I don't think the game is really that bad, but man is it disappointing. It feels like a lot of the metal gear charm just zipped away. The weird but hilarious boss fights, the over the top villains, the cliche and overcomplicated but sincerely told plot... it's all just kind of missing. The game feels spiritless, like it was a metal gear game that Shang Tsung walked over and ripped its soul out.

The gameplay is probably the best in the series, not that it's a super high bar, but it does get old pretty quickly. There's a good reason why none of the previous games were all that long.

Es una experiencia curiosa. Es el MGS más experimental y más centrado en sí mismo. Lo cuál no sería un problema si no fuese el último capítulo de la saga, pero es que el 4 ya cerraba y conectaba todo de tal forma que cualquier cosa que viniese después se iba a quedar pequeño en comparación.
Es un juego muy imperfecto y todo se siente artificial, como algo que conocemos, pero no es como debería y es intencional. En Sons of Liberty la idea era que pensasemos que esto era una Shadow Moses descafeinada y aquí sobre el descenso de Snake y su equipo a convertirse en villanos.
He llegado a leer a mucha gente decir que aquí no se puede ver un descenso al mal, al final seguimos siendo héroes y... no. Hay una tradición en esta saga que es la parte de tortura, siempre tenemos que aguantar una por parte del enemigo, pero en este caso nosotros somos los torturadores. Ya no tenemos que apretar el triangulo para aguantar el dolor, nos queda sentarnos y ver cómo se lo hacen a otros. En Peace Walker Boss metía ya a niños en su ejército y en Ground Zeroes vamos a salvar a Paz y Chico no por altruismo si no para interrogarles por si han chivado algo. Diamond Dogs es una fuerza que se mueva en una escala de grises, no ayuda a buenos, ayuda a cualquiera que esté dispuesto a pagarles bien. Skull Face es peor por supuesto, pero no van a por él realmente por su plan, quieren matarlo por pura venganza, por destrozar su vida en los últimos 9 años, quieren justicia por lo que les falta y por los hermanos en armas caídos, nada más.
Es el juego más "oscuro" de la saga por ejemplo tenemos una cinta donde Strangelove se ahoga por falta de oxígeno en la cámara de una IA por culpa del asqueroso de Huey porque ella no le dejaba experimentar con su hijo ¿Hemos dejado de ser los buenos? No, porque buenos son Solid, Otacon y Raiden. Boss, Miller y Ocelot nunca lo fueron y no lo serán. La escala de grises es mucho más latente como he hablado más arriba con las torturas, pero también tenemos armas nucleares, un metal gear a nuestra disposición y niños soldado que aunque se intenten educar de otra forma, siguen encerrados en nuestra base madre. D-Dog es como el mono en el 4 un pequeño punto para aliviar el tono.
Entre todo esto tenemos a Venom Snake, un protagonista mucho más clásico, qué parece sacado de la época de la MSX. Mayormente callado y que suelta poquitas palabras. El conflicto de Venom es muy interesante porque es un Paramedic que ha ascendido a convertirse en el hombre que le lideraba. Big Boss y Solid Snake se diferencian en una cosa, uno abraza ser un héroe de leyenda y el otro no, uno tiene ego y el otro está atormentado por su pasado, no abrazó ser un soldado como su padre, no quiere ¿En qué se queda Venom Snake entonces? En un hombre que tiene el recuerdo y el sentimiento de lo que se supone que debe ser, pero qué no es. Un sentimiento disociativo con su gente más cercana incluso con el reflejo que le devuelve el espejo. Vive un doble sentimiento de culpa por un lado la de su mente transformada en Big Boss y por otro su yo de antes que no pudo salvar a Paz. Pandemia, confinamientos, virus, el juego está muy centrado en que el conflicto de este Big Boss este ligado a su antigua profesión como médico. "Con un buen entrenamiento, todo el mundo puede ser el soldado perfecto" Raiden y Venom son caras de una misma moneda. Uno era la confirmación de lo que se podía hacer con la manipulación de los medios y el entorno, el otro como si ya tienes un legado y nombre importante sólo necesitas una cara que cumpla mínimamente lo que eras. Raiden rechaza al final del 2 la identidad del jugador para buscarse una propia, en cambio Venom decide quedarse con esta que le ha sido impuesta y sonríe porque ha cumplido la misión de Big Boss como debía y ya no es un extraño en su vida. Solidus tuvo a Raiden, Snake a Venom. Por ello el cambio de David Hayter a Kiefer Sutherland lo veo necesario. Hayter es perfecto para personajes como Solid o Big Boss, pero con Venom los one liners no funcionan. "Keep you Waiting huh" es la línea más icónica de la saga, cuando Snake y Boss la dicen es con picardia y arrogancia, cuando la dice Venom al rescatar a Miller es con normalidad, monotonía, suena extraño, te saca del momento y es rarisimo.
Otro punto interesante que diferencia a Venom de su antecesor es que claro Boss,Miller y Ocelot son soldados y pueden querer mucho a su ejército, pero los hemos conocido siempre como líderes mejores que el soldado promedio que saben lo que es perder a gente, en este caso aunque es un médico es un tío normal genérico ¿Habría convertido el Snake normal a sus compañeros caídos en diamantes para llevarlos consigo siempre? Yo diría que no y eso le da fuerza a esta encarnación como aún con todo muchas veces habla más el Paramedic habla más que su otro yo.
Pero el juego no se queda ahí, se moja con la conolización y como la gentrificación alrededor de una falsa cultura nos arrebata de la nuestra. Como por culpa de la manipulación yanqui y Británica muchas culturas acaban perdiendo su identidad y convirtiéndose en cosas prefabricadas para lo que se necesite en ese momento. Phantom Pain habla de como no pertenecemos a un país nunca, si no a su lengua, lo que nos une realmente es el lenguaje y como de fácil es despojarnos de él por una fuerza que a priori cree que ser mas poderosa.
Tenemos a Quiet también un personaje con un diseño estúpido e insultante, pero que tiene una trama muy potente a su alrededor. Pasa de intentar matar a Snake a comprometerse con su causa y enamorarse de su persona. Quiet y Snake conectan por una razón, comparten un silencio que les une fácilmente. Por parte de Boss está el hecho de que es una persona nueva su pensamiento con ella no está ligados a los recuerdos de otra persona, con ella no se siente un espectador de su vida.
Es irónico como el dolor fantasma que lleva de título el juego es latente al acabarlo. Como sabemos que nos falta contenido porque se junto la ambición de Kojima y las ganas de dinero de Konami. Triste por supuesto, pero gracioso que al final tengamos sensación de vacío al sólo quedarnos un par de cinemáticas y varios concept arts.

Strange to say the least. Side-ops make me want to blow my head off and I wish there were only about 50 or so (Not the 151 we got instead). Story is ok at face value, but I think people look too far into it. They act like Kojima was attempting to tell the deepest story in the series when I really don't think that was his intention. The gameplay really is spectacular though. Every single combat situation can be taken on in hundred of different ways, and the outposts are great ways to test your skills. Overall, I think if this were more consistent in the long run, people might call it the best of the series. At least it's not Peace Walker.

I might play it again.

This game got me into Metal Gear and it's now one of my favourite game series' of all tie

Stealth Excellence

WIsh it was finished tho

Wow, I actually finally finished this game. Just for your information, I started playing this game about 2 years ago, and today I finally finished it. Over 100 hours of gameplay have given me lots of information about this game. And I must say that this is one of the best PC games I've ever played. Sure, compared to other Metal Gear games I've played, it's not as good, but the gameplay more than makes up for that! And what gameplay it is! This has got to be some of the best stealth I've ever had the pleasure to play through! Almost every single mission had my blood pumping throughout the whole thing, and completing them was always immensely satisfying. The music always fit really good, and the standout tunes were Sahelanthropus Dominion, Sahelanthropus Dominion and Sahelanthropus Dominion. So, to summarize: this may not be the best Metal Gear game, but it is an absolutely incredible stealth game!

So i just finished the story in Metal Gear Solid 5 The Phantom Pain… I have some mixed opinions but like… i kinda love love it alot. Like i had such a great time with it despite its flaws it's almost flawless gameplay design wise so just on that level its 100% worth it and amazing. The gameplay is just is so versatile and has amazing game feel. I really just felt control over everything almost all the time and it helped to engage me alot and make the possibilities endless. It's practically perfect in that accept and it is a game i still feel like i can explore for a long while more (and i've played it 69 hours (yes just checked and it happened to be the funny number! EPIC RIGHT!) and i'm usually not someone who loves to sink a lot of hours into a game, but this game was just so addicting. It does such a good way to allow the player to do anything they want but still incentivising you to go a stealth rout in really clever subtle ways with how it rewards you and it really allows you to regulate the game's difficulty (for the most part, will get to that) and shape your own experience for you.

But that's not generally why people doesn't have a positive view of this game and are pretty harsh against it. The main point where people are mad at this game is its story. What do i think of the story? While not as present in other mgs games, the story that we get to see i actually quite liked. I didn't think the problem with the story was with what that is in the game, but the more what story we didn't have. There is something super effective about this sort of sour sad atmosphere. Our characters are just so bitter just fueled by revenge. There is this false hope and heroism, where i feel like is this false bravado to avoid the clear unethical aspects of their “pure” ideology. I feel like this feeling fits perfectly well in the context of this game in the whole MGS chronology, how this is right before Big Boss battle against snake and such. It paints the Diamonds Dogs as these pretty hypocritical opportunities in denial hiding behind their philosophies. I think this shines specifically well with how Huey, instead of Snakes and Hals wonderful cute love relationship, Snake and the rest of Diamond Dogs constantly don't trust him and are just generally really sour and mean towards him. Also while Huey clearly isn't in the right or perfect, his big rant against the Diamond Dogs clearly has a lot of truth to it and i think is emblematic of the problematic aspects of Diamond Dogs false bravado. Also i did actually really liked Skullface story, his backstory was really interesting. Him losing his ethnicity and native tongue was a really poignant and direct criticism of imperialism and the war and killing of languages and cultures as a political weapon. But it is undeniably messy and how the story is delivered is really flawed with how its just peppered without the regard for the whole like Kojima has shown with the other MGS games.

But where the biggest flaw in this game really stands out is the huge mess of chapter 2. I never understood why people always called this game unfinished as when i played the chapter 1 i feel like it was consistently pretty great. But then chapter 2 dropped and my frustrations started growing. Reusing missions but with obituary harder difficulty as main missions and making it esoteric how to progress made for a needlessly frustration experience. It's also more frustrating as a lot of these issues could have been improved a lot if they were just managed a lot better. Also lets just say Silent was just so poorly handled. Like i love aspects of her, but got how the game constantly frames her is so obnoxious and dumb. Like ignoring the outfit, the camera stopping everything at her boobs just get obnoxious.

But over all, i felt this had more good than bad. But I have only played two other Metal Gear games, the first one and the second one and i only played them for the first time this year. This mixed with me having lower expectations due to mostly just hearing really negative opinions of this mightve lead to me having a lower expectation and made it easier for me to have a different take on this game. I certainly understand how the people playing this right when it was hyped up as much as it was left them with a real sour taste in their mouths. It has this sort of sad air about it, which with hindsight is very obviously was due to Kojima's relationship with Konami and their incredibly mismanaging and unforgivable way they dealt with the wrapping up and aftermath of the game. Understand how they felt ripped off, disappointed and left with their own phantom pain. But i was a happy customer, i came in with low expectations and came out with a experience that was certainly flawed but had me thinking and had aspects that i really loved and gameplay that was frankly almost perfect. I loved this amazingly wonderfully flawed unfinished mess of a game.

This game is fucking amazing. Best gameplay in the series, and one of the most fun stealth games besides because of all the valid options. The story's great, with a lot of fantastic moments and great cutscenes, though its the weakest link due to it being an unnecessary addition to the series and also due to a cliffhanger on one of the secondary story threads (though there's that Mission 51 video out there for that anyway). Also wish Venom had talked more, because he had potential to be my favorite Snake. Despite all that, I fucking adored this game and the dozens of hours I pur into it for the plat. One of those games that truly made me sad to finish.

This hurts me. MGSV has arguably the best gameplay mechanics in the series, providing an almost endlessly flexible arsenal that grows exponentially throughout the game (provided that you actively seek out materials and soldiers to meet requirements). The areas, while not quite as varied as I might have wanted, are amazingly free, and completely open to approach in any way you personally see fit. In previous MGS games, the gameplay continuously evolved, introducing more and more options to further deepen the player's experience, while also tightening the AI, making for an overall better sneaking experience. However, nearly every past venture came with at least one caveat. MGS2 had bleeding, which was rather annoying to deal with when escaping an alert phase. MGS3 had the cure system and general menu navigation, which had some growing pains and took up a lot of playtime. MGS4, while having the most evolved and easily accessible form of gameplay, introduced the stress bar, a mechanic I despise with every fiber of my being. The Phantom Pain expands upon the freedom of any given mission, massively grows the arsenal, introducing new and fun tools to experiment with, and has possibly the best inventory system I've ever experienced in a game. The core gameplay is absolutely incredible. However, in my mind, MGS games are made up of two equally important halves; the gameplay and the story. I think you can see where this is going. Unfortunately, as a complete package, MGSV is disjointed and unfinished. Its plot has a decent enough setup, being posed as a fairly simple revenge story, and it hooked me right from the start. It all goes downhill from there. The story is spread so thin to the point where I often forgot what the next main objective even was, especially during chapter 2. Throughout the first chapter, while being rather shallow, still held my interest and had a satisfying climax/conclusion. After that point is where it all falls apart. To even simply unlock new story missions, you're often expected to meet arbitrary goals and complete seemingly unimportant side ops. All for hardly any extra story advancements, and perhaps the worst reveal in video game history. Though it's neat that we now have an answer that explains why Big Boss returns in Metal Gear 2, the Venom Snake reveal in the context of MGSV has absolutely zero impact on the story, and isn't build up to or teased in any significant way. It tries to have this big profound message about identity right at the end, but without any of the genius storytelling through gameplay or impact that MGS2 had. It's simply thrown in at the end, after a final mission which is just as bad as its eventual reveal. After having no significant plot developments in several hours, MGSV has you play through the entirety of the first mission, only this time with extra cutscenes at the beginning and end, only serving the purpose of answering a question that never existed. While I love the moment between Ocelot and Big Boss, this mission was a massive headache. The worst part is, mission 43 gave me hope. Being easily the best mission of the game, it has so much impact through its visual storytelling and strengthens Venom Snake's character significantly, more than the final mission ever could. It gave me hope that maybe, just maybe the rest of the game would be worth playing, but it really wasn't. This game had the potential to be the best in the entire MGS series, but ended up being a disjointed mess. It makes me wonder what it would have been like if Kojima and his crew were actually able to finish the game. Unfortunately, we'll never truly know. Though it was massively disappointing in the end, it still has the gameplay to hold it up. For that, I can't bring myself to call it a "bad game."