Summary
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 brings back beloved legacy characters, but this pushes newer characters like Farah to the sidelines.
- Farah Karim has quickly become a popular character in the Call of Duty series thanks to an impressive backstory and excellent performance.
- While Farah appears in Modern Warfare 3, she doesn't have much to do and her presence is associated with the game's disappointing Open Combat Missions.
The Call of Duty franchise has had some great characters over the last 20 years. While the first three Call of Duty games weren't without a handful of fun personalities, it was Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare that delivered the first truly memorable cast of characters, with Captain Price being one of the clear standouts. Then the ball kept rolling with 2009's Modern Warfare 2, which introduced Ghost and gave Soap a more prominent role, along with including new villains like Makarov and General Shepherd. And while the Black Ops series definitely has its own set of iconic legacy characters, they're arguably not as beloved as that original Modern Warfare crew, and it makes complete sense why Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 would want to capitalize on that.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 brings the whole band back together in a pretty big way. Along with the entirety of Task Force 141, Modern Warfare 3 also brings Shepherd, Makarov, Nikolai, and even Yuri to the table. But doubling down on legacy characters is a double-edged sword, and while it's great to see them all back together again in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, it does end up pushing some newer characters to the sidelines, and that's especially true with Farah.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Pushes Farah to the Sidelines
Farah Has Become a Modern Call of Duty Mainstay
Introduced in 2019's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare reboot, Farah Karim has quickly become one of the most popular characters in Call of Duty history. Though it was certainly a risk, Modern Warfare spends a good portion of its missions centered around Farah and her own personal fight with the Russian oppressors in her homeland of Urzikstan, and her character is all the better for it, with players gradually learning more about her tragic backstory and her impressive resolve. Infinity Ward also made a smart choice by tying a legacy character like Captain Price into Farah's backstory, giving quite a bit of fan-service to those who became fully invested in Farah's story.
One of the biggest highlights of Farah Karim's character in the Modern Warfare series is her excellent performance courtesy of Claudia Doumit, best known for her work on The Boys and now Gen V.
Before release, fans were pretty vocal about their desire to see Farah return in last year's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, and she did exactly that. While Farah didn't get too much to do in Modern Warfare 2's campaign, her brief appearance was pretty memorable, making the character feel like a major player in the game's story and universe, and one that would surely appear in the near future to assist Task Force 141 again.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Gives Farah the Grunt Work
A good portion of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's campaign revolves around Urzikstan and the ULF, so naturally, it makes sense that Farah would be a main player in the story once more. However, while Farah does appear several times throughout Modern Warfare 3's campaign, she really doesn't get all that much to do, and what she does get doesn't seem to have much bearing on the overarching story at all. It also doesn't help that Farah is the main playable character in most of the game's Open Combat Missions, which are proving to be one of the game's most controversial aspects.
The latest big campaign gimmick, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3's Open Combat Missions are widely regarded as some of the laziest levels in franchise history. Rather than have a strict set of linear goals and action set-pieces, these Open Combat Missions let players tackle some barebones objectives in any order, with a variety of different playstyles. While that sounds good on paper, it's a premise that isn't executed well at all, with some frankly boring gameplay, lackluster objectives, minimal story beats, and repetitive level design, with most of these missions just taking place inside previously seen Warzone locations. It's genuinely unfair that Farah is the character most associated with these disappointing levels.
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 58 /100 Critics Rec: 14%
- Released
- November 10, 2023
- ESRB
- M For Mature 17+ Due To Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Strong Language, Use of Drugs
- Developer(s)
- Sledgehammer Games
- Publisher(s)
- Activision
- Engine
- iw 9.0
- Multiplayer
- Online Multiplayer, Local Multiplayer
- Cross-Platform Play
- PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One & Xbox Series X|S
WHERE TO PLAY
- Franchise
- Call of Duty, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
- Platform(s)
- PC, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5
- Genre(s)
- First-Person Shooter
- How Long To Beat
- 5 Hours
