First Look at the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Campaign’s Open Combat Missions

Fresh from revealing gameplay of the first level of the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 campaign, developer Sledgehammer Games has revealed a first look at its Open Combat Missions.

In a series of tweets, the developer released clips showing the different styles of gameplay possible in these campaign missions. The clip that shows off stealth gameplay confirms a ledge hang mechanic in the campaign.

In #MW3, we’re introducing a new innovation to the Call of Duty Campaign that allows players to interact with the story like never before.

Open Combat Missions are player-directed, allowing the audience to play the game the way they want to play it. pic.twitter.com/ngpgvc3fsw

— Sledgehammer Games (@SHGames) August 22, 2023

If you want to go in loud, you can strap on armor plates and hit the enemy head-on. pic.twitter.com/RtgQUnewmW

— Sledgehammer Games (@SHGames) August 22, 2023

Open Combat Missions are crucial to our story, positioned seamlessly alongside the cinematic Campaign missions that you know and love.

Look for more intel to follow in the days to come! pic.twitter.com/oDC0SPi9jw

— Sledgehammer Games (@SHGames) August 22, 2023

Sledgehammer had said these Open Combat Missions, or OCMs, add an “incredible” level of choice to the player. OCMs offer the player a raft of choices for mission completion. You can, for example, go for a stealthy approach and use night-vision goggles and suppressed weapons to complete the mission without alerting enemies to your presence. If you want to go all guns blazing, you can use extra armour plates and wade in.

It’s worth pointing out you won’t be given an OCM that’s a dedicated stealth op, with silenced weapons to choose from. Rather, if you want to take the mission on stealthily, you can do that by only using a knife and playing the OCM as a stealth mission. Conversely, for an all-guns blazing approach, you can use one of the vehicles available in the mission for an assault.

Some of the OCMs contain what are called Armaments, Modern Warfare 3’s campaign name for Call of Duty’s famous killstreaks. If you search your surroundings and find an Armament, you’ll get a tactical item, for example calling in air support. We’re not sure if this means Call of Duty’s classic UAV or AC-130 Gunship, but we do know Armaments are in the single-player campaign.

Helpfully, you don’t need to actually kill any enemies to earn an Armament in an OCM, which means stealthy players can carry on being stealthy and still get one.

The Call of Duty games are known for their cinematic, linear missions, and Modern Warfare 3 has these, with OCMs designed to “complement” the traditional campaign experience. It remains to be seen if these OCMs offer a truly sandbox experience, but it sounds like Modern Warfare 3 may get as close as any Call of Duty has so far.

Elsewhere, Modern Warfare 3 includes a Zombies mode set in an “all-new open world” in which players can team up to fight the Zombie hordes in the “largest Call of Duty zombies maps ever”. This is the first Modern Warfare game to include a Zombies mode.

On the multiplayer side, Modern Warfare 3 includes all 16 launch maps from the original Modern Warfare 2, and will see 12 new 6v6 maps come out post-launch. Activision will host an open beta across PlayStation, Xbox, and PC (PlayStation owners get first access). Those who pre-order gain access to the campaign up to a week before release.

Modern Warfare 3 launches on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X and S on November 10.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.