It's been a while since I played a Call of Duty, but Modern Warfare 4 felt all at once familiar and refined to the Nth degree. Basic movement in this game is just majestic.

Infinity Ward has had plenty of practice honing the fundamentals, of course, but there's a balletic precision to CoD's locomotion that feels elegant, 'natural' even. Oddly, I've woken up from dreams recently after bobbing and sliding around in my mind, as if I'd been controlling myself with a pad.

My point here is that, away from playing the thing, my mind has lingered on MW4's mechanics in a way it usually does only with very special games (for instance, when I go to Ascend through a rocky outcrop in the real world). Returning after years away from the series — mainly because 2013's Ghosts was the last time it was on a Nintendo platform — catching up has been a pleasure.

If you've played the previous three Modern Warfare reboots, and the umpteen CoDs before that (Black Ops is up to #7 now), you might take those decades of refinement for granted, but it's absolutely worth highlighting. Seamlessly transitioning into slides, showing your soldier's animated limbs and extremities grabbing the environment with the grace of a platformer, reloading with little flourishes, tapping out bomb codes - this is best-in-class movement and gunplay.

And here it is, all running on Switch 2, and bloody well. The usual caveats apply (you'll be familiar if you've read my deeper impressions of the story and DMZ modes - I highly recommend checking those out), but it's an impressive package.

Let's tackle this monster in three parts, addressing the trio of modes you'll find on the main menu, starting with the Campaign. You're in for a six-to-eight-hour rollercoaster that cherry-picks and CoD-ifies scenarios from Hollywood blockbusters with panache. Visceral, compelling, satisfying; all the positive yet vague adjectives apply to this romping thriller.

There's more than a little Mission Impossible being channelled as it barrels from set piece to set piece, jumping between continents across a 16-mission narrative until Capt. Price's cartel entanglements and revenge quest eventually dovetails with Pvt. Park's North and South Korean crisis. Funnelled relentlessly between calamitous missions, there's no room to step off the narrative path or catch your breath, but it's a hell of a ride.

Writing and performances are excellent across the board. You get token nods to tough decisions in grey situations, but it doesn't have anything to say beyond the old staples: Are we the good guys? Do the ends justify the means? Where do you draw the line? But hey, those questions bear repeating.

Moral quandaries are just background dressing to the entertainingly stupid action anyway, and IW is content to shoot you in the face, repeatedly, if you deviate from plot-critical dialogue options.

Elsewhere, the interactions and cross-border camaraderie between soldiers is well done, but again, we're not here to get hung up on any message or explore themes in depth; we're here for a Statham-style smackdown and serious artillery. Capt. Price can bang on about avoiding civilian casualties all he likes, but eggs must be broken for a seat-of-your-pants action omelette. That bystander bouncing over your bonnet will be fine, probably.

The only real let-up comes around two-thirds in. Crash-landing behind enemy lines, you bunker down in an abandoned basement and head out into the snow to scavenge supplies and complete three objectives in the order of your choosing. 'Stranded' is welcome respite from the rollercoaster, and though jamming a single open-zone mission into the playlist hardly solves the open-world versus set-piece-chute question, it changes the pace well enough.

Perhaps one day we'll see the two styles integrated more artfully. Until then, it's BOOM, BOOM, BANG, BOOF, BAM, [quiet bit], STAB, BOOOOM, [surprise character death], STABBY-STAB, "Civilians!", KERPOWWW, OORAHHHHH!, and repeat. All very enjoyable.

Switch 2 handles it admirably. The Campaign runs at 30fps, but feels smooth in the hands. Environments are exquisitely detailed, lighting and particle effects look great, and the whole thing just feels fantastic. Some fizzy hair and occasionally fuzzy presentation aside, I came away feeling I'd had the full-fat CoD experience. Digital Legends, who handled this version, have made the right compromises to deploy on handheld.

Next up, we've got the extraction-based DMZ mode. I've covered the bases of this PvPvE mode already, but having spent more time with it on my sofa, I'm even more impressed.

Taking on NPCs and human Operators across the vast Hajin map, you've got story missions, side ops, objectives, and unlocks to keep you busy, with Free Roam available if you just want to drop in with some pals for some shootin' and lootin'.

It's overwhelming at first, with a large checklist to tick off at your leisure, XP to earn, gear to craft, bounties to hunt. You could spend hours back at home base just tinkering with optics and laser sights.

Going it alone is an option, but having someone to revive you is handy, and DMZ really shines when you squad up with two pals. I can see it becoming a place to hang with friends, getting into as much or as little trouble as suits your mood. Performance-wise, it targets 40fps docked and 30fps handheld, and both feel solid. Elite players will baulk at anything less than 60, but I never felt it was the tech's fault when I bought the farm.

Conceptually, it's the polar opposite of the stringent, on-rails Campaign, and hints at the franchise's future. Whether Infinity Ward can ever integrate the two approaches — or would even want to — is another question, but that's a can to kick down the road once more while they see what sticks here.

Finally, there's Multiplayer, the catch-all term comprising everything else in the package. It, too, is a lot.

Kill Block comes in 10v10 or 3v3 flavours, dropping you into a military facility divided into three 'slabs' - modular map chunks which are switched out every round, the idea being that you'll rarely encounter the exact same configuration. It also means IW can inject terrain and references to previous CoD maps without flooding the game with old content Day One.

The objective turns to flag-capture once the timer gets low. Rounds are short and sharp (bite the dust and you're spectating until the next), but the block gimmick didn't bowl me over. Lots of samey concrete and chipboard in the matches I played. Fun but hardly a game-changer.

I was more into Frontline, primarily because I could employ my preferred close-quarters shotgun playstyle. Playing on ship-bound Nautical, two teams spawn at their bases either end of the map, running at each other to dominate the middle zone. Nothing revolutionary, but good old-fashioned fragging.

Collateral ups the ante and injects some roguelite. You 'buy' your preferred equipment and perks at the start of each round, with wins resulting in more cash to spend on upgrades, so everyone builds their loadout on the fly as you work to attack or defend bomb sites. Again, this let me crack out a shotty, and with some solid wins for the team, I came away happy.

Ground War: Combat Outpost is a 32v32 mode that brings larger maps and vehicles into the mix. Here, you work to capture, reinforce, and retain Outposts, choosing where to respawn when you die while taking part in much larger-scale combat.

With so many players in one zone, it's got the feeling of 'DMZ condensed', and it's engaging, if a little repetitive as you pinball between outposts. "We've taken Alpha." Great! "They've taken Charlie." So off you trot to take Charlie, but then, "We lost Alpha!" Rinse, repeat.

With good team comms or different maps, maybe there's a better time to be had, but with this many players you end up feeling like a small cog in a mindless machine, cycling between losing and winning the same three outposts for 20 minutes. I preferred the more intimate modes.

That's just scratching the surface of MP, with loads of new maps and modes planned post-launch. Infected is scheduled for Halloween, but you've also got Kill Confirmed, Possession, Domination, Inflation, et al., all with daily challenges and XP to earn. Numbers will go up. Not everything will hit with you, but the wealth and breadth here means you'll find something that hits the spot.

Performance-wise, it's the same story: caveats, but no complaints. Multiplayer appears to target 60fps in most modes, and I didn't note any dips in the thick of it. Environmental fidelity takes a hit, so obviously it doesn't look as pretty as other platforms. Here's the key thing, though: Not once did I think about frame rate while playing the thing. Ultimately, Digital Legends made the right calls and compromises to deliver on Switch 2.

The bottom line, then. Campaign is a return to form and a strong reminder to lapsed fans of just how fun the CoD ride can be. DMZ has massive potential as its own thing, with a gripping loop that blends nail-biting story with open-zone multiplayer. And with the right friend group, the Multiplayer suite could keep you busy for years.

On Switch 2, you're getting the entire package, presented well, with crossplay and cross-progression. With IW's roadmap laid out, it's hard to argue you're not getting your $70's worth of triple-A here. You can almost feel the weight of the gigabytes filling up your system storage.

And after this deep-dive back into the series, it's started inhabiting my dreams. I'm not sure if that's a recommendation, but I've had a brilliant time with it.