When the game was really popular, I never liked games like that. Now I find I love games like that. It really all started with Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, which got me on the first person view, then graduated to Mass Effect and Fallout 3, which got me into shooter-type games, and next thing I know I’m playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and loving it. I am almost finished playing Alpha Protocol, which was fun, too.
Will MGS be dated? I have a PS2, I can play it on that, I think. What do you guys think - is it worth a shot? It’s cheap as hell right now.
I never played Metal Gear until I got MGS IV for my PS3. I love MGS IV, granted you have to skip pretty much all of the cut scenes. Game play is solid and tight and I have never noticed a bug. Given how much I liked MGS IV, I went out and bought a couple of the earlier games (my PS3 is PS2 compatible). The earlier games are nowhere in the same league in terms of gameplay. My opinion may have been different if I had been playing MGS games from the beginning.
I am pretty sure that you will find others on the boards who will think I am insane for liking MGS IV and tell you to play all the earlier games and avoid that one.
MGS IV sucks dick; it’s still worth playing because it has some very cool gameplay elements like the Ota-Camo, and some of the boss fights are pretty amazing. The little mechanized scout device is a lot of fun too. But the story is wretchedly shitty and there are some unbelievably idiotic characters like Akiba and Drebin that severely detract from the gaming experience.
MGS III - Snake Eater is the gem of the series by far, in my opinion. Kojima really hit his stride with this one - fantastic balance of stealth, action, drama and humor. MGS I is a classic and definitely worth playing. II (Sons of Liberty) is also awesome but Raiden takes a little getting used to and there’s some heavy-handed philosophical shit in the storyline.
Kojima was truly out to lunch with IV though. God, this game could have been so great, and it was ruined. It’s almost like George Lucas directed it or something.
I don’t have a PS3 and don’t intend to get one, and I hate idiotic characters. I am thinking about getting 1, since it’s so cheap, and it will tell me whether I have any interest in the others.
Yes honestly, I think you will find the original MGS incredibly dated. The game is 13 years old at this point and it shows, both graphically and design wise. That said MGS is a classic and I still rate as one of the best games I’ve ever played. Fantastic story and great characters, and not nearly as up it’s own ass as it’s sequels would get. (And I don’t necessarily mean that in a bad way…)
You mentioned Mass Effect, Fallout, and Call of Duty. I feel the need to point though that Metal Gear is not a shooter, it’s a stealth action title at heart. Minimal gunplay, lots of sneaking and hiding and taking out bad guys quietly. Alpha Protocol’s a good comparison though.
MGS 2 gets a bad rep for a couple reasons. Raiden isn’t as bad as people want to say, but the way Kojima presented him was atrocious. I’ve heard “bait and switch” tossed around and I can’t disagree with that. (The main character from the first game becomes a supporting character in the second and it left a bad taste in a lot of people’s mouths.) There’s a lot of philosophy about memes, and information dissemination that just feels out of place. (Seriously, google “Metal Gear Solid 2” and “philosophical analysis”. It gets kinda scary.) Kojima was smart enough to tone it down in subsequent titles though.
I would agree with Argent that MGS 3 is the highpoint of the series by far. Great twisted little cold war spy tale with sci fi elements. It serves as a sort of prologue to the rest of the series.
I played a bit of the original and enjoyed it at the time. Never got into the sequels though.
I agree with Jihi. You’ll find it incredibly dated and pretty frustrating. Still worth it for the perspective though I guess. Go for it if it’s cheap enough and you think you have the patience to go back in gaming time.
I love it. The graphics of the first one are dated, but the game is still fun and the story entertaining. I like 2 and 3 too, but still think the first MGS is best
Didn’t they already release a MGS reboot for the…I wanna say gamecube? I remember playing the original and the redone version. Redone was worth it. I only played MGS after MGS 2, and it caused me to enjoy the delightfully tinfoil hat story line ever so slightly less. Then I failed on the FIRST LEVEL of MGS III over the span of a weekend over and over again, and gradually lost interest in the franchise, sadly. 'Cause I really really liked it since the original NES game!
MGS1 is cool, but the graphics are badly dated, as are the controls. And the story *really *makes little sense. No, really. If you know anything about genetics, anything at all, you’ll bite your controller in half at some points. Still, if you’ve ever played stuff like Thief or Splinter Cell and enjoyed them, you’ll enjoy it.
MGS2… well, it’s a game with a split base. Love it or hate it, there’s no middle ground.
On the one hand, the graphics are awesome, the gameplay is too, and I really liked the amount of mind games Kojima played on the player without it being too in love with itself. On the other hand, the protagonist and his girlfriend are whiny little shits, the environments are very samish (hope you like orange and catwalks) and the end is… well, it’s clever but it’s a lot of pretentious and circular infodump at once so the first (few) times you’re left with a “what the Hell just happened ?” feeling.
MGS3 is a pure gem. For once, the story is in the realm of Tom Clancy-like believability (people COVERED IN BEES! winning WW2 on their own notwithstanding), the gameplay is the apex of the series, it’s stylish as Hell… really, zero complaints, although perhaps it starts getting a little too heavy on cutscenes. But they’re really cool cutscenes.
MGS4 is when Kojima decided he was too good to make games so shut the fuck up and watch his Vision, Beotian !
Count me firmly in the middle. I understood… (Eventually at least), what Kojima was going for and I actually think it works in the long run. But it’s way beyond the expectations set forth by the first game, into the realm of, as some have termed it, “post modern” videogames. It addresses the link between player and character in a way that completely breaks the fourth wall. That was nearly unheard of at the time.
The only thing that has even come close since then was Bioshock’s “Would you kindly” arc phrase that had the player questioning their own free will. And it only went a fraction of the distance MGS 2 did.
OTOH, MGS 2 has one of the best musical themes ever in gaming. Right here. Fast forward to the final minute or so. That music, for me at least, perfectly sums up MGS’s general tone.
The OP really would be better off with MGS III. (Snake Eater.) It’s far, far more “accessible” than II; it has a lot of humor and fourth-wall-breaking irony; the graphics are very good, maybe the best graphics of any game on the PS2. It was really the last big-budget game made for the PS2, if I’m not mistaken, so they really took the system’s capabilities to the max.
The Subsistence version, additionally, resolves some issues with the camera perspective that gamers complained about. I didn’t have a problem with the camera in the basic version of the game - I don’t mind fixed third-person angles - but I think the Subsistence edition added the option of a fixed first-person view (rather than having to hold a button to momentarily toggle the first-person view.)
I’d really suggest starting with III, because II has very drab environments and some tedious missions that are likely to turn off a first-time player, and I has very bad graphics by today’s standards.
There are also some exceptionally unique bosses. Kojima really shattered a lot of traditional ideas about what a “boss” is supposed to be with this game…some really memorable fights, including a protracted battle against a 100-year-old sniper with a pet parrot for a spotter, spread out over a sprawling, lush jungle area. (You can actually capture and eat the parrot!)
Oh, speaking of which, the timeline of the games is 3 -> 1 -> 2 so you won’t miss anything plot relevant by starting with the latest.
The only part of 3 that has an impact on the other games (or that you’d have more insight in, having played the other 2 games) is the hero (who’s the “father” of 2 characters from 1) and one boss who appears in all 4 games as the magnificent bastard. He has a condition, OK ? Chronic backstabbing disorder is no joke :mad::). Other than that, the game is pretty self-contained.
OTOH if you liked 3 and crave more, be advised that you probably shouldn’t play 2 without having played 1 first, or many things will make fuck all sense. Worse than the baseline for that game, I mean
One of my favorite video game themes ever. (And a solid contemporary orchestral piece in its own right.) And I love the opening montage of MGS2 where this plays over some of the more impressive scenes from the game.
Yeah, but you won’t get the cool gun (knockout round sniper rifle) or camo for pulling this trick.
If you play MGS2 or 3 first, you won’t like MGS1 since the graphics will be so dated that you’ll have trouble even seeing stuff. Play them in order if you’re interested in the story line. Skip MGS1 if you’re not.
Everyone here is right, though: MGS3 is by far the best of the series. Wait till November when it comes out in HD.
