Review: Metal Gear Solid 4

Earnest Cavalli

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Review: Metal Gear Solid 4

Metal Gear Solid 4 is easily one of the most highly-anticipated games to be released for the PlayStation 3, but is it a masterpiece or an unintelligible mess?

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PedroSteckecilo

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Feb 7, 2008
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An excellent review but... since when does The Escapist review games? Is this going to be a regular thing?
 

darthzew

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I want see Yahtzee's review above all else. It's easily the best feature on this website (not by a wide margin though, this is an excellent site). But anyway, that was a good review. I don't think it was a really spectacular one, but it does show that one day the Escapist could house some of the best reviews on the 'net.
 

Susan Arendt

Nerd Queen
Jan 9, 2007
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PedroSteckecilo said:
An excellent review but... since when does The Escapist review games? Is this going to be a regular thing?
Absolutely. You can look forward to seeing reviews on a weekly basis from here on out. Any requests?
 

Virgil

#virgil { display:none; }
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Jun 13, 2002
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PedroSteckecilo said:
An excellent review but... since when does The Escapist review games?
Since February, 2006 [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/reviews]
 

sammyfreak

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Dec 5, 2007
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Susan Arendt said:
PedroSteckecilo said:
An excellent review but... since when does The Escapist review games? Is this going to be a regular thing?
Absolutely. You can look forward to seeing reviews on a weekly basis from here on out. Any requests?
Limbo of the Lost please.
 

Gigantor

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Dec 26, 2007
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sammyfreak said:
Susan Arendt said:
PedroSteckecilo said:
An excellent review but... since when does The Escapist review games? Is this going to be a regular thing?
Absolutely. You can look forward to seeing reviews on a weekly basis from here on out. Any requests?
Limbo of the Lost please.
http://uk.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/theelderscrollsivoblivion/review.html?om_act=convert&om_clk=gssummary&tag=summary;review

Same difference, non?

On a serious aside, that was a good read. However, I'm going to stop reading these reviews of MGS4 altogether pretty soon, simply because there's so little prospect of my playing it in the near future.
 

zombielifecoach

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Feb 21, 2008
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Decent review. My opinion is that MSG4's greatest strength, is also it's greatest weakness. This game, I whole-heartedly believe was crafted for the fans. Period. It's comparable to never having heard of JRR Tolkien or any of his writings, then sitting down to watch 'Return of the King'. It's an amazing movie on it's own, full of spectacle and a beautifully woven story. But without the knowledge of the previous films(story) you miss out on so much, it will leave you questioning what the hype was about. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the game. In ALL aspects. There are points in it, especially the Fourth Act, that literally filled me with heartfelt nostalgia. But for those without a relatively strong familiarity of the prior games, you'll get the gist of what's going on-but you won't have a rich sense of, "OH MY GOD! I GET it now". Game play, I believe feels just slightly off balance, but not enough to hurt the game. I'm on my third play-through, and I think It's just because Kojima throws EVERY possible type of game mechanic into this game so just as you grow comfortable with one way of playing (BAMF!) your playing a rail-shooter (BAMF!) 3rd-Person action (BAMF!) and so on... The loading is present but, once again, for the FANS the initial 8 minute load, if your like me your sitting there staring at what's going on on the screen and salivating at what's to come. The short "now loading" moments never really seemed inexorable to me and I wasn't affected by the between mission load times(3 minutes) mostly because of ALL the game gives you throughout. To close, this game may be one of the greatest pieces of fan service ever. Thanks to Kojima for giving such a stellar ending to those who have followed his work from the beginning.
 

zombielifecoach

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Of course now reading what I wrote, I could have just wrote, "DITTO". I am an redundant ass. Sorry about that folks.
 

Sylocat

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Nov 13, 2007
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Interesting choice of movie comparisons.
While most games are content to present a rather straightforward plot in the vein of any Hollywood action flick, Metal Gear Solid, like Kubrick's films, has always been defined by its circuitously branching plot details that almost always border on incomprehensible to those not taking detailed notes and consulting Wikipedia every 20 minutes.
Kubrick's movies are also defined by butchered source material, stilted dialogue, hilarious overacting, Diabolus Ex Machina [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DiabolusExMachina] endings, and snooker-loopy plot twists that no other director in the history of cinema would ever be allowed to get away with by so many film critics.

Of course, I don't know how apt the comparisons are since I haven't played MGS4 yet...
 

Robert Plummer

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Jan 22, 2008
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Sylocat said:
Interesting choice of movie comparisons.
Kubrick's movies are also defined by butchered source material, stilted dialogue, hilarious overacting, Diabolus Ex Machina [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DiabolusExMachina] endings, and snooker-loopy plot twists that no other director in the history of cinema would ever be allowed to get away with by so many film critics.

Of course, I don't know how apt the comparisons are since I haven't played MGS4 yet...
That's a pretty spot-on analysis of Metal Gear Solid's story.

Susan Arendt said:
Absolutely. You can look forward to seeing reviews on a weekly basis from here on out. Any requests?
Does this mean my Soldier of Fortune review will finally be posted?^^
 

Jedted

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darthzew said:
I want see Yahtzee's review above all else. It's easily the best feature on this website (not by a wide margin though, this is an excellent site). But anyway, that was a good review. I don't think it was a really spectacular one, but it does show that one day the Escapist could house some of the best reviews on the 'net.
Me too, i was disapointed to see Yahtzee post a review of Haze this week. Is MGS4 not out yet downunder or what?
 

Susan Arendt

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Jan 9, 2007
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Robert Plummer said:
Does this mean my Soldier of Fortune review will finally be posted?^^
Can't say that we'll be including that one, but we do hope to feature Guest Reviewers plucked straight from the community. More as it develops! :)
 

ElArabDeMagnifico

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Dec 20, 2007
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I thought the whole reason you had to install during each act was so we didn't have to have a 30 minute install at the beggining, and since each install is just 2-3 minutes you hardly feel it.

Hell, I consider it a blessing in disguise, if I didn't have those "intermissions" then I would have never put down the controller and taken a break, and I'd have to get a new pair of glasses since my eyes took so much damage.
 

Hurray Forums

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Jun 4, 2008
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Don't get me wrong I love the MGS series but "it completely obliterates any other digitized attempts at storytelling" to me is a bit laughable. I can agree that is the best storytelling out of all the games to get a decent amount of media attention but best of all time is going too far. The greatest thing about MGS in my mind is it combines a great story and great gameplay while other games that might be better in one category usually sacrifice the other to achieve it.
 

Eagle Est1986

That One Guy
Nov 21, 2007
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A good review but I felt that it didn't really scratch the surface of what's in the game.

Also, I felt that the story telling was let down by the fact that some of the voice actors, David Hayter for one, don't stand up to the standards that have since been raised by other games. Bioshock, Heavenly Sword and Uncharted: Drakes Fortune all had much better voice acting which I think MGS4 could have benefited from. In the same breath though, I would have been heart broken if David Hayter hadn't played Snake.
 

Rucknar

Man of few words.
Jun 6, 2008
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Good review. I've gotta say that MSG4 hasn't motivated me to go out a buy a PS3 though.

Jedted said:
Me too, i was disapointed to see Yahtzee post a review of Haze this week. Is MGS4 not out yet downunder or what?
No I dont think it has, plus it only came out here on Monday(?), and Yatzee posts his reviews on Wednesday, as much as he is awsome, I dont think he could play the game then write and produce a review in 3 days.
 

Eagle Est1986

That One Guy
Nov 21, 2007
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Rucknar said:
No I dont think it has, plus it only came out here on Monday(?), and Yatzee posts his reviews on Wednesday, as much as he is awsome, I dont think he could play the game then write and produce a review in 3 days.
It came out, worldwide, on Thursday of last week so he could have probably reviewed it in time. Still, I'd rather he took his time with it, to be honest, I've yet to hear of someone who had bad first impressions and then didn't go on to like it by the end of the game. He'll like it but he'd never let us know it.