Metal Gear Solid 3

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With all this talk about Metal Gear Solid 5 lately it caught my eye the other week when MGS 3 and MGS Peace Walker were on sale on PSN.  I got both of them for my Playstation Vita for less than $9 total.

My history with Metal Gear basically went like this:

  • MGS: I loved this game, it was amazing at the time.
  • MGS 2: Um... weird... but still impressive for the time.
  • MGS 3: Utter frustration at controls and story.
Then I gave up on the series.  I thought I would pick up the story where I left off with MGS 3 and see what I thought of it now that I've had years of distance between me and the series.

I started up MGS3 and instantly felt frustrated.  The game kept yanking control away from me.  It was full of cutscenes and dumb radio dialog.  I mean, they tell Snake that it's a super secret stealth mission and time is of the essence but then immediately spend 30 minutes on the radio with him just introducing each other, making jokes, and shooting the shit.  And then introduce some more characters.  And then talk about philosophy.  And then, eventually, Snake gets to start his mission.

Now I know why I put down this game so fast last time.  It's trying to cram so much information down my throat before I even get to play that it's ridiculous.

Then I finally get out of the radio dialog window, walk 30 seconds across the jungle, and get another cutscene.

At that point I'm almost done with the game because I can't take pacing like this, but I think, hey maybe the gameplay will be amazing.

After the cutscene I have my first encounter with two guards.  BUT, there's no tutorial about the button configuration and the controls of this game don't match up to any modern standard.

So I gave up on MGS 3 for the second time in my life.  This time was much quicker than last time.  I remember playing at least a handful of hours the first time I tried this when it came out.

I've come to the conclusion that MGS 3 isn't a game for me.  But, I'm going to give Peace Walker a try and see what I think.

I did enjoy the first two MGS games, but at this point I doubt I could ever go back to them.  They're too much a product of their time.

Really, I'm testing out these games that I missed to see if there's any point in me picking up MGS 5.  I keep hearing people rave about how much fun they're having with it and I wonder if it might be fun for me too.

Comments

  1. AzurielOctober 9, 2015 at 10:54 AM

    I can't even imagine what you'd think about MGS4. Or, actually, I probably could. I haven't gotten too far in it, but I distinctly remember watching a 15 minute cutscene, and then having control of Snake long enough to be able to crawl underneath a truck before the next 5-10 minute cutscene.

    It's too bad about MGS3 though, because that is widely regarded as the best in the series. I don't remember if it gets better control-wise, but the boss fights were really cool.

    All that aside, MGS5 has significantly less cut-scenes and is largely open-world to boot. At least, it is once you get out of the first tutorial mission. That segment is probably at least an hour long and has multiple cut-scenes. Gets much, much better after that.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. VoidOctober 10, 2015 at 10:49 PM

      I've actually played a bunch more Metal Gear since this post. I have some more posts scheduled out for the next week or two.

      You're very right though, I like MGS5 much much more. And I hated the prologue. But the open world is fun :)

      Delete

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