Call of Duty: Modern Warfare - The Story so Far
Get up to speed on all the events of the previous two games.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 is almost upon us, but if it's been a while since you played the previous games the story might be a little bit hazy. We're here to clear that mind fog by offering you a rundown of the complete Modern Warfare story up to Modern Warfare 3.
Prior to the events of CoD 4 / Modern Warfare 1
1996: Lieutenant John Price of the SAS is sent to accompany Captain MacMillan on a covert mission in Pripyat, Ukraine - a ghost city that formerly housed workers at the Chernobyl Power Plant. The two men set out to eliminate Imran Zakhaev, a Russian weapons dealer who is collecting abandoned fuel rods so that he can then sell them on the black market. The pair ambush Zakhaev in the middle of an arms deal, and Price takes aim with a Barrett M82 sniper rifle. Unfortunately, Price's shot only succeeds in blowing off Zakhaev's left arm, and while MacMillan believes the dealer will die from shock and/or blood loss, this doesn't prove to be the case.
Over the next 15 years, Zakhaev gets rich by selling arms (not the kind that he lost, though), using these funds to fuel his rise to political power. By 2011, he has become the chairman of the Russian Ultranationalist party. Price, meanwhile, climbs the ranks of the SAS, becoming Captain of the 22nd regiment.
User Comments
riley0818mw2
87Sarah
mydeaddog
For me, the interesting thing to note is that CoD 4 clearly had a much, much better plot than MW2. I know that this was never really in disputem, but when you have it all laid out on paper (well, screen), it really is quite striking.
MW2 had lots of great moments, but the plot was totally all over the place. And even CoD 4 seriously drops the ball with the Four Horsemen. Makarov may turn out to be Horseman 4, but that clearly wasn't the plan at the time, was it? They'd have mentioned it in MW2, somehow.
Of course, the really telling thing is that MW2's campaign still works, despite being fairly nonsensical. If you give people pure mayhew in the right quantity, you don't need narrative sense.
Although I'd still say that the campaign in CoD4 was the best we've had so far...
draytone
dazzadavie
altaranga@ squidman
squidman
FantasyMeister
The fourth horseman is George Papandreou who has to destabalise Europe sufficiently enough so that Cost and Shower Gel (new undercover names to avoid Interpol) can crack a couscous in the Caucus joke to break the tension after an over the top set piece involving a minigun, a fuel depot, a nuclear tank batallion and a banana skin.
altaranga
mydeaddog@ squidman
I reckon they just forgot to include a fourth character.
squidman
Also, I assume Makarov is the fourth horseman.