Snake is back, and he is taking names!
Upon opening the game package, and inserting the disc into the shiny black monolith that is the PS3, I was greeted by none other then Snake himself, albeit a tad bit older snake. Expecting an extremely long install time, I was pleasantly surprised with only a 7 minute experience (there are 4 install points throughout the game). Then, I was subjected to one of the oddest experiences I have ever had in a game, the intro scene. I have no clue what this was all about, but the only thing I can say is that there are 4 or 5 of these little intros and they are all extremely weird in their own way, and all completely different. The one I got was a real life video of a totally bizarre interview between a talk show host, and the voice actor that does Snakes voice, David Hayter…… but enough of this, on with the game.
I am just going to come right out and say it right now, Hideo Kojima might have just made the most spectacular game I have EVER played. You might remember, about a week ago when I first talked about MSG4, I mentioned that I could not understand how the game got a 10 from GameSpot, well, I take that back, and now I wonder how it only got a 10 and not a 15!
Now please don't let such a high score confuse you with a PERFECT score, we all know that in gaming, there might not be such a thing as perfect. My opinion is just based on the entire presentation of the game, from story line, to graphics, to voice acting, to the seamless way that cut scenes morph into game play, MGS 4 is nearly flawless.
Graphics: 10
Nothing else needs to be said except that they are the best out there. The detail on EVERYTHING in not only the cut scenes, but also in game play is amazing. Throughout the entire game I found myself just getting lost in the sheer enormity of it all.
Controls: 8
This might be the only area where the game might have fallen just a tad shy of perfect. Yes, the game has been updated with a new camera system that allows you to rotate your field of view, but I found the button layout a little confusing, and almost cumbersome in some cases, but some of that might be the simple fact that I am not totally use to playing with the PS3 controller yet.
The thing I found very exasperating was during gun fights when the camera is behind Snake. What would happen is, if I was aiming at someone, and they were on lets say the left side of my view, if I tried to rotate the camera to line them up while firing, if they then ended up on my right side, the camera would jump to follow them and the gun would stop firing. So if I was going from left to right a lot, there would be interruptions of my gun… which is not a good thing. Not sure if that makes sense, but I don't know how else to describe it! Also, during the final boss fight, during which I died A LOT I felt like the button layout was once again difficult to use properly.
Audio: 10
Beautiful. You are able to hear every breath, grunt, footstep and ping of empty bullet casings hitting the floor. And MGS4 being a stealth game (or at least that is how it's supposed to be played) being able to hear all the little things is very important.
Story line: 15! (Possible spoiler here)
This, in my opinion, is where this game really brings home the gold. I will not go into the plot, because my simple little mind is not nearly intelligent enough to be able to put it all into words. How ever, Kojima does and absolutely brilliant job of tying everything up and closing all loose ends. He also somehow manages to invoke a wide range of emotions in you. With a combination of story (audio) and flashbacks (video), he takes you all the way back to the beginning of the MGS series. Maybe one of my favorite parts in the entire game is when you go back to where the first game took place, to the hanger were you fought Rex, otherwise known as MGS. It brought the good ole days of playing on the PS1 screaming back.
As in past MGS games, there are TONS of cut scenes in MGS4. Some might take points away for this reason, but I think in order to tell the entire story of MGS it had to be done.
Cut scenes: 10
As mentioned, the voice acting is by far the best I have ever seen. Along with that comes beautiful character modeling. Many times during the games cut scenes, I forgot that I was actually playing/watching a game and not a movie. The over all movie feeling is delivered in a pure cinematic way, which is helped by being able to press the L1 button at times in order to show the same scene from a different angle, very similar to the way it was done in As$as$ians Creed.
Also, at the beginning of each act, you are treated to a Mission Briefing. These mission briefings are more specifically interactive cut scenes, you can move in and around the entire scene with the Mark II , view it from what ever point of view you want. You can even leave the area all together, and it will still play even without you there to follow the story.
Difficulty: 10
I am torn on how to judge the difficulty of this game, I guess it can be as hard as you make it? MGS4 is supposed to be a stealth game, sneak through most levels without being detected. However, that is only one way to play the game! I pretty much gave up on the whole sneak thing about 13 minutes into the first level, I guess I just like to use guns to much :) Where I did find great difficulty was during the last two boss fight. A few times it was not so much that it was hard to beat the boss, but it was tricky to figure out exactly how to fight them. The final fight, pretty much led me to the brink of beating my cat, and throwing the PS3 out the window. After I finished the game, I went on line to look up some walk throughs. What I fond blew my mind, I might be the only person that had a difficult time with that final boss!
Over all, again, this is a SPECTACULAR game that might deserve its own category, or at lest its own place in gaming history. There are some "cheesy" moments during the games story, but they are few and far between and easy to look past. If you are like me, you will find yourself getting drawn into the game, and wanting it to never end.
Goodbye Snake, it's been a great journey :(