GT4 and NFS is a little unfair to compare, no?
MW is hardly the most realistic game in the world, and to be fair you've sorta nit-picked a problem out. I personally don't care about this, whilst it serves as a good annoyance, I try not to focus on it. MW still delivers in all other parts of the game.
The modding system in games are a huge chunk of appeal to me.
And I dont think it delivers in all parts of the game, I think there's alot of room for improvement personally.