What does the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare ending and post-credits mean for the reboot of the subseries? The ending for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare leaves the door wide open for potential sequels and doesn’t shy away from hinting at what that sequel may look like and even what characters might feature in it.
Obviously, there are some whopping spoilers ahead, practically the most spoilery spoilers it’s possible to spoil in Modern Warfare, so if you haven’t seen the ending for yourself, please stop reading now and come back when you have. Consider yourself warned.
If you’ve just beaten the main campaign and have been left scratching your head at either what the story’s ending means for the game’s characters, or what exactly was being hinted at in the post-credits sequence, then don’t worry as we’ll break down all the details for you below. Plus, we also spoke to the narrative director Taylor Kurosaki about the ending to get the official line on what it all means.
What happens at the end of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare?
The ending itself is pretty simple. Farah gets her revenge on the Russian General Roman Barkov responsible for war crimes in Urzikstan. Alex, our CIA operative who spends much of the campaign helping Farah, is killed ensuring the destruction of the nerve gas.
After the credits roll on the game’s campaign, you’ll be treated to two post-credits scenes. The first is a pretty hefty hint at a Modern Warfare 2, while the second is the introductory cinematic of Spec-Ops.
In the first post-credits scene, the team’s CIA handler, Kate Laswell, sits down with Captain Price to discuss an upcoming situation involving a General Shepherd. Price then pulls three dossiers out of a package and reveals who he has in mind for the mission. The first is for Sgt. Kyle Garrick, who it’s revealed is nicknamed “Gaz” (a key character from the original series). Next up is John “Soap” MacTavish, another familiar face. Finally, a dossier for Simon Riley is shown with a blank picture is pulled, which is of course the iconic “Ghost” character who players will remember appearing in Modern Warfare 2 for the first time. Price refers to his new team as Task Force 141, the main faction in Modern Warfare 2, and then the scene ends.
So, what’s the new Task Force 141 getting together to solve? Well, Zakhaev is after Barkov’s throne, but not the Imran Zakhaev from the original Modern Warfare, instead it’s his son. Price says he almost buried the father in Pripyat with MacMillan, which is a nice nod to the original game. Laswell says that the son, Victor, is a fan of Hadir’s work and wants to recruit him, which can’t be good news.
In the second post-credits scene we get the opening cinematic for Spec-Ops, which sets up the continued story of the main game. Effectively, the terrorist group you’ve been fighting, Al-Qatala, have a new leader operating out of Verdansk, and it’s your job to hunt down its high-value targets that can point you in his direction.
We had the opportunity to speak to the game’s narrative director, Taylor Kurosaki, about the game’s ending and the desire to make a sequel. “We would love to make another one of these,” Kurosaki tells us, “We have every intention of making another one of these. Have we spent much time thinking about what it could be? A little. We’ve also spent a ton of time just getting to the finish line, so yeah that is intended to get fans of the original trilogy excited and get new fans excited about what that could be. We feel like we’ve reset this universe, so now it’s fertile ground to make lots and lots more content.”
Kurosaki is keen to point out that there will be additional story in Spec-Ops, which will receive a lot of post-launch support, so he may not necessarily be talking about a sequel, but it’s pretty plain to see the team at Infinity Ward would love to continue their reimagining of the Modern Warfare series.
If you’re still on the fence about picking up the latest CoD then we’ve got a mini guide breaking down how long Modern Warfare is, in case you’re short on time. Alternatively, you can read our CoD: Modern Warfare review for a detailed analysis of the complete package. Alternatively, you can check out our guide to the best Call of Duty: Modern Warfare weapons here, to make sure you’re fully prepped before hopping into multiplayer.