Time for something not-so-different-but-different-enough to this blog. A video game review! And what else can I talk about but perhaps the last great big chapter in a series that has lasted nearly three decades: Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain! Normally I don’t do my impressions of games, since there are elements to it that I don’t feel qualified to talk about i.e. Frame-rate, animation, coding etc. But there are times when you feel about something so strongly that you have to talk about it, entitled or not. So let us begin!
So the story takes place after Ground Zeroes, where Big Boss finally awakens from a nine-year coma, lacking an arm and a piece of shrapnel embedded in his head. Only minutes later the hospital he is in is attacked by the forces of the mysterious group Cipher, intent on killing the legendary soldier. Narrowly escaping with the help of Ocelot, Big Boss travels to Afghanistan to find his old friend Kazuhira Miller. From there, he must rebuild what was lost for no reason other than simple revenge against Cipher.
First of all, the gameplay is magnificent. One of the best I have gone through. The game is very, VERY responsive to the playstyle of each player, and it adapts itself to counter it, giving the game an added sense of atmosphere. For example, if the player prefers to conduct missions in the night, then enemy guard post and sentries will have more searchlights, and even Night Vision Goggles. If the player takes a lot of headshots, the enemies in that area will start wearing helmets, maybe even body armour. These changes and adaptations ensure that you either increase your stealth/marksman skills, or adapt, by changing guns and other equipment. Also, building your Mother Base can be both rewarding and annoying. On one hand, actually being able to see your base grow, seeing the men you have recruited, it is very satisfying to see the fruits of your labour right in front of you, and that’s before getting to the assortment of weapons and items you can create and customize. On the other…..godamned fighting between staff!
Like I said, in terms of being on the field, the game allows you to use whatever tactic you see fit: Sneak by without being noticed, take over guard posts or eliminate enemies by force, or just pass everything by with the use of your buddy. As for gathering soldiers for Mother Base, they are not just simple numbers to ensure your access to better stuff; although a lot of people would just prefer using Snake himself, the soldiers can have different perks, such as faster running, more health and a longer Reflex mode. On that note Reflex mode, although very useful can make the game a little too easy, since a lot of mistakes made can be rectified.
Aesthetics wise, the game just looks beautiful. It’s hard to appreciate how much effort is put into creating the landscape and areas in the night, but in day it looks magnificent, especially the day and night cycles, which again adds atmosphere to the game. The world is not by all means extensive, you can reach the edges of a mission area, which can be frustrating especially in more hectic missions, but the areas of deployment are certainly big enough to easily lose yourself in.
Alright, now before I get to where I feel like MGSV falls short, I will need to deal with a quite big elephant in the room: And that of course is the presence of Quiet, the sniper robbed of her words, who happens to be dressed in quite a ‘unique’ fashion, which has led to quite a big backlash. Now I’m not going to do go all SJW on this, first of all because I don’t think that the objectification of a character completely eclipses who they really are. Take Revy Two-Hands from Black Lagoon: let’s be perfectly honest, she is one of the most objectified characters in the show, if not the most. However, her character is striking enough to stand out to the point where you don’t care how she looks. If you can focus on who they are more than how they are portrayed, then to me any form of objectification could be forgiven. Also, I think we’re in a sort of post-GamerGate stage considering that no one had THAT much of a problem against EVA from MGS3 (Or if someone did, they were in the minority).Plus, the game does try to explain (emphasis on ‘try’) why Quiet is the way she is, which is more that can be said for others. WITH THAT SAID,
-She barely talks
-She is part of the buddy system, meaning that she has to compete for competence with a dog, a horse and a robot
-Shower scene and “Dancing in the rain” scene
-Icon for her costumes is her chest
-And reason for being the way she is pretty much comes down to “Parasites, Son.”
All I’m saying is, there’s adding sexiness to a character, and then there’s painting two bullseyes on your buttcheeks and then making lewd gestures at Anita Sarkeesian. Making things too easy for critics, wouldn’t you say?
Anyway, back to impressions. Where MGSV: The Phantom Pain falls real short is the plot. Okay, not necessarily the content, more like its consistency. Putting it simply, the story is a mess. Granted a delicious mess, but still a mess. Many people have called the game “unfinished” and I can see why. There are brilliant moments in the story, such as the Prologue, and Mission 43 which are the most harrowing moments in the game. There is real potential in the story to be truly engaging, but the terrible structure just squanders it.
In a broad sense, we were all expecting to see the downfall of Big Boss become complete, as he proceeds towards the building of Outer Heaven, and an ideal world for soldiers, casting away the last of the ideals given to him by the Boss. The game is that in some ways, but in many others it really isn’t. In particular the big M. Night Shyamalan-esque twist….it’s not bad, but at the same time it feels too insufficient to be the BIG twist. It only really serves as retcon, to tie this game to the others, albeit very, very thinly. I believe that it would be the conclusion of Chapter 2 and then it rolls into 3, but this is just a personal opinion, no real theorems behind it.
The first chapter is, albeit quite short the best section of the game: Everything feels fresh and big, and the genuine feel of building up to a final confrontation. The second chapter is where it falls apart, with most of the missions being more difficult versions of those in the first chapter, with events and features that are given no closure. It’s like the first chapter is the party, while the second is the clean-up job. In fact, it has been news that Konami had certain parts of the game taken out before release: Mission 51 was removed, and there is supposed to be a third chapter named ‘Peace’. To be honest, if the game was going to be complete, they would need the third chapter. Mission 51 concludes one stray plot thread, but not all of them.
Another peeve of mine is perhaps the same problem that MGS4 was afflicted with: Using one thing to explain all the weird stuff. In Guns of the Patriots it was “Nanomachines, son”. Now it seems to be “Parasites, Son”. If it didn’t work for explaining Vamp, then it won’t work here. Though I guess old habits die hard.
Character-wise I feel mixed. Venom Snake I believe can be a charming and engaging character….when he actually talks, which is strangely a rare phenomenon in this game. Most of the talking is done by Miller and Ocelot. Ocelot is his typical enigmatic but helpful self, but Miller is perhaps the most engaging character in the whole game. Every line he speaks is laced with nine years of bitterness, pain and anger. Robin Akin Downes really out-did himself in this performance. As for Huey, I think they tried a little too hard to make him unlikeable, and although he is very demonised, there is still uncertainty as to whether he did everything accused of. Perhaps it’s a reference to the “phantom pain”, which would have a phantom cause causing them to lash out at anyone? But it does remove the use of something which is bigged up a lot, which can only be used in Combat Deployment, NOT by you. As for Skull Face, he is a very charming villain, but as with a lot of things in the story, a lot of his potential feels wasted.
So in the forest of 9s and 10s, I think MGSV: The Phantom Pain gets 7 out of 10 from me. Truth be told, I don’t hate it as much as I want to. Buried within the mess that we got is a absolutely brilliant piece of work that would have been a fine conclusion to the Metal Gear Series: It is an absolute blast playing the game, I love how interactive and even intuitive the gameplay is, the whole game in general looks beautiful, particularly in the day. But storywise, as an addition to the Metal Gear series it falls flat, a conclusion committing the one sin that cannot be forgiven: leaving more questions than answers.
Words Create Worlds 