The year is 2011, and civil war has broken out in Russia between the Russian government and Russian ultranationalists under the command of Imran Zakhaev who seek to restore Russia back to its former Soviet-style leadership. A revolution has toppled a regime in an unnamed Arabic country which has ties to the Russian ultranationalists, with Khaled al-Asad coming to power. These two simultaneous events are causing fear that al-Asad and Zakhaev might form an alliance and use nuclear weapons against the West. In response to these concerns, the United States and the United Kingdom conduct joint operations to put down both uprisings, without putting their own nations' security at risk. Will they succeed?
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The two most popular perks in the game were deliberately built to cancel each other out. Run Stopping Power against someone using Juggernaut and the extra bullet damage and extra health basically wash out, keeping either perk from completely dominating a match.
Infinity Ward wasn't built from scratch. It was founded in 2002 by a group of developers, including Vince Zampella and Jason West, who'd all just come off working on Medal of Honor: Allied Assault together at a different studio.
When Infinity Ward got off the ground, Activision only held a minority stake in the company. It wasn't until after the very first Call of Duty shipped and proved itself that Activision bought out the rest of the studio outright.
The sniper shot meant to kill Imran Zakhaev during the Pripyat flashback was supposed to be a clean headshot. Wind speed and the sheer distance threw it off just enough that it took his left arm off instead, which is exactly why he's still alive to cause problems fifteen years later.
After the botched shot, Captain MacMillan doesn't sugarcoat it. He just tells Price he thinks he blew off Zakhaev's arm, which sounds like it should be a failure but ends up haunting the whole rest of the story.
According to the in-game backstory, the mission to kill Zakhaev in 1996 marked the first time the British government had authorised an assassination order since the Second World War, which says a lot about how seriously they took the threat of him buying up Chernobyl's leftover fuel rods.
When the squad finally gets cornered near the end of the campaign, Zakhaev doesn't leave the dirty work to his bodyguards for Gaz specifically. He pulls the trigger on him personally, which is part of what makes that scene land so hard.
With Zakhaev's back turned and both of them seemingly out of options, Price slides his sidearm across the floor to Soap, who uses it to finish the fight. It's a small, almost silent beat, but it's become one of the most referenced moments in the game.
Despite only physically appearing in two missions of the original game, MacMillan isn't gone for good. He turns up again, voice-only, as the director of an SAS command post when Price reaches out to him during Modern Warfare 3.
Imran Zakhaev's plan starts to unravel for real once his son Victor is killed during the campaign. It's that loss, more than the lost arm or the lost war, that pushes him to threaten launching the remaining missiles at the United States.
