280: Psycho Mantis, Qu'est-ce que c'est?
- Thread starter Brendan Main
- Start date
Wow. Ok Brendan, I have to stop a moment and congratulate you. That article was Fuckin Awesome.
I literally shivered remembering how creepy it was listening to Mantis "read your mind."
Truly a puppet who can see the strings. We should all be so lucky...
I literally shivered remembering how creepy it was listening to Mantis "read your mind."
Truly a puppet who can see the strings. We should all be so lucky...
There was also another one in the 4th game.DTWolfwood said:
When Snake is in Shadow Moses, Otacon tells him to stop and switch out discs, but snake says there's no second disc to which Otacon replies "OH yeah we're on the PS3 multi-layered discs"
Snake: "grrr Otacon get a grip"
That made me seriously LOL XD
Ah, good ol' Hideo. He has such great ideas for games but always takes them so far out that any power they'd have end up being greatly dilluted. It really worked well for Psycho Mantis though.
I always thought that one of the signs of games stepping into the boundaries of SRS ARTZ would be when it started to make metacommentaries outside the realm of comedy, but somehow I missed they have such a powerful precursor in here.
The Metal Gear series is still pretty bad though.
I always thought that one of the signs of games stepping into the boundaries of SRS ARTZ would be when it started to make metacommentaries outside the realm of comedy, but somehow I missed they have such a powerful precursor in here.
The Metal Gear series is still pretty bad though.
i'll add that to my "One more reason to actually play the game, eventually" list XDMadara XIII said:
when i was playing Metal Gear Solid 4 and was fighting Screaming Mantis, i did the controller switch, trying to avoid using my syringe because of what Naomi said earlier that using it too much will reduce it's effects and i didn't want to loose it effects then cause i was expecting an apocalyptic battle against a new Metal Gear (shows how much of a sucker i was)
back in Metal Gear Solid, i was probably 15, i think, anyway, i worked out right away Mantis wasn't reading my mind, i didn't put my controller on the floor and felt it vibrate in my hands knowing that the rubble function was called at that moment and the trick relied on my doing as the game said, the reading of my kills and alerts i knew he was reading variables in the game code as i had played GHOST BABEL on the Gameboy Color and knew of the thats i would get at the end, the prediction of my attacks i knew that there was a function between the check for the button press and the call to the function to make Snake move that was only used just for that battle, as for reading about other games that was saved, never knew that, i had the PS1 game and Metal Gear Solid was my only Konami game, the rest of my memory card was for Final Fantasy and Digimon World, but it was still cool how the creators though about using the hidden data that players never saw to pull off tricks like that
as for beating him, i didn't do the controller swap till my second play though while i was trying to listen to every possible Codec message i could get in every situation, my first time fighting Mantis i used grenades and emptied every one of my weapons, he could dodge the grenade but sometimes it would bounce back and he wouldn't see it, sometimes he would be caught in the explosion, either way, i made a mess of the office and ran out of ammo at the end, made it hard after that, if you want a challenge in Metal Gear Solid, beat Mantis without switching ports and on the highest difficultly, i've yet to do that (mainly because the disk swap for Metal gear Solid doesn't work on my PS3, at least when i tried it 2 years ago it didn't)
back in Metal Gear Solid, i was probably 15, i think, anyway, i worked out right away Mantis wasn't reading my mind, i didn't put my controller on the floor and felt it vibrate in my hands knowing that the rubble function was called at that moment and the trick relied on my doing as the game said, the reading of my kills and alerts i knew he was reading variables in the game code as i had played GHOST BABEL on the Gameboy Color and knew of the thats i would get at the end, the prediction of my attacks i knew that there was a function between the check for the button press and the call to the function to make Snake move that was only used just for that battle, as for reading about other games that was saved, never knew that, i had the PS1 game and Metal Gear Solid was my only Konami game, the rest of my memory card was for Final Fantasy and Digimon World, but it was still cool how the creators though about using the hidden data that players never saw to pull off tricks like that
as for beating him, i didn't do the controller swap till my second play though while i was trying to listen to every possible Codec message i could get in every situation, my first time fighting Mantis i used grenades and emptied every one of my weapons, he could dodge the grenade but sometimes it would bounce back and he wouldn't see it, sometimes he would be caught in the explosion, either way, i made a mess of the office and ran out of ammo at the end, made it hard after that, if you want a challenge in Metal Gear Solid, beat Mantis without switching ports and on the highest difficultly, i've yet to do that (mainly because the disk swap for Metal gear Solid doesn't work on my PS3, at least when i tried it 2 years ago it didn't)
I'm going to try to play Metal Gear Solid on my PS3. I'll let you know how the Mantis Fight goes. It could get interesting.
Funny no one's mentioned Eternal Darkness on the GC. Yes, it came out a year later, but 4th-wall breaking was pretty vicious in that as well... IMO, even nastier. It was also random, so you could play one or two times and never have it happen and then on the third playthrough hit the awesome "NOT MY SAVE FILE!!!!" moment.
Good breakdown of the character/game, but just curious as to why you decided to write about this now? It's a pretty thoroughly-discussed topic, and the game itself is fairly old now. Not that I didn't enjoy the read, it just felt a quite random thing to bring up.
I agree with teknoarcanist's mini rebuttal though. Even though the boss did break the 4th wall, the way it did so somehow managed to pull you in to the emotional state of the game as well, often without the player realizing it.
I'm just now playing through MGS4 for the first time, there's already been a bunch of those.
I agree with teknoarcanist's mini rebuttal though. Even though the boss did break the 4th wall, the way it did so somehow managed to pull you in to the emotional state of the game as well, often without the player realizing it.
That was MGS2. It was the Patriots AI posing as Campbell to try and get you to give up. MGS as an entire series is riddled with 4th-wall breaking moments, from major things like that, to the more minor tips from characters on your codec, telling you to save your game or do things in various game menus. It's kind of a series trademark.DTWolfwood said:
I'm just now playing through MGS4 for the first time, there's already been a bunch of those.
FA FA FA FA FA FFFFFF...
OT: I really must getting around to playing a Metal Gear game. I don't mind super long cutscenes, and the concepts they throw into these games sound really good. Question is, should I start from the PS1 and work my way up? Or just pick one at random? Or, an even better question still, will I even have the time to play one?
Damn, ninja'd. By several days in fact. I really should have read this earlier.Raziel_Likes_Souls said:
OT: I really must getting around to playing a Metal Gear game. I don't mind super long cutscenes, and the concepts they throw into these games sound really good. Question is, should I start from the PS1 and work my way up? Or just pick one at random? Or, an even better question still, will I even have the time to play one?
..I don't know. Isn't the game already fighting with the fact that you're only interfacing into the game-world with the controller, and watching a TV..?Brendan Main said:
Like the other guy - when the game was suddenly aware of me, that I saw the game through a TV - that immersed me in the narrative and the running theme about the nano-machines, the system, virtual soldiers, and so on, in a new way.
Because I didn't get Kojima's comment on video-games until that point. Or - I understood the reference, and I could read and hear the words, and so on - but I didn't experience it until the game broke the "rules".
That was beautiful. Mantis truly is head and shoulders above the rest of any of the bosses out there.
There's also a great part in Metal Gear Solid 4 where you fight another psychic boss. If you go into the PS3 options and change your controller to #2, there's a brief scene where Snake complains that he can't move and Otacon chides him for not having the controller set to #1. Good stuff.Madara XIII said:
Raiden is an even bigger wussy in MGS4. Sure he's a better fighter and indeed gets some great fight scenes, but he's also a suicidal wuss whose every line of dialog throughout the game made me wish he'd shut up and just end himself already.Madara XIII said:
Really love this article. Gave me a new perspective on one of the weirdest and craziest boss fights I've ever encountered.