Tactical Espionage Action arrives on PlayStation 3, courtesy of Konami's long-awaited Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, which brings an end to one of video game's most memorable characters, mercenary Solid Snake, who is a gray haired old man. An army of gorgeous cut scenes and a beautiful score highlight this memorable third person adventure, which ties up loose ends while weaving new characters and plot twists into the Metal Gear mythos. It's a long-winded tour of duty that, despite its somewhat bland gameplay, offers an unrivaled cinematic experience.
Snake's adventure begins in the war-torn Middle East, where he slithers through battles in search of his evil twin, the nefarious Liquid, who inhabits the body of MGS villain Revolver Ocelot. In order to kill him, Snake must sneak past or engage hundreds of foot soldiers, as well as vanquish expertly designed boss characters, including Vamp (from Metal Gear Solid 2) and the twisted Beauty and the Beast Corps, four terrifying ladies with signature abilities. He gets help from his friend and techo genius, Otacon, who provides Snake with advice and equipment, most notably the delightful OctoCamo, which changes color in real time and blends into the environment. Along the way, he runs into old friends, makes new ones and uncovers more plot twists than a daytime soap.
Despite having one foot in an old age home, Snake doesn't move any slower, nor is he inept at using a weapon. He creeps on his belly, leaps over things and flies through the air, so it's good that Konami elected to make his appearance central to the plot and not the action. Even better, MGS4 has the most stacked armory in franchise history. You'll acquire numerous weapons early and often, including the MP7 Submachine Gun, Tanegashima Assault Rifle, an RPG-7 Missile Launcher, the M870 Custom Shotgun, grenades of all types, claymore mines and C4, most of which are upgradeable via Drebin, an arms dealer that exchanges weapons for points you acquire during play. Picking up guns you already own automatically earns points, and you can access Drebin's shop via the Start button and sell unwanted equipment. This will allow you to purchase more exotic guns as well as scopes, fore grips, bullets, laser and dot sights. Drebin also comes in handy when you need to unlock weapons; outdated nano machines in Snake's body prevent him from using certain guns.
Although over the shoulder and first person perspective action is fun, the combat doesn't produce the same visceral experience that other shooters possess. Scoring headshots earn you instant kills, but repeatedly shooting someone in their legs or chest yields no physical effect, as bad guys stand there absorbing punishment. This is ridiculous compared to the upcoming Resident Evil 5, where enemies fall when shot in the leg or rocked backwards after taking a round to the shoulder. Furthermore, we came upon a gun turret, only to discover that we had no evildoers to shoot. There's no point putting a turret into a game if you won't let us use it.
Metal Gear Solid 4 Screens
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the final chapter in the saga of Solid Snake which sends him around the world in pursuit of his arch nemesis, Liquid Ocelot. Armed with new gadgets and abilities, Solid Snake must shift the tides of war into his favor, using the chaos of the battlefield to infiltrate deep into enemy territory. In his globetrotting final mission, Snake must sneak deep into enemy locations in the Middle East, South America, and other corners of the Earth to foil Liquid Ocelot's plans for total world domination.
Konami
With that said, the Metal Gear series isn't known for mindless shooting and MGS4 is no exception. You'll get the most enjoyment from finding ways to avoid detection by creating diversions and utilizing OctoCamo as well as the Solid Eye, a device that enables Snake to see in the dark via infrared, as well as zoom in on faraway targets. On the downside, enemies act ridiculous when they bump into camouflaged Snake. A guy will run into him, scope out the scene and then leave. OctoCamo doesn't obscure Snake's head, so it makes no sense why enemies would run into a mostly invisible object and find nothing strange about it. He picks up additional camo along the way that makes him even more invisible, but that doesn't justify seeing his head exposed through Act 1. It looks silly.
If you must fight the enemy, you can always incapacitate them with tranquilizer darts or sneaking up from behind and knocking them out. Most enemies hold valuable items, so it pays to check them before moving on. In fact, Metal Gear Solid 4 has numerous goodies to collect, including ramen noodles, rations, bullets and even Playboy magazines, which Snake can admire. In series tradition, he can slip underneath a cardboard box to avoid detection, but now he can also hop into a rusty barrel and roll around (doing this for too long makes him barf). And despite his age, he's hip with an iPod (characters have Apple computers in cut scenes), which you can equip and then listen to soundtracks from previous Metal Gear video games during play. There are also references to producer Hideo Kojima (a box says "No Room for Hideo") and his video games (Otacon has Zone of the Enders wallpaper on his computer screen).
All of this combines to form a powerful game that's just as thrilling as the summer's best movies, but like all Metal Gears, there's a bitter sweet ingredient that at times makes the game hard to digest. Confusing commercials raise question marks at first, and some of the cut scenes are unbearably long, thanks to characters rambling on. This winds up damaging the game, since Konami uses awkward pacing to tell the story. At times, you'll watch a long cut scene, play for a few minutes and then watch another. You can skip them, but then you'd deprive yourself of the storytelling, admittedly the game's best feature.
It also doesn't help that the camera almost always fails when in tight spaces, zooming in too far. We also struggled with the menu system, which forces the player to scroll through too many items to find something he or she needs. Once equipped, it's easy to accidentally press a button in the heat of battle and disarm Snake, which could lead to his demise.
It's also worth noting that despite the game's slick graphics, some effects aren't so hot. Fire looks terrible, and the glass breaking animation is equally horrid. Neither ruin the visual splendor, but are in stark contrast to MGS4's otherwise stellar presentation.
With five difficulty levels, enjoyable stealth based play and plenty of over the top action, Metal Gear Solid 4 is one of the best PlayStation 3 games. That said, its features, acceptable 10 years ago, seem foolish given the better playing games on the market. Snake's epic, final act just isn't the triple A extravaganza we expected, and it's clear that if Konami intends to continue this franchise or spin off into something new, it needs to study its competition and evolve, delivering shorter cut scenes and superior shooting. But for now, this is one of the most important games in history and you'll dig its cool boss battles, at times witty dialogue and unrivaled sneaking mechanics. Just be sure to keep a magazine handy when those cut scenes get ridiculous.
[Editor's Note: We were unable to access MGS4's online mode, Metal Gear Online, due to Konami's nonsensical sign up process, which forces gamers to create a Konami ID independent of their PlayStation IDs. Its system was unable to register us after repeated attempts, and we will revisit this exciting mode as soon as it works.]
Reader Comments (103)
I got a good laugh out of this review. The reviewer sounds like an FPS player who is incapable of enjoying this sort of game, so it's ironic they had him write it. The enemies in Metal Gear Solid are not regular people, so they do not react like regular people when they are shot. The shooting is responsive, it's just not the simplistic fantasy firing you're used to (and you can't strafe back and forth at 30 MPH). The combat is different for the same reason that there are turrets with nobody lined up in front of them: realism. The game creates real world environments, and reality doesn't conjure bad guys whenever there's a weapon you want to try out. Sneaking in the game has been significantly updated, and the shooting is upgraded by adding a load of weapons that fire differently and can be used at the player's discretion. Each weapon also has several upgrades that alter its function. The review didn't really seem to go into this, for some reason. Ultimately, the game is being punished for being too real and too different.
Oh, and Copyninjaben, an "8" is not a "great" score. It's a "good" score according to gamedaily standards(not that it means much now). Having said that it's "one of the most important games in history" and then slapping a nice "good" score clearly shows the sites inconsistency.
Copyninjaben - A review isn't a review when over 50% of readers disagree. Doesn't that say something? Professional opinion? There are arguments that this reviewer didn't get passed the first area. You call that professionalism? You obviously don't understand the value of game scoring from reviewers. Read each page of these comments carefully for the next couple days, even months. That should open your eyes. Oh, and your comment "The trick is to find a reviewer that has the same tastes as you, and then get their opinions, since you're like minded" Why in the world would I have to jump from reviewer to reviewer to find something I can relate to? I, and I speak for a lot of gamers, just want a GENERAL overview of pros/cons and a score that is consistent. Don't argue with me, my feeble-minded friend...
This review sucks and you can tell the reviewer has no respect or knowledge of the series or anything about it, since MGS has never been your typical "shooter" game. 10 years ago? The amazing cutscenes (running off the same engine the gameplay runs off of) featured in this game would have been IMPOSSIBLE to play on any hardware 10 years ago, and they do something that a cutscene has never done for me before in a game: make me want to keep playing even more. Resident Evil 5 I can guarantee you won't have half the storyline that MGS4 does. The storyline, I must emphasize is a central part of the game and is simply amazing. You won't find a more in depth storyline in any game to date, and Kojima has indeed chosen to present it like a movie (worth several Oscars) that you''ve got to play to keep watching, and you'll eagerly do so. It was an intersting and risky strategy, but it paid off big time. The gameplay in this game is excellent. The Octocamo feature is new and innovative, the new first-person aiming can come in handy at times, and of course it's always fun (and more rewarding) to be as stealthy as possible, although it's usually not necessary. This game isn't meant to be 'realistic,' it's meant to be fun and even humorous at parts with the Playboy magazines for instance. The reviewer doesn't understand Kojima's style of gameplay, and it's obvious they should stick to playing your typical bland American shooter games. The reviewer fails to mention this game has some of the best graphics in any game ever. They also fail to tell you how beautifully the musical score blends in with this game. There are many references to the previous MGS games here (which the reviewer probably hasn't played), as well as a political and social message that can be found in the complex storyline. Simply put, MGS4 is MGS at its best, and I'll take the best of the best from Kojima and day.
The reviewer clearly did not play past the first act of the game. I didn't like this game very much, but this "review" sounds like he watched the trailer and gave his thoughts. It seems like he read the back of the box and typed out what he thought. Every other website (negative and positive reviews) have a 3 - 4 page review of the game. This one is maybe half a page in comparison. I seriously will never read this website again, and I didn't even like the game.
to everyone complaining about the gun turret thing: Isnt it kinda annoying to find a big powerful weapon laid out in front of you, and nothing to use it on? No one likes being teased
to jere1231 This game isnt historical because it's good, or because it has any sort of value. It's historical because it's supposed to be the last game in the MGS series that features solid snake. A historical game can very easily suck, as well as be great, so shut the hell up. Alot of the things the reviewer pointed out was true, and it is very bothersome that the cutscenes are so long, MGS4 was still good. At this point though Hideo and his team know how to lead the fans of the MG series along, even if the game is the same thing in previous installments. Dont worry so damn much about how much someone reviewed a game for. Chances are, if you're a fanboy of the metal gear series you'll like it regardless of what they make. And if you're worried less people are gonna buy the game because it got a 8, guess what. An 8 is pretty good, and people will probably still buy it.
The same idiot who wrote this article is probably best friends with the guy on this site who put day of the tentacle in his list for top 25 games of all time.
Furthermore, we came upon a gun turret, only to discover that we had no evildoers to shoot. There's no point putting a turret into a game if you won't let us use it. since the site claims that i cursed in my last post....there is a point in putting a turret in a game....its called continuity, plus with metal gear you can get in a situation where the alarm is raised and return to the turret, there are far more turrets useful than not, such as the mortars within the first act. I feel you really misreviewed this game, and I am not even a fanboy of MGS, I feel mgs, halo, and gta all have flaws, but in the case of gta and halo since they are so socially accepted, a ten is expected. If you are going to give GTA and Halo 1 expansion pack 2 (erm halo3) higher scores despite their flaws, do your job and TRY to be objective across the board.
I thought the review for this game was spot on. I love the MGS series, but I noticed by the 3rd game... that the gameplay wasn't updating much (at all), and the cutscenes were getting ridiculous. Game? More like interactive movie. An 8/10 is a great score, that's a B. Which means above average. Which is what MGS4 was - Above Average. But when a game CLAIMS it is going to be freaking epic... and then overlooks some details (enemies not recoiling from body-shots, for one), we, as gamers, don't need to look the other way because it's a loved producer or series. Demand more of our games, and we'll get it. Also... Mikeyclipse, a review IS an opinion. It's a professional opinion. You don't have to agree with it. The trick is to find a reviewer that has the same tastes as you, and then get their opinions, since you're like minded. The flaming of this reviewer is childish and stupid, and I for one appreciate that Chris Buffa took the time to write this up. Buffa did not trash the game, or even dis it - Flaws were pointed out and it was given a great score. And pr0blemchild117, just because someone disagrees with you about a game, doesn't mean they're not a gamer. Buffa, keep up the good work. You have my support.