So.... Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, thoughts?

[jwonno]

Really don't like the look of this game. I know Hideo wanted to pass his legacy "on to a younger generation", they obviously don't understand that Metal gear was about more than mecha and cut-scenes. Spin-offs like this very rarely work.

Right, because there hasn't been a ninja in three out of the last four mainline mgs games. There hasn't been the theme of the thrill of battle....

You quoted me but then argued about a point I never made. I know the ninja is a recurring theme, I didn't say it wasn't. Unless you thought I meant the mecha (i.e. Metal Gears).

My point was that when stories or styles drastically change, such as replacing subtlety & stealth for rashness & action, they very rarely are as successful.

 

[shadow skill]

Really don't like the look of this game. I know Hideo wanted to pass his legacy "on to a younger generation", they obviously don't understand that Metal gear was about more than mecha and cut-scenes. Spin-offs like this very rarely work.

Right, because there hasn't been a ninja in three out of the last four mainline mgs games. There hasn't been the theme of the thrill of battle....

You quoted me but then argued about a point I never made. I know the ninja is a recurring theme, I didn't say it wasn't. Unless you thought I meant the mecha (i.e. Metal Gears).

My point was that when stories or styles drastically change, such as replacing subtlety & stealth for rashness & action, they very rarely are as successful.

Metal Gear isn't just about stealth or subtlety, hell MGS 4 was much more action oriented than the other games in part because the setting of an active combat zone allowed such a shift to work. Metal Gear happens to be one of those rare games where they have established characters that could support different types of games as part of a single franchise. Look at the Legacy of Kain series, the first game was much more like Torchlight or Dungeon siege in terms of gameplay, yet the Soul Reaver games were much more puzzle oriented and much more subdued affairs. These games worked because the gameplay and the rest of the game (story, voice acting, etc.) was good enough to support that kind of shift. Furthermore gameplay should also fit the character and when you can hold back the mass of something the size of Arsenal Gear it becomes a bit stupid to try and shoehorn the character into a stealth oriented kind of game. It would make as much sense as having Meryl do sneaking missions like Snake rather than a more direct approach.

 

[Shoggoth2588]

As much as I want this, I'm going to wait on two major deciding factors:

1) Reviews. This looks like it's going to be an awesome game but...well, so did Dragon Age 2

2) The possibility that this will be a Wii U release. Apparently there is interest to put this on the U and if I have to wait a few months or a year or so for a U version, I'll wait. I happily waited for Mass Effect 3 and, Arkham City so I can wait for this one too.

 

[jwonno]

hell MGS 4 was much more action oriented than the other games

Just because the gameplay element of MGS4 made open conflict more accessible, due to the story relevant theme of an all-out-war, does not mean that the game itself portrayed a story of action. Snake & co. still spent the entire plot trying to dissuade the conflict with minimal "action".

Spoiler

Assassinate Liquid Ocelot straight off, extract information from Naomi/Big Mama, hide Big Boss' remains, deactivate the nuke/GW

In my opinion this meant it wanted you to be subtle & stealthy in the face of open conflict, again integral to the Metal Gear Solid way.

gameplay should also fit the character...it becomes a bit stupid to try and shoehorn the character into a stealth oriented kind of game.

You're right, Raiden as it stands is not a great character for a stealthy game, hence the backlash from MGS2. Does that mean the Metal Gear universe can't be anything but stealth? No. But does that mean it a spin-off can ride on the success of the previous games by providing some nostalgia, a character resurrected from shame (but still quite moapy), and (some) good voice acting, bearing in mind the script isn't Hideo's? I doubt it.

 

[normalguycap]

Got it. Beat it today. I regret getting it. Story was a fucking mess. Characters were either bland, inconsistent or downright stupid. Gameplay was okay, unless you deviated from the very linear route they want you to play. Unique weapons useless. Subweapons clunky and useless. Camera sucks. Over reliance on parry. Music forgettable. Graphics and special effects are great, but those are the least important part of gaming. Controls are not tuned for precision. Stealth and AI are broken and dumb. They couldn't find a balance between KojimaProductions and Platinum Games. Once the intial wow factor is over (during the 2nd level sometime) you start to notice how bad it is. It's functional and I had some fun, but it's rather insulting to America and does not respect the Metal Gear Solid legacy like DMC didn't for Devil May Cry.

 

[IronMit]

I'm a die hard MGS fan but I'm not crying because it's a hack and slash. It's a spin-off its cool... I don't even care if it's canon with a silly story...Kojima retcons some of the stuff that happens in his own MGS game anyway.

From What I have seen and read;


5-6 hour campaign. That's it.

The 9/10 - 8/10 reviews are pretty stupid.I don't care if it's subjective...to only dock 1-2/10 (for a really short campaign, random camera, inconsistent AI/stealth, half useless unique weapons, and an OK parry/block system) is lame. I guess the parry/block system may be fine...but it's made it such a way that rolling/strafing is useless.

Unless your a massive fan of platinum games there's no need to get swept up by the hype. wait till its under £20

rev3games gave it 3/5. That sounds far. It's good OTT fun.

 

[Nieroshai]

Just watched the trailer again and holy shit that was stupid.

"Hey I can cut a car in half with a single stroke, but I have to slash this mook 15 times to cut him in half."

Or the police..

"Well we have guns on this guy and he has a sword, hey lets throw our guns away to fight him with batons!"

Yea that is pretty dumb. But I guess the conceit is that cyborgs can just dodge small arms. Raiden is able to block bullets during his ninja run. As far as the whole cutting thing you can cut the mooks at any time in one hit but you have to use blade mode which requires meter. In the demo I cut the legs right out from under one of the mooks in the first encounter. I'm glad you brought that up because I hadn't thought to use blade mode right at the outset to get rid of mooks.

I am reminded of the Grey Fox fight in Metal Gear Solid. He'd dodge your bullets and hit you for it. The only way to beat him was to wait until he was about to strike and sucker punch him. As little sense as it may make, Raiden is the third (or fourth, maybe?) Cyborg Ninja in the series, and even the weakest one was a ***** to hit.

EDIT: I think... no, you actually have to track him down and play his little hide and seek game, and guns were futile since he'd deflect them, but donkey punching him out of hiding worked like a charm.

 

[Nieroshai]

Got it. Beat it today. I regret getting it. Story was a fucking mess. Characters were either bland, inconsistent or downright stupid. Gameplay was okay, unless you deviated from the very linear route they want you to play. Unique weapons useless. Subweapons clunky and useless. Camera sucks. Over reliance on parry. Music forgettable. Graphics and special effects are great, but those are the least important part of gaming. Controls are not tuned for precision. Stealth and AI are broken and dumb. They couldn't find a balance between KojimaProductions and Platinum Games. Once the intial wow factor is over (during the 2nd level sometime) you start to notice how bad it is. It's functional and I had some fun, but it's rather insulting to America and does not respect the Metal Gear Solid legacy like DMC didn't for Devil May Cry.

The Metal Gear Solid games have all been insulting to America. It's Japan. Also, unless Raiden feels like a leaden truck chained to an elephant, there's no way the game's clunkier than the rest of the series. Also, Tranquilizer. No point in using any other gun. Ever. I can't wait to get my copy by post so I can see if the story really is so much of a betrayal, and how much of it is recent fans' predisposition to bash anything "different."

I could rant about DmC, but explaining the point of a reboot is like explaining to a preschool child where babies come from: futile in that they won't really listen, and it's not like they're going to do anything with the knowledge anyway. It's just easier to tell them babies are brought by fish-eating birds, just like it's easier to say Devil May Cry had a great storyline and DmC utterly betrayed it (by totally not having more story than the first 3 games combined).

Also:

Spoiler: Kojima Productions made this. No stealth, minimal plot, hard to control, retardedly short campaign, 100% amazing.

 

[Nieroshai]

As much as I want this, I'm going to wait on two major deciding factors:

1) Reviews. This looks like it's going to be an awesome game but...well, so did Dragon Age 2

2) The possibility that this will be a Wii U release. Apparently there is interest to put this on the U and if I have to wait a few months or a year or so for a U version, I'll wait. I happily waited for Mass Effect 3 and, Arkham City so I can wait for this one too.

Eh, Dragon Age 2 is only as bad as you let people tell you it is. I actually liked it better than a lot of RPGs. Insert Unpopular Opinion Bear here, or something.

 

[Nieroshai]

Too much of a shark jump for the MGS universe for me, plus I don't think we really need anymore DMC/GoW games.

...How is it a shark jump? If anything, this Raiden is actually much, MUCH weaker than MGS4's Raiden.

This Raiden had a bit of difficulty when he tried to throw a Metal Gear RAY into the air. MGS4's Raiden stopped Outer Fucking Haven while badly damaged and missing an arm. Outer Haven is a country-sized submersible battleship with a facsimile of Mt. Rushmore build into it.

As for the Cyborg Ninja, those were build off the technology utilized by the FROGs in MGS4. Pretty much everything in Revengeance was stuff present in MGS4.

I haven't played yet, but I think his power difference may have something to do with having a lot less cyber on him after the events of MGS4, or something. He got a facsimile of a human body back, and surely either he can interchange bodies or the transition is reversible and modular.

 

[Nieroshai]

Day one buy for me. I love Platinum Games. They haven't let me down yet.

This basically. Platinum Games seem to be the only Japanese developer that isn't trying to ape the style of western games these days, and is making some damn fun, over the top, Japanese style action games. Hell, even Vanquish, a third person shooter with a cover system, was absolutely nothing like any western third person cover based shooter. They're doing their own thing and it is awesome.

You remind me of a good argument about the game's length: a lot of Japanese games are short, because they're meant to be replayed many times, wringing out gameplay value through getting good at the game and exploring every inch of it, as well as getting a good score. Over there, score is still a pretty big deal while we abandoned it for achievements.

 

[Therumancer]

My thoughts are kind of simple. It's taken a stealth series and turned it into a brawler. It stars a protaganist I hate, and uses a nonsense word "Revengeance" which is almost hilarious when you think about it. I said 'no' early on.

What's more it strikes me as being kind of ironic that we have people doing backflips over a demo, trailers, etc... at the same time there are major controversies over being lied to by the gaming industry. Sure it's got an awesome Demo, but look at all the people who got screwed the same way over "Aliens: Colonial Marines" and truthfully that had more potential than this game.

I'm sure people will get in my face for saying this, but it's my thoughts on the subject. I recommend waiting to see what happens. To be honest it seems to me a lot of people psyched for this game ultimatly want more "Metal Gear", similar to how people who flocked to "Colonial Marines" really, really, wanted more Aliens. This blinded people to the obvious flaws.

On a lot of levels it surprises me to see so many people vocally supporting "Revengeance" given that at least with the western audience Raiden was pretty much a pariah and hated to an extreme in pretty much every Metal Gear discussion that came up. Especially given the alleged racist motivations for creating the character (ie having a Japanese protaganist for the Japanese audience given that it didn't go over well to have a Gaijin hero this way... something which kind of failed). With all the QQing about being forced to play as the guy, or watch his cut scenes, it's kind of shocking to see so many people getting behind playing an entire game as this guy.

Just my thoughts. I might give it a shot if the game comes out and gets some really good critical and fan reception over a period of time... but right now my thoughts are still along the lines of "no... just... no", perhaps combined with a bit of "WTF were they thinking when they thought this was the direction to take the series in".

 

[Kopikatsu]

Too much of a shark jump for the MGS universe for me, plus I don't think we really need anymore DMC/GoW games.

...How is it a shark jump? If anything, this Raiden is actually much, MUCH weaker than MGS4's Raiden.

This Raiden had a bit of difficulty when he tried to throw a Metal Gear RAY into the air. MGS4's Raiden stopped Outer Fucking Haven while badly damaged and missing an arm. Outer Haven is a country-sized submersible battleship with a facsimile of Mt. Rushmore build into it.

As for the Cyborg Ninja, those were build off the technology utilized by the FROGs in MGS4. Pretty much everything in Revengeance was stuff present in MGS4.

I haven't played yet, but I think his power difference may have something to do with having a lot less cyber on him after the events of MGS4, or something. He got a facsimile of a human body back, and surely either he can interchange bodies or the transition is reversible and modular.

He's actually significantly more Cyborg now, and he was upgraded from his MGS4 self. At the begnning of Rising, Raiden gets into a fight with Sam, who ends up cutting off an arm and eye. Which prompted him to get the upgrades.

 

[anthony87]

Pre-ordered it literally the second I finished playing the demo, not out over here for another week or so though. Must've played through the demo 20-30 times by this stage, it just oozes that Platinum Games style that I can't get enough of and I genuinely pity those who can't see the fun in this.

 

[DrunkOnEstus]

I know what I'm about to say is blasphemy in these parts, but MGS 3 disappointed me so much that I'm waiting until I beat 4 and have a handle on the "Guns of the Patriots" thing before playing this. It's Platinum games, so I know the engine and controls are rock-solid before looking at anything, but I want to know what the hell's going on (if I have any hope of doing that). Seriously, MGS 2 was my favorite one. People threaten my life in RL for saying that. Maybe this is worth it to be Raiden again...

 

[xplosive59]

I don't like it as I have said before, the soundtrack makes this game unbearble though. Absolutely disgusting Drum and Bass meets Celldweller and Linkin Park shit, this game really needs a soundtrack like GitS: SAC had.

The game would be better if you played as Goemon from Lupin III, then the slicing mechanic would make sense.

 

[Tohuvabohu]

My thoughts are kind of simple. It's taken a stealth series and turned it into a brawler. It stars a protaganist I hate, and uses a nonsense word "Revengeance" which is almost hilarious when you think about it. I said 'no' early on.

I thought it was a pretty obvious joke when the word became attached to the game. Given the OTT tone of the new trailer at the time, with the tagline "Revenge with a vengeance" coupled with the overuse of guitar. I'm pretty sure it was meant to be silly.

What's more it strikes me as being kind of ironic that we have people doing backflips over a demo, trailers, etc... at the same time there are major controversies over being lied to by the gaming industry. Sure it's got an awesome Demo, but look at all the people who got screwed the same way over "Aliens: Colonial Marines" and truthfully that had more potential than this game.

I'm sure people will get in my face for saying this, but it's my thoughts on the subject. I recommend waiting to see what happens. To be honest it seems to me a lot of people psyched for this game ultimatly want more "Metal Gear", similar to how people who flocked to "Colonial Marines" really, really, wanted more Aliens. This blinded people to the obvious flaws.

Hold on, didn't Aliens:CM not have a demo?

I really don't see how this is at-all comparable to the A:CM debacle. When you're looking at it the way you do, you can pretty much cast this sort of doubt on any future release for any game with any sort of hype. (Which isn't a bad thing, but still.)

I'm really not sure what you're going on about here. Besides, MGR is actually out now and it's had a very positive reception thus far.

www.destructoid.com/reviews-elsewhere-metal-gear-rising-revengeance-246016.phtml

Compare that to A:CM.

www.destructoid.com/reviews-elsewhere-aliens-colonial-marines-244711.phtml

Also, the part in the full-game that was in demo is significantly more polished.

On a lot of levels it surprises me to see so many people vocally supporting "Revengeance" given that at least with the western audience Raiden was pretty much a pariah and hated to an extreme in pretty much every Metal Gear discussion that came up. Especially given the alleged racist motivations for creating the character (ie having a Japanese protaganist for the Japanese audience given that it didn't go over well to have a Gaijin hero this way... something which kind of failed). With all the QQing about being forced to play as the guy, or watch his cut scenes, it's kind of shocking to see so many people getting behind playing an entire game as this guy.

I think a lot of the upset came from the bait-and-switch, since MGS2 was a sneaking game (aka 'Snake' game) starring a non-Snake person. as I remember at the time that there was no mention of the fact that we wouldn't be playing as Snake. Hell, even the original cover of the game had Snake plastered on the front with no mention of Raiden to be found.

Raiden himself wasn't quite the problem, I think the entire execution of the game and Raiden's character was botched. Even so, you can't speak for everyone since I've heard a lot of westerners say that they liked Raiden in MGS2.

Besides I don't think it's all that surprising people would want this game when you look at Raiden in MGS4. You may have never liked him sure, and maybe a lot of people never did either. But in general, Raiden was much more accepted in MGS4. And I thought he had redeemed himself all the while becoming an even more distinct character from Snake, and establishing that he is a badass in his own right.

Even back from the MGS1 days, people wanted a cyborg ninja game. And Kojima did want to make it happen.

Just my thoughts. I might give it a shot if the game comes out and gets some really good critical and fan reception over a period of time... but right now my thoughts are still along the lines of "no... just... no", perhaps combined with a bit of "WTF were they thinking when they thought this was the direction to take the series in".

Are you completely ignoring the fact that this is a spinoff, and the fact that Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes is a thing?
A cyborg ninja game set in the Metal Gear universe was destined to happen one way or another. If this is apparently the "wrong direction" for a cyborg ninja game to go in, then what is the right direction?

I don't want to seem like I'm jumping on you for having concerns over this game... But with the game being actually out now, and having a lot of positive feedback, I think a lot of your concerns can be put to rest.

Except for the concern of still-being-Raiden.

 

[WanderingFool]

Having played it (not beaten yet), I can say the Demo did not lie. But damn if the bosses arent a *****...