Summary
Fans ofCall of Duty: Modern Warfare 3are preparing for the game’s upcoming Season 3, which is set to launch on April 3. Activision recently released a full roadmap for what content Season 3 will bring to core multiplayer, Zombies, andWarzone, and the update is clearly shaping up to be the most jam-packed in the game’s history.
These post-launch seasonal updates are one of the best ways thatCall of Duty: Modern Warfare 3can directly address the most glaring and prominent issues that some players have with the release, and it seems that Season 3 is taking this to a whole other level. The recent roadmap for Season 3 showed a significant amount of attention will be placed on bolstering the core 6v6 map pool ofModern Warfare 3, serving as an excellent step toward the title finally moving away from one of its most longstanding criticisms.
Maps Are at the Forefront of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3’s Season 3
Many fans were surprised at the news ofModern Warfare 3’s 2023 release, withMW2having just been released one year prior. This sequential release schedule for a single sub-franchise is quite unusual forCall of Duty, with it being assumed thatMW3would need a significantly longer development cycle before being launched. Because of this rapid turnaround and short time in development, it is clear thatMW3suffered in the amount of original content that it could realistically feature, with a lot of its substance coming from past entries to theCoDfranchise.
Whilethe campaign ofMW3was criticized for its short lengthand Zombies for its use ofWarzoneassets, the map pool of the game’s multiplayer was arguably its most controversial element. At launch, the entirety ofModern Warfare 3’s 6v6 maps were composed of maps from 2009’sModern Warfare 2, leaving some players to accuse the release of lacking its own unique multiplayer identity.
The in-game seasons forModern Warfare 3have slowly but surely been rectifying this, with several completely original 6v6 maps having been added to the game post-launch. So far, the followingbrand-new 6v6 maps have been added toModern Warfare 3through seasonal updates:
MW3’s Season 3 Map Pool Sets a New Standard
These new maps have been added alongsidere-skins of older franchise maps like Das Haus, yet the upcoming Season 3 ofModern Warfare 3is set to add a staggering six fresh 6v6 maps to the game’s roster. Three of these maps will come at the start of the season, namely Emergency, Six Star, and Tanked, with Grime, Growhouse, and Checkpoint dropping later on in the season.
While Growhouse is aremaster of the map Sphere from 2021’sCall of Duty: Vanguard, the five other Season 3 maps are entirely original, significantly bolstering the unique content thatMW3’s core multiplayer possesses. The first two seasons forMW3only introduced three completely original maps each, making the five original experiences in Season 3 all the more impressive. It is true thatModern Warfare 3has had to contend with negativity surrounding its map pool for some time, but the sheer amount of brand-new content that is set to come in Season 3 may finally lay these criticisms to rest.
