The new Call of Duty: Modern Warfare is struggling with review bombing on the review platform Metacritic. There are masses of user reviews with 0 points. The reason for this seems to be an unfortunate portrayal of Russia in the single-player campaign.
On October 25th, the new Call of Duty: Modern Warfare celebrated its release. The ratings from press and gaming magazines are quite decent – mostly in the solid 80s range. You can read more about it here: CoD Modern Warfare in review – Here’s what the first ratings on Metacritic say
What is going on with Metacritic? However, many players are currently rating the game significantly worse.
There are user reviews pouring in with 0 points. This review bombing is significantly lowering the user score.
While the average review score
- is 85 (out of 100) on the PS4
- is 85 on the Xbox One
- and is 82 on the PC
the user-written reviews, on the other hand, look like this
- 3.0 (out of 10) on PS4
- 3.0 on the Xbox One
- and only 2.4 on the PC
This is currently what a glance at the latest user reviews on the site shows – whether for PC, PS4, or Xbox One:
Accusations of Propaganda Against Activision
What is the reason for these ratings? It is not technical issues or lack of content that are to blame for this review bombing. Aspects such as controls, gameplay, sound, multiplayer, and graphics are actually well-received by most users – aside from some technical problems, there is hardly anything to criticize regarding gameplay or content.
However, what is responsible for the majority of negative reviews is a controversial discussion surrounding the portrayal of Russia as the enemy within the single-player campaign.
Many consider the depicted image of Russia to be overly exaggerated, sometimes even labeling it as Russophobia or pure propaganda.
The game seems to do everything to portray Russia in a bad light – to an extent that has never been seen before, according to the prevailing sentiment of most negative reviews.
We summarize some of the recent voices for you here as examples:
- COD2019Sucks: “Russophobic propaganda. The single-player is pure brainwashing for zombies…”
- Metalstorm9: “Absolute disgusting propaganda. Why make such games? Games should bring people together, not incite them against each other…”
- AlexGucciEkb: “This is no longer political propaganda; it’s racism, hatred against an entire nation…”
- Hitodenashi: “The worst game of the year. Good thing I managed to get my money back. Russians have always been the villains in CoD, but this time it goes too far.”
- Reilshat: “Activision has linked the sins of the US Army to the Russians and made the Russian Army terrorists and inhuman…”
What does the Highway of Death have to do with this? Furthermore, it is criticized that controversial US blunders are rewritten so they can be blamed on Russia.
For example, the so-called Highway of Death is mentioned. In the game, this highway is presented as the scene of a mission. Some time ago, Russia bombed and killed innocent civilians during their escape on the eponymous highway – so the story in the new Modern Warfare goes.
However, the Highway of Death actually stands for controversial attacks by US forces and their Western allies during the Gulf War (1991). The US-led coalition bombed Iraqi units that were retreating along the highway, destroying thousands of vehicles that were piled up along the highway. There are also reports that among them were 350 unarmed Iraqi soldiers who were killed by US forces.
“It’s just a game”
The Russia controversy continues to spark discussion: The portrayal of Russia is widely discussed – also here with us on MeinMMO: As a shooter fan, I love CoD Modern Warfare – As a Russian, my heart bleeds
Many players, however, believe that it is just a game with a fictional setting and that it therefore has no relation to reality. And even this, as far as Russia is concerned, would not necessarily look any different.
Moreover, in this context, other nations, such as the Germans, often serve as a clichéd enemy image. Therefore, many do not understand the whole fuss and find it exaggerated.
Furthermore, there are indeed allied Russians in the new Modern Warfare, so not all are automatically portrayed as bad. The barbaric troops would belong to a rogue general and do not represent Russia as a whole.
Others, however, emphasize that Modern Warfare has gone too far this time. Previously, there was the enemy image of Russia – but never as extreme, exaggerated, and poorly resolved as this time.
It feels almost like a political campaign and brings the complete opposite of what the developers promised with Modern Warfare – a realistic depiction of war, without black and white, but with many shades of gray. They wanted to shed as authentic a light as possible on our world as we currently live in, along with its conflicts – even if in a fictional work.
Many players believe that this has not really succeeded and leaves the game in an unfortunate light.
By the way, a well-known Russian streamer also decided not to play the new Modern Warfare anymore:
