Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain

[Stevencc]

Got my final play of Ground Zeroes done today. Should hopefully get around to checking it out before work tomorrow... man, getting it so early has been more painful than anything, having it sat there but being unable to touch it. But tomorrow.

TOMORROW!

(Now watch some other bullshit come up and I don't get around to playing it tomorrow as well)

Poor you Oaf. POOR FUCKING YOU.

 

[Oaf]

Poor you Oaf. POOR FUCKING YOU.

Yeah, I know, I know

But honestly, I'd rather just have it listed as "not yet dispatched" and not be able to play it rather than having the fucking game case sat under my TV with Big Boss staring at me taunting my very soul with the fact that I have it yet can not play the fucker!

This being said...

I played the fucker this afternoon. It was only about 1 and a half hours worth.

BUT OH MY FUCKING LORD.

Ok, so the opening is very cinematic and not actually proper "gameplay" or whatever... but of the like 20 minutes where I got to actually see the open world sandbox format of the missions, my god does this look like it's going to be a special game. Watching these sorts of missions in videos is one thing, but doing it all yourself, making your decisions, reacting on the fly, it's so cool. I'm just gutted that I only had 20 minutes... just enough to entice me into really wanting to see more.

 

[Jockney]

Oaf

You should really play through Peace Walker before properly playing Phantom Pain or at least watch the story cut-scenes (

). Whizzed through it over the past few days and story wise it's pretty great. Has some of the most memorable scenes in the series to date, espesh the torture scene with Dr Strangelove. Also should be played because The Boss (or rather her AI), Huey Emmerich, Kaz Miller, Paz Ortega and others look like they're going to play a pretty big role in PP. It also explains a lot of Big Boss's motivations going into Ground Zeroes and I really get the feeling that PP will refer back to PW a helluva lot.

 

[Leewilson]

For anyone as sketchy as me on the Metal Gear story so far:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/2050xm/metal_gear_the_complete_story/


My brother got it yesterday and has been playing it. I'm leaving it a while as starting back at work Tuesday. I'll probably play it over half term. Still, from what I've seen of my brother playing it, it looks excellent.

Thanks for that video link as well Jockney, a very good watch.

 

[Jockney]

For anyone as sketchy as me on the Metal Gear story so far:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/2050xm/metal_gear_the_complete_story/


My brother got it yesterday and has been playing it. I'm leaving it a while as starting back at work Tuesday. I'll probably play it over half term. Still, from what I've seen of my brother playing it, it looks excellent.

Thanks for that video link as well Jockney, a very good watch.

Nae worries. You need a fucking library of resources to understand the series' story at this point.

 

[Pyeman]

I got hold of ground zeroes recently but I haven't really experienced any of the series before that.

Will I still enjoy the new game? Or do I really need to invest time in understanding the whole story first?

 

[Jockney]

I got hold of ground zeroes recently but I haven't really experienced any of the series before that.

Will I still enjoy the new game? Or do I really need to invest time in understanding the whole story first?

People in your situation have either been baffled or intrigued by the story in GZ. Personally, I think you can get something out of it story-wise without having played any of the other games in the series, as I hadn't played PW going into it and bar Kaz and Snake/Big Boss and all of the characters and elements were new to me, but I still enjoyed it.

I really would recommend watching the cutscene supercuts for MGS3 and Peace Walker, in that order, though, as they inform a lot of the context and backstory of GZ and PP.

Having said that, I'd probably recommend buying the PS1 version of Metal Gear Solid on the PSN store above all else. Including cutscenes, you can whizz through it in 7-10 hours, and it will greatly inform your understanding of the series' story, references, memes and general stylistic beats. It might be a sequel to the events of MGS3, Peace Walker, Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain, but from what I've come to understand it's just as important to your general understanding of the newest entries in the series as 3 and PW are.

 

[Pyeman]

People in your situation have either been baffled or intrigued by the story in GZ. Personally, I think you can get something out of it story-wise without having played any of the other games in the series, as I hadn't played PW going into it and bar Kaz and Snake/Big Boss and all of the characters and elements were new to me, but I still enjoyed it.

I really would recommend watching the cutscene supercuts for MGS3 and Peace Walker, in that order, though, as they inform a lot of the context and backstory of GZ and PP.

Having said that, I'd probably recommend buying the PS1 version of Metal Gear Solid on the PSN store above all else. Including cutscenes, you can whizz through it in 7-10 hours, and it will greatly inform your understanding of the series' story, references, memes and general stylistic beats. It might be a sequel to the events of MGS3, Peace Walker, Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain, but from what I've come to understand it's just as important to your general understanding of the newest entries in the series as 3 and PW are.

Cheers for the info.

I'm playing on X-box One. Is there anyway to get hold of MGS for this platform?

 

[Jockney]

Cheers for the info.

I'm playing on X-box One. Is there anyway to get hold of MGS for this platform?

The original is a PS exclusive unfortunately.
Do you have a Gamecube or a Wii? The Twin Snakes, the remake, can be played on either of those platforms.
Otherwise you'd have to make do with one of the fan-made supercuts.

 

[Stevencc]

You could download EPSXE onto your PC and play the rom. Not everyone is comfortable doing that of course, but it's an option.

 

[Jockney]

So, uh, I canceled my PS3 MGSV pre-order and have instead opted to buy the sexy limited edition Diamond Dogs PS4 console and game tomorrow for £320 -- the third time I will have bought a new console just to play a new MGS game.

Love life? Lol.

 

[Cas]

Buying new hardware makes me giddy as fuck. Enjoy, Jockney.

Edit: Hoping Shopto still have their steelbook edition in stock for when I get paid.

 

[Jockney]

Buying new hardware makes me giddy as fuck. Enjoy, Jockney.

Edit: Hoping Shopto still have their steelbook edition in stock for when I get paid.

I don't usualy get a hard-on for hardware but after playing Ground Zeroes again on my PS3, and comparing it to demo footage of PP on Youtube in 1080p @ 60fps, it was an easy decision. Gonna have to buy the PS4 eventually and with Fallout 4 on the way soon, I couldn't ignore the opportunity. That limited edition console is sexy as fuck.

 

[Oaf]

Oaf

You should really play through Peace Walker before properly playing Phantom Pain or at least watch the story cut-scenes (

). Whizzed through it over the past few days and story wise it's pretty great. Has some of the most memorable scenes in the series to date, espesh the torture scene with Dr Strangelove. Also should be played because The Boss (or rather her AI), Huey Emmerich, Kaz Miller, Paz Ortega and others look like they're going to play a pretty big role in PP. It also explains a lot of Big Boss's motivations going into Ground Zeroes and I really get the feeling that PP will refer back to PW a helluva lot.

I did actually just go and read up on it all, plus Ground Zeroes does have a nice little briefing thing that explains most of the story, but I will certainly check out that video as that looks like a great idea just to get fully in sync with the story of MGS V.

Good job on that PS4 preorder as well, that console looks slick as fuck! And, I have to say, TPP is probably comfortably the best looking game I've ever seen, so if ever there was a release to justify the upgrade, this is it. Not that it looks bad on last gen (by all accounts, it actually blows people away on the PS3/360 as well) but when it looks that damned good, you may as well be doing it on as powerful a machine as you can get your hands on!

 

[Oaf]

Anyway, I've managed to play a fair bit of it over the last two days... and I am torn. And I don't mean that in a "I sort of love it, I sort of hate it" way, because I do absolutely love this game... and in the grand scheme of things, I'm sure that my misgivings aren't even a bad thing and I'm sure I'll get over it and it'll turn out for the best... but my mind is caught in two places right now with MGS V. One is based on nostalgia, the other based on seeing it for being as great a game as it does seem to be. On the one hand (getting the "negative" stuff out of the way, if you can even call it that):

In a lot of ways it doesn't feel like Metal Gear Solid. And I'm not even sure that's a bad thing overall... it's just... it's such a far cry from the days of walking around Shadow Moses. MGS has always had a wee bit of freedom in what to do, but overall they've been very linear games. TPP is just so far from that. And as I've already said about 100 times already, that's not really a bad thing. But shit... it's gone from, go here (Cutscene) to here (cutscene) to here (poop joke) to here (cutscene) to here (EPIC BOSS BATTLE) with a very structured format... it was basically just like a massive 13 hour long movie before (and I don't say that as a pun relating to the the copious amounts of cutscenes), but this is about as sandboxy a game as I remember ever seeing. In so many ways, it reminds me a lot more of, say, Far Cry 3, than Metal Gear Solid.
But it's not just that. The sheer fucking scale of everything. EVERYTHING. The map size. The resource gathering, leading to something bigger and better going on for the future. And no little radar in the corner. No item menus to scroll through. And, yeah, even the fact that it's missing David Hayter. It's moved onto a new place in pretty much every way, and if it wasn't for name dropping things like "Big Boss" and "Revolver Ocelot" once in a while, you may even forget that you're playing a Metal Gear game.

But moving on to the other part of where I am with this game... it's just so damned good. SO GOOD. SO FUCKING GOOD.

So yeah, anything that sounded negative there is just me being a whiney little fanboy crying about nostalgia who wants more of "his" Metal Gear Solid, the MGS I know and love. It's just a simple desperation for that old format of one big consecutive story taking place over like a day in game where it's set out like a movie, where you're set on a pretty linear path and are buffeted with cut scenes every time you take more than 20 consecutive steps.

But remove that hunger for nostalgia and you have something so special here. It's such a magical experience. As I said, the format of it reminds me more of, say, Far Cry 3 or GTA V than Metal Gear, only on a much larger scale with much more freedom and a system of analysis, planning and execution that, from what I've seen in gaming, nothing has ever come close to. Putting a plan together, pulling it off, improvisation when shit hits the fan and then that sense of satisfaction while flying away knowing that you did it your way is a special feeling.

Gargh. I feel like I'm not really getting my main point across here (I'm blaming it on the ~3 hours sleep I had last night) but basically:

Fanboy Oaf sort of misses "old school" Metal Gear Solid type game, but still absolutely adores "new school" Metal Gear Solid V type game. And I am sure that, looking back on this game years from now, it's going to absolutely be worthy of the series, even if it does stand out on its own. I guess that when I think about it, my main concern boils down to the fact that it's so much bigger and so different from typical MGS that I can't see them ever going back to how MGS used to be. And I'm not entirely sure that is even really a bad thing.

 

[Stevencc]

Come onnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn.

 

[Jockney]

First impressions...

Well, for a start it's as beautiful on the PS4 as Oaf said it was. I know it's more advantageous to play missions at night, but the way this game renders light effects it would feel like a big waste.

Controls and weapon select interfaces are pretty intuitive, Snake's movements are responsive (sometimes too responsive in interior locations) and the reflex system, while potentially gamebreaking, counterbalances the fact that enemy alert phases are a far bigger deal in this game than they have been in previous MGS's. Seriously, while they eventually stop actively searching for you, they never really give up being on the alert and they inform other outposts and bases in the area, too.

Not big on the fact that they've rejigged GZ's control scheme, though. For instance, when you execute hold-ups on enemy soldiers you have to hold down the L2 button with your index finger and then wrap your middle finger over your index finger to bring up the interrogation prompts: literal finger gymnastics.

Couple more things, one minor and one major. Minor thing: the credits sequence that plays at the end of each mission op is immersion-breaking as fuck, Kojima high on his own fumes again. You ain't a fucking movie director, mate, get over it. Major thing, and this is potentially very major: LISTEN TO THE AUDIO TAPES AT YOUR PERIL. They explain a lot of the backstory and questions that hang over what happened between GZ and PP, but there are also plot details that, if you're a long-time fan of the series, you probably won't want to know until they play out later on in the game in cut-scenes.

So yeah, enjoying it so far. Not gushing before I've finished it, or at least played most of it, though. GTA V taught me that lesson the hard way...

 

[Don Tonberry]

I was gonna get this at Argos today and use up the rest of my love2shop vouchers but the dinny bint behind the counter refused to serve me because I had no ID and thought I may have been under-age. Utterly ridiculous!

 

[Oaf]

First impressions...

Well, for a start it's as beautiful on the PS4 as Oaf said it was. I know it's more advantageous to play missions at night, but the way this game renders light effects it would feel like a big waste.

Controls and weapon select interfaces are pretty intuitive, Snake's movements are responsive (sometimes too responsive in interior locations) and the reflex system, while potentially gamebreaking, counterbalances the fact that enemy alert phases are a far bigger deal in this game than they have been in previous MGS's. Seriously, while they eventually stop actively searching for you, they never really give up being on the alert and they inform other outposts and bases in the area, too.

Not big on the fact that they've rejigged GZ's control scheme, though. For instance, when you execute hold-ups on enemy soldiers you have to hold down the L2 button with your index finger and then wrap your middle finger over your index finger to bring up the interrogation prompts: literal finger gymnastics.

Couple more things, one minor and one major. Minor thing: the credits sequence that plays at the end of each mission op is immersion-breaking as fuck, Kojima high on his own fumes again. You ain't a fucking movie director, mate, get over it. Major thing, and this is potentially very major: LISTEN TO THE AUDIO TAPES AT YOUR PERIL. They explain a lot of the backstory and questions that hang over what happened between GZ and PP, but there are also plot details that, if you're a long-time fan of the series, you probably won't want to know until they play out later on in the game in cut-scenes.

So yeah, enjoying it so far. Not gushing before I've finished it, or at least played most of it, though. GTA V taught me that lesson the hard way...

That's the exact way I feel about the whole night time missions thing... As far as I can see, at night there is less chance of being seen, less guards on patrol and guards do actually doze off on their own without needing a tranq dart in the face... it seems so much easier to play the game at night, but I just don't want to miss out on how gorgeous it looks during the day

Though actually on the topic of the intro/end credits before and after each mission thing (which is hilarious in ways that I'm sure Kojima never intended) I actually find them to be pretty bad... if for nothing else, for the fact that I was flying into a mission and it came up at the start saying "Guest staring: Skull face and the MIST unit"... I'm just say there thinking "SPOILERS YOU PRICK HIDEO". I mean, I know they're going to pop up at some point in the game, but at least keep it a surprise until that time.

 

[Megaclyde]

Picked it up yesterday, but not at home and won't be able to play it until at least the 25th
Doing everything I can not to buy/beg to borrow a PS4 in the meantime
This is torture

 

[Jockney]

Feel for ya, Clyde.

Man, I've barely even scratched the surface of the game's plot so far. In terms of narrative progress, I've completed Episode 6 of the main ops where

Spoiler

you have to meet Skull Face for the first time and have to face off against the Mist Unit again

, but otherwise I've just been doing side-ops, fulton-extracting personnel and generally fucking about. Developing your base is a pretty addictive timesink. Gameplay is deep, man. It's basically Far Cry 3 meets XCOM, but it feels so much deeper than the former at least.

 

[Stevencc]

I'm a couple of hours in and have just been introduced to my base.

I'm going to hold back on offering too much of an opinion on it just yet because I'm still in two minds at the moment.

The PC servers are still unavailable for online play at the minute, is this the same for the consoles?

 

[Stevencc]

I'm loving it now.

 

[Jockney]

Don't read if you haven't done episode 11 in Afghanistan.

Spoiler

That sort of comes out of nowhere doesn't it? I was on my way to do a side-op: I enter a new area and BAM new episode and a boss fight right off the bat. Quiet's a fuckin' G. Big Boss becoming less and less sympathetic. All hotting up now.

 

[Oaf]

Episode 11?! Bloody hell, you're already miles ahead of me

Think I did up to episode 6ish so far and then preemptively started episode 10 (or whichever is the Quiet stuff) by heading toward the power plant.

The side ops are damned distracting though. And I'm a bloody idiot. Loaded one up yesterday without actually reading the objective... just went into a small village, found a prisoner, extracted him, then left assuming that was mission complete. Then loaded up what I thought was another mission, thought it seemed similar, and did exactly the same thing again... then the third time, realised it was a "find the skilled enemy" mission, not a save a prisoner one

 

[Jockney]

Episode 11?! Bloody hell, you're already miles ahead of me

Think I did up to episode 6ish so far and then preemptively started episode 10 (or whichever is the Quiet stuff) by heading toward the power plant.

The side ops are damned distracting though. And I'm a bloody idiot. Loaded one up yesterday without actually reading the objective... just went into a small village, found a prisoner, extracted him, then left assuming that was mission complete. Then loaded up what I thought was another mission, thought it seemed similar, and did exactly the same thing again... then the third time, realised it was a "find the skilled enemy" mission, not a save a prisoner one

Some of the Side Ops are ball-bustingly hard. In fact, much of the game is really fucking challenging.

Also I might have unlocked ep 11, but I still haven't completed 8 and 9. I essentially can't progress without getting R&D to level 12 to make a rocket launcher, as those missions are near impossible to pass without missiles.

 

[Gladders]

Fuck this crap, do you people not realise Fishing Planet came out recently?

 

[Oaf]

Some of the Side Ops are ball-bustingly hard. In fact, much of the game is really fucking challenging.

Also I might have unlocked ep 11, but I still haven't completed 8 and 9. I essentially can't progress without getting R&D to level 12 to make a rocket launcher, as those missions are near impossible to pass without missiles.

Ah, I just did one of the ones where it recommends taking a rocket launcher with you, had to go and do some side ops to gain the funds first. But yeah, it was one where you had to take out some tanks... and to be honest, there were two tanks to take out and it took like 5 rockets and some C4 to take out just one of them, I ended up finding a tank thing of my own and going all out.

Funny how often missions progress like that one did, though... at the start I was isolating each guard, taking them out, carrying them off, interrogating them and then fultoning them... one by one, did it so fucking much. And then right near the end of clearing out this huge village, two fuckers spot me at the same time and I can only kill one, shit hits the fan, and after such a slow methodical start with no kills to speak of, I ended up in a fucking tank blowing every one of the pricks to hell.

 

[Jockney]

Ah, I just did one of the ones where it recommends taking a rocket launcher with you, had to go and do some side ops to gain the funds first. But yeah, it was one where you had to take out some tanks... and to be honest, there were two tanks to take out and it took like 5 rockets and some C4 to take out just one of them, I ended up finding a tank thing of my own and going all out.

Funny how often missions progress like that one did, though... at the start I was isolating each guard, taking them out, carrying them off, interrogating them and then fultoning them... one by one, did it so fucking much. And then right near the end of clearing out this huge village, two fuckers spot me at the same time and I can only kill one, shit hits the fan, and after such a slow methodical start with no kills to speak of, I ended up in a fucking tank blowing every one of the pricks to hell.

Oh man, yeah. I ended up just spamming all three vehicles to hell with missiles. If you shoot the first tank, the whole convoy stops until for about 20 seconds. A good vantage point and they don't even see you.

I think you're coming up to a fucking awesome, but absolute ballache of a mission soon, and you won't even know it til you're actually on it. It's probably the best example of why, gameplay-wise at least, this is considered the best title on the current-gen. Miraculously I managed to do it on my first try without being spotted, well right up until the end at least when... something... happens...

 

[Stevencc]

Oh man, yeah. I ended up just spamming all three vehicles to hell with missiles. If you shoot the first tank, the whole convoy stops until for about 20 seconds. A good vantage point and they don't even see you.

I think you're coming up to a fucking awesome, but absolute ballache of a mission soon, and you won't even know it til you're actually on it. It's probably the best example of why, gameplay-wise at least, this is considered the best title on the current-gen. Miraculously I managed to do it on my first try without being spotted, well right up until the end at least when... something... happens...

I *think* I just did the mission you are referring to.

Spoiler

Honey Bee?