Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2023 first look appears online ahead of official announcement

Call Of Duty is no stranger to annual releases, and this year looks no different as leaked images of multiplayer maps for Modern Warfare III have appeared online.

It wasn’t too long ago that the series publisher Activision stated it’d be moving away from annual releases, focusing instead on prolonging the life of it’s new titles with live-service support. This was the original story with Call Of Duty Modern Warfare II (2022), which was supposed to receive several years of post-launch support, including new maps and modes returning from the original Modern Warfare II (2009).

Unfortunately, it seems like there’s been a change of plans, as leaked images from Call Of Duty Modern Warfare III have revealed remakes of classic maps from MW2, which were originally planned to be DLC, but have since been repurposed into an entirely new game.

Reddit user PK-Ricochet shared links to the leaked images, saying: “This is the game that was originally intended to be a year 2 DLC for MWII but is instead being turned into a full release by Sledgehammer Games”

The classic maps featured in the images turned out to be Terminal and Scrapyard, both of which are fan-favourite maps from what many believe to be the “golden era” of Call Of Duty. Many had hoped to see them return in a future update.

It’s safe to say Call Of Duty fans weren’t impressed with Activision's decision to repurpose planned DLC into a new, full-priced release.

“You have one of the most iconic maps from OG MW2 and you don't even put it the game that has it's namesake. Talk about milking the fanbase.”

“That’ll teach me to buy COD. MW2 (2022) was the first call of duty I bought since BO3, on the promise that it would have a longer lifespan. Lol jokes on me, but lesson learned: Never take these companies at their word. They will lie through their teeth to get those initial sales.”

“I'm actually so mad they turned the dlc into [MW3]. Since I literally only bought mw2 thinking there gonna put all the original mw2 maps for the year 2 dlc. If mw3 ends up selling more than mw2, I'll have no faith in the cod community.”

Call Of Duty has seemingly been in a sharp decline in recent months. Aside from Call Of Duty and other Activision titles potentially being ripped from the UK market, it’s recently been reported players can have easier matches online if they buy cosmetic skins and other microtransactions. This links to a larger issue felt by the community, who believe Call Of Duty is getting “greedier” with new releases.