Game Review (Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Content Drop: September)

This is it -- the final month of downloadable content for Modern Warfare 3 (Or at least what we're lead to believe will be the last bit of DLC). August was probably the most disappointing month for Elite as far as I'm concerned, but after seeing some leaked images of this month's maps, I actually looked forward to September 5th.

---

Boardwalk: This map takes place on a boardwalk on the Jersey Shore. Yes, it looks as cool as it sounds. It's a medium sized, mostly close-quarters map that has a handful of snazzy buildings to go into, such as a club, a laser tag lobby, and an arcade. Not just that, but you can go on the beach and go underneath the boardwalk. I was most looking forward to this map of the three from this month, and it hasn't disappointed me yet -- I'd probably go as far as saying this is my favorite map for Modern Warfare 3. Not only does this map look insanely neat, but it plays perfectly to my play style. The only reason I won't give this map a 5 is because the one far side of the map near the club there's a pretty pointless area I don't see anyone going at, as it's so far away from the action. I'm pretty sure its only real purpose is the original spawn at the beginning of the game. Anyway, yeah. Boardwalk is a brilliant map in just about every sense. It's just a shame you'll be too busy killing people to get a chance to see the map. Pro-tip: Private match. 4.75/5

Gulch: Gulch is set at an abandoned mining town in Utah. When I first saw some pictures of this map, I was intrigued. But with a name like "Gulch", I figured the map would be pretty large ... and indeed it is. The map itself looks great. The color of it, the water flowing through the center, some of the buildings... but the problem I have with Gulch is the same problem I have with most maps in this game -- the spawns. After my first match on Gulch, I could see this would be a problem. A map of this size, and you'll still die within a second and a half of spawning. I literally had a Kill Cam show a guy spawn, push his right stick right, and kill me instantly. Not only that, but Gulch has countless areas to sit up on around the map, which is great for snipers, but terrible for people trying to get out of spawns. Snipers will hop up in these areas and wait like vultures until you move. This could be a really good map, but it just doesn't all work. It's not terrible, but it's definitely frustrating. I probably set my hopes a little bit too high on Gulch. 3.5/5

Parish: Here we have the map I was most unsure about when I found out about these three maps. Parish is in New Orleans, and contains a church, a bar, and a slew of military vehicles that are scattered around, particularly on the "oceanic" side of the map. There's not much to be said about this map in my opinion, other than that to me it feels like a typical Infinity Ward map. This one's mostly close quarters and plays fairly well, but it's just not extremely memorable as far as its appearance goes. I'd say the size of this map is about the size of Boardwalk, probably a little bit smaller. I was surprised in my experience that some people on the other team were actually trying to snipe on this map on Kill Confirmed. Really...? Well, I think you can guess which team won. Anyway, Parish is decent. It doesn't look as purdy as Boardwalk or Gulch, but it plays better than Gulch, I'll give it that. For that reason, I'll slip it a 3.75/5

---

And that's all for Modern Warfare 3's Elite Content Drops. That was a pretty quick nine months... This final 'drop' actually let me down. Regardless of the pretty decent scores, I was just overly excited when I saw these maps after the terrible month that was August. Still, Infinity Ward concluded MW3's DLC with a pretty decent bang. Not a bang that you'd hear from a .50 Cal, but a bang nonetheless.

4/5