Even Call of Duty Now Has a Parry—and It’s Brilliant, But Do We Need It in Every Game?

For what it’s worth, I enjoy parry mechanics. I use the term “parry slop” affectionately as shorthand for action games I want to play that feature parrying as a dominant mechanic. I’m also a fan of Call of Duty campaigns, and those games rarely include any melee combat, let alone something as sophisticated 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 correct. If you haven’t yet jumped into the Modern Warfare 4 campaign early, it contains lengthy segments where your only weapon is your fists. In fact, those hand-to-hand encounters can only be completed by learning the parry timing; miss it or botch it, and it’s an instant Game Over. You’ve been able to punch people in COD campaigns before, of course, but none have the depth—or the 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 on, the John Wick inspirations become clearer, with a shootout in one of those rooms featuring anamorphic 3D LED light walls.

The game’s hand-to-hand tech is introduced when a security guard attempts to stop you. To my knowledge, this is the first time I’ve seen the prompt “Block just before being hit to parry” in a COD campaign. The game slows down time to let you read it and internalise the concept, but not nearly long enough for me to pick my jaw off the floor.

I decided to test the depth of the mechanic with the next opponent and wasn’t impressed: guards have limited animations and wide attack windows that were easy to read. Deeper into the mission, however, enemies start adding mix-ups (!) into their repertoire, culminating in a multi-stage fight against a boss who introduces knives (harder to parry) into the formula, before throwing kicks and back-handed punches into the mix after you disarm him.

The game never shows stamina or stagger gauges, which—ironically—adds more depth to the system. You’re forced to read attack animations to be able to time your block and land the parry. Without parrying, you simply can’t break your opponent’s posture and perform a takedown; you have to participate in the dance in order to advance.

There are a few of these throughout the Modern Warfare 4 campaign, but none more impressive than a pivotal fight in the latter half of the game. On top of standard punches, knife attacks and kicks, your opponents can now perform headbutts. This is made more impressive by their ability to dodge, a move you do not have access to.

There’s a surprisingly dense animation system that makes all of that work. Hits are sharp, delivered with a heft and weight games don’t get right often. There are even bespoke knife parry animations that play when your knife connects with the opponent’s. If you were feeling generous, you could call it COD’s version of Onimusha’s steel-on-steel combat, I suppose.

So, have we reached peak parry slop? No! Parrying adds depth to what would otherwise be mundane moments. Mer games can be enriched by borrowing mechanics from popular genres outside their own. Call of Duty has actually been doing more of that in recent years, expanding campaigns to include loot, crafting, and open-world scavenging mechanics. They’re not always done well, but when they are, they create memorable moments that go beyond breaking up the pace.

Now, I want to know if the same hand-to-hand system has carried over to DMZ. Imagine the possibilities!

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