Ok well I tried not to make it this long, but I had so much to say, well anyway here it is, my score may change I am undecided yet. If you would be so kind to tell me whether you think my score at the end reflects on what I have said.
Metal Gear Solid 4 was announced years and years back, and ever since its announcement people were talking nonstop about it. Every year they'd release another trailer which would reveal loads of information that would keep fans happy. Alongside MGS4 was Metal Gear Online, now this is not to be confused with Metal Gear Online that came with Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistance, that one is now locked and is unplayable. Anyway, people seemed were far to intrested in MGS4 that MGO floated along unoticed, now MGS4 is finnaly here and it lived up to everybodys expectations and was a masterpiece of a game. So now people are done with MGS4 they turn to MGO hoping for it to be just as fun as MGS4. So does Metal Gear Solid's stealthy gameplay work well online, or will people be quickly running back to Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare?
Ok well there is one thing you need to know about creating your profile, well to put it simply, after the Nintendo Wi and its absurd 16 digit friend code strings, MGO has one of the worst online profiling systems in the buissness. You first need to create a Konami ID, this can be obtained off there website which is done through the PS3. From there you must make a Konami Id and a password for that, then a Game ID and a password for that! The need for multiple screen names is absolutly ridiculous and makes the whole process go slower. And belive me it does go slow, you have to fill in lots of information and all in all just getting yourself to the create a character screen can take up to an hour if you have a slow connection.
Now we are on to the create a character section, now be warned you only get one shot at doing this, if you are not satisfied with your character or want a second one you must pay, so get it right the first time. Ok so you go through the normal procedure of name, face, voice etc. then you can move on to the finer details of clothes and accsesories such as helmets, goggles, vests arm guards etc. You may also chose what colour you want but black seems to be the order of the day as it blends in nicely into the shadows, but if you want a soilder top to tail in pink be my guest.
Now this is where it complex, you must assign your character skills, the skills re divided into lots of diffrent catagorys and you only need chose 4. And don't worry if you pick the wrong one you can always go back and change the skills if need be. There are lots of diffrent skills and they range from sniper skills, trap skills, running skills to box skils. When you start of they will all be at leval 1, however, frequent use of the skill will see it go up a leval and then that skill will benifit you more. But as I said before you can always go back and change the skills and swap them if you decide later you want to know more about CQC and less about being in a cardboard box.
Now this is where you may get lost, you are then dumped into the main menu, now there are lots of diffrent catagorys that then go into subcatagorys and it is easy to lose yourself. It dosn't help that the menu isn't very use friendly, neither is the instruction book, so just listen to Otacon giving you a brief explination of each of them. All you really need to know is the gaining accses to the game mode.
Now you get a choice of whther you want Free play or Automatiching. Free play gives you the freedom to go join any game that is open, and I mean any so if your quite new to MGo this isn't reccomended as you could be walking into a game with people of a much higher skill leval than you. Automatching pits you agaisnt people with simmilar levals of skill so this is where newbies are reccomded to play for the first couple of days. When you think you understand the menu's and stuff then feel free.
Game modes here are your basic modes but some have MGS twists. There is Deathmatch, Taem Death Match, Capture Mission, Rescue Mission, Base Mission, Team Sneaking Mission and Sneaking Mission. Now I don't really need to explain Deathmatch and Team DeathMatch, thats pretty straight forward. Capture mision is another word for Capture the flag, and Resucue is essentially a one sided capture the flag where you must bring back target back to your teams base. (The targets in the game are reprsented by a frog and a duck) Base mission has your team running around the map to capture bases, or recapture them. Now onto the more diffrent ones.
Team Sneaking can be alot of fun, but only if your good at it. Ok so the members are split into two teams, one of the teams has Stael Gear and Non-Leathal wepons while the other has no stealth gear but a choice of leathal wepons. The non lethal team either has to capture the target(s) and bring it back to there base, or kill or knock out the opposing team. The lethal team just has to kill/ knock out the non lethal team. this mode is one of the favorite modes for all the stealthy people out there, but once you die however you cannot respawn and must wait for the match to end. Quite boring waiting around for god knows how long so thats why if your no good at it it can become a mode of dislike but give it time it can e fun.
Now basically Sneaking Mission is just team deathmatch with Snake thrown in. There is the standard Red VS Blue but also Snake, (And if the amount of people playing exceeds 10 then Metal Gear MKII also joins) now for Snake to win what you must do is go round and collect thre peoples dog tags. To get a dog tag you must knock sombody out, and tap them and then it falls off of them. Once you have 3 you win. For the other team to win is to either have the most number of kills after the time limit or for there team to kill Snake a set number of times, it varies.
In Sneaking Snake has accsess to his Octocamo and Octocamo FaceMask, and it works the same as in MGS4. he also has his Solid Eye, Drum Can, Cardboard Box and many other gadgets. If the MKII is about that also works the same as in the game, has accsess to stealth and can knock people out. This is one of the best modes because who dosn't like running around as the MKII?
A feature unique to MGO is the SOP system, you are playing as one of the soilders from MGS4, so you will automatically have accsss to it. It works rather wll and soon you'll be wondering how you completed MGS4 without it. Under SOP link, team members see each other's position behind walls, and are informed of allies "entertained" by magazines, sleeping, speaking, stunned or dying. Teammates' traps are highlighted, and any information gathered by SOP augmenting skills, like Monomania, benefits teammates. In Sneaking Missions, Snake's position is broadcast to all linked members when he's been discovered. SOP can optionally enforce "lockdown", a temporary cease fire for any player that injures a team-mate. In some situations, SOP data can be leaked from the opposition (or to them) displaying enemy positions.
Now before each match and before each rspawn you are given the choice of wepons. You select your primary wepon, sidearm and support wepon. (Grenades, magazines etc) Under the eponymous rule, players gain "Drebin Points" for actions such as kills and headshots, and can redeem them for advanced weapons, attachments or ammunition at their team's base or at respawn. You gain accsess to most of the wepons found in MGS4 which is very handy.
Items you are given at the start of a match and respawn are Biniculours and a Box. But on the battlefield you will find one Drum can and One pair of EVG's, if sombody else have them you must take it from them by either killing them or knocking them out. Using NVG on a Team Sneaking match however is frowned apon by players and gets you useally kicked off from the game.
If you don't feel like using wepons however CQC is a good choice for the trained people, to begin with you are only able to throw down but once you leval up your CQC skill you'll be slitting throats like the very best. And whats better than grabbing Snake as a sheild eh?
Metal Gear Online includes 5 maps. These are Ambush Alley, Blood Bath, Gronznyj Grad, Midtown Maelstrom, and Urban Ultimatum. If you were lucky enough to play MGO (Subsistance) you may recall Urban Ultimatum, it is back and now in HD! Youw will cetenly remeber Gronznyj Grad, its is the same one found in the story mode of MGS3. It has changed abit but the nostalgia will still rush back. Each of the maps have very good designs however on some of them the sides are unbalanced on some maps for instance Ambush Alley, but its only minmal.
Now the big question, does MGS4's steahly gameplay work here? Well the simple answer is no, but the more complex answer is yes. The thing is that there is no reason to avoid your enemys unless on capture missions or team sneaking as you simply must engage with the enemy at one point otherwise you'll lose. So staying out of sight completely is out of the question, the maps do however provide nice shadowy areas which work very well for stealth. COD4 fans however will not like it as you will find the people who actully use stealth and are very skillfull in it will beat those who just run and gun no matter how good they are. This may turn people off but more patient people will enjoy it.
Graphically the game is identical to MGS4, so you will still get the loverly visuals here. The frame rate is what were all looking at through, and it has its moements but useally its quite good. Lag is unavoidable though especially when lots of people are on, soilders will vanish infront of you and appear behind you, you yourself may see soilders standing out in the open because there experaincing lag. It all depends really on your connection speed. But graphically its a masterpiece.
Ok now sound wise its a mixed bag, I mean Metal Gear Online has 3 tracks exlusive to it, the rest are all taken from all other MGS games and even MG games. So they all come from MG, MG2, MGS1, MGS2, MGS3, MGS3S, MGSPO and MGS4. The tracks include the Tanker Theme, Screaming Mantis Theme, Metal Gear Alert Phase and many many more. They did chose lots of good ones and they all fit nicely into the game. So sound wise its great, but not really anything new.
Sound effects are taken from MGS4 aswell so nothing new, however if you don't have a microphone do not worry, you can still comminicate. There are lots of pre made messages ready for you, these will be spokon by your soilder to the rest of your team and use the voice you gave them. Alot of them are very usefull and can get your messege across, ones like Go Go Go! and I need Back Up are very usefull and shall be your friends from beggining to end. So good here aswell.
Now MGO is supposed to be for the next 10 years updated frequently, and so far expansions have been released and so have updates. But they are overpriced by a mile and should only be purchused if your a true hardcore MGO gamer, otherwise give them a miss.
Now MGO is a game that requires patience on all fronts, whether it be the stealthy gameplay or the awfull setup of it, with a little patience, you'll have fun with this game.
Thanks for Reading - Score 8.0
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