Mw2 Plot Hole List (Warning: Possible Spoilers)

[SgtWaffles]

Just wanted to compile a list of all of the mw2 story plot holes!

-How does the British s.a.s not know that captain price was in the gulag? Did they lose track of him or something?
-Why does the rest of the world just stand by and let an intercontinental war go on
-Why does the British s.a.s just ignore the fact that Sheppard killed two of their units? Do they not keep track of them?
-Where is the president in all of the game? Why does he just authorize a war with his country
-Why do the Russians seem to suddenly all die when d.c. is Emp'd, do they all have pacemakers ?
-How does the Russian airfare fly over all of America with what seems like no resistance.
-What is the importance of the VIP you find dead in the urban American neighborhood?
-What are the tattoos of the "special Russian soldiers" you find in that same house.
-How does Makarov literally just walk into a Russian airport? He is a wanted criminal/terrorist and I am pretty sure they have security and cameras in the airport.
-How does price manage to get into the Russian submarine and pretty much instantly laucnh an emp? Are there no launch codes?
-How does said emp destroy a space station thousands of miles above the earth?
-How the f*** is there fire in space?

The list goes on, post your favorite plot holes below

 

[DanielPowell33]

These are all just my guesses...

-How does the British s.a.s not know that captain price was in the gulag? Did they lose track of him or something?
at the end of COD4, they thought he was dead, and left him because they had to GTFO, then the Russians got ahold of him
-Where is the president in all of the game? Why does he just authorize a war with his country
isn't the president codename raptor in (i think) the wolverines mission. and America was invaded, there wasn't really a choice weather or not to war.
-Why do the Russians seem to suddenly all die when d.c. is Emp'd, do they all have pacemakers ?
they don't, you still fight some after the EMP goes off
-How does price manage to get into the Russian submarine and pretty much instantly laucnh an emp? Are there no launch codes?
HAX!!!


My favorite plot hole is...Why can't you just kill Makarov in the "No Russian" mission?
Then the game would of been alot shorter.

 

[SgtWaffles]

True, I forget about those parts :S, how ever it kind of goes hand in hand with the other holes like how the russian army just flew over all of american and attacked dc And after the emp it seems like you won or something. It doesn't really explain anything well.

 

[hittite]

Addressing the one about fire in space. I've never played the game, but I'm assuming that it was coming out of the space station at the time. Three words: high oxygen environment. It aint pretty.

 

[soapyshooter]

well about that launching nuke thing Price is a 1337 H4x0r. everyone knows that

 

[irishdude]

ya mw2 storyline is full of plotholes, but what really annoys me is how reviews did not mark it down for its story because if i reviewed it, i would give a 4 out 10 for story because of all the plotholes you listed

 

[SgtWaffles]

Not all of them correct as you can see from the posters above, but there are still quite a few.

 

[saintchristopher]

I would have to say that all the plot holes can be explained by nobody who wrote the game giving a shit about it, as they were all too busy NOT beta testing their game to spend a day proofreading their tacked-on campaign script.

 

[irishdude]

I would have to say that all the plot holes can be explained by nobody who wrote the game giving, a shit about it, as they were all too busy NOT beta testing their game to spend a day proofreading their tacked-on campaign script.

couldnt have said it better myself

 

[Johnnyallstar]

MW2 had plot holes big enough to drive mack trucks through. Nobody really bought that game for it's complex and well written story, though.

 

[super_smash_jesus]

I would have to say that all the plot holes can be explained by nobody who wrote the game giving, a shit about it, as they were all too busy NOT beta testing their game to spend a day proofreading their tacked-on campaign script.

bam.

This guy knows how the business of FPS games work.

 

[SgtWaffles]

I would have to say that all the plot holes can be explained by nobody who wrote the game giving, a shit about it, as they were all too busy NOT beta testing their game to spend a day proofreading their tacked-on campaign script.

bam.

This guy knows how the business of FPS games work.

Indeed!

 

[mobsterlobster]

I always thought the whole airport mission was stupid. Even if some terrorists did decide to just walk into an airport and gun everyone down, I doubt the leader of the terrorist organization would join them. You wouldn't see Osama Bin Laden go head on into a gun fight.
Also, not really a plot hole, but it annoys me if you accidently shoot one of the terrorists in that mission, they all call you a traitor and you fail the mission. But at the end of the mission, you find out they already knew you were a traitor and they kill you, but you win. If they already knew I was a traitor, what's the difference between them killing me in the airport and killing me outside that van?
And another thing. I'm sure Russia invaded America because they found the body of an American CIA agent at the airport and thought it was America who did it. Do I really need to explain why that's dumb? Or did I misinterpret that?

 

[Korolev]

Some of your plot holes aren't plot holes. The Russians do not all die when the EMP goes off. You fight them after in the White House, remember? It's just that their equipment fails. The reason why there are no russians in the IMMEDIATE aftermath of the EMP is due to the fact that helicopters were falling out of the sky.

As for whether or not the S.A.S knew whether or not Shepard killed their guys, that could be a plot hole. I find it hard to imagine that the S.A.S wouldn't keep some sort of watch on any joint operation.

The rest of the world ignores what is going on because they don't want to become a part of it. Simple really. Also, the Russians say that the US organized the terrorist attack at the airport. Of course, a bigger plot hole is the fact that how did the Russians know Allan was C.I.A and why on earth would they think the U.S government organized an attack just because they found one American body.

The importance of the V.I.P is never explained. They just dropped it. It feels like a plot point that was just plain forgotten about. The Soldier with the tatoos is also similarly never explained. Fans have made up explanations, but if the game itself doesn't explain it, then the game itself did a pretty poor job explaining its plot.

How did the Russian Air Force fly all over the East Coast without anyone detecting it? The game says that the Russians "Cracked the ACS module". This supposedly makes all U.S satellites and Radar Systems easily hackable. In reality, of course, there's no way one module controls ALL the PAVE PAW stations in Europe and the US and Australia, and other nations would have easily detected the massive movement of Russian arms and personnel. In short, there really is no way the Russians could have. It IS impossible for them to launch a surprise invasion of the US in reality. But this is a GAME. It was also technically impossible for Ramirez and Roach to survive getting shot a bajillion times and recover by hiding behind a wall.

How does Makarov walk into an airport without a mask? How come the Russians don't realize it was him from the camera footage? Well...... there is no explanation. It's a plot hole. A major massive plot hole. Simple as that.

But a much bigger plot point is how the C.I.A could somehow just magically insert a US ranger into Russia as a deep-under-cover agent. Sure they gave him tattoos and a fake russian name - but I don't think Private Allan, an army grunt, commanded a deep expertise in the Russian language. There's no way the C.I.A would have ever allowed him to become an agent, no matter what Shepard said. Allan must have also been a complete idiot to volunteer to go to a nation as a agent when he didn't speak the bloody language.

How did Price launch the Nuke? Again, there's no defense of that. Ignorant gamers might not know that you need TWO highly encrypted, almost unobtainable codes and TWO keys on OPPOSITE sides of a room to be turned on at the SAME TIME to launch a nuke. So yeah. Price COULDN'T have launched the nuke by himself. But again, it's a GAME. Not a work of non-fiction. For most gamers who don't know much about Nuclear Weapons protocols, it's not a problem because they don't know its a plot hole. Still is a plot hole though. A bigger plot hole is how Price managed to program a nuke to hit Washington and detonate above atmosphere in an EMP blast, all within a few minutes. That is just a massive plot hole.

Fire in Space? Well, again. It's a game. There is no way the shockwave could have destroyed the space station, because a shockwave needs AIR TO TRAVEL IN. No air in space = no shockwave in space. But then again.... it looked pretty cool right?

So in summary - yeah, there are a hell of a lot of plotholes. One of the major bugs was how they sacrificed what little realism they had in MW1, in order to make MW2 bombastic and "exciting". In order to "top" MW1, they had to make the whole thing into a Michael Bay movie. And it works provided you don't think to carefully.

 

[SgtWaffles]

Some of your plot holes aren't plot holes. The Russians do not all die when the EMP goes off. You fight them after in the White House, remember? It's just that their equipment fails. The reason why there are no russians in the IMMEDIATE aftermath of the EMP is due to the fact that helicopters were falling out of the sky.

As for whether or not the S.A.S knew whether or not Shepard killed their guys, that could be a plot hole. I find it hard to imagine that the S.A.S wouldn't keep some sort of watch on any joint operation.

The rest of the world ignores what is going on because they don't want to become a part of it. Simple really. Also, the Russians say that the US organized the terrorist attack at the airport. Of course, a bigger plot hole is the fact that how did the Russians know Allan was C.I.A and why on earth would they think the U.S government organized an attack just because they found one American body.

The importance of the V.I.P is never explained. They just dropped it. It feels like a plot point that was just plain forgotten about. The Soldier with the tatoos is also similarly never explained. Fans have made up explanations, but if the game itself doesn't explain it, then the game itself did a pretty poor job explaining its plot.

How did the Russian Air Force fly all over the East Coast without anyone detecting it? The game says that the Russians "Cracked the ACS module". This supposedly makes all U.S satellites and Radar Systems easily hackable. In reality, of course, there's no way one module controls ALL the PAVE PAW stations in Europe and the US and Australia, and other nations would have easily detected the massive movement of Russian arms and personnel. In short, there really is no way the Russians could have. It IS impossible for them to launch a surprise invasion of the US in reality. But this is a GAME. It was also technically impossible for Ramirez and Roach to survive getting shot a bajillion times and recover by hiding behind a wall.

How does Makarov walk into an airport without a mask? How come the Russians don't realize it was him from the camera footage? Well...... there is no explanation. It's a plot point. Simple as that.

But a much bigger plot point is how the C.I.A could somehow just magically insert a US ranger into Russia as a deep-under-cover agent. Sure they gave him tattoos and a fake russian name - but I don't think Private Allan, an army grunt, commanded a deep expertise in the Russian language. There's no way the C.I.A would have ever allowed him to become an agent, no matter what Shepard said. Allan must have also been a complete idiot to volunteer to go to a nation as a agent when he didn't speak the bloody language.

How did Price launch the Nuke? Again, there's no defense of that. Ignorant gamers might not know that you need TWO highly encrypted, almost unobtainable codes and TWO keys on OPPOSITE sides of a room to be turned on at the SAME TIME to launch a nuke. So yeah. Price COULDN'T have launched the nuke by himself. But again, it's a GAME. Not a work of non-fiction. For most gamers who don't know much about Nuclear Weapons protocols, it's not a problem because they don't know its a plot hole. Still is a plot hole though. A bigger plot hole is how Price managed to program a nuke to hit Washington and detonate above atmosphere in an EMP blast, all within a few minutes. That is just a massive plot hole.

Fire in Space? Well, again. It's a game. There is no way the shockwave could have destroyed the space station, because a shockwave needs AIR TO TRAVEL IN. No air in space = no shockwave in space. But then again.... it looked pretty cool right?

So in summary - yeah, there are a hell of a lot of plotholes. One of the major bugs was how they sacrificed what little realism they had in MW1, in order to make MW2 bombastic and "exciting". In order to "top" MW1, they had to make the whole thing into a Michael Bay movie. And it works provided you don't think to carefully.

This guy knows what the hell he is talking about XD, I hastily put together that list just to spark the topic.

 

[Chester41585]

-How does the British s.a.s not know that captain price was in the gulag? Did they lose track of him or something?
If I remember right, he was injured at the end of Modern Warfare, as said before. He may have been taken to a Russian hospital and discovered by an enemy operative, then taken off to the Gulag.
-Why does the rest of the world just stand by and let an intercontinental war go on
This was probably not thought of by the development team, but considering how things are going presently, I'm going to assume NATO is taking the usual sit back and wait it out approach to the invasion.
-Why does the British s.a.s just ignore the fact that Sheppard killed two of their units? Do they not keep track of them?
I'm pretty sure that this happened so fast and (if I remember right) at the same time, that there was a presence of violence of action, rendering the survivors pretty much too stunned to do much else.
-Where is the president in all of the game? Why does he just authorize a war with his country
I'm not sure I understand the question here. Authorize a war against his own country? I think that might be covered in the United States Constitution concerning the States, Federal Union and Sedition / Withdrawal from the Union. Remembering back, there's an article that says something like:
"No state in the union shall endorse or commit acts of war against another state."
-Why do the Russians seem to suddenly all die when d.c. is Emp'd, do they all have pacemakers ?
Just the electronics. You and your bullets do the rest!
-How does the Russian airfare fly over all of America with what seems like no resistance.
In the beginning of the game, you and Soap infiltrate a Russian airbase to retrieve a data module of some sort. This module belonged to a surveillance satellite that had IFF codes or something similar that rendered the US Defensive Tracking Systems (NORAD and associated networks) useless.
-What is the importance of the VIP you find dead in the urban American neighborhood?
This eluded me
-What are the tattoos of the "special Russian soldiers" you find in that same house.
This eluded me as well. Could be that they're associated with Makarov, or some other fringe group. Alot of special military units, such as Spetznaz, SAS, SEALS, and the Foreign Legion like to get tattoos that show their association. This could be a reason.
-How does Makarov literally just walk into a Russian airport? He is a wanted criminal/terrorist and I am pretty sure they have security and cameras in the airport.
He was most likely in disguise, or just blended in with the crowds, or security was late to act. The September 11 Hijackers were well documented ahead of time (up to a year and more in most cases) and were on a wanted list, however, they were able to enter an airport and make it past security. It could be anybody's guess.
-How does price manage to get into the Russian submarine and pretty much instantly laucnh an emp? Are there no launch codes?
It wasn't as instant as you would like to think. I remember it being a while between the time he got into the sub and launched the missile. It's likely that he was versed in Russian launch codes, as he was already in the area and in the last game, You (as Soap) have to enter codes to disable some nukes already in transit to the States. Besides, even for being a Typhoon-class submarine, most Russian ports are pretty muck lax in guard standards. Big Man Syndrome, I suppose.
-How does said emp destroy a space station thousands of miles above the earth?
This was discussed in a couple other threads. The ISS doesn't actually orbit in space. It orbits in a very high level of atmosphere. In layman's terms, it's still in the air, though the air is very thin. The shock wave traveled through the atmosphere and wrecked the ISS.
-How the f*** is there fire in space?
for the same reason there's sound in space... Actually, that only partly true. I was going to go the angle of "because it's a video game" in this instance, the fire presented is more "firey" than fire should be. So yes. Because it's a video game, but there is some science there.

 

[Cpu46]

-Why does the rest of the world just stand by and let an intercontinental war go on
so there is a war between two global superpowers with vast stockpiles of nuclear weapons and you expect another nation to want to get involved?
-Why does the British s.a.s just ignore the fact that Sheppard killed two of their units? Do they not keep track of them?
Ghost and Roach are not S.A.S in game, they are part of Sheppard's own specialized unit
-How does the Russian airfare fly over all of America with what seems like no resistance.
They cracked the code from the satellite from the first mission with Mctavish and Roach and broadcast false signals to mess up the US air defense (explained in cutscene)
-How does said emp destroy a space station thousands of miles above the earth?
Nuclear missiles emit an electro magnetic pulse (EMP) upon detonation, the nuke destroyed the station while the resulting EMP hit the united states, disrupting the Russian offensive
-How the f*** is there fire in space?
most likely the air inside the space station detonating, plus it makes the scene more exciting

 

[ThePostalGamer]

All of those can probably be negated by saying "It's a game, it doesn't have to make sense." but I'm going to go with what Korolev and Chester said.

 

[Oilerfan92]

Just wanted to compile a list of all of the mw2 story plot holes!

-How does the British s.a.s not know that captain price was in the gulag? Did they lose track of him or something?

My guess is that if they did have track of him right after MW1. That when the Russians went over to the bad side that they wouldve moved him without the British knowing.


-Why does the rest of the world just stand by and let an intercontinental war go on

Probably dont wanna get involved in a war between two superpowers.

-Why does the British s.a.s just ignore the fact that Sheppard killed two of their units? Do they not keep track of them?

This i dont get. The SAS wouldve had SOME servaliance on the situation.

-Where is the president in all of the game? Why does he just authorize a war with his country

He probably got evacuated quickly. I mean, the Russians were probably spotted before they reached the White House.


-Why do the Russians seem to suddenly all die when d.c. is Emp'd, do they all have pacemakers ?

There were still Russians left. You fight them. Like in the mission Whisky Hotel.


-How does the Russian airfare fly over all of America with what seems like no resistance.

This bothers me. I know that they Russians hacked the ACS and the satelites. But wouldnt someone look up in the air and see the Russian Airforce ? That would seem like an easily noticed thing.

-What is the importance of the VIP you find dead in the urban American neighborhood?

I dont know. That pissed me off that there was no explanation. Felt like a tacked on level with an excuse to fight in Suberbia America

-What are the tattoos of the "special Russian soldiers" you find in that same house.

The terrorists under Makarov all have tatoos ( thats why Allen gets them before No Russian ) and the fact that the soldiers also have them shows that the terrorists are also soldiers. That, or the guy they find the tats on was the 3rd guy who survives the Airport level ( you start with Allen, Makarov and 3 other guys, 2 die through the mission, one, im thinking Viktor, survives)

-How does Makarov literally just walk into a Russian airport? He is a wanted criminal/terrorist and I am pretty sure they have security and cameras in the airport.

Nightcrawler is part of the group. One thing that does bother me about the mission is how i know people survive, you can see them in the background at a couple points. Couldnt they simply say that it was Makarov, hes a known terrorist.

-How does price manage to get into the Russian submarine and pretty much instantly laucnh an emp? Are there no launch codes?

Well, would you wanna sit there for 30 minutes while he does it ?

-How does said emp destroy a space station thousands of miles above the earth?

Magic

-How the f*** is there fire in space?

Magic

The list goes on, post your favorite plot holes below

 

[Mechanix]

To be honest, I didn't play the campaign to analyze the story, I played it so I could shoot things and see explosions left and right, and that's what I got.

It's also amusing seeing these obvious plot holes.