Running the mercenary unit Militaires Sans Frontières like a Big Boss

I’m not sure where I first heard this–or if it is even true–but Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker was originally supposed to be the real Metal Gear Solid V. And Hideo Kojima’s last game. I’m glad neither of those came to be, and while I don’t know too much about The Phantom Pain–I’ve avoided listening to countless podcasts over the last month or so, as well as skipped any and all coverage at Giant Bomb to remain as spoiler-free as possible–I do know that the newest game involves taking on individual missions to recruit members to your main base and grow its power and potential. Well, Peace Walker does that too, but on a much smaller scale.

Set in 1974 in Costa Rica, Peace Walker follows the exploits of returning protagonist Big Boss–you might remember him as Naked Snake from Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater–as he runs the mercenary unit Militaires Sans Frontières (Soldiers Without Borders). A mysterious group called the Peace Sentinels have been deployed in-country. Unfortunately, the Costa Rica government cannot do anything about them because the country’s constitution does not allow the creation of armed forces. The presence of the Peace Sentinels threatens to endanger the balance of power between the East and West, forcing Snake to intervene. Plus, he wants to build up his Mother Base.

Peace Walker is broken up into two primary modes: “Mission” and “Mother Base.” Missions are the traditional action/sneaking scenarios of the previous games, with Snake creeping through a jungle or occupied building to either kill a certain someone, rescue somebody or somebodies, or gather some intel. It’s the expected mix of sneaking, fighting, and watching. Mother Base is a crew managing simulation where you assign people to different work areas to strengthen your soldiers, upgrade your items and weapons, or keep everybody healthy, happy, and fed.

For missions, you can play either as Snake or a male or female MSF soldier, though some missions will only be available for one or the other. Your score is penalized with a lower rank and reduced heroism for the excessive murdering of soldiers or frequently being discovered, which works fine for me as I’m all about stealth pistols, stun grenades, and using the Fulton surface-to-air recovery system to send knocked-out enemies to Mother Base to switch sides. Also, using items and weapons results in leveling them up at the end of a successful mission, which means Snake is only going to get better and better at making grown men fall asleep where they stand. Peace Walker is designed for co-op play, but I’ve been doing fine so far going at it solo.

In terms of story, so far, Peace Walker is fairly traditional. Shocking, right? I mean, I’m fighting straight up tanks for boss battles at the moment, not psychics that can read my memory card save data. That said, I expect this to go from sane to insane in a short span of time, and I’m really digging the comic book style to the cutscenes, drawn by Ashley Wood, especially when they are interactive. Peace Walker was originally a PSP game, and it shows, but boy is its style on fleek. On the fleck? I don’t know how the kids talk these days.

Not all is amazing though. Camouflage, while still being there and a collectible factor in terms of different outfits for Naked Snake, seems to be completely inessential. You also cannot crawl, and I will never remember this as it is my go to when almost being spotted–to drop to the ground as swiftly as possible and lay prone. I’m not sure going forward what the bosses are like, but I’ve only taken on a tank currently and am looking to more supernatural elements to intervene. Lastly, the whole Mother Base simulation side can be extremely daunting at first, to the point that I simply relied on auto-assignment to place captured soldiers; thankfully, Mother Base opens slowly, which means it is not overwhelming immediately.

It certainly seems like there’s a lot of missions–both main story-wise and side objectives–to go for Peace Walker, so I’ve got some time still before I can load up Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes and see how the newest franchise plays. Surely Naked Snake will be able to crawl on his stomach. Surely.

Big Boss will carry on the fight after Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater

I’m not sure why I was so worried that Drew and Dan over at Giant Bomb would get ahead of me in this sneakathon to experience all the Metal Gear games, to fully absorb their cool and zany and ridiculousness, one after the other. Well, I’m aiming to play ’em all, but I believe they’ll be skipping Peace Walker, and already bypassed the original MSX2 titles and, thankfully, the lackluster VR Missions.

Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater goes the distance in terms of providing a realistic setting where sneaking, where hiding in grass and tiptoeing around booby traps, makes much more sense than an isolated oil rig or even an Alaskan nuclear weapons disposal facility. The trick to super-sleuthing through a Cold War jungle is to no longer rely on your old tricks, such as a radar and pressing against a wall before peaking out from behind it to pop a guard in the noggin with a tranquilizer dart. I spent the majority of my time as Naked Snake laying flat on his stomach, crawling through tall grass and closely monitoring my camouflage meter. My trek from screen to screen wasn’t a perfect, spotless run, as my stats at the bottom of this post will reveal, but when I got through a scenario relatively unnoticed, with only snoring bodies left behind, it sure felt awesome and super spy cool.

I’ve already talked a bit about some of the game mechanics, as well as my love for healing radio frequencies. For this post, I’d like to quickly examine that classic Metal Gear Solid juxtaposition of realistic and bonkers, of military-driven jargon and a man that shoots bullet bees from his mouth. You could compare it to a James Bond film–for me, I’m thinking of Roger Moore’s Moonraker–where the action is certainly outrageous, but believable in some slant of light. Perhaps if you squint. The weapons are traditional and accurate for the time period, but a number of items, such as porn, toss-able venomous snakes, and the crocodile cap, can lead to rather amusing moments. The game even goes so far as to comment on its James Bond-like elements, with Naked Snake refusing to be put next to such a goofy master spy.

Also, more so than the previous games, one of which had you staring closely at Meryl’s butt, there’s a high amount of sexuality here, starting naturally with EVA and her zipped down bikini outfit, kiss of death lipstick, and press LB to stare at her chest sequences. Later on, there’s breast and crouch grabbing, as well as nods to Yevgeny Borisovitch Volgin’s bisexuality. Some of it is handled better than others, and yes, scene where EVA removes the tracker from Naked Snake’s nether region, I’m looking directly at you.

Lastly, other than the lengthy cat-and-mouse chase with The End and emotional, time-restricted last go against The Boss, the rest of the boss fights are a major disappointment. Yup, I’m even including the Shagohod. Gone are the gray characters you are battling with, replaced with cartoonish, black-and-white named goons that mostly only say their codename and then explode when you defeat them. I don’t think I could tell you much about The Pain, The Fear, or The Fury, as the game barely reveals anything about them. Remember how you got to know Metal Gear Solid‘s Psycho Mantis and Sniper Wolf intimately after defeating them? That kind of stuff doesn’t happen here. These COBRA unit members are merely roadblocks, and they don’t take too much work to bypass; once you do, you’ll never think of them again.

As per tradition, I took a snapshot of my end game stats screen:

I think that 22 hours and 45 minutes logged play time is a bit bloated; a few times, I left the game on the “pause” menu or sitting at the end of a codec call if I needed to do something else or got a phone call. I killed 142 people, but I swear the majority of those were after the fight with The Sorrow. Leading up to that legendary encounter, I was pretty conservative with lethal rounds. Other than that, I’m not sure what to make of the crocodile title rating…is that good? So-so? For beating the game on Normal difficulty, I got a bunch of special items, like a tuxedo and The Boss’ Patriot gun, but I’m not going back into the jungle just yet. Though I did miss the Trophies to poison a guard and blow up an ammunition shed. Hmm.

For some reason, I always thought that Peace Walker came out next in the series. Nope. Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is up next, and I know very little about it, save for something about a funny install process and that Snake–as in Solid Snake–is old and coughing up blood. I’ll get to it soon. That is so long as another sneaking mission doesn’t occupy my attention first.

2015 Game Review Haiku, #23 – Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater

Destroy Shagohod
By sneaking, CQC-ing
Through awkward cutscenes

–

From 2012 all through 2013, I wrote little haikus here at Grinding Down about every game I beat or completed, totaling 104 in the end. I took a break from this format last year in an attempt to get more artsy, only to realize that I missed doing it dearly. So, we’re back. Or rather, I am. Hope you enjoy my continued take on videogame-inspired Japanese poetry in three phases of 5, 7, and 5, respectively.

Sixteen years later, Metal Gear Solid is still big budget stealth and action

Before I start, let me just own up to the fact that this blog post’s picture is taken from Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes, the 2004 remake for the GameCube. I tried finding decent screencaps from the original PlayStation 1 version, but none of them were good enough to fill the slot, all too muddy or pixelated or extremely low res; I have some standards to uphold, y’know.

Released in 1998, some eight years after Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, Metal Gear Solid is much more of the same stealth and shoot gameplay found in the previous game, but now in glorious 3D. Well, for the time, it was pretty glorious. Either it hasn’t aged well or I had a phenomenal imagination as a teenager, able to make faces appear where flat texture washes were, able to see actual footprints in the snow instead of grayish-black globs that faded fast, and, though I’m reluctant to admit this, able to see Meryl as a stunning, do-anything-for-her kind of woman instead of the feisty, yet lifeless character she actually turned out to be. Thankfully, looks aren’t everything, and where Metal Gear Solid shone was in the gameplay–which I now know was a nearly identical rehash of what went down in Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake–but it was fun, is still a decent amount of fun these days, and helped balance the wordy storytelling with interesting set pieces and things to do in them.

The story, as simply as can be said, goes a little something like this: Six years after Solid Snake, a war-hardened infiltrator of the U.S. special forces unit FOXHOUND, snuck into the military nation of Zanzibar Land and destroyed the armored bi-pedal tank Metal Gear D and its leader, the rogue FOXHOUND commander Big Boss, he’s called back to action. On a remote Alaskan island, Liquid Snake is operating a secret nuclear weapon disposal facility codenamed Shadow Moses with nefarious intentions. Also, he has some hostages. And so in goes the snake with nothing but his smokes and a loose plan of action to his name.

And this story goes from perfunctory to insane pretty quickly, but thanks to the power of voice acting, lengthier Codec chats, and movie-framed cutscenes, everything is told well and at a good pace. In fact, this is a fairly short, straightforward action adventure game in the seven to ten hour range. There really is no filler; everything is pushing Snake forward to the eventual showdown with Liquid Snake and whatever new incarnation of Metal Gear is around. David Hayter’s performance unequivocally defines that character, and he even shows some emotional range by the end of things, depending on whether or not you gave into Revolver Ocelot’s torture (I did). Some of the other voice actors lay the accents on pretty thick, like Mei Ling and Nastasha Romanenko, and it’s beyond clear from the first word that Master Miller says what’s going on there. But yeah, I found myself losing my mind again over the twists and turns, and I’m a sucker for the real footage of warheads exploding and storage buildings mixed in with the in-game cutscenes.

A lot of Metal Gear Solid‘s “unique” gameplay elements were lifted almost verbatim out of Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, and I never realized that until recently, since I got to play both of them back to back. Oh well, no biggie. Just learn your game history, that’s all. Mainly, I’m highlighting having to recover a Codec frequency from the game’s packaging, figuring out how to identify a woman disguised as a soldier, and changing the shape of a key based on hot/cold temperatures. There’s plenty of smaller nods too, but those are the big boys. Being a digital copy, I was happily surprised that I could still look up Meryl’s Codec frequency by accessing the manual through the pause menu. Maybe not as cool as it once was, flipping over the jewel case we all probably just tossed aside once the game’s CD was in our hungry PlayStation, but still pleasing.

Here’s a thing: I do remember the game being larger, with more areas to explore, but it’s actually quite contained. Maybe that was them new 3D graphics playing tricks on my still evolving mind. For instance, outside in the snow with Sniper Wolf, there’s really only a couple of screens to explore, whereas a teenage kid I felt I was lost in some snowy wilderness, far from the comfort of card key-activated doors and guard-alarming cameras. The buildings themselves are compact, and you’ll eventually come back to every locked door for one reason or another. Again, there’s a good amount of back and forthing, but it’s not as frustrating as in the previous games, mostly because it is much easier to stay alive this time around. Most of Snake’s deaths were a result of boss fights, which leads into the next paragraph nicely.

I’ve never had much luck with boss fights, especially Metal Gear ones. Those early NES games all followed followable patterns, but you could only make two or three mistakes before it was all over. Well, the same applies here, except I handled 75% of the bosses with ease. No, really. Sniper Wolf, Psycho Mantis, Revolver Ocelot–easy peasy. It was really the final three sequences–fighting Metal Gear Rex, hand-to-hand combat with your genetically identical bro Liquid Snake, and then that drive-and-gun escape sequence–that nearly proved too much for me. Thankfully, I soldiered on and watched that sun rise anew over that beautifully cold Alaskan horizon.

So yeah, I’m glad I got to revisit Metal Gear Solid in this self-assigned journey of mine. It was pretty enjoyable, even if I remembered it a little differently, but I don’t suspect I’ll touch it again for many years to come, if ever again at all. If you’ve never played it, however, and are just entering the franchise with, say, Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes, then I highly recommend it. You’ll probably even see some connection with how Kojima wrote Meryl in relation to some of the more controversial topics in his newest game.

Lastly, we’ll end as we have the previous two Metal Gear posts with my stats screen:

Sorry for the blurry text. I think that says I saved 25 times and used a lot of rations. Anyone know if Leopard is a good rank to get?

Up next…Metal Gear Solid: VR Missions!

This is truly Hideo Kojima’s legendary Metal Gear

Last year, I put myself to the task of completing five games that I’ve always wanted to see through to the end, but never did for a variety of reasons. I was able to beat three out of the five, and I still plan on at least giving Final Fantasy IX a solid go this summer, as that type of JRPG feels like the kind one plays piecemeal-like across some warm, sockless nights. I thought about doing another list like that again this year, but secretly I’ve had another idea in mind ever since I bought Metal Gear Solid: The Legacy Collection 1987 – 2012 last fall and then never cracked its case.

The idea is simple, but lengthy. Possibly even maddening. Basically, I’m going to play through every game in the collection in the order of release. That means like this:

1. Metal Gear
2. Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake
3. Metal Gear Solid
4. Metal Gear Solid: VR Missions
5. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty HD Edition
6. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater HD Edition
7. Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots
8. Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker HD Edition

Woah. Talk about a plunge. Some quick history is that I’ve played Metal Gear Solid, Metal Gear Solid 2, and Metal Gear Solid 3, all of them at least once. I know for sure I’ve mucked around on several occasions with MGS2‘s opening tanker level, just to try things a few different ways. Other than that, everything else above has never been experienced. And it’s been many moons since I did play those previously checked titles, meaning I remember very little of the story, the gameplay, the secrets, and the surprises. I’m looking forward to revisiting and seeing these games for the first time, all of which is, I guess, fine preparation for Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes and Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain.

Anyways, I spent most of Sunday playing the original Metal Gear. I was confused, I was pleased, I was determined, and I befuddled from time to time. First off, to play Metal Gear in this collection, you have to load up MGS3‘s main menu and select it from there. Took me a bit to figure that out. Then, right from the get-go, I realized this was some different version, seeing at it starts you directly with Solid Snake swimming up to Building 1 instead of in the jungle. I know about the jungle level because of the Internet, and so I immediately went investigating. Evidently, there’s an NES version (jungle) and an MSX version (Building 1), and the NES release was produced without any involvement from series creator Hideo Kojima. In fact, Kojima has been quoted as calling the NES version “complete garbage” so I guess it’s better that the collection comes with the MSX edition instead.

Set in 1995, Metal Gear stars the newest FOXHOUND member, a rookie soldier codenamed Solid Snake. His mission is to infiltrate Outer Heaven, which is militaristic state founded by some “legendary mercenary,” and destroy Metal Gear, a mysterious weapon capable of mass nuclear destruction. That’s kind of it for story beats, and you’ll occasionally get some more info through Snake’s transceiver and meeting other people in the buildings, but it doesn’t add much detail to the overall plot. I do like that you eventually learn that Metal Gear is being built 100 floors below Building 3, but when you take an elevator to go fight it, you only descend like nine or ten floors. Close enough, I guess.

Right. Metal Gear. It’s a top-down action-adventure game that puts an emphasis on stealth–but not a requirement. Solid Snake can shoot guns as well as punch soldiers in the noggin, and these are his two offensive tactics through the whole game. He can also sneak past unalerted guards, which works too, until you get spotted, and then you have to fight or flee. You’ll explore buildings and floors, looking for clues and hostages to rescue; once you rescue enough hostages, your class star will increase, which allows Snake to have more health and hold more ammo. You’re always being steered in a specific direction, whether it is to find a certain level key card or an item to help you move to the next area, but I will admit I used a walkthrough in a few spots where I missed a certain item, like the enemy’s uniform.

Even here, in its earliest form, it is still quite rewarding to slip past guards or make it through an entire room unnoticed while still taking out every enemy soldier. This is only lessened by the fact that enemies respawn immediately after leaving and re-entering a room. All that work for naught. Or, if you really enjoyed it, well…do it again. Sometimes it was not worth the effort, and I found myself either running for the exit or punching every guard in the face with little care to alarms. The boss battles always appear intimidating, but there’s a pattern to look for, and they come with some killer chiptune tracks.

Alas, not all is amazing in Metal Gear, even in Kojima’s preferred version. Here’s the stuff I hated in list form:

• For some reason, Solid Snake has to take his gas mask off in gas-filled rooms to use a key card because there’s only one accessory spot to use, and you lose a decent sliver of health in this process.
• The portable transceiver is steamy trash. No one ever answers Snake when he calls, and if they do, they speak batshit or just repeat text even though I already found the item they told me to go find. What was the point of Diane?
• The checkpoint system is bonkers. Basically, it checkpoints every time you enter an elevator, but that’s it. You can “save” your data at any time through the pause menu, but if you die, you can’t reload to this save spot. Only the checkpoint. Thus, I don’t understand what the point of “saving” is. Thankfully, I played the game in a single sitting, so no worries there.
• I wouldn’t say I hated this as it helped me more often than not, but you can basically grind for ammo and rations by entering and exiting rooms over and over. Seemed like a silly oversight.
• Not enough reasons to use many of the items outside of their required spots. Like the bomb-blast suit or the cardboard box.
• There’s no way to know what key works on what door. You just have to keep switching between them until the door slides open. Not a problem early on, but later, after you have cards 1-7, it can be a nuisance.

Lastly, for all you data nerds, my end game stats:

As they say, it’s not a stealth game unless you kill 319 humans. Probably a dozen dogs, too, though that data wasn’t tracked. Okay, that’s it. On to Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake next!