(Game provided on PlayStation 4 by Konami)
By Sam Coles:
The stealth genre in video games is rather a rare sight these days, as they tend to be used more as a side mechanic in a game rather than a dedicated game. However, in the late 1990s to the mid 2000s they were everywhere, you had Thief, Hitman, Splinter Cell and of course the game that kicked off the popularity of the genre, Metal Gear Solid. The series first debuted in 1987 as Metal Gear on the MSX, but most people in the West wouldn’t become familiar with the series until the release of Metal Gear Solid in 1998 on the original PlayStation. Not only did it put stealth games on the map of mainstream gaming, but it also redefined how stories were told in video games with mature stories and solid (no pun intended) writing and legit voice acting. So, let’s talk about each game, Metal Gear Solid, Sons of Liberty and Snake Eater.
Metal Gear Solid (1998):
Let’s journey back to 1998, the release of Metal Gear Solid on the original PlayStation which I was only five years old, but I do remember watching my brother playing it. Now, this may sound ridiculous these days with the game’s visuals but have your mindset in the late 1990s, it is incredible what Hideo Kojima achieved with the limited hardware.
Anyway, let’s get into the plot of the game. You are playing as Solid Snake; you are tasked with infiltrating a nuclear facility called Shadow Moses as it has been captured by terrorists who formerly part of a special force's unit called Foxhound. Snake is tasked with taking down each member of the group, to avoid a nuclear disaster, while questioning certain aspects of his mission as the game progresses. What I like about the plot is that you see it as a standard military drama, but then you start seeing illusions of men in gas masks in trench coats as well as cyborg ninjas. It is mostly grounded, but it is also willing to introduce absurd elements while having an anti-war and nuke message throughout the game.
Also, for the first time in gaming, the voice acting delivered emotion and gravitas as the voice actors are taking the roles seriously while not hamming it up to Shakespearean levels. Yes, the character models especially the heads are like potatoes bobbing up and down as they emote, but back then your imagination could piece together the missing elements of facial expressions etc. because the voice acting is well done, coupled with the excellent musical score. David Hayter, the man, the myth and the legend plays Solid Snake, and his performance comes across as the typical gruff soldier, but he delivers some truly thought-provoking monologues throughout the series as well some emotional moments.
Now, I know it took me a couple of paragraphs to get to the gameplay, but the major aspect of the Metal Gear Solid games is the story with their notoriously long cutscenes so strap in and make sure you space out your toilet breaks. Anyway, the game is a stealth game a basic one at that, not to say that makes it bad but it works. The game is based on sound and line of sight, the guards have a cone of vision which is displayed on the radar, and honestly, they are rather oblivious and blind, but they have good hearing if you run on unstable surfaces.
The game’s layout is a grid, which Kojima designed each level with Lego sets in his studio back in the day. This layout accommodates the isometric camera angle, so you have a decent line of sight of the enemy, but not so much to make it easy for you. You can go in guns blazing, but for one you don’t have a gun at the start, and secondly you have the resilience of week-old cheese. It’s about taking things slowly, analysing guard’s movement patterns and not getting spotted by the enemy. When you do get spotted you enter an “Alert” phase, you have to run and hide, which will go down to an evasion status and then it will be lifted. When you are spotted your radar is jammed, which elevates the tension as you have no idea where the enemy is coming from, coupled with the pulse pounding music it makes you panic a bit.
The game was an achievement at the time, and really put the series on the map and it wouldn’t be long until the next instalment.
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (2001):
The PlayStation 2 is one of the bestselling consoles to date, and for good reason as it housed some of the best games of that generation as well as it being a very cheap DVD player at the time. Metal Gear Solid of course would make an appearance on said console, Kojima wrote the design document back in 1999 and it was a long development for the game as there were a lot of aspects cut from the game due to political reasons. It was a huge leap from the original game, with some controversial choices which I will get into.
Metal Gear Solid 2 takes place two years after the Shadow Moses incident, where Solid Snake has been branded as a criminal and now works as part of a fringe organisation that speicalises in taking down Metal Gears. He and his tech backup Otacon who he met in the first game, sneak on a Marine Corp tanker to investigate a new model of Metal Gear, but it is quickly hijacked by Spetsnaz mercenaries with scheming Revolver Ocelot. Everything goes wrong and Snake is presumed dead, then it switches to the Big Shell in 2009 where you are now playing as the rookie Raiden which was the controversy I mentioned.
During the lead up and marketing of MGS2, Hideo Kojima purposely hid the fact you played as Raiden for most of the game and people were not happy. The outrage has calmed down in recent years as the game has one of the best and most forward-thinking narratives in the series. The game basically predicts everything about the internet, such as fake news, an overabundance of information as well as artificial intelligence telling us what to buy, how to feel and what to do next in life. If you play this game now, it is very scary how accurate the game is about today’s society and this game was released in 2001. Replaying this game recently was eerie, especially after the past three years and a lot of what is discussed in this story is very close to what has happened in the past three years.
The gameplay is nothing too drastic from the original, it takes the framework of the first game and elevates it. It has the same isometric perspective, but with some added tweaks with movement such as being able to hang from ledges as well as aiming guns in first person. This is a big addition, as enemies now have location-based damage, so a headshot will put them down immediately or cause critical damage during boss fights. There are more ways to outwit the enemy too, you can now hold guards up with weapons to make them put their hands up, this is great for shaking them down for items as well as just teasing them before you knock them out. With the added tricks is the enhanced intelligence of the guards, the bodies no longer disappear when you kill them, you must stash them in lockers.
However, when you knock guards out and they do not report to command, they will get suspicious and send in back up. The back up teams are brutal; they will check their corners like real military operatives as well as packing shotguns and riot shields to deal with you. You will die very quickly in this game compared to the first, enemies are no joke and will surround you quickly if you are too careless.
Visually the game was a huge step up from the first, seems an obvious statement but the amount of detail that is put into this game considering the hardware is staggering. Characters will react to weather, such as in the Tanker chapter, if Snake stays out in the rain for too long, he will start to sneeze as he gets a cold, and you must take medicine to stop it. Also, there are dynamic shadows too, enemies can tell if you are around a corner by the shadow you cast, which is insane for 2001 but they thought about it in development. There are lots of details I could list, but I would be here all day and this article is long enough as it is.
Metal Gear Solid 2 was a great success, but I think what helped its sales was the fact that it was an early title in the lifecycle for the PS2, but it was a highly anticipated sequel. However, we would only have to wait three years until the next instalment.
Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (2004):
Metal Gear Solid 3 took a different turn for the series, Kojima decided to do a prequel and set it right at the start of the Metal Gear timeline where you play as a young Big Boss, before he became Big Boss. It takes place in the 1960s in a fictional region of Russia in the jungle, for you who have any knowledge of geography will know there are no jungles in Russia but hey it is fiction! Digressions aside, Metal Gear Solid 3 is hailed as one of the best games in the series, and for good reason for its fun and heartfelt story to the more in-depth gameplay that is thematically appropriate for the new setting.
Metal Gear Solid 3 is about the titular operation Snake Eater, where Naked Snake who is soon to be Big Boss later is tasked with assassinating his old mentor The Boss. She defected to the Soviet Union and gave her new masters a nuclear device, unfortunately her new Soviet partners used said nuke on Soviet soil causing an international dispute between the USA and the USSR. Snake must decide between his loyalty, the mission, his country or the love for his mentor.
The story is less complicated compared to the second game as it is mostly a straightforward spy story, but doesn’t mean it does not hit hard, as it does have some truly emotional moments especially towards the end of the game. It is not clear cut who are bad or good guys, as the historians will know the US and Soviet Union were as bad as each other during the Cold War period, and the story shows that throughout as there are many double and triple crossing moments.
When the game was originally released Hideo Kojima wanted to keep the classic style of camera, however the old camera didn’t work with the more wide-open spaces of the jungle. So, they re-released the game with the Subsistence version, which gave players a traditional third person camera which was more common at this point.
With the jungle setting they changed the gameplay up, so you no longer use rations to regain health as it regenerates on its own, that is if you feed yourself the local flora and fauna. You must hunt animals and plants, to keep yourself fed but to also help heal your wounds as you can be injured, which takes a chunk off your health bar. You have to fix broken bones, bullet wounds, burns as well as curing poisoning from snakes and other animals. It adds heightened tension, as it is not just the Soviet soldiers you have to worry about but also your own physical health and wildlife.
Stealth has also been tweaked, for one the guard's eyesight is much better compared to the first two games I noticed that they could see me from far away, but this is where the camouflage system comes into play. You have a camo gauge in the top right corner of the screen, the higher the percentage the harder it is for the enemy to see you in certain environments. So, if you are in a grassy area, wear a uniform and face paint that is green and vice versa in other environments. It really adds to the jungle environment and the atmosphere of hiding in plain sight, where you then grab a guard by the neck from the tall grass, you really feel like The Predator.
Combat has taken a similar approach with the new environment; the alert system has been toned down compared to the second game as units are scattered across the jungle. However, that doesn’t mean that the enemy is no slouch in that regard as they will cut you down immediately if you are too careless. Weapons have been changed too, specifically with suppressors. In the old games when you find a suppressor for a gun, it would stay on the weapon for the rest of the game but not in this game as they can break if you use the gun too much. This sounds like a hassle, but on the other hand you can pick up multiple suppressors for each weapon throughout the play through, so it becomes a non-issue, but it does encourage you to use your guns sparingly.
Metal Gear Solid 3 flipped the gameplay formula on its head, with the new jungle setting with a grittier survival element while retaining its identity of Metal Gear Sold, I would say it is my favourite out the three. The 1960s setting and the jungle survival elements, make it for me the ultimate Metal Gear experience.
Metal Gear Solid is a series that I absolutely love and always will. Replaying these three games in the Master Collection was a blast. It was great seeing how each game progressed with both its story, and leap in technology and graphics especially the leap between MGS and MGS2. I am glad to see these games back on modern platforms, and I look forward to Vol.2 of the Master Collection and have my fingers crossed for Guns of the Patriots to be in that collection.
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