Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 takes place five years after the events of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. During the single-player campaign, the player controls five different characters from a first-person perspective.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is the first installment of the Call of Duty series set outside of World War II and was released in 2007. A Nintendo Wii port for the game, Modern Warfare Reflex, was released by Treyarch in 2009 and a remaster version whose development was led by Raven Software was released in 2024.