The Modern Warfare 2 trophies/achievements have been released, and as expected, about 90% of them require you to do something special in the campaign. Here are all the trophies/achievements in MW2 and how to complete them.
Whether you're playing Modern Warfare 2 on Xbox, PlayStation or PC, there are lots of trophies / achievements to be completed. The vast majority of them are earned via the campaign, as per usual, and most of them aren't too difficult. Having just completed them all, my advice is to finish the campaign on Veteran / Realism, then go back, mission by mission, and play on recruit to finish the rest of the Trophies. Don't bother trying to do them on your Veteran run, they will just take far longer.
In this article you can find an overview of every trophy in MW2, ordered by mission, and where necessary some tips on how to complete them. You'll be pleased to know that some missions can be skipped entirely on a trophy-hunting run. These missions have no trophies / achievements associated with them:
- Strike
- Kill or Capture
- Tradecraft
- Borderline
- Cartel Protection
- Close Air
- Hardpoint
- Hindsight
Right, let's begin.
Campaign Trophies / Achievements In Modern Warfare 2
We've ordered the trophies / achievements by mission, so you can just go through them all one by one.
General Campaign Trophies / Achievements
These can be completed at any time during the campaign, they aren't specific to one mission:
Time for Pints (Gold / 100G)
Description:
- Finish the campaign on any difficulty.
You don't need tips for this, just play the game.
Cutting Heads off Snakes (Gold / 100G)
Description:
- Finish all campaign missions on Veteran or Realism difficulty.
My biggest tip for Realism is to use the Riot Shield whenever possible, and to rely on your lethals and tacticals. It's not actually too punishing compared to other CoD campaigns on Veteran.
Wall of Duty (Bronze / 20G)
Description:
- Kill three Enemies with the Riot Shield in the Campaign or in Co-op.
The easiest mission to do this on is probably Prison Break. You can't avoid encountering riot shield enemies on this mission, so pick up their shield once defeated, and use it for the rest of the mission.
Gentleman Thief (Gold / 60G)
Description:
- Open three safes in the campaign.
There's one in the El Sin Nombre mission, and two in Alone. Here's our guide to the safes in Modern Warfare 2, complete with video tutorials on finding the safes and each of the code combinations.
Dare Devil (Bronze / 20G)
Description:
- While affected by one Flashbang, kill two enemies in the campaign or in Co-op.
There are lots of opportunities to do this but in Dark Water you start with Flashbangs. So we suggest trying to get it done in this mission while doing other achievements.
Wetwork: Trophies / Achievements
Crocodile (Silver / 30)
Description:
- Shoot three enemies while underwater in ‘Wetwork’.
The first three enemies you see on the piers are the easiest to kill to complete this.
Nessie (Silver / 30)
Description:
- Reach the barge without being seen in ‘Wetwork’.
There's no "trick" to this, you just need to take it slow and use your throwing knives as much as possible.
Recon by Fire: Trophies / Achievements
Nobody Was There (Silver / 30)
Description:
- Never trigger the alarm in ‘Recon by Fire’.
This is talking about the sniping sections, not the building-clearing part of the mission. It's actually not that hard, just listen to the notch adjustment instructions from Price and take it slow.
Violence and Timing: Trophies / Achievements
Test Drive (Bronze / 20)
Description:
- Drive five vehicle types in ‘Violence and Timing’.
You need to pull to the side of the road and jump in the civilian vehicles as well as hijacking all the different military vehicles to complete this.
Keeping this One (Silver / 30)
Description:
- Reach Price using the first vehicle you hijack.
Go slow and lean out your vehicle to kill every enemy on each vehicle before moving further up the convoy. Remember that you auto reload when you lean in from the window, so just keep popping in and out, and besides the bomb throwing truck (which does take a few tries) you can complete this one fairly quickly.
El Sin Nombre: Trophies / Achievements
Ghost-in-Training (Gold / 60)
Description:
- Reach the penthouse in ‘El Sin Nombre’ without killing anyone or triggering the alarm.
The key to this is that you shouldn't attempt to go for the keycard in Diego's weird shrine-room. But next to that room, on the roof outside, you can find a ladder that takes you to the penthouse floor. Climb another ladder on this floor, and you can descend to the Penthouse via the elevators.
Dark Water: Trophies / Achievements
Don’t touch the deck! (Silver / 30)
Description:
- In ‘Dark Water’ advance 90 meters towards the front of the ship without touching the deck.
I hated this one so much. It's very difficult. If you jump from one container to another, but you don't make it, and have to ledge-hang, then you've already failed. Ledge-hanging counts as "touching the deck" and you will fail. Once I realized this I was able to complete the challenge, but it takes a lot of time and patience.
A Crappy Way To Die (Bronze / 20)
Description:
- Kill the enemy in the porta-potty.
Right at the start of this mission, after ascending the first staircase you can see two porta-potties. Just shoot the left porta-potty a bunch of times as soon as it's in your line of sight.
Alone: Trophies / Achievements
Gunless (Gold / 60)
Description:
- Finish ‘Alone’ without firing a gun.
This one is far easier than it seems, just craft a bunch of smoke grenades and use them whenever you need to get past enemies. Chuck smoke bombs and run through the mission, really not that hard on recruit difficulty.
Look how scrappy but easy this one is:
Prison Break: Trophies / Achievements
No Time to Lose (Silver / 30)
Description:
- Complete the CCTV sequence in four minutes.
Backpack Guy (Silver / 30)
Description:
- Kill gassed or blinded enemies using a Molotov, Semtex and Frag in ‘Prison Break’.
You can complete this in multiple scenarios during the mission. Just chuck a Gas Grenade and then loads of Semtex. It's easiest to complete against the riot shield enemies in the corridor.
Ghost Team: Trophies / Achievements
Practice Makes Perfect (Silver / 30)
Description:
- Shoot all the targets in the training area in ‘Ghost Team’.
When Graves is trying to kill you in the tank just head to the second floor of the buildings in the training area, and you can avoid him easily enough while shooting the targets. They aren't hard to spot.
Countdown: Trophies / Achievements
Must be Wind (Gold / 60)
Description:
- Rescue the hostages in ‘Countdown’ without the enemies firing their weapons.
I'm not sure why this is Gold or worth 60G, it's one of the easiest in the game. This challenge is completed during the final mission and right at the beginning. As you descend with Price stay on the far right side of the building, and you'll be fine.
Spec-Ops Trophies / Achievements In Modern Warfare 2
There are six trophies / achievements which can only be completed in Spec-Ops, and you can find them listed by Spec-Ops mission below.
General Spec-Ops Trophies / Achievements
These can be completed across various Spec-Ops missions.
Only the Beginning (Silver / 40G)
Description:
- Earn at least one Star in Co-op.
Play at least one Spec-Ops mission to completion, and even if you're terrible, you will have unlocked this trophy / achievement.
Full SSE (Silver / 40G)
Description:
- Find 20 intel fragments in Co-op.
We will update you once we have found every piece of intel with a full guide.
Low Profile Trophies / Achievements
Night Fight (Silver / 40G)
Description:
- Earn three Stars in ‘Low Profile’.
Spec-Ops is not yet available so we can't offer advice here yet.
Going Dark (Silver / 40G)
Description:
- Complete ‘Low Profile’ without triggering any alarms.
We will provide a complete guide to this once the mission is available to play.
Denied Area Trophies / Achievements
Hellride (Silver / 40G)
Description:
- Earn three Stars in ‘Denied Area’.
When we have tips we will provide them.
Mt Zaya Trophies / Achievements
Kings of the Mountain (Silver / 40G)
Description:
- Earn three Stars in ‘Defender: Mt. Zaya’.
As above, we haven't played Spec-Ops yet.
That was your complete rundown of all the trophies/achievements in Modern Warfare 2. Complete them all, and you will unlock the final Trophy / Achievement: "We Are RTB".
Will you be bothering to try and complete them all? Or are you a one-and-done kind of player when it comes to the campaign?
Here's what else you have to look forward to in Modern Warfare 2: