Metal Gear Solid 4 brings all kinds of new features, including the best visuals out there. But is it THAT good?
As usual, I will start by stating the good.
The story, when it sticks to the basics, is very good and very emotional. While you will certainly spend more time watching than playing, it keeps you drawn in with frequent interactions (press L1 to view things in first person, or X to see a flashback from a previous game).
The voice acting is the best to date. All the actors pull off their lines with ease and really help draw you in.
The graphics may be the best I've ever seen. Character models are nearly flawless, and outside of some lazy lip syncing, everything is very believable.
The game finally has taken us to original-feeling places, ranging from battlefields to cities. There is nothing quite as cool as crawling down the middle of a huge fire fight with nobody seeing you.
And now on to the issues, of which there are many.
The biggest issue, which literally made me detract a full 1.0 from its score, is the fact that the game STILL lacks a decent save system or checkpoint system. This is most evident when you are caught by a guard, and have to choose between killing the pursuing patrols, hiding for 5 minutes while they look for you and then go away, or exiting to the title screen and loading. I cannot for the life of me understand why they did not insert a "Load Last Checkpoint" option, an option which is present is literally every other game in existence.
Boss fights seem to wave back and forth between awesome and repetitive. Nothing flashy really happens in the first couple of fights, and you will find yourself basically running and gunning. While the CQC moves are useful, they aren't that cool to watch, and are never useful against bosses. I would have really liked to see a bit more substance to the fights, where things are blowing up, and Snake actually seems like a bad ass, instead of killing the most brutal killing machines with tactics that, for the life of me, seem identical to what others were doing before.
The story is, in my opinion, the hardest thing to like. There are basic concepts that are excellent and left me feeling very satisfied, but a lot of it was really really convuluted. More often than not, my eyebrows were arched and my face was contorted into a "....wtf? They expect me to buy that?" In no way shape or form is the story believable. From the mooing mini-Metal Gears that bleed, to the ever increasing plot of "nanomachines run the war!", this game gets more and more far fetched. It has fast degenerated from Espionage Thriller to the levels of a Sci-Fi movie script.
This would be okay if Metal Gear wasn't originally coined as a more realistic game. The point was that Snake had to sneak because it was more realistic and he would be killed, and now the plot is so far fetched, you have to entirely suspend your disbelief to even contemplate it. I truly wish this entire series would be re-done, with all the Sci-Fi elements left out. I don't exactly want Metal Gear to go Splinter Cell, but this game is left out of my Top games literally because of the absurdity of the plot.
Possibly the strangest idea of the game is the title character himself. Solid Snake has degenerated from veteran bad ass to damn near crippled. That would be okay, honestly, if they had given him a better look. But the ridiculous mullet and mustache is just not bad ass. It's almost as if it was an inside joke, but one that literally is present throughout the entire game. It's very hard to feel awesome when you have your FaceCamo on and your mullet is literally flapping out the back of it. The Old Snake thing could have been pulled off, but never would be as cool as sticking with 40-50ish Snake.
Other little things could have been left out as well. The ability to carry every weapon in the world is becoming more ridiculous as time passes. The game has a bit too much comedy in it, considering the otherwise serious tones. The Metal Gear Mk.II or whatever seemed to be a filler. I never once used it, and again it seemed too comical.
The Codec seems almost useless this time around, as you only have 2 numbers you can call. I really missed having a series of people to call during boss fights to get their perspective on it.
Why this game was given a 10 is beyond me. Perhaps for die-hard fans, it is 10 worthy, but for it get a 10, in my opinion, it would have had to fix a lot of issues.
Don't get me wrong, the game is good. It's just not fantastic. It will likely make die-hard fans love it, and make make newcomers justify not buying into the hype in the past.