'We want to make sure that it feels really good to move, but it also feels good for the person who wants to shoot you' — Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 developer on balancing the game's next-level movement system

• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4's movement is considerably faster and more fluid than Modern Warfare 2
• It also offers new parkour mechanics
• The developers say the goal is "being able to move the way you want to"

Multiplayer matches in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 are underpinned by an overhauled movement system that facilitates smoother slides that carry your momentum, a new ledge grab mechanic, and more.

The result is the most fluid feeling Modern Warfare game yet, offering a new level of freedom in contrast to the comparatively clunky Modern Warfare 2.

"We wanted to make sure this time around that being able to move the way you want to and play the way you want to was also supported," lead game designer Jackie Reynolds tells me at a preview event in Los Angeles.

"We looked at all these systems that would have made the game feel sluggish and cumbersome before, and we actually rebuilt them from the ground up to support that more fluid play. We want you to still feel like a gritty badass, but we also want you to feel like you can move with some parkour, kind of like a call back to the Jason Bourne movies."

Adding extra speed to movement is almost certainly going to increase the game's skill ceiling and widen the gap between newcomers and the most experienced players. Still, the team at developer Infinity Ward tells me that they are confident everything is balanced.

"I think the elegance in our movement stuff is that we generally prioritize your forward movement," studio multiplayer creative director Joe Cecot explains.

"We're not moving as rapidly horizontally as the other games, and so you still feel very fluid. You can move quickly, but those players should be a bit easier to track, to pick up, and that sort of thing.

(Image credit: Activision)

"For us, it's that balance again. We want to make sure that it feels really good to move, but it also feels good for the person who wants to shoot you, and that's the challenge we kind of set for us at the beginning of the project."

According to Cecot, those who prefer to play more slowly will still have plenty of options to do so.

"We have certain equipment in the game that, if you're more of a tactical player and you want to hold down a location, allows you to set up," he adds.

"The razor wire is a great example, where you can pop it like it's a trap that will catch people. It's not very lethal, but it halts them a little bit and gives you a moment to react. Then we have other equipment that helps you search out and find people on the move, so the seeker drone, you throw it out and actually zips through the world, and it finds people, and you can follow it."

This approach comes as the result of plenty of fan feedback, with many players finding recent Modern Warfare games a little too slow.

"You could argue in our previous game, Modern Warfare 2, we tried to push too hard into the tactical at the expense of responsiveness," Cecot says.

"We're not trying to point fingers; we want to be better. We want to provide a better game for those players."

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 launches on October 23, 2026, for PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Series S, and Nintendo Switch 2.