Modern Warfare 3 maintains the same standards as prior Call of Duty titles, but the series is growing stale.
CAMPAIGN (7.5/10)
Modern Warfare 3 picks up where Modern Warfare 2 left off. The rogue provocateur Makarov continues to raise hell on an international scale, inciting war between Russia and the United States, with an invasion of Europe thrown in just for the hell of it. The player takes control of several characters on the war's multiple fronts -- a Navy SEAL infiltrating a Russian submarine outside of New York, an Army Ranger recovering the Vice President in Berlin, and some old favorites (Captain Price).
Overall, the campaign is better narrated than its predecessor, as I actually understood why I was visiting each of the game's far-flung locales. But the narrative as a whole remains quite ridiculous. (Russia invading Europe and the United States?), and because the storyline is so unbelievable, it becomes imbued with a kind of fantastical numbness. It's hard to feel any emotions about seeing cities like Paris, New York, or London being attacked when it is impossible to believe that this could actually happen. At one point, for instance, I had to order an airstrike that leveled the Eiffel Tower, but my only reaction was laughter.
The gameplay on the whole is very frenetic, with lots of explosions and several on-rail vehicle segments as you slalom through famous cities toward your next objective. Unlike titles like Halo or Crysis, which give you leeway to explore big environments and attack enemy fortifications using different tactics, Modern Warfare 3 funnels you down extremely linear paths and gives you pretty much only one way to progress -- kill enemies, follow orders to plant explosives, and move forward. Personally, I prefer games that present you with combat puzzles, which allow you to experiment with different ways of completing mission objectives, so I've never been a huge fan of Call of Duty's campaigns.
Of course, none of this should be news to anyone even remotely familiar with the series. Though not spectacular or surprising in any way, it satisfyingly wraps up Modern Warfare's storyline in a tidy and compact five and a half hours.
SPEC OPS (CO-OP) (9.0/10)
Special Ops has always been my favorite part of this series dating back to its debut in Modern Warfare 2. It consists of 16 short missions, with very specific objectives (e.g., download enemy intelligence), that are set in locations from the campaign but are largely divorced from its story. Spec Ops remains hugely entertaining, and has improved in several aspects since last time around.
First, the 16 missions have objectives that are more varied than before. There aren't really any "kill everyone" missions any more, as all seem to have some sort of objective outside of eliminating the enemy.
Second, there is a survival mode where you and a team-mate can take on unlimited waves of enemies. This is essentially Call of Duty's take on Gears of Wars' Horde mode (or Halo's Firefight), and it offers another dimension of mindless fun.
Overall, the inclusion of Spec Ops makes the game a lot stronger. Indeed, one can argue that the co-op and multiplayer components of Call of Duty are its primary modes now, with single-player being an after-thought.
MULTIPLAYER (8.0/10)
Multiplayer is another area in which this series feels like it's stagnating, while somehow still remaining lively and fun. There is very little progress from one year to another in the Call of Duty-verse, though fans of multiplayer will certainly not complain about there being more of the same. I'm not a huge fan of multiplayer shooters anymore, so I honestly don't have much to say here.
PRESENTATION (8.0/10)
On the Playstation 3, there are several shooters with superior graphics and sound effects, particularly the Crysis and Killzone series. While the Modern Warfare engine was remarkable in 2007, it too has aged, and not always well. Textures and items can be surprisingly ugly at times, and the game relies on its rapid pace to insure that you don't look too closely around your environment. On the whole, the game seems to have prioritized performance over fidelity, and it does run smoothly compared to other titles, e.g., those built around the Unreal engine.