I, for my sins, enjoy parry mechanics. I use 'parry slop' lovingly as a shorthand to refer to action games I want to play which feature parrying as a predominant mechanic. I am also a Call of Duty campaign enjoyer, and those games rarely feature any melee combat, let alone something as advanced as parrying. So, to say I was genuinely surprised to see Modern Warfare 4 bring the two together would be an understatement.

Yes, that's right. In case you haven't jumped into the Modern Warfare 4 campaign early, it has lengthy segments where your only weapon is your fists. In fact, those hand-to-hand encounters can only be finished by learning the parry timing; whiff it or mess it up, and it's an insta-Game Over. You've been able to punch people in COD campaigns before, of course, but none have the depth - or frequency - seen in Infinity Ward's latest. We're first introduced to the idea in the second mission, but that version is elementary compared to what's thrown at you later.

Out in the Cold, the earlier mission, actually starts out as more of a play on John Wick. Price, dressed in plain clothes, enters a nightclub looking for a lead on a target. Things quickly escalate - as they tend to do in MW campaigns - and Price finds himself pushing through a packed nightclub with nothing but a handgun. As it goes, the John Wick inspirations become clearer with a shootout in one of those rooms with anamorphic 3D LED light walls.

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