match. Ironically enough, however, the Weaksauce Weakness of a Shield player is...another Shield player. Due to the fact that Riot Shields completely block non-explosive damage coming from in front of them, that means players using them cannot bash each other to death. Face-offs between two players using Shields often devolve into games of chicken, to see who would drop their guard first, or retreat out of boredom. Such is not a completely uncommon sight, and two opposing Shield players sitting on a Domination point could result in an unending stalemate unless someone else intervenes.
• Bragging Rights Reward: As ever, the Golden camos for your weapons. They represent the fact that a player has completely mastered a given weapon by unlocking every other unlockable camos available to it. The game takes it up to eleven, however, with Platinum and Damascus skins, the former of which is unlocked by achieving Gold camos for all weapons in a single class, and the latter for getting Platinum on all classes, including the Combat Knife and Riot Shield, making it basically 100% Completion.
• Break Out the Museum Piece: Weapons available include WWII-era MG34s and Kar98ks. These are somewhat justified, as both have been used by rebel forces in the present day, though a more period-appropriate alternative of the MG34 should either be a Rheinmetall MG3, or a Zastava M53 instead.
• Bribing Your Way to Victory: Nothing's stopping you from simply shelling out cold hard cash to buy your way up the tiers of the Battle Pass instead of earning them the old-fashioned way. In fact, the game itself even sells a "Battle Pass bundle" where the first 20 tiers are already unlocked for you.
• Broken Aesop: The game's narrative is designed to push the idea that War Is Hell, as explicitly pointed out in one conversation where Price says that his and Garrick's role is to get themselves dirty to keep the world clean - it's the mean ol' ugly and inevitable reality of war that, sometimes, good soldiers have to be the bad guys to get the job done and protect their people. The problem arises in that the game never adequately demonstrates this, especially any of the tough, morally-ambiguous decisions the developers hyped up pre-release. Farah's playable sections entirely consist of her fighting for survival, never putting her in any sort of situation where her actions could be called into question, and the closest Garrick gets to a tough choice to make is leaving a child held hostage by the Butcher to be killed, rather than opening the door to try to save him (which results in the Butcher and his assorted militants storming the building and killing everyone) - every other time any sort of morally-ambiguous decision is placed at his or Alex's feet, picking any option other than the most morally-clean one immediately sends you back to a checkpoint. Even the less-than-favorable decisions you are allowed to make are undercut primarily because whatever individual bad things Price and company do for good reasons are wholly overshadowed by Al-Qatala and the Russian forces both being so ludicrously evil in comparison - most immediately obvious is that both sides regularly target civilians on principle - that they may as well have nametags announcing themselves as the villains.
• Canon Character All Along:
  • Throughout the game, the player switches between new characters Farah Karim, CIA operator Alex, and Kyle Garrick. They interact with several new characters as well as old favorites like Price, Griggs, and Nikolai. Nothing indicates that the three player characters are anything but new faces for the rebooted game. At least until the epilogue, where Price receives files for his new task force, and asks that Kyle "Gaz" Garrick joins the team along with Soap and Ghost.
  • In the Operation Monarch event for Warzone, a hidden easter egg in the form of cave art of Godzilla fighting a mysterious white reptilian Titan was discovered. The Titan in question was revealed to be canon to the Monsterverse when it was added to Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire and given the name Shimo.
• Car Fu: Like in Black Ops 4, land vehicles and killstreaks can be driven at enemy operators for an instant kill. In Spec Ops, one solid ram is enough to kill a Juggernaut, and this is also how Nikolai (non-fatally) incapacitated the Butcher in the campaign.
• Countrystan: Urzikstan, located hell-knows-where (Season 5 trailer places it on the Northeast side of what most probably is the Azov Sea, and Northwest of the distinctly Eastern European city of Verdansk).
• Covers Always Lie: The front cover of the game (see above) is guilty on three counts: a) Captain Price isn't the protagonist, b) nowhere in the game does he look remotely similar to that, and c) the rifle he is holding, a Noveske Shorty Switchblock, isn't available in-game, though a similar model can be created by grafting certain mods onto a M4A1.
• Crosshair Aware: Certain targetable killstreaks like Cluster Strikes and Cruise Missiles will paint the impact area on the minimap with a giant blast footprint. The closer they are to impact the larger the crosshair will be, so if you see one coming at you, run!
• Crossover: The "Operation Monarch" event for Warzone was a short-lived tie-in for the MonsterVerse's Godzilla vs. Kong and has the soldiers fighting on a tropical island while Godzilla and Kong duke it out in the background.
• Cruelty Is the Only Option:
  • During The Embassy, the Butcher makes a show of force by executing a father right in front of his young son, threatening to kill the boy as well if Kyle and Price don't surrender, as well as declaring that senseless death is not his ultimate goal if the player do so. The glass door separating the player from him can be opened, but the instant Kyle lets the Butcher in, he is shot and killed, netting the player a game over. The only option is to abandon the boy to his fate, which is a Hand Cannon shot to the back as he flees.
  • During the opening minutes of The Wolf's Den, Kyle and two Alphas breach and clear a suspected Al-Qatala house, which it turns out to be. Apart from the two armed combatants in the building, there's a woman comforting her child in the back room that will pull a gun and shoot at the player if they enter. If the player shoots back, she will die instantly regardless of where she is hit, so kneecaps won't do. Killing her leaves her son an orphan, assuming he lives, and what especially twists the knife is the fact that you cannot leave her alone as she wanted, she has to be killed to proceed despite the fact that she is only shooting in self-defense and will not leave the backroom to pursue anybody.
• Darker and Edgier: Most of the game puts a greater focus on smaller-scale conflicts and the personal consequences of modern war over action film antics, with war crimes regularly committed and civilians being targeted by both sides. Overall the tone is far closer to the Black Ops games than the original Modern Warfare series.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • During the "Clean House" mission, there is a certain door on the third floor that hides a few enemies, who will shoot through it and maim one of your friendlies. Due to the game's use of destructible environments, it is perfectly possible for you to shoot through the door yourself from the stairs as you come across it and kill those hiding behind it. Not only does this save Alpha 3-2 a trip to the infirmary, Price will also commend you for your keen intuition, and this nets you an achievement (appropriately named "Wall Hax") for your troubles.
  Price: Good call on the door, Garrick.
  • In the same mission, there is a mother and a baby in the house. If you open the door, she will run and grab her baby. If you shoot the mother while she's carrying the baby, an NPC will pick up the baby and gently put him back in the crib.
  • During the mission "Embedded" at one point the player is required to pick up a cinder block in order to bypass some soldiers quietly. Not only does Farah have special dialogue if you beat a soldier over the head with the cinder block, if you for some reason decide to carry it through the entire mission with you, when hiding amongst the bodies in the mass grave, Farah will ask you to drop the cinder block to blend in.
  • During the Butcher's interrogation, if you aim the gun at Price and pull the trigger without any bullets loaded, he'll simply flash you a cheeky smile and quips;
  Price: Would be a shame if that was loaded, wouldn't it?
• Dynamic Entry: Instead of stopping to open a door manually, players are given the option to either destroy it with gunfire or explosives, or sprint right into it to throw it open and surprising whomever hiding behind it. Be careful not to blunder into Claymores or a gun muzzle waiting for you, though.
• The Empire: Known in-game as the Allegiance. They are headed by the Russian Federation and are represented by their Spetsnaz along with various militant and mercenaries groups that are allied with them (Jackals, Chimera, and later Shadow Company). Oddly enough, this is also the faction that Farah and other ULF fighters, who are the pinnacle of goodness in the Campaign, ended up joined with in Multiplayer mode, making the entire faction more morally ambiguous rather than outright evil.
• The Ending Changes Everything: Prior to the game's ending, you wouldn't necessarily know that this is the Ultimate Universe to the earlier Modern Warfare trilogy; there are more than a few shared characters, obviously, but the story seems to be wholly unrelated to that of the original trilogy until the ending hints at the existence of a Zakhaev.
• Enemy Mine: By the end of the campaign, thanks to Al-Qatala (under the leadership of someone who is heavily implied to be Khaled Al-Asad) seizing control of Verdansk, the capital of Kastovia, and military-grade hardware, Russia, in particular their moderates such as Nikolai and Kamarov, have decided to join forces with the United States and the United Kingdom in dealing with the threat.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Shown several times during the game:
  • One incident in "Clean House" has a "hostage" horrified when you gun down their captor, followed by an attempt at Avenging the Villain.
  • Certain missions have the player conducting an SAS raid on suspected AQ houses. In a certain instance, an AQ sympathizer can be found clutching her baby as the player breaches the room she's in, and much later in the campaign one can be found comforting her son in the back room as the player is doing the rounds on the men outside. The latter woman will shoot back in self-defense, and unlike the first one, cannot be left alive otherwise the objective won't advance.
  • Played painfully straight with The Butcher, who is normally a tough nut to crack, but caves in extremely quickly when his wife and son are being threatened.
• Evil vs. Evil: Barkov's forces, aside from dealing with Farah's Urzikstani Liberation Force, are also dealing with the equally ruthless Al-Qatala group led by Omar Sulaman.
• The Faceless: Ghost and the multiplayer-only characters Nikto, Mace, and Kreuger. Nikto wears an odd balaclava/ballistic mask hybrid (after being disfigured by Al-Qatala), Kreuger has a sniper veil similar to the Danish Frogmen, whom players might recognize from Rainbow Six Siege's Nokk, Ghost, and Mace wear almost identical balaclavas with a skull motif.
• The Federation: Collectively referred to as the Coalition in multiplayer. They are represented by the British SAS, NATO Warcom, and American Marines, nicknamed Demon Dogs.
• Fictional Counterpart: The rescue workers that rescue child Farah from being buried in rubble have distinct white helmets similar to the Syrian Civil Defense organization.
• Fictional Country: Urzikstan isn't real, although it draws inspiration from other nations in the Middle East and could easily double for any infamous war-torn area in the region. Kastovia isn't, either, but Verdansk is clearly based on Central and Eastern European cities, and "St. Petrograd" is a clear stand-in for Sankt-Petersburg.
• Final Boss: Quite unusually for the series, especially the Infinity Ward games, the game actually has a full-on in-game final boss fight against a Juggernaut at the very end, which is followed by a more typical-for-the-series Cutscene Boss confrontation with General Barkov.
• Friendly Fireproof: Averted, one stray shot can kill civilians in a tense situation, though the game isn't instantly over for it. Killing too many nets you the checkpoint reset, however, and certain situations and kills are crossing the line, such as shooting the baby in "Clean House".
• Funny Background Event: One of the final encounters of the game has you fighting a squad of Spetznaz equipped with shotguns loaded with incendiary rounds in a machine room filled with explosive materials. There's a crossed-out "no matches" sign just before this area, as if to say, "no smoking here you idiots this is where we store the explosive barrels".
• Gangsta Style: During night-time operations in both single and multiplayer modes, any guns will be aimed in such a manner (only canted 45 degrees rather than turned the full 90), as most optical attachments are not compatible with NVGs (either the reticule doesn't show up in night vision or their combined bulk simply prevents the user from actually lining them up while still having the stock secured against their shoulder). If the firearm has an IR laser sight mounted, tilting the firearm is done in order to aim with that. If the firearm has no IR sight, trying to aim-down-sight will still cause you to tilt the firearm even though it serves no practical purpose.
• The Gloves Come Off: After the Piccadilly terrorist attack, Garrick rages to Price that the attack could have been prevented. His team had actionable intel on the terrorists, but procedure and bureaucracy kept them from acting. Price is able to recruit Garrick largely by promising if he joins Price's squad, the gloves will come off. Later, however, even Garrick is disturbed by threatening the Butcher's wife and child to get him to cooperate and questions Price how far they're willing to go. Price replies that Garrick wanted the gloves off, and now that they're off, they get blood on their hands.
• Guide Dang It!: If you acquire the Tomogunchi Watch, you won't have any direction on what to do with the thing because the game doesn't explain it at all. You'll need to source information from other places (like YouTube videos) to get a complete understanding of what goes into caring for it and how to level it up.
• Gun Porn: Turning away from the traditional attachment system of past titles, the 'Gunsmith' feature runs on this trope. Weapons can be customized with various attachments such as barrels, stocks, magazines, sights, lasers, grips, and underbarrel launchers, with each attachment reflected both visually and statistically on the weapon.
• Harmful to Minors: The whole flashback mission to Farah's childhood, which starts with her father being brutally killed and spirals from there.
• Hate Sink: The Barkov-led Russian forces portrayed through most of the game are vile war criminals who torture, interrogate, and kill Urzikstan citizens (including children) under the vague premise of "being terrorists" when the majority of Urzikstan's population have no hostile intentions towards anyone. They also indiscriminately use chemical nerve agents against civilian targets. The Al-Qatala "freedom fighters" are portrayed as slightly A Lighter Shade of Black, playing up the Well-Intentioned Extremist role claiming they fight for Urzikstani freedom from foreign oppression but involving acts of terror against western societies that haven't acted directly against them (and they also kill children), and moreover, according to multiple in-game conversations, they may even have done these before the Russian invasion. Ultimately neither are portrayed as anything but evils that must be eradicated and the forces led by the Karim siblings act to quell both sides (Barkov for invading their homeland and oppressing their people and Al-Qatala for giving their people a bad name, which is implied to be the reason for Barkov's invasion in the first place).
• Heavily Armored Mook:
  • The Juggernaut who shows up as the Final Boss of the main campaign. He's about 10% tankier than his Modern Warfare 2/Modern Warfare 3 Spec Ops/Survival Mode counterparts, is noticeably faster, and is fought in a room specifically designed as a boss arena, with lots of exploding barrels, triggerable steam pipes to hide you, etc.
  • Juggernauts appear in Survival Mode; these ones are equipped with miniguns. Survival Mode also has Armored Troops, who behave like regular enemies but can soak about 11 or so assault rifle bullets before dropping. A more polished version of these Armored enemies would later go on to feature prominently in the campaign of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II.
• He Who Fights Monsters: Arguably, the Central Theme:
  • Barkov repeatedly insists his goal is to protect his country from terrorists. He's certainly not wrong about the threat Al-Qatala poses, but he commits numerous atrocities and war crimes during his occupation of Urzikstan, including using chemical weapons on innocent civilians and killing children. Upson seeing him execute people (sans trial and in front of other civilians), Alex outright says "This is a goddamn war crime". His actions are bad enough for Farah to say that he and his forces are terrorists as well. If anything, Barkov only created Al-Qatala by inspiring Sulaman to radicalise...
  • Al-Qatala fight the Russian invaders, and they are right to. However, they use terrorist tactics such as bombing civilians, including those in Britain who aren't occupying Urzikstan. They also attack their own citizens. Their actions ultimately just make the situation worse, and harder for genuine freedom fighters like Farah. Omar 'the Wolf' Sulaman used to be a genuine freedom fighter, but his anger against foreign powers (and sadism and blood lust) lead him to become a terrorist. He even believes this is the only way to fight.
    "We fight without sorrow. We wage war without sympathy. This is the only way to live....and die."
  • Hadir believes there is no reason not to use their enemies' own weapons and methods against them. He leads a group of men in stealing the Russian gas and ultimately uses it against the Russian forces. He gives the remaining gas to Al-Qatala (who plan to use it on Russian civilians). He then participates in a raid on Barkov's home estate, with Al-Qatala forces killing and torturing members of Barkov's family. Hadir himself, however, is never shown attacking anyone other than enemy combatants, so he hasn't fallen all the way yet.
  • Garrick is visibly disturbed when he and Captain Price threaten the Butcher's wife and child to force him to cooperate, and questions how far they'll go, where do they draw the line. Price tells him to draw the line wherever he needs to. For what it's worth, if you point the gun at his wife and child and pull the trigger, nothing happens. So the game itself will only let you go so far.
  "At the end of the day, somebody has to make the enemy afraid of the dark. We get dirty, and the world stays clean. That's the mission."
  • A young Lieutenant Price even warns Farah and Hadir about this, the latter of whom evidently didn't listen.
  "Even war has a high ground, stay on it."
• Hellish Copter: Plenty of helicopters are shot down throughout the course of the campaign, many times with the player still on board, and Spec Ops begin with your chopper being beaned by an RPG and spiraling out of control. If you're wondering why this happens so much you're probably new to the series.
• Heroic Mime: Averted, unlike in the original Modern Warfare; Kyle, Alex, and Farah are quite talkative even when they're being played.
• Hitbox Dissonance: Vehicles in the Warzone battle royale mode are afflicted with this, as they have different hitboxes depending on the type of object it's interacting with (ie Is it colliding with level geometry/destructables or another player?). While there is no dissonance if the vehicle hits the former, there is if it's hitting a player, as its player damage hitbox actually extends well beyond the vehicle model itself, to the point where not even hard, indestructible cover can keep a player safe from a roadkill.
• Hollywood Silencer: A bit downplayed compared to prior titles, as suppressed firearms can still be rather loud and audible when fired. Then there are also the oft-memed oil filter silencers found in Embedded, which are yoinked out of unused cars or motorbikes. They're universal, "one size fits all" baffles that can be snapped onto every gun you could find on the level, including the hidden .357 magnum revolver which shouldn't logically work^note You can’t suppress a typical revolver because the gas discharge, which is what creates the “bang”, comes from a part of the weapon that is not sealed off; the cylinder. Regardless of whether you're firing a weapon chambered in .45 ACP or .50 AE, the gunshots are never louder than a simple cough. This type of suppressor is available to select pistols in multiplayer as well.
• Homage: Infinity Ward continues their tradition of copy and pasting set pieces from their favorite action movies into this game.
  • "The Embassy" is reminiscent of the film 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi where our heroes must fight their way out of a U.S. Government building and fend off an attack from rogue terrorist fighters as they try to sneak up onto your compound through a grassy field in the dark.
  • The second half of "The Wolf's Den" puts Alex and Farah inside a set of underground tunnels, just like the ones near the end of the film Sicario, where both the female lead and her male lackey are placed in a tense CQB scenario.
  • And who didn't think of Zero Dark Thirty whenever the S.A.S. had to do a midnight breach and clear? They even gave them their own set of GPNVG-18s.
  • In a video game example, during the Piccadilly terrorist attack, Price throws a hostage fitted with a suicide vest over a railing to prevent collateral damage, in a scene reminiscent of the end of the trailer for the canceled Ubisoft title Rainbow Six Patriots.
• Hostage Situation: It occurs several times during the game where you can either attempt to rescue the hostage, watch them die, or Shoot the Hostage. Sometimes the hostages turn out to be The Mole and will attempt to gun you down if you manage to "rescue" them.
• Hyperactive Metabolism: The Combat Stim tactical equipment somehow near-instantly heals all wounds when used, regardless of severity, and returns the user to tip-top shape in mere moments. It can even revive players in bleedout instantly when used as the Medic class' skill in co-op, healing all manners of injury in less than three seconds. A self-revive version of the Combat Stim is available in the Warzone game mode.
• Implacable Man: If you're able to score the necessary fifteen kills to summon a Juggernaut suit to the battlefield (or get lucky from a care package crate), the game is essentially won from that point onwards thanks to the insane amount of punishment one can take and how effortlessly it cuts through the enemy ranks. You can be felled in the suit (and doing so will drop the Juggernaut's minigun) but even the combined efforts of an entire team won't topple the Juggernaut immediately and you will definitely be able to do some damage before going down, turning the game into a Mook Horror Show at least for a while.
• Improbable Infant Survival: Averted. Many children are killed numerous times throughout the campaign, usually within the player's view. The Embassy formally begins with The Dragon of that chapter's main villain coldly shooting a young boy in the back with his Hand Cannon, and a young Farah Karim could be gunned down by invading Russian troops during her Whole Episode Flashback. To put icing on the cake, the player themselves could partake in this during Clean House, to a baby no less, though this nets them a checkpoint restart and a What the Hell, Hero? moment if done a second time.
• Incompetence, Inc.: Military version and is specific to Barkov's unit. The only success that they achieve in Urzikstan is when they easily steamroll against those who are unable to fight back and suffer setbacks the moment they do.
  • During the flashback, even though Farrah is still a child at that time, she managed to overcome and took down a built-like-a-mountain, giant J-12 with nothing but her survival skills taught by her father. She also managed to take out two Russian troops with a revolver she got her hands on before being captured.
  • Despite being thrown in prison and on the verge of starvation due to insufficient food and water for 10 days and onwards, Farrah still managed to not only rally her fellow female POW's but actually fought their way out of the gulag and took down scores of Russian troops despite having little to no military training at that time when they initiate a prison break. And this is before the SAS arrived to conduct an operation to stop Barkov from producing chemical weapons.
• Injured Player Character Stage: The level "Captive". Although it's less injured and more "weakened by 10+ days without food and water". Your reloads are slower than usual and you stumble when you move.
• Ink-Suit Actor: The campaign characters look exactly like their actors, especially Farah. For the multiplayer operators, this is an exception - only a few (Mara, Talon, and Otter) do.
• In Name Only: Although it is stated that the conflict in Urzikstan is a "civil war", we do not see any Urzikstanis that support General Barkov's occupation forces. Instead, all the skirmishes involve Barkov's army vs two of Urzikstan's freedom fighters (representing the extremist Al-Qatala, and the more moderate Urzikstan Liberation Force), who are also at odds with each other but have for the most part both decided to direct their ire elsewhere (the ULF focusing on Russian forces in-country and AQ also performing terrorist attacks on other countries they see as trying to exert outside influence on Urzikstan). The conflict doesn't truly become a civil war until after the game is over and the Russians are forced out.
• Interface Screw:
  • Using the oil filter silencers in Embedded dampens the report of your guns, but they are huge. Depending on the weapon, the level of obstruction varies, but generally, you might as well forget about aiming, as even with optics attached the sights barely clear the cans themselves.
  • Warzone has a ring of poisonous gas which slowly restricts the playing field. Players can survive longer in the gas by picking up a gas mask, but it partially blocks one's view. Players can risk not picking up a mask to avoid the animation of putting on or taking off the mask when moving in and out of the circle.
• Interservice Rivalry: There seems to be a lighthearted example of this going on between the two Russian Allegiance factions, Spetsnaz and Chimera, judging from the begrudged interactions between their leaders. Nevertheless, they are still amicable enough with each other to work together.
  Kamarov: Nikolai. You've been a bad boy.
  Nikolai: From you, that's a compliment.
  Kamarov: Please. We're all friends here.
• Ladder Physics: Averted. For the first time in the Call of Duty series, the player has a first-person animation for climbing ladders, including holding a pistol in the right hand during the climb so they can immediately shoot if they find an enemy at the top.
• Lightning Bruiser:
  • The Juggernaut near the end of Into the Furnace. Players who were used to seeing Juggernauts as slow, lumbering Mighty Glaciers will be in for a big surprise when this one starts sprinting. And, despite being decked in full heavy armor and lugging around a PKM machine gun, he is faster than the player.
  • The Juggernauts in Spec Ops could also sprint, but due to the miniguns that they wield, they fortunately don't do that very often unless the player is at a good distance away.
• Loads and Loads of Loading: The game's file size was only 61 GB at launch but has its Campaign, Multiplayer, and Spec Ops modes all in separate downloading files (with the Campaign requiring two separate downloads. The game is expected to have as much as 175 GB in storage space by the time game support dies down, and well before that's even happened it's more than surpassed that. And that's not getting into the shaders that the game seems to be constantly installing somehow. Almost every time the game is booted up, it has to install something, preventing the player from actually playing it until it's done, which could take anywhere from a few seconds to several minutes. Trying to play anyway will cause the game to be very wonky for a few minutes after starting a match or campaign level.
• Ludicrous Gibs: Very uncommon for a shooter that was supposed to be realistic. The only ludicrous gibs in the game are done in four campaign missions plus multiplayer.
  • In "Piccadilly", you encounter suicide bombers who explode into nothing but a pile of meat chunks and a large pool of blood.
  • In "The Embassy", you end up encountering another suicide bomber when you have to prevent Al Qatala from retrieving The Wolf.
  • In "Highway Of Death" and "Into The Furnace", the player uses Hadir’s Sniper Rifle chambered in 12.7x108mm which, when fired at Russian soldiers, puts a literal crater from their chest to their stomach and blows their arms, legs, and even heads off.
  • It's also the case with multiplayer as the shield turret and a few killstreaks offer you the chance to literally rip players (or bots) to shreds.
  • The game does lack a lot of gibs and bodily damage that would happen in real life. In real life, even 9mm Parabellum can do some serious damage. This also would be the case with larger cartridges, even intermediate ones like 5.56 NATO or 7.62x39mm, which will put holes the size of a medium pipe in a person and even explode their head. The shield turret, a .50 BMG Browning M2, also doesn’t blow subjects in half or put massive holes in them like it would in real life.
  • Played straight with certain weapon blueprints with a dismemberment effect... then exaggerated with weapons possessing electrical tracers, which reduce enemies to a cloud of blood and charred limbs.
• Mêlée à Trois: The war in Urzikstan involves Russian forces commanded by General Barkov vs Farah's Urzikstani Liberation Force vs Omar Sulaman's Al-Qatala.
• Mini-Boss:
  • As young Farah, you have to fight Russian trooper J-12 when he breaks into your house and fatally wounds your father. Since he's a huge ox of a man, and you're a small child, the fight is a full-on boss fight in which you have to sneak around the house evading him and stabbing him in the back 3 times with improvised weapons.
  • The Russian Juggernaut under Barkov's command in the last mission is essentially this, being a unique small boss fight that isn't seen a lot in Call of Duty games.
• My Country, Right or Wrong: Defied when Alex is told to rescind all ongoing affiliation with the ULF upon the ULF being labeled as terrorists themselves in the wake of Hadir's use of the chemical agent he stole. Alex flatly stands up to his order and says he won't tolerate being told who he is allowed to ally with and will trust his gut as to the causes he fights for.
• Mythology Gag:
  • During the mission "Highway of Death", Hadir and Farah decide to test Alex's sniping skills. One of the targets is a watermelon, and hitting it leads to Hadir remarking that "[Alex's] fruit killing skills are remarkable." Just a few words off from Gaz's memetic line from the original Modern Warfare's tutorial.
    • This one gets a second gag during the Warzone Practice scenario, when, upon activating a Contract pickup, mission control remarks that "Your contract accepting skills are remarkable."
  • In the mission "Going Dark", Captain Price pulls up a disoriented player character and says "On your feet - we are leaving!" This is one word off from Price's quote in "Crew Expendable" back in Call of Duty 4.
  • As Price drives headlong at a police roadblock, he mentions his game plan is "shock and awe", namedropping the infamous mission from Call of Duty 4 that saw the American forces get trapped in a nuclear explosion.
  • One mission sees the protagonist tailing an enemy HVT through hostile-infested streets to capture him alive, with said HVT nearly getting away at the end of the chase, only for an ally to literally crash into and disable him. Is this "Old Comrades" or "Takedown"?
  • Present in Verdansk and the entire setting for the Superstore multiplayer map are Atlas corporation superstores. A comparatively humble beginning for a future global superpower. Especially since, hidden in the center of the store, are boxes marked "whiskey" which are filled with artillery shells.
• A Nazi by Any Other Name: Russians led by General Barkov are racist towards Urziks and attempt systematic genocide on their people (women and children included), forcing them into labor camps, and even subjecting them to poisonous gas much like the Nazis did to people they deemed inferior.
• No-Sell: AI Juggernauts in this game are markedly much more resilient than their prior counterparts. For one, high-caliber weaponry like the Desert Eagle or AX50 no longer stumble them with headshots, even with Stopping Power rounds, and they could laugh off several belts of concentrated machinegun fire while high-explosives only deal slightly above-par damage to them. Not even several cluster strikes landing smack dab on their heads could do much more than momentarily inconveniencing them for a bit. Flash grenades still stun them, sure, but only for a few moments as they are a lot less affected by them than they used to be.
• Nostalgia Level
  • Three new maps introduced in Season One are Call of Duty 4 classic maps "Vacant", "Shipment", and "Crash" with some redesigned elements to update them for Modern Warfare's gameplay style (particularly actionable doors). In addition, the "Port of Verdansk" Ground War map also has Vacant as part of its map design.
  • Season 2 brings back "Rust" from Modern Warfare 2.
  • Season 3 returns "Backlot" from 4, now called "Talsik Backlot". A late Season 3 update also added "Hardhat" from Modern Warfare 3.
  • The entire map of Verdansk in Warzone features modified maps from Call of Duty 4 and Modern Warfare 2, including "Killhouse", "Broadcast", "Vacant", and "Scrapyard". In addition to the previously mentioned Vacant, the other three maps would also eventually be made into standalone multiplayer maps.
  • While not explicitly presented as such unlike the aforementioned classic maps, Suldal Harbor is actually a remade version of the original Call of Duty's Harbor map.
• Not the Intended Use: Pistol-Whipping. While ostensibly meant to be used as a last resort against close enemies, it is bar none the easiest way to gain large amounts of experience for your sidearm, especially when using the Fast Melee perk. As pistols are generally considered to be impractical and unreliable, many players instead wield them as glorified blackjacks due to Fast Melee being one of the earlier perks available to them. With a Fast Melee pistol, one could just zip around the map or wait around corners and then bopping everyone on the head for massive XP gain, since melee kills award a Nosebreaker bonus on top of the usual 100XP. Buttstroking enemies using larger firearms with similar setups also work, but they're better off used for shooting instead, and there are other, more useful perks to use with them than Fast Melee.
• One-Hit Kill: While there are a handful of weapons that can one-shot player in both core multiplayer and in Warzone (even with full health and armor), all but one of them can't actually one-shot kill (only one-shot down) enemy players in Warzone unless it's a free-for-all Warzone match, or the target was the last member of their squad that's up/alive. Enter the Crossbow, whose bolts can one-body a full-health player if they have less than 25 points of armor, or one-hit them in the head regardless of health/armor (Does exactly 250 damage, equal to a player with full health and armor). While that's still not a one-hit kill, we're instead going to look at the 'explosive bolts. While they deal the same amount of damage on impact as a regular bolt, it's the timed explosive charge on it that makes it a one-hit kill, as the explosive charge does enough damage to a downed player to kill. Long story short, if a player gets downed by the impact of an explosive bolt, the explosive charge will immediately finish them off with no chance of revival.
• Obviously Evil: The name of the game's resident terror group Al-Qatala is literally "The Killers" in Arabic, and they don't seem to exist for anything but killing and massacring others. For reference, their real-world inspiration Al-Qaeda's name translates to "The Foundation" in Arabic. The first words of their leader in the opening are literally "We are the Killers. We fight without sorrow. We wage war without sympathy. This is the only way to live.... and die."
• Present Day: The game was released on October 25th, 2019 - its story begins just one day earlier on October 24th.
• Press X to Die: Sadly for the boy at the embassy, his only options are to take a bullet to the back of the head or for you to open the door and let The Butcher in, getting shot yourself as you do.
• Proxy War: Farah's forces are being backed by the United States against Russia. From Laswell's perspective, this keeps her and the CIA's hands clean and the US out of foreign affairs that could blow up if they crossed any lines while still pledging support to defeating known terror organizations and war criminals. The only US operative on the ground is Alex, who is really there on a mission to find a toxic nerve agent that was stolen during an earlier mission, but he gets involved with Karim siblings' overarching fight against Al-Qatala and Barkov as well.
• Qurac:
  • Urzikstan is a pastiche of Middle Eastern countries: it's Arabic-speaking and has a geography similar to Syria, despite being located next to the Caucasus, but also has the -stan suffix found in countries that historically belonged to the Persian sphere of influence, as well as having the Simorgh of Persian mythology on its emblem. The rebel fighters have a combination of Arabic, Persian, and Turkic names.
  • Urzikstan’s flag, unlockable as a player nameplate background for competitive play, is heavily influenced by Chechnya’s Ichkeria regime, overthrown by Russia in the Chechen wars.
• Recycled Title: Subverted. Similar to Need for Speed (2015), there isn't a game with this specific title. There are games titled Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2/3, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Mobilized, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare — Reflex Edition, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered, but not a game simply titled Call of Duty: Modern Warfare.
• Regenerating Health:
  • The classic regenerating health mechanic that's been a mainstay of the franchise since Call of Duty 2 returns in the multiplayer beta, after sitting out the previous entry, and works just like in previous games (health immediately goes back to 100% after at least 5 seconds of not being hit). However, the Wounding effect applied by the Frangible Bullets gun perk can delay health regeneration, while the Stim Shot equipment item, similar to Black Ops 4's first-aid injectors, gives the player the ability, twice in one life, to skip the wait time and immediately go back to full health.
  • This mechanic is preserved in Warzone, with armor plates adding extra hit points.
• Renegade Russian: Barkov is hinted to be this; one of his men suggests that Moscow doesn't know of all the evil deeds he's committing in Urzikstan. The post-game campaigns imply this further, with Russia disavowing his actions.
• The Revolution Will Not Be Civilized: Al-Qatala's own definition of kicking out foreign oppressors (both the Russians and the Western nations) in the name of Urzikstan's freedom is by committing unhinged violence within their own country and performing terrorist attacks both in Russia and Western Europe, much to the dismay of the Urzikstan Liberation Force who genuinely want independence and peace in Urzikstan.
• Revisiting the Roots: With most of the immediately preceding games in the series having grown more and more fantastical in setting, plot, and gameplay (namely Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, Call of Duty: Black Ops III, and Call Of Duty Infinite Warfare), Modern Warfare is a return to a more real-world, modern age setting akin to the original Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare game, with the objective of creating a more gritty, visceral, down-in-the-dirt, morally ambiguous modern warfare experience in contrast to the Sci-Fi direction the series had been heading in.
• The Revolution Will Not Be Vilified: Compared to the Al-Qatala, Urzikstan Liberation Force (ULF) only wants to end Barkov's military occupation in Urzikstan, and by far is the nicest Urzikstan independence fighters around. Even Farah admits that it is the people like AQ who give the Urzikstan people a bad reputation of being terrorists by other countries.
• Ripped from the Headlines: The campaign draws strong inspiration from events of the 2000s and 2010s:
  • The terror attack on London takes parts from the 2005 Piccadilly line bombing and the 2015 Paris attacks.
  • The conflict in Urzikstan is a thinly-veiled take on the Syrian Civil War, with elements of the Chechen wars and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan mixed in.
  • The embassy siege and compound assault is heavily based on the 2012 Benghazi attack.
  • Averted with the abandoning of Farah's resistance group. That was just coincidence instead of a direct reference to the US abandonment of the Kurds.
• Ruritania: Kastovia, a region in the Caucasus and the setting of several early missions, is clearly based on Abkhazia.
• Serkis Folk: In addition to voice-overs, the principal cast provided performance capture for cutscenes.
• Setting Update: Despite the plot at large still checking many of the boxes of the old Modern Warfare trilogy, the settings have been bumped up to Present Day instead of still taking place from 2011 on upwards. Along with this, many returning characters have had their entire backstories rewritten, some of which are implied to be entirely different people from the original, and those that aren't have been largely given an Age Lift, the most prominent example being Captain Price. As a result of the setting update, many of the series' staple firearms and tech pieces have also been eschewed in favor of more "modern" equipment.
• Shown Their Work:
  • Without Sleight of Hand, the MP5's charging handle is always locked back, even on half-empty reloads. This is actually the recommended procedure when changing magazines with the MP5, as inserting a magazine while the bolt is closed, due to the extremely short space between the top of the mag and the bottom of the bolt, can be quite difficult and even possibly damage the mag's feed lips.
  • All of the ammo/magazine conversion options for specific weapons are actually possible in real life. The MP5's 10mm conversion is one of several available for the platform, turning it into an MP5/10 with a straight magazine. The AUG is designed to be extremely versatile and adaptable, and can easily be converted from an assault rifle to an SMG through the use of a different barrel, bolt, and magazine well adapter. This isn't entirely perfect, however, as "converting" a weapon to use new ammo only changes the magazine model, while the rest of the gun still remains the same for the most part. This effect is most visible with the AUG, which retains its 9x19mm barrel even when rechambered into 5.56x45mm.
  • The .357 has a very slight delay between pressing the fire button and the in-game gun firing, to reflect the heavy double-action trigger pull of the revolver. The .357 found in Hometown has no such delay, due to young Farah firing it in single-action.
  • During Clean House, the squad will call out which floor they're advancing to; during a similar manoeuvre while on a joint op with the marines, the SAS will call out building "decks" instead. British and American English have different number systems^note American English classes the "lobby"/ground-level area as the first floor, while British English omits the "ground floor" from the numerical system, starting from the first elevated building level and starting from there for building floors, "decks" is an international standard.
  • Zig-zagged with the FAMAS. On the one hand, the reloading animation clearly shows magazines loaded with steel-cased ammunition, which was a requirement for this specific rifle platform owing to overpressurization issues when feeding standard brass-cased rounds, which could cause rupturing, weapon malfunctions, or even injury to the user, as well as accuracy problems if not using specific 55-grain bullets. On the other, its model has what appears to be a Remington ACR gas block out front, despite the FAMAS not even being gas-operated. It's also animated to switch fire modes between burst-fire and semi-auto with a lever behind the magazine; in reality, that switch selects between burst-fire and full-auto, with the combination safety/selector lever ahead of the trigger switching between automatic and semi-automatic.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!: You have the option of shooting and/or stabbing both the Wolf and Barkov in the face immediately instead of letting them get through their last stand villain speech.
• Sniper Scope Glint: A new feature added in multiplayer has the scopes of sniper rifle-wielding players produce a visible white glint when 20 feet or more away from other players.
• The Stinger: Thanks to the Evil Power Vacuum in Urzikstan created by the deaths of Omar Sulaman and General Barkov, a new face has emerged as the commander of Al-Qatala and taken an aggressive stance against Russia: a bearded man with sunglasses who is heavily implied to be Khaled Al-Asad from Call of Duty 4. Price, Laswell, Nikolai, and new face Kamarov gear up to engage in a joint NATO-Russian op, based on intel received from Laswell's FSB counterpart in Russia.
• Strapped to a Bomb: Happens twice in the campaign. Once to an innocent Londoner, who picked a bad time to visit Piccadilly Circus, and a second time to Al-Qatala's leader Omar Sulaman who decided he'd try some too, knowing that Alex and Farah are coming for him.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • Hometown: When a very young Farah shoots an AK-47, the cumulative effects of recoil from the full-auto fire causes the rifle to fly right out of her hands, as she's not strong enough to handle it. Similarly, Farah and Hadir try to move its deceased owner's body to retrieve the weapon, as it was tethered to him and had fallen on top of the rifle as he expired, but can't because an adult's corpse is far too heavy for them to move. Later on in the first flashback mission, Farah finds a revolver, but her low strength means that she's unable to overcome the heavy trigger pull for the double-action trigger (requiring her to fire it in single-action by manually cocking the hammer first, which increases the delay between shots), has difficulty bringing the revolver to bear and keep it steady whilst aiming (thus giving the player a prompt to hold down sprint to steady it as if it were a sniper rifle), and almost like with the AK earlier, the weapon's recoil on each shot almost causes her to lose her grip on it.
  • Unlike many games, killing a civilian or two in the crossfire of an intense battle doesn't auto-fail the mission. In any war, some civilians will inevitably end up as collateral damage, even in wars waged against unambiguously evil foes, and the "good guys" must accept that. As a result, the command gives you some wiggle room. However, you will fail if you kill too many, showing that while some civilian deaths are inevitable, Western militaries do still try to minimize them.
• Tactical Door Use:
  • Most doors are now dynamic parts of the maps they are on, and can be opened and closed at will to gain or deny passage. They can be opened in either direction, which could help with ambushing one's enemies or setting up traps for the would-be intruders. How quickly they are opened is left entirely at the player's discretion, who could slowly creak them open to get a drop on the enemy hiding in the next room. Or, if the player so chooses, they could always pull a Dynamic Entry by smashing the door in and taking whoever is hiding behind them by surprise.
  • Claymores work wonders with this, as the doors help to conceal them from enemy players, who often won't realize they're walking head-first into a mine until it has already exploded.
• Tempting Fate: Early in the mission "Embedded", Alex and Farah overhear a group of Russian soldiers talking about how the commander of the Urzikstani rebels is a woman. One of the soldiers then confidently says, "I will not be killed by any woman." Take a guess at what happens to him not even a minute later.
• Took a Level in Badass: Juggernauts in Multiplayer are considerably tougher than they were in previous Call of Duty games. It takes a good 150 rounds of automatic weapons fire to bring one down (compared to about 25 rounds in Ghosts and 35 rounds in Modern Warfare 3, or several dozen rounds to kill an NPC Juggernaut in MW2 or MW3), and even heavy weapons like sniper rifles and explosives take way more hits to kill one than in previous games. Overall they have between 4 to 5 times the amount of health they had in previous games. They were noticeably toned down for Call of Duty: Warzone.
• Trauma Conga Line: Farah and Hadir's origin story. Farah wakes up in a pile of rubble, feet away from her mother's corpse, and is dug out by rescuers, who pass her back to her extremely-relieved but saddened father. They barely get a moment to reunite before they are forced to run from invading forces who massacre civilians (including children) and barely make it back to their home, where Hadir has been waiting. Just when they think they can wait it out, a soldier enters the building and a physical confrontation ensues with their father, netting the latter fatal wounds in the process. Farah and Hadir manage to kill the soldier by stabbing him several times with a knife, then using his own AK-47 against him. Their father lives long enough to impart some passing encouragement to stay alive before he dies, and they are forced to flee, wearing gas masks and sneaking through areas populated with piles of bodies. Just when they think they've managed to escape (by stealing a truck), they're captured by Barkov and the Ultranationalist forces and locked up for nearly a decade before their eventual rescue by the British SAS. After all that, it's no wonder why they became freedom fighters.
• Ultimate Universe: Price and MacMillan's attempt on Imran Zakhaev's life also occurred in this timeline in Pripyat, except that apparently this time Imran didn't survive the assassination (he survived the attempt but died sometime before the campaign), and now his son Victor leads the Ultranationalists faction of the Russian military. The game's campaign ends with Price selecting 3 recruits to form Task Force 141 to hunt down Victor - Kyle "Gaz" Garrick, John "Soap" MacTavish, and Simon "Ghost" Riley, whose files were all pulled by one General Shepherd. Meanwhile, in Urzikstan, the Al-Qatala has rallied under the banner of a person that looks exactly like Khaled Al-Asad, Desert Eagle included.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: In the mission "Embedded", the player as Alex is required at certain points to bring around a cinderblock with them to get past guard checkpoints, or they would be gunned down otherwise. What's unusually uninteresting about this is that Russian soldiers standing guard don't seem to notice anything wrong with a worker lugging a bloodied brick around, going into random rooms, and taking paths into places he would have no business carrying one into, such as the areas underneath the helipads. They also cannot hear the sound of bricks thudding against the ground whenever the player has to drop them to do anything. The Guards Must Be Crazy, indeed.
• Version-Exclusive Content:
  • The Survival mode was initially only available to players on the PlayStation 4. For the rest of the player base, it was gated behind a 1-year exclusive period and wasn't be available until October 2020.
  • The content of the three "classic" operator packs (War Pigs, Crew Expendable, and All Ghillied Up) can only be obtained by pre-ordering certain editions of the game or buying at least the Operator Edition at launch. As of November 2019, the packs have still not been made available for individual purchase as DLC, and will likely continue to stay that way for some time.
• Villain Has a Point: Despite his iron fist rule on Urzikstani people, Barkov does have a point in wanting to eliminate Al-Qatala, who are arguably even more dangerous than he is. They've already proven capable and completely willing to stage terrorist attacks against foreign countries including America, Western Europe, and Russia. In addition, the moment Barkov is finally eliminated, Al-Qatala seizes on the Evil Power Vacuum to take control of Urzikstan and eventually launch an invasion of Russia itself, further validating the point of his reasoning on invading Urzikstan.
• Video Game Caring Potential: If you invest in it (either by buying the pack it's in or the Season 3 Battle Pass), you can use the "Tomogunchi Watch" on your wrist, which lets you maintain a little virtual pet in the style of the Tamagotchi. The pet reacts to your performance in-game and evolves depending on how well you care for it (it thrives off of game performance such as kills, objective captures, and other things and each pet has an affinity for what it likes you to do).
• Video Game Cruelty Punishment:
  • Each mission includes a "Collateral Damage Assessment" stat, and civilian deaths at the hands of the player negatively affect the ranking the player receives for the stat upon mission completion.
  • Shooting the baby in "Clean House" instantly resets you to a prior checkpoint, telling you that "children are non-combatants". Continuing to shoot the baby after the reset will make the game say "Are you serious?", before kicking you out of the mission and back to the menu screen.
  • While some campaign missions give you a little leeway when it comes to collateral damage, others will fail you immediately if you shoot down a civilian even in the middle of a hectic firefight.
• War Is Hell: While the series has regularly indulged in depicting the horrors of war, Modern Warfare (2019) takes it to another level compared to its predecessors. Gone is the glamourization of violence, Black-and-White Morality and bombastic action from previous entries, instead being replaced by realistic violence that is Played for Horror at all times, both our protagonists and villains engaging in terrorist acts and horrific war crimes, and while still having some of the series' trademark badassery, much of it is toned down to disturbing extremes. And as the cherry on top, like any civilians unlucky enough to get caught in the crossfire, the Player Character is just as vulnerable this time around.
  • The best demonstration of this is when that Farah and her brother Hadir are exposed early to the horrors of war in their youth, watching their parents get murdered by Barkov's forces and getting captured and spending most of their lives inside a concentration camp and brutally dehumanized by the Russian occupation.
• Wham Shot: Near the end of "Highway of Death", the player is prompted to open the trunk of a truck so Hadir can utilize some "powerful explosives", which turns out to be the toxic gas that was stolen back in Kastovia.
• What You Are in the Dark: You have the option of opting out of interrogating the Butcher by threatening his wife and child.
• With Cat Like Tread: While there are many different ways to stealthily approach the competition, the multiplayer operators will call out enemies in the vicinity should they spot them, potentially giving their own locations away. This could, and has, ruin many an attempt at flanking or executing otherwise unaware targets. This behaviour no longer exists in Patch 1.06, where operator callouts can only be heard by their player and their own team.
• Would Hit a Girl: Several characters gun down women without hesitation, including the player character.
• Would Hurt a Child: Several characters show no qualms with harming children.
• Would Not Shoot a Civilian:
  • Averted. The Russian occupation forces under General Barkov don't hesitate to retaliate against the Urzikstani civilians because of "terrorist" attacks.
  • The good guys and our player characters follow this trope, up to a point. One or two accidents are let slide, but killing too many, or specific cases (like shooting the baby in "Clean House") will boot you back to a checkpoint. If a "civilian" picks up a weapon or you're ordered to open fire, though, they're fair game.
• Your Terrorists Are Our Freedom Fighters:
  • CIA and SAS team up with Farah's Urzikstani rebels against the Al-Qatala and rogue Russian forces. Meanwhile, Al-Qalata call themselves freedom fighters against foreign oppression but their actions are just plain terroristic (particularly since they also launch attacks against NATO countries, which has nothing to do with the Russian occupation of Urzikstan) and no one but themselves agree with their methods, including their own countrymen. Barkov's forces simply call everyone in Urzikstan a terrorist regardless of what, if anything, they did. This trope starts swinging around when the U.S. military labels Farah's forces as a terrorist organization after Hadir goes rogue.
  • The inverse also occurs in Multiplayer mode with Jackals subfaction, a Russian-backed African militant forces who like Farah's own ULF also call themselves freedom fighters against Al-Qatala extremism, but while ULF were fully backed by NATO, the Jackals were labeled as a terrorist group instead, which is not unlike Russia's own treatment to the Urzikstani freedom fighters.
  • The Multiplayer mode complicates this even further when ULF-affiliated operators (including Farah herself) were added as playable characters for the Allegiance side. Implying that after the U.S. cuts ties with them, the ULF turned to Russia, or at least the Chimera, for assistance against the reborn Al-Qatala. Much like how Syrian Kurds were forced to cooperate with Russia and Assad's Syria in the wake of Turkish incursion of northern Syria.
  • One of the quotes that pops up when you die cites the trope.

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