"I'll explain: Before you can launch Modern Warfare 3, you have to launch Modern Warfare 2 first. Seriously. "Call of Duty HQ" is just the Modern Warfare 2/Warzone client under a new name.
Switching between Modern Warfares 2 and 3 from the HQ is not like switching modes. Once you're on the main menu, you could jump immediately into Warzone or a multiplayer match of MW2. Clicking the Modern Warfare 3 button, however, closes the HQ app and launches an entirely different executable called Modern Warfare 3. There is no option to just launch Modern Warfare 3, because "Modern Warfare 3" is not its own game. It's buried, literally, inside CoD HQ as a piece of add-on content.
The result? It takes 70-90 seconds to launch Modern Warfare 3—at least, those are the times I'm getting. That's an eternity for CoD, but what's baffling is that these extra steps serve no discernable purpose for players. Perhaps Activision pitched the CoD HQ with consoles in mind, where games aren't so easily organized by series and an app that switches between the handful of still-active CoDs is useful."
You can actually download it without buying . I wanted to play warzone on ps5 . Took forever to find the download for it but it basically makes you download all of modern warfare 2 just to play the free to play parts .
Sadly, that's the case with most AAA games now. The shit EA and Ubisoft, to name two other examples, get away with because of owning a few extremely successful franchises with huge loyal followings is RIDICULOUS!
Wait, WHAT!?! Really tells me they could just add content to the same game for 2 or 3 years as DLC and stop with the annual releases. Now THAT, I'd like.
It Takes Two too often borrowed from that "well that just happened!" school of comedy that I just couldn't stand. Not all the time mind you, but enough to bother me.
This author took the valid position of hating whatever the fuck this setup is supposed to be, and made the whole complaint look silly by how thick the BS was laid on.
On Steam there is a different entry for MW3, that is waiting to be unlocked for installing on November 10th. It doesn't make too much sense that this different Steam Store game (with a different game id) will also open MW2's CoD HQ. I'll wait and see, maybe there will also be a way to open MW3 directly.
So with the last Steam update, the previous Call of Duty entry in Steam now launches into MW3 directly. To enter Warzone or MW2 multiplayer you will have to wait for it to start the MW2 process. It's exactly how they did it with the MW3 beta and campaign, just viceversa, so to play MW3 MP and Warzone (starting in December) you won't have to wait for game switching.