[Hint: This review will be Totally Awesome because I put those words in the title.]
Great praise should be given to Hideo Kojima for his greatest project ever, the interactive movie he has entitled Metal Gear Solid 4! With gripping realism, heart-pounding drama, and danger around every corner, wooden crate, tree stump, and other object that lies in our protagonist's path, nothing is held back in this grand tale!
Kojima is a master at weaving a thoroughly complex tale with so many twists and turns that you'll be begging to get off this rollercoaster ride! Witness Solid Snake reunite with characters like the old Kernel Cambell, Otaku Convention, Naomi "Naomi!" Hunter, and his evil brother Liquid Snakealot. See him sit around with new characters like Dennis Rodman and his Coke-loving monkey as he takes on the military-industrial complex that threatens to destroy the world!
Every single chapter starts out with rich movie scenery, featuring Solid Snake talking with people aboard a plane, or a ship, as he receives his orders for the next mission. Sometimes, there's even a small model of the Metal Gear Rex you can steer around the scene, and spot hidden extras like the three chickens named after the Terrible Infants, or the less-pussified Rainen lying in critical condition on a table. From here, you will learn all the bad things that Liquid Snakealot has been doing across the globe while Solid goes out on his secret missions to try and stop him.
But Kojima has given you some funny twists in this interactive movie. For example, there are various parts where you are expected to pick up the controller and actually make Solid move around and possibly even shoot people. It may seem shocking at first when you find out that this PS3-exclusive interactive movie actually requires you to do more than push X and trigger flashbacks, but unfortunately they are necessary in order to see the next riveting cutscene.
I'm not sure why they felt the need to include such trite gameplay in there when they had a perfectly good story to tell. I mean, you can't even pass it quickly like I usually can do in Counter-Strike. You actually need to use a little bit of strategy, lure your enemies into traps, and shoot them in the head. Plus, the main character has the body of my grandpa, yet he can mysteriously move just as well as Sam Fisher from the Splinter Cell video game series. This interactive part can be a little distracting from the MGS4 movie, though, especially the unrealistic bosses who can take a Javelin missile in the face and not die.
However, the actual gameplay soon fades away so that Kojima can continue his riveting tale of how war is bad, even though you may shoot several faceless bad guys throughout the course of the interactive movie. No longer does Solid have to concern himself with such things as "stealth" or "discretion" when he has an eyepatch that feeds him real-time data around the battlefield. This especially makes him a hit with the ladies, like when Marrow makes a surprise return appearance as the leader of a UN Peacekeeper team, complete with daddy issues and showing an entire powerpoint presentation to Solid.
Truly, MGS4 is an astounding tale, one that will be difficult to surpass in the future. Only a genius like Kojima could find a way to sew up all the plotholes from the story canon with the explanation of "nanomachines" for everything. From Naomi!'s constant appearances in this interactive movie to the reason why Solid can somehow survive walking down an irradiated tube and still have enough time to wail on Liquid Snakealot. It doesn't matter that the plot is pretty much held together with scotch tape and old gum, as long as one of the characters mentions "nanomachines", it suddenly becomes clear to the viewer.
What becomes clear, you ask? Only the fact that advances in battlefield technology will allow us to live forever while also eliminating all racial and religious prejudice from the world, so that we can become killing machines motivated only by power and greed instead of individual concerns. Thus, Kojima gives us a truly awesome cinematic experience. Also, Snakealot meets his end, and the guy that might be the boss from number two or the hero from number three makes an appearance, but I can't remember which because the script was so totally clear on who that guy on the gurney was.
On a scale of one to five, I give it a 4.5, because of the parts where Kojima got lazy and makes the viewer actually have to control Solid by himself. Other than that, it is a totally awesome tale that blends futuristic technology with old grouchy people, the military-industrial complex, and endless amounts of continuity porn [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ContinuityPorn]. An instant classic for those wishing to devote an entire week of their lives to this masterpiece. All hail Kojima!
P.S. For those who think this review is tl;dr? "Nanomachines."
Great praise should be given to Hideo Kojima for his greatest project ever, the interactive movie he has entitled Metal Gear Solid 4! With gripping realism, heart-pounding drama, and danger around every corner, wooden crate, tree stump, and other object that lies in our protagonist's path, nothing is held back in this grand tale!
Kojima is a master at weaving a thoroughly complex tale with so many twists and turns that you'll be begging to get off this rollercoaster ride! Witness Solid Snake reunite with characters like the old Kernel Cambell, Otaku Convention, Naomi "Naomi!" Hunter, and his evil brother Liquid Snakealot. See him sit around with new characters like Dennis Rodman and his Coke-loving monkey as he takes on the military-industrial complex that threatens to destroy the world!
Every single chapter starts out with rich movie scenery, featuring Solid Snake talking with people aboard a plane, or a ship, as he receives his orders for the next mission. Sometimes, there's even a small model of the Metal Gear Rex you can steer around the scene, and spot hidden extras like the three chickens named after the Terrible Infants, or the less-pussified Rainen lying in critical condition on a table. From here, you will learn all the bad things that Liquid Snakealot has been doing across the globe while Solid goes out on his secret missions to try and stop him.
But Kojima has given you some funny twists in this interactive movie. For example, there are various parts where you are expected to pick up the controller and actually make Solid move around and possibly even shoot people. It may seem shocking at first when you find out that this PS3-exclusive interactive movie actually requires you to do more than push X and trigger flashbacks, but unfortunately they are necessary in order to see the next riveting cutscene.
I'm not sure why they felt the need to include such trite gameplay in there when they had a perfectly good story to tell. I mean, you can't even pass it quickly like I usually can do in Counter-Strike. You actually need to use a little bit of strategy, lure your enemies into traps, and shoot them in the head. Plus, the main character has the body of my grandpa, yet he can mysteriously move just as well as Sam Fisher from the Splinter Cell video game series. This interactive part can be a little distracting from the MGS4 movie, though, especially the unrealistic bosses who can take a Javelin missile in the face and not die.
However, the actual gameplay soon fades away so that Kojima can continue his riveting tale of how war is bad, even though you may shoot several faceless bad guys throughout the course of the interactive movie. No longer does Solid have to concern himself with such things as "stealth" or "discretion" when he has an eyepatch that feeds him real-time data around the battlefield. This especially makes him a hit with the ladies, like when Marrow makes a surprise return appearance as the leader of a UN Peacekeeper team, complete with daddy issues and showing an entire powerpoint presentation to Solid.
Truly, MGS4 is an astounding tale, one that will be difficult to surpass in the future. Only a genius like Kojima could find a way to sew up all the plotholes from the story canon with the explanation of "nanomachines" for everything. From Naomi!'s constant appearances in this interactive movie to the reason why Solid can somehow survive walking down an irradiated tube and still have enough time to wail on Liquid Snakealot. It doesn't matter that the plot is pretty much held together with scotch tape and old gum, as long as one of the characters mentions "nanomachines", it suddenly becomes clear to the viewer.
What becomes clear, you ask? Only the fact that advances in battlefield technology will allow us to live forever while also eliminating all racial and religious prejudice from the world, so that we can become killing machines motivated only by power and greed instead of individual concerns. Thus, Kojima gives us a truly awesome cinematic experience. Also, Snakealot meets his end, and the guy that might be the boss from number two or the hero from number three makes an appearance, but I can't remember which because the script was so totally clear on who that guy on the gurney was.
On a scale of one to five, I give it a 4.5, because of the parts where Kojima got lazy and makes the viewer actually have to control Solid by himself. Other than that, it is a totally awesome tale that blends futuristic technology with old grouchy people, the military-industrial complex, and endless amounts of continuity porn [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ContinuityPorn]. An instant classic for those wishing to devote an entire week of their lives to this masterpiece. All hail Kojima!
P.S. For those who think this review is tl;dr? "Nanomachines."