VIDEO Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain

So Ground Zeroes and The Phantom Pain are actually the same game? That's some crazy marketing there. It was obvious Phantom Pain was MGS-related but I didn't for a moment consider they were actually the same title.

Wonder why this is being given the "5" title, when Peace Walker wasn't numbered.

 

Oh Kojima you clever bastard. What would we ever do without you?

 

I think it's because it's a console game. Portable Ops wasn't numbered either.

Also found this:



Now, 'Ishmael' is obviously Kiefer Sutherland, but is it just me or does Big Boss sound a hell of a lot like Kiefer too? Little disappointed that it's not David Hayter but even more so that it's not Richard Doyle. If you're going to replace Big Boss' VA then you should replace him with the other guy who voiced him, especially considering how amazing he was last time.

On the other hand his new VA sounds awesome to me. Really puts across how messed up he is now.

 

I used to love MGS, I will always have a certain fondness of it, but Hideo Kojima just seems so full of himself IMO. He's made great(but not perfect) games but I was hoping MGS4 was the end of the MGS franchise. It ended on a excellent note, with the two GOWs(Ascension and Judgement) being prequels it fills like all franchises are being milked in the gaming industry more than before with the prequel bug. As well as the sequel bug.

 

I actually feel prequels in gaming are a lot more successful than in film. Halo: Reach, Deus Ex: Human Revolution, the two God of War prequels, and yes, MGS3 (MGS5 I would class more as a sequel, as it continues the Big Boss storyline started in MGS3). Does BioShock: Infinite count? There's not as much connection between it and the original games as a conventional prequel, but it does take place prior to those events.

Sometimes a franchise does go on for too long though. The most recent case of a truly pointless prequel would be the latest Gears of War game, which I haven't bought as there literally seems to be no point to it's existence.

 

They aren't. From what I can gather Ground Zeros is a stand alone title that introduces players to the sandbox mechanic in a smaller world map with Phantom Pain being a direct follow up in a map that is comparatively massive.

Personally I'm not interested in either at the moment. I was when they were both first announced because I've been playing these games since I was 8 years old and am a massive Metal Gear fanboy. It would have been impossible for me to see a Metal Gear Solid 5 without getting some kind of excitement from it. But when Kojima's reasoning for not asking David Hayter back to voice Big Boss was that he wants to make a different kind of Metal Gear Solid game for a western audience I could feel any interest I had in the announcement go down the proverbial drain, because that's not what I want from Metal Gear. The cheese and silly, over the top nature of the series is part of its charm. Say what you will about the overly long cutscenes and blathering about nanomachines, but at least the franchise has a distinct personality of its own. If that gets sacrificed to the homogenized blob that is games that try to hard to appeal to the mainstream western gamer then for me it just wont be a Metal Gear game.

 

Kojima Productions have been aiming for the West since 2005.

It's why when you get to the end of MGS4 every single dangling plotline links in to eachother (Operation Snake Eater - FOX Unit - The Patriots - Naomi Hunter - Vamp - NANOMACHINES SON) and why there's no ambiguity, nothing left open for discussion. It's why there's a fluid over the shoulder shooting system. It's why when you lie down on the floor the OctoCamo makes you invisible. It's why you can buy guns and ammunition instead of relying on on site procurement. You can even save up enough Drebin Points to buy the Stealth Camouflage and Bandanna. It's why there's 70 different guns in the game that are all pretty much the same in each category. It's why there's a multiplayer option.

The MGS fanbase (and particularly us Westerners) has never really recovered from the last few hours of MGS2, the bar was just set too high that anything that followed never really had a chance. All this madness (i.e. fake studios, this David Hayter stuff. Not to mention the ridiculous content of the trailers) is reminding me a lot of the run in to MGS2. IMO Kojima and the team are going back to their A-game.

Over the top? Cheese? Someone who looks like a young Psycho Mantis summons a gigantic flaming whale to swallow a Hind, Revolver Ocelot rides in on a white horse to save Snake from a ghost on a flaming unicorn and Big Boss has a horn growing out of his head. I've never seen MGS get more OTT than this and this is a sequel to a game where there's a guy made of bee's and to another one with a character called Paz who never stops talking about peace!


I guess my point is this: they may be aiming for a Western market, but that's nothing new and it hasn't stopped KJP from delivering incredible videogames.

 

So it's been confirmed that Ground Zeroes is being sold as a separate package, at £20/$20 on current-gen, and £30/$30 on next-gen. Due spring 2014.

Personally, I think that's BS. While we don't know the exact length of this installment, it essentially serves the purpose of MGS2's Tanker mission - setting up the plot of the game proper. Back in 2001, that was included on the disc.

But in 2014, it's apparently acceptable to sell the first level of your game, and the first act of the story, separately now. For half the price of a full retail game, no less. Unless it turns out this delivers 8 hours of content, I'll not be picking this up.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/11...-release-date?abthid=527845bf59122e0f0b000020

 

Metal Gear Solid was one mission. I also highly doubt they'd sell a fifteen-minute game that they've previewed over and over again - especially considering they didn't actually do anything in those demoes.

Also, in 2011, 2012, and 2013, it's been acceptable for games developers to do a lot of things that were unheard of in 2001.

 

I know you wrote this months ago but I can't help but agree with almost every word you said, especially on how MGS2 was ill received then (thankfully not so much anymore) and how Kojima, with a little help from death threats, gave into pressure to explain things which were never meant to be explained but were deliberately left open for interpretation while making 4 more westernized as well in ways such as giving it 3rd-person shooting. Thankfully, it seems that Kojima is returning to his roots in a number of ways and doing things the way he wants to overall so to him I say good for you!

P.S. You wouldn't by any chance subscribe to the whole VR Theory surrounding 2 would you?

 

Yeah I'm really liking what I see of MGSV. I just get a special feeling from it that the team are going to absolutely knock it out the park on all fronts.

On the VR Theory. I love that idea about MGS2, especially how it basically literally makes the player Raiden and adds just another layer to the game.

 

Personally I find the whole "MGS2 was nothing but VR" total bunk. Any and all "evidence" that supports it is suspect at best. Mainly because I'm fairly certain some of the events of the game are mentioned directly in MGS4.

That said, I can't wait for Ground Zeroes to release.

 

The VR theory generally calls those accommodations retcons.

That said, Raiden is pretty clearly a stand-in for the players themselves in the later parts of MGS2, and there is a lot of meta commentary, but I think it's safe to say Kojima intended to have the events be playing out in the "real world," whatever that means. The VR Theory relies way too heavily on literal readings of some of the franchise's trademark on-screen gags and lackadaisical fourth wall breaking - it's the analysis equivalent of someone declaring "Metal Gear Solid 1 is all just a simulation because Ocelot clearly mentions a controller during the torture scene."

 

http://uk.ign.com/articles/2014/02/...-ground-zeroes-reported-to-be-extremely-short

All I'm saying is those better be some long-ass side missions. 2 hours for the main story?!? That's lower than even my previously cynical predictions. Though if it really is this short, I bet they'll include it with The Phantom Pain when that eventually releases, making anyone who buys this game for $30/$40 a complete moron.

 

While it wouldn't surprise me if Konami pulled some stunts, because Konami's terrible, the 2 hours figure is really suspect. It's getting echo chambered based on a single Game Informer playthrough, as parsed by Craptaku.

So, I dunno, I'm waiting and seeing. I was never going to buy either of these games at full price anyway.

 

It's really not that suspect. Kojima himself has since stated that the game comprises of just one main mission and five side ops, and that any longevity from the release would stem from the game's open ended nature and online leaderboards, not from the story. Ground Zeroes sounds exactly like the Tanker Mission demo for MGS2, or the virtuous mission demo for MGS3. Both were short prologues to their respective games. However instead of releasing it for free this time around they've demanded a fee to access it.

I wouldn't have a problem if this was a budget bit of content acting as a teaser for the main game, like Dead Rising 2: Case Zero did (Which Konami have named as an inspiration behind Ground Zeroes from what I understand), or was being used to help sell another Konami title like they did when they put the MGS2 demo on the Zone of the Enders disc. However this thing is being rushed out to retail at almost full price, which is kind of despicable.

 

You... do realize the irony of citing Zone of the Enders in the context of a debate about a game that's been deemed too short, right? Compared to that, Ground Zeroes is a cost to content bargain even if the two hour figure pans out.

Edit: And that's before you get into the fact that a not-insubstantial portion of the people who bought ZoE were only buying it for the MGS2 demo, and weren't playing the actual game at all.

 

I don't think I ever suggested that ZoE as a stand alone title was a shining example of value for money. However it's undeniably better value than Ground Zeroes when you account for the fact that every copy had the prologue to MGS2 bundled within it. Unless Ground Zeroes is bundled in every copy of, say, Lords of Shadow 2 (A franchise Kojima had some involvement in, so it could have been possible), then there just isn't as much content within this purchase. Certainly not enough to justify £30 on a digital download. I can get South Park: The Stick of Truth, a fully fleshed out RPG by Obsidian out around the same time, for roughly the same money.

 

That's not actually true, is the thing. ZoE AND the demo is about 5 hours of content for $50, whereas Ground Zeroes can run as little as $20 (Digital download on PS3/360) for what's looking like 3-5. I'm not arguing this isn't something of a jerk move on Konami's part, because it pretty much is, but I am arguing it's a wholly precedented - and previously supported - jerk move.

 

Well I got Ground Zeroes with trade in credit yesterday and... yeah...

I completed the story in 20 minutes without even really trying, and including all the side ops it lasted me about an hour. It'll last even longer if you're going to look for all the XOF patches to unlock the system exclusive mission, however hiding content behind tiny, obscure collectibles is padding at its absolute worst.

 

Yeah, it looks cool, sounds like it's fun, but obviously all of the complaints about it being damn short were well founded. I think I'll wait until I can pick it up for $10 or so.

 

I think its the best dude running around simulator money can buy. Think of it as a toy rather than a game and it is more than worth the money.

The quick dive move is the best thing evar.

 

I said before that if it was this short I wouldn't support it, despite being a massive MGS fan. Guess what, yep, I'm not buying it. The potential for abuse if this sells well is pretty awful, and I'd hate to see introductory missions being sold separately become widespread.

I just hope there are more people who realise what this could do to the industry as a whole instead of blindly buying it because it's Metal Gear, right?

 

You're giving this industry too much credit, if it does badly the conclusion will be "Well, maybe we just need to use a more successful series, like Halo..."