Call Of Duty Modern Warfare 4 Makes Big Changes, But Is It Enough

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 is the next major installment in the yearly, globally popular FPS franchise. MW4 is set to launch on October 23rd on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PC, and for the first time ever, Nintendo Switch 2.

Ahead of today’s big reveal, I attended a digital preview of the next Call of Duty sequel and came away impressed by some of the changes developer Infinity Ward is making to the series, but still unsure if Modern Warfare 4 is truly, as Activision claims, “a new chapter” for the franchise.

At that digital media briefing I attended earlier this week, the vibes were a bit off. It felt like the people involved in making the game were both excited to show players (and us) the thing they’ve been working on for years, while also being aware that last year’s offering, Black Ops 7, landed with a wet thud.

And while it’s true that Call of Duty games take years to make, and so it’s near-impossible that Infinity Ward was able to make major changes to the game in reaction to BLOPS7, I do get the feeling that they wanted to emphasize how Modern Warfare 4‘s tone and subject matter are very different from the sci-fi hijinks and bizarre boss fights of that last game.

Welcome to South Korea

Modern Warfare 4 takes the Call of Duty franchise to South Korea. The game’s campaign will feature three intertwined storylines spread across a dozen or so missions. During many missions, players will take on the role of Private Park, who the devs described as a “young Korean grunt soldier” who is embedded in a squad of named characters made up of Korean and American troops. The game opens with North Korea invading South Korea and attacking one of the country’s main cities, forcing Park and his squad to fight back, escape, and eventually try to recapture the city with the help of other soldiers and squads.

Meanwhile, Captain Price is the star of some other missions as players deal with the ramifications of what happened in MW3. Price is a wanted man, on the run from his former allies, and desperate to save the world, and his story will converge with Park’s as the game progresses.

Lastly, a few missions will feature players taking on the role of a North Korean soldier and seeing their side of the DMZ. We didn’t learn too much about these missions, but from what was shown, it seems a female North Korean general will play a major role in the story.

In the gameplay and footage seen during the event, as well as what the devs told us, it’s clear that Infinity Ward is trying to return to the older days of CoD campaigns when you’d be the boots on the ground and not the spec-ops super soldiers featured primarily in recent titles. Expect prolonged gunfights as you and your squad fight for every inch of ground.

I’m not fully convinced the studio and the other teams helping develop Modern Warfare 4 will be able to tell a gritty, grounded war story while balancing Price’s more action-movie antics. To do that while telling a tale that involves North Korea invading South Korea seems tricky. It could work, but it could also end up being a controversial mess. For now, I’m not sure which outcome is more likely.

Multiplayer seems fine, but not exciting

Of course, Call of Duty games live and die by their multiplayer offerings, and so it’s no surprise that most of the digital event I attended focused on that part of Modern Warfare 4. The game is set to launch with 12 new 6v6 maps spread across the globe. MW4 is also arriving on day one with dedicated Gunfight maps, multiple “Big War” maps built for vehicular action, and perhaps most intriguing of all, Kill Block.

This is a map that contains three different sections that can change between rounds and matches. Some of these sections are based on past CoD maps, while others are generic. As these swap in mid-match, players will have to adapt quickly. The devs claim Kill Block has over 500 possible configurations and will get more in future updates. It’s an exciting idea that also feels ripped out of a different, less grounded and serious game.

A lot of the modes you expect will be back at launch, including deathmatch, Hardpoint, Kill Confirmed, Search and Destroy, and Gun Game. And yes, more will be added in future updates. It’s a Call of Duty game in 2026. You know what to expect. Classic Prestige is back, too, but now players can also choose to Prestige without losing all their unlocked weapons and gear. Doing so will bar you from some rewards and an XP boost, but Infinity Ward is hoping that offering both endgame options will make everyone happy. Loadouts are also getting some nifty quality-of-life features, including the ability to assign specific kill streaks to different loadouts. Finally.

Infinity Ward also flashed a list of features to expect in Modern Warfare 4 at the end of the event. This list included Theater Mode, the ability to pause the campaign and play offline, map voting, red dots on the minimap, and classic perks. This all sounds fine to me, but I can’t shake the feeling that nothing they showed really seemed to define what MW4‘s multiplayer will be beyond “realistic.”

Jumping and shooting like never before

The part of the event that had me the most intrigued, however, were all the nitty-gritty details about how Infinity Ward is changing up gunplay and movement in Modern Warfare 4.

For starters, Infinity Ward is looking to change how bloom and hip-firing guns in an FPS work. As the studio explained, for decades now, when you shoot a gun in a game without aiming, what happens is that bullets randomly fly out of the weapon at different angles and directions. The idea is to simulate someone not aiming and just spraying and praying. Infinity Ward even showed other first-person shooters during this segment, including Battlefield 6 and Apex Legends, to suggest that every major AAA FPS (including past CoD titles) did hipfire like this. Didn’t expect to see BF6 at the event!

Anyway, MW4 tracks the muzzle of the gun at all times, and when you pull the trigger, the game renders the bullets firing from the barrel, even when you’re not aimed down the sight. But because of new, enhanced animations that add more sway and movement while running or turning, it can still be really tricky to hit a target without aiming down sights. I’ll be curious to see how this less random, more accurate firing system works in an actual match.

Movement is also expanding in a big way. Players will be able to climb, hang, and shimmy on edges and pipes in Modern Warfare 4. The devs showed someone hopping onto the back of a large parked truck, hanging off the side of it and firing their pistol over the top, and then shimmying around the corner of the trailer and hopping off backward. These moves, coupled with new slide and mantle options, make it look like getting around maps in MW4 will be a slick and satisfying experience. Will it make it hard to actually hit targets as people exploit these new moves? My gut tells me yes.

It also seems like Infinity Ward has been inspired by the recent influx of bodycam shooters, as Modern Warfare 4 zooms out the FOV and renders the gun differently to provide a more “realistic” experience. The end result looks similar, though not quite the same, as a lot of bodycam shooters on Steam. Add in new animations for when you get close to a wall or corner, and the end result does indeed look much more like I’m watching a real person run around a map with a gun. Will that make multiplayer more exciting or change things up in a big way? Not sure, but at the very least, I think Modern Warfare 4 will have some of the most accurate and realistic gun combat I’ve seen in a game.

Lastly, Infinity Ward showed off the game’s third mode: DMZ. Yes, Call of Duty is trying to do an extraction shooter mode again. What was shown at the event looked interesting, like something that might be a bit more grounded and challenging than Arc Raiders, but not quite as intense and sweaty as Marathon. But…there’s a bunch of weird embargo restrictions on what I can and can’t say about DMZ until it’s revealed completely at a later date. So instead, I’ll just move on and talk about it when I can do so freely and without looking at a list of rules.

Modern Warfare 4 doesn’t quite feel like the next chapter of Call of Duty. Instead, it feels like Infinity Ward taking what has worked in recent entries and tweaking bits and bobs to create something grittier, realer, and more grounded than what’s been seen in some past titles. It very likely might work, but I’ll need to see more and get my hands on the game in October to find out. And remember, MW4 won’t be on Game Pass at launch.