Today was quite a hot day in the deserts of Southern Nevada, so hot in fact that the local pool had gotten hot (yes, I said hot, not warm) so I unfortunately was confined inside until the sun went down. The day was bittersweet until my cable AND internet failed on me for several hours. Frustrated, I attempted to try steam's offline mode; which also failed due to trying to update in offline mode.
Then I saw it, my Playstation, and next to it......
Then I saw it, my Playstation, and next to it......
I quite enjoyed this game the last time I ran through the single player (2009), but a lot has changed since then. So I wondered if it has the same effect it had on me the last time.....
PLOT (don't worry, no spoilers here)
The plot, however complicated is rich and all events of the previous games that are relevant are explained via 8 hours of cutscenes (most of which that are skippable) which sounds excessive, but is actually quite required. I couldn't imagine anyone supplying enough information to cover 7 games in anything less than that.
The base plot itself is thorough and interesting, the actors are stellar as well. Overall it feels like a Tom Clancy movie done right, with some classic anime elements thrown in. Meaning its a serious social commentary with some rather silly bits thrown in to soften you up.
I score the plot 9/10. Its amazing, but all the military-industrial jargon wears you down while you realize to fully understand the world the game takes place in you have to sit and watch for 8 hours...
Gameplay
The premise of the Metal Gear series has always been to be a stealth-action espionage game, ever since its initial release as Metal Gear in 1987. The series has always been great at perpetuating the stealth aspect of itself, it always got better with every game released. Until now.....
On this particular playthrough I had wanted to play my way through the hardest difficulty (The Boss Hard, unlockable only to those who beat the game on normal or harder), but unfortunately it appeared that some time ago I deleted my old save file, so I decided to press on with just Big Boss Hard.
About 20 minutes into sneaking around the middle east I discover a merchant named drebin, who explains that copies of guns you collect in the game will be sent to him in exchange for "drebin points" which you can use to unlock ID guns and purchase completely unique ones, while you keep the ammo. A useful feature not present in the previous games in any form.
After about 10 more minutes of the game it had become apparent to me that picking up guns off of dead enemies gives a lot of points, so much in fact it makes the end-of-stage sneaking bonuses irrelevant. So in the process of clearing a single area (no sneaking) I collected enough guns and items to double my points....this gave me a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.
Every chapter of the game has a type of "boss battle" in several forms before the end. Be it a large swarm of enemies or a cooperative battle vs a vampire. There's nothing really extraordinarily special about these. They look cool, but in the end its the same old "run around and wait for them to reveal their weakness, then strike" style that pretty much every adventure game of the last decade has done.
By the middle of the next chapter it became apparent that this game is very poorly designed in the department of AI behavior and incentive to actually sneak. The enemies are piss-poor in direct combat, several examples of this include
- Firing my unsilenced gun 3 feet from them only to be ignored
- Sluggish movement
- Not running from grenades
- Not attempting to find cover when they're being fired upon
- Sneaking difficulty doesn't ramp up when putting the area on alert
This combined with the fact that you have superior equipment and a whole damn private armory stocked with any type of weapon imaginable make for a very lackluster experience. Meaning the only thing that makes this game hard is you, attempting to sneak around mentally challenged guards.
Gameplay: 4/10. The game responds well when you attempt to sneak, but it doesn't know what to do when it finally catches you.
Graphics
This game LOOKS GREAT. Its incredible how Konami was able to squeeze this much out of a console game that still looks better than all current console games.
Graphics: 10/10. It still looks good, even by todays standards.
Overall
Metal Gear Solid will always have a place in my heart as a great stealth game, but this iteration will always sit in the back.
5/10
(Mods please move to General Gaming if you feel it belongs there.... I actually thought thats where I was posting it >_>)
