I've always been a fan of the Metal Gear Solid franchise. These games are sort of their own genre because there is nothing else in gaming quite like them. They're basically a mash up of two of my favorite things; stealth action games and B-movie storytelling. Well, it may not be like a cheesy Hong Kong Kung Fu film (I miss Jackie Chan), but nothing is perfect.
Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is still one of these things and is decent at the other thing until the second half. Luckily this entry brought in one of my other favorite things (sorta) by making the game with "RPG elements", although seemingly every game now can claim to have ""RPG Elements"". Another thing every game has now is open worlds, which I think will be every AAA game from now until the heat death of the universe. But as far as action stealth mechanics go, MGSV might be the best stealth game I've ever played.
I'm not kidding. While the original Metal Gear Solid may have revolutionized and sort of invented the way we see stealth games, MGSV lives up to its history and surpasses it. Every small mechanic that I've ever seen in a stealth game is here*, plus some new ones. Throw an empty magazine to distract a guard. Move slower and lower to make yourself harder to detect. Hide in tall grass, in dumpsters, in porta-potties. Stealth takedowns can kill or knock out an enemy, or, you can interrogate him, or, you can hold up an enemy by sneaking up with your weapon raised, or, you can wait for nightfall to be harder to detect, or, you can wait for a sandstorm which drastically reduces visibility, or, rainfall to mask your steps, or, hide in a cardboard box, or...or...or...
*I lied a little here. MGS V does not have disguises like the Hitman series does but those are too stupid for Metal Gear Solid. I repeat, those are too stupid for Metal Gear Solid. Hitman is stupid.
The other half of a good stealth game, the enemy AI, is also really, really good. There is a new reflex system that when an enemy sees you, you get a slow-mo effect for about 5 seconds so you can try and take him out before he alerts the entire base. Using a non-silenced weapon will screw you here anyway, but it's a clever way to keep in stealth mode without having to fight a base on full alert. It's such an easy fix to a long standing problem in stealth games that it seems stupid to call it innovative but it weirdly is. You get one more chance to stay in stealth mode instead of being severely punished for one little mistake. Likewise, you can always run and hide if enemies are on full alert. If they lose sight of you, they well enter search mode. If they still can't find you, they will return back to low alert.
"I'm sure he just left the area because we are so badass. Just gonna return to guard duty."
While enemy AI will occasionally be stupid, like not being able to see you when they should, they sometimes see you from a mile away making this one of the harder games to always go full stealth. It's okay though because even if you don't like stealth games, the shooting mechanics are...better.
Yes, for the first time in MGS history, you have the option to go in guns-a-blazin without it being impossibly hard. All the noisy lethal weapons get used quite a bit. I personally think that the times when I fail at stealth and everything goes to shit is some of the best times in this game. Do I run/hide or do I shoot it out? I've used both depending on the shit I'm in and the game is remarkably good at it.
Nobody here. Might as well waltz right in.
Still though, shooting from cover is weird. It's too easy to shoot into the cover you are behind even though you're aiming above it, if that makes sense. It's best to just back slightly off of cover to fix this problem but it seems like a weird lack of polish on the mechanics here. It's not a major issue, but worth mentioning.
Most of how you plan your attack is through your iDroid (nice one Kojima *rolls eyes*) and through your binoculars. You can mark targets from a distance which always stay on your HUD, unless you get too far away, which eliminates the need for a mini-map like previous games. The iDroid has your map, which is very active with things you have marked, showing their approximate location or exact location depending on your intel. You also use your iDroid for all sorts of other stuff (which I'll get too). Using both of these tools allows you to plan your moves with an impressive amount of detail, as well as be your support system.
There are SO many options that the """RPG elements""" activated from the iDriod seem to borrow from every game ever. Have the wrong equipment for a mission? Request a supply drop to change your loadout at a specific point on the map. Want a new weapon or item? Select R&D from the iDroid. Need a helicopter to pick you up? Select a drop point. Need a different buddy (more on them later)? Request one from the iDroid. Want to say "fuck this shit" and just napalm a village? Request fire support from the iDroid.
Fuck alllllll this noise
Yes. This game has air strikes and they rule. Well, you can't get an S rank with one (the flare grenade which calls in your helicopter to minigun everybody also affects this) but seriously getting S ranks are hard as balls and only for perfectionists.
Also from the iDroid, you can build up Motherbase, which is basically the Normandy of this Mass Effect game only shitty. You can build up your base with money and resources earned/collected on missions and side ops. You also build up the soldiers for the Diamond Dogs mercenary group you control. The soldiers can be prisoners you rescue, or random soldiers that you whisk away with a Fulton balloon which is never not funny.* Motherbase is the home of the """"RPG elements"""" and you need to go there every once in a while to wash blood off and raise morale because I guess my mercenaries miss me...which reminds me, I need to call my mother.
*I don't know where else to put this but the Fulton system is great. You can tie a balloon to people, gear, materials, and goddamn tanks to be taken to Motherbase and used for future missions. It's awesome.....oh and also you can capture live animals with it because for some reason Motherbase has your own personal zoo. I repeat, this game gives you a personal zoo because Kojima is a crazy person.
Motherbase itself is actually really big (not at first but you build it up) and really boring. There is almost nothing to do there. You can't even visit major secondary characters for some reason, other than Quiet who does nothing but sunbathes where there is no sunlight (more on her later). Yeah, you can do some shooting gallery things but whoopie de fucking do. A lot of wasted potential here.
WHY IS THIS HUGE AREA HERE WITH NOTHING TO DO?
One thing I absolutely have to mention is the squad missions, which remind me of the war table missions from Dragon Age: Inquisition. You can send your combat unit to do random missions in god knows where, that run in real time, and provide you with personnel/material/money/etc. What is odd, is that the game says the rewards are not good, the game outright says this, yet I found these rewards to be much better than what I got in DA:I. It's weird. Also, there are some that are harder and give you a tactical advantage like sending your guys out to destroy some warehouses so that enemies in an area don't have body armor. This is closer to what the war table should have been in DA:I and what I HOPE the rumored "war table like thing" in Mass Effect: Andromeda works.
The final gameplay thing I have to talk about (told you, SO MANY features) is the buddy system. You accumulate them over time if you choose to do so and sort of gives you a party like another """""RPG element""""". One is D-Horse, who does horse things and can poop on command. One is D-Dog, who is my favorite even though he gets in the way at times but makes up for it by being a double for Snake so that you can take down two enemies at the same time. One is a mini-walker that I never use cause it's stupid. And the last one is the controversial sniper support, Quiet.
Quiet is a mixed bag*. Super useful on some missions and annoying on others. She basically sends an entire enemy unit on alert by providing covering fire for when you get spotted. You can request her to take out a specific target but even then, the enemies are alerted to a sniper. It's good for a distraction as they pay attention to her and not you, but it doesn't always seem to work right. Also, she hums a 10 second long looping musical track that gets REALLY ANNOYING really fast. She is, however, one of only a handful of boss battles and a good one at that. You have to beat her before she can join you, kinda like a Pokemon.
*About her nakedness....I'll save it for another blogpost. I don't have a whole lot to say about it actually but I don't want to go on a long-ish tangent here. I'll just say that a) her character is actually really interesting and a shame that it's overshadowed by b) the justification for her going into battle wearing a bikini being ridiculous, for now. I don't think it's that big of a deal, but it is stupid.
The games presentation is great. The Fox Engine is amazing. For you sticklers out there, NO frame rate drops and consistently runs at 60FPS. The musical score is outstanding as usual but this entry is the first to also use licensed music, which you can play at anytime while stealthing or fighting. Granted, you have to collect tapes to do so, but they are not too hard to find. Luckily, you get this sweet David Bowie cover automatically.
Amazing intro sequence with this song.
The open world is a bit restrictive....which I know I'm in the minority but like in an open world game. Lots of cliffs make paths more like corridors, though some areas are more open than others. It's open world-ish.
But like every goddamn open world game, the side quests vastly outnumber the main story missions. I'd prefer something like 60/40 with main story being the majority, but can I at least get 50/50? Ever?!? There are about 40-ish missions but only about half directly involve the main story. 10-ish directly relate to character development and the Diamond Dogs, which is very Mass Effect 2 and I love those, but at least another 10-ish are random bullshit like tutorials. Then, there are OVER 100 side opts which are 10 rescue the prisoner missions, or, 10 assassinate this dude missions, or, 10 destroy these tanks missions, or, 10 eliminate this squad missions, or, 10 extract this enemy missions, or.....Every review that said the side quests are not repetitive is lying. This is yet another """""RPG element"""""" that this game borrowed but this one really should not have been. I don't care if it makes the game shorter. Make side quests interesting PLEASE! ANYBODY! Can I have one fucking open world game that has a "TON OF CONTENT" actually have content that is worth a damn???????
As for the story....well, the story of MGS V is worse than any of them, and I LIKE MGS's story. It takes place in the 1980's, so in the middle of the MGS timeline. It's after MGS: Ground Zeroes (which I did not play but has a Bioware like save upload thing), and more importantly, MGS3: Snake Eater. Snake is Big Boss in this game. The main story is about revenge against another mercenary group named Cipher and XOF. Both groups are kinda sorta the same thing but not entirely because one has Zero involved (the MAIN secret villain over all of MGS even though he is kinda sympathetic and whatever) and the other doesn't but they ARE kind of the same thing........
Hey. I said I like the story but I like shitty, melodramatic, and very, VERY convoluted B-movies so....to each their own. MGS is no exception. It's just like those movies only with an insanely higher budget. Kojima loves plot twists and addressing plot holes....with more plot holes. Again, he is a crazy person.
The storytelling is where this game really takes a turn away from the previous games. Don't what to play a Metal Gear Solid game because you hate cutscenes in video games? Well, this one has hardly any!!!! The first mission is cutscene heavy and linear as hell, also long as hell, but once you get into the open world stuff 2 hours later....you get a handful of cutscenes. None of those cutscenes are all that long either. Nothing like the notoriously long, epic cutscene at the end of MGS4: Guns of the Patriots exists in this game. Diehards may hate this, I KINDA HATE IT because this is Metal Gear Solid damnit, but people scared off from the series due to the cutscenes shouldn't be anymore.
From MGS4: Guns of the Patriots.
I know what this means but out of context sounds dumb as hell.
Almost all of the backstory is told through audio tapes which is soooooo boring. If there is one gripe I have with Bioshock, it's popularizing the audio log idea. At least you have to find those though. In MGS V, they're just given to you periodically. Why in the hell didn't they make Motherbase more like the Normandy in ME? Go home, talk to your people, have backstory explained organically. Audio logs, even in Bioshock, are cold. They have to be presented in a very specific way to be interesting.
The open world nature didn't actually hurt the narrative all that much, what hurt the narrative is the fact that this game takes place in the middle of the MGS timeline. Prequels never have good endings, and without spoiling anything, this one doesn't either. Yeah, this story has just as many Kojima plot twists and it's convoluted as all hell, but it lacks the punch other MGS titles had. No MGS story in any of the games make any goddamn sense, but they are entertaining as hell and are narratively solid. There is a good story told with every bad storytelling convention ever used. It's an anomaly, and obviously, not for everybody. MGS stories are a weird mix of serious and silly that....I haven't really seen in any work of fiction. Not at this level of weirdness anyway.
Again. You can tie balloons to sheep in this game.
And what makes me really, really sad, is the story was likely a lot better. It's rumored that MGSV has a ton of cut content, almost all of it story related in the second half of the game. Is...is it possible, that Konami cut story crucial content for DLC????? I mean, Konami has already advertised horse armor DLC and no I'm not kidding that is a thing-where-is-the-self-awareness-or-awareness-of-their-industry-or-any-fucking-thing-holy-fucking-shit. YOU DON'T DO THAT KONAMI. You don't fucking save half the story for DLC. You've already killed my Silent Hills dreams Konami. Don't do this to me. You used to be great. What....like, what happened to you? Who hurt you? Have fun being a company that makes slot machines I guess.
I will fucking quit buying AAA games if slicing off story for DLC becomes a trend. EA already did that TWICE with Mass Effect (Javik and Leviathan. Both are story critical that should have been included in the main game) and I don't play it, but it seems like Bungie has done that with Destiny as well. This is unacceptable for any story driven game but it seems even more egregious with Metal Gear Solid since it's story has always been a big part of the fun.
Apparently, I'm the only person who thinks story matters in games that bother to have one. (Obviously, I'm not going to say Tetris is terrible because it doesn't have a story. If a game has a story, make it.....at least decent or fun). How in the hell this game got perfect scores in almost every review is stupid as hell. The gameplay is FANTASTIC, but this is Metal Gear Solid and goddamnit I want my stupid, stupid epic story. Why was this """""""RPG element""""""" ignored?
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Overall, Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is still a great game. It has, since the original, the best gameplay of the series. It's presentation is great even though there is some wonky stuff here or there. The story is okay in general, terrible in the 2nd half, and I'd argue BAD for a MGS game mostly because the story is told so poorly.
It's been a long time since I played the original Metal Gear Solid, but MGSV might be better. MIGHT BE, Hard to tell. When a classic game franchise is perfected in so many categories except for story, how do you know? Regardless, this is Hideo Kojima's swan song to MGS and I'm not sure Kojima can do much better.
Give this game a play. You'll probably like it, but even if you don't, you'll know you experienced something unlike any other game...except for other Metal Gear Solid games, with less """""""RPG elements""""""".
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One last thing. Hideo Kojima is the man. A crazy man, but THE man. Despite Konami firing him and removing his name from the title (It is not a "Hideo Kojima Game" except it is), he still promotes the game, wants people to play it, and is just a super cool dude. For every Metal Gear Solid release since the 2nd one, he would go to a game store in Japan and sign copies of the game for fans. It was promoted by Konami and usually had huge lines. This time, he had already been fired from Konami, but you know what he did?....
He walked into several stores on release day, completely unannounced like some random customer and signed copies for random people buying the game. Since there was no big event, he chatted with them too in a more "I'm just hanging with my people nonchalantly" way. Cool as fuck.
We will see more Kojima games, I'm sure. It's too bad Metal Gear Solid will never be the same, and almost certainly awful, without him.*
*Just do something new bro. Please. Every other jilted developer seems to just want to launch a Kickstarter to make the exact same type of game they became famous for only under a different name. Mighty No. 9, Bloodstained, whatever the hell the Bioshock people are working on that looks exactly like Bioshock. Just get weird with it dude.
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Fuck Konami.
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