Zero Punctuation: Metal Gear Solid 4

gasto

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Apr 16, 2008
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I agree with some posters here, in that games should be more "interactive movie" than "game/movie". The MGS saga seems to follow the latter.

I haven't played MGS4, but seen the beginning of it, and right from the beginning you are presented with ~25 minutes of cutscenes, and that is plain bad game design.

When I think, "I want to play a game", I am thinking of interacting, not watching. If I just want to watch, I think of movies/videos.

The MGS saga is excellent, you just have to get acquainted with the long cutscenes.

A more interactive and thus better game could have been created with the same budget and talent, by turning most cutscenes into interactive scenes.
 

Sandoggg

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Tempdude0 said:
...You essentially said it was a fallacy yourself, no tricking required there. As for the "so many people disagree with you" route, that just brings up the same old problems. Enough people like ANYTHING, that if one were to go by popular opinion than every single thing in the world would be awesome with sunshine, lollipops, rainbows and everything that's wonderful.
I?m not talking straight numbers, I?m talking ratios. And the fact that this is more along the lines of an opinion argument just makes it stronger.

Tempdude0 said:
Going into his motivations isn't really the bad writing part...But what they hey, why not. Yes, all that is correct, and by god it's some of the loopiest writing I've ever run into. Even streamlined it's kicking suspension of disbelief upside the head. Oh, and you forgot the part where the original idea was that Liquids arm was taking over as a second personality because of Ocelots Parentage. Because of his father being the Sorrow, it was believed he had psychic powers and it was as a result of these that the second personality manifested itself through the graft....Which, incidentally, he ditched later on for an actual replacement. One wonders why no one picked up on that.
Indeed.. I?m doing more research. And by that I mean talking with a friend who thinks he knows what?s going on. I?ll get back to you at some point.

Tempdude0 said:
See, I'll agree that the Metal Gears can be intimidating, but I'm guessing that's only because they can't speak. Every villain that had the opportunity to be truly imposing killed the chance by opening their mouths. Thankfully, Kojima didn't go the "smart robot" route with those things.
What did you think of the MGS bosses? For the most part they didn?t talk too much. Sniper Wolf was an interesting character, and as I?ve stated Vulcan Raven has been one of my favorites for a while. The fight with The Boss might not have been as dramatic as the one with Ocelot, but? idk. I?m not sure which one was better. They were both epic.

Tempdude0 said:
I never said they were unclear. I was wondering why you were referencing things not actually related to what was being written. That's not you being unclear, that's you being disorganized. Incidentally, the only difference between our two posting styles is that you choose to use quotes.
You?re lucky, I?m actually looking back a couple posts for something?
Alright, here?s what you said,
?and if the game/movie/book is truly great, even those who don't enjoy it can look upon it and go "Yeah, it's not my thing, but dammit...It's well done."?
And here?s what I said,
?Parents everywhere were cringing as GTA3 came into their homes. No one likes everything.?
As I said, GTA was on my mind and it was a good example of a game parents love to hate. I doubt they?d look beyond the car stealing and muggings long enough to say that GTA3 was ?well done?.

Tempdude0 said:
And that's what I was getting at. Aside from the perks that you get that relate to being a fan, the casual player isn't going to care much. In fact, odds are good they won't even know about some of the extras because they can't be arsed to check.
They SHOULD know about stealth camo and the bandanna? they were basic rewards in the first game, and have been obtainable in some way in every game so far. Unless MGS4 is their first game and they don?t know how to use the internet, those two items should be known. But whatever. This is not an argument.

Tempdude0 said:
Common flaw aside, yeah, I was getting at it doing it constantly. Interruption here and there is to be expected, but in the best games those "interruptions" aren't seen as such because they're handled well. As for the bouncer, go back and replay it at some point. It's entertaining enough, kinda...It just, well, you'd have to replay it.
I?ll consider replaying it sometime haha. First I?ve had the urge to play MGS 1 2 and 3. I don?t even have a PS or PS2 with me atm though?

Tempdude0 said:
That's terrible...At least Snake was an interesting character, so I can see that purchase. Though I have no idea what Riki-Oh is, despite it sounding familiar. To wikipedia/imdb I suppose.
Riki-Oh.. amazing. In that terrible way, of course. Where did you research take you?
 

Doug

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Apr 23, 2008
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Walls of text...Brain...willing self...to die...

I find it somewhat ironic in a debate about lengthly non-interactive sections (i.e. Cut scenes) we have these bloated text walls (i.e. lengthly non-interactive sections).
 

Tempdude0

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Jun 27, 2008
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Ratios fall under straight numbers. Where do you think a ratio would come from?

Just hit up the Metal Gear Wiki/Ocelot on wikipedia. It breaks it down as far as it can go...Which is sad, because in the plainest words it's still balls up.

I'll use MGS3 as an example because I'm more familiar with that...And by that I mean I've actually gone through it myself in addition to watching others play it. The Boss is as close as it gets to intimidating, but since she essentially expects you to kill her that aspect falls flat. Volgin grabs Snakes testicles in a manner NOT intended as torture, which, while creepy, isn't all that scary. That and all the monologuing he did. The Sorrow floats about and makes you feel bad. The Pain is bees, my god. The Fury, yeah, the outfit just kills any fear the flamethrower may cause. The End is crippled. I can't feel intimidated by a man in a wheelchair. Ocelot meows. All of them lose any intimidation due to either goofy outfit or monologues. Or, in the case of Ocelot, goofy outfit, goofy monologue, and he meows. Honestly man, that's like the antithesis of intimidating.

Fair enough, though the problem there is that GTA, all of them, aren't really "well done" I may enjoy them, but a children's wading pool puts their depth to shame. That said, GTA falls under the "games not being able to have universal appeal" thing. Either way, the reason I said disorganized was because you had originally referenced GTA in response to another person and had tossed it in the middle of a response to me. I was under the impression that you had somehow gotten mixed up again.

Let me clarify, I didn't mean stuff like that. I mean, say, getting the camo by tranquilizing all the bosses/not getting noticed/hitting all those frog things. I was referencing the crazy ass perks. Once again, just clarifying.

Sounds kind of like Fist of the North Star.

To Doug

In what way is it non-interactive? You're posting your idiocy, it can't be that non-interactive....Also, yes, ironic, if the word meant that.

1: a pretense of ignorance and of willingness to learn from another assumed in order to make the other's false conceptions conspicuous by adroit questioning

2 a: the use of words to express something other than and especially the opposite of the literal meaning b: a usually humorous or sardonic literary style or form characterized by irony c: an ironic expression or utterance

3 a (1): incongruity between the actual result of a sequence of events and the normal or expected result (2): an event or result marked by such incongruity

Because this discussion is TOTALLY ironic...God people are stupid.
 

Ryuuken

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Jul 24, 2008
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In all honesty. I don't see why everyone throws a shit-fit over what Yahtzee says over certain games. You know you'll like it and no one will tell you otherwise. His reviews are more for humor appeal than critical review.

I'm one of the biggest MGS fans, and found this review to be hilarious. Even though I pointed some things out, I still found it hilarious.

Main Point: Don't take what Yahtzee says so seriously.
 

GojiraX

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May 7, 2008
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Nobody is taking Yahtzee seriously. The problem is whether or not to take the people who don't take Yahtzee seriously seriously, and whether or not to take the people who take the people who don't take Yahtzee seriously seriously, seriously. Maybe we just shouldn't take anyone on the internet seriously ever, even when they say not to take them seriously. Hey, problem solved.
 

Snow28

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Aug 6, 2008
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sad every word is true but i love this game

http://www.halocrusades.com?p=page&x=4075
 

Sandoggg

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Jul 25, 2008
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Tempdude0 said:
Ratios fall under straight numbers. Where do you think a ratio would come from?
Looking at your S&M analogy, I claimed that the amount of fans of S&M among the total number of sexually active humans would be very unbalanced. You said that enough people always like anything, to which I said that just because 100,000 people enjoy S&M doesn't make it great. if 100,000 out of 200,000 total people liked S&M, I might agree, but the ratio is much smaller. To apply my argument here, the amount of people who enjoy MGS4 compared to the amount of people that wanted their money back is probably a landslide. You point out flaws but as we've been discussing, they all boil down to preference and/or the patience of the player.

Tempdude0 said:
Just hit up the Metal Gear Wiki/Ocelot on wikipedia. It breaks it down as far as it can go...Which is sad, because in the plainest words it's still balls up.
I find it cool that Ocelot admired Big Boss.. but who couldn't?
I had an interesting random flashback while someone was playing the MGS2 Soundtrack in my workspace today, when Ocelot mentioned to Gurlukovich of his betrayal that he abandoned Mother Russia during the Cold War... More reading must be done.

Tempdude0 said:
I'll use MGS3 as an example because I'm more familiar with that...And by that I mean I've actually gone through it myself in addition to watching others play it. The Boss is as close as it gets to intimidating, but since she essentially expects you to kill her that aspect falls flat. Volgin grabs Snakes testicles in a manner NOT intended as torture, which, while creepy, isn't all that scary. That and all the monologuing he did. The Sorrow floats about and makes you feel bad. The Pain is bees, my god. The Fury, yeah, the outfit just kills any fear the flamethrower may cause. The End is crippled. I can't feel intimidated by a man in a wheelchair. Ocelot meows. All of them lose any intimidation due to either goofy outfit or monologues. Or, in the case of Ocelot, goofy outfit, goofy monologue, and he meows. Honestly man, that's like the antithesis of intimidating.
=\ I liked The Fury's costume too.. I also thought his death cry was the best... in the form of raging fireballs with faces..
You forgot The Fear, although I'm sure you'd have mentioned something about his ridiculous backwards tree skittering and that tongue of his.
Ocelot wasn't really supposed to be intimidating either I'd say... He was the rookie here, John owned him pretty hard a few times in that game.
I guess MGS isn't really a game about intimidation haha.. It's not a necessary aspect thankfully.

Tempdude0 said:
Fair enough, though the problem there is that GTA, all of them, aren't really "well done" I may enjoy them, but a children's wading pool puts their depth to shame. That said, GTA falls under the "games not being able to have universal appeal" thing. Either way, the reason I said disorganized was because you had originally referenced GTA in response to another person and had tossed it in the middle of a response to me. I was under the impression that you had somehow gotten mixed up again.
I haven't played it, but I hear GTA4 is essentially... life. If you were a gangster of course. The depth seemed.. too much. Looked very cool of course. I'd probably do what I always do in GTA games and just run around and kill people and steal cars all day.

Tempdude0 said:
Let me clarify, I didn't mean stuff like that. I mean, say, getting the camo by tranquilizing all the bosses/not getting noticed/hitting all those frog things. I was referencing the crazy ass perks. Once again, just clarifying.
Yeah, I actually let my friend borrow the game and get all the frogs for me..

Tempdude0 said:
Sounds kind of like Fist of the North Star.
Something I'll have to look up I suppose.. Also, check out Crippled Masters.
 

Tempdude0

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Jun 27, 2008
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...And the main point went whizzing on by. The point is that no mater how many people like something, it doesn't inherently make it good. Hell, going back to literary lunacy, Finnegan's Wake is one of those "books you have to read if you want to know anything about blah blah blah."...And it's terrible. Yes, we realize it essentially invented a style of writing, but the problem there is that every person with little or no knowledge of punctuation came up with it first. That book was just the first that did it intentionally. The numbers are in no way indicative of the quality of the experience, it just means many enjoy it or think highly of it.

...Because he's the fruitiest fruit that ever meowed during a gunfight? Honestly, the character is pathetic. I enjoy his antics, but it's mainly because he's so laughably sad.

No, see, the outfit KILLED any fear of him. He was a crazy astronaut, which, while a cool concept, looks goofy wielding a flamethrower, especially considering how horrendously bulky the suit itself was. On the last point, that's the problem with it, it tries to put up at least one or two people as these bad-ass superhumans OH MY GOD THEIR GOING TO KILL YOU!...and instead of that, we get people like The Fear, bondage freak extrordinare or Volgin, Sexual Harassment King of the USSR.

To Indigo_Dingo

Some of what Yahtzee says is still fairly accurate though. The problem with the other side of the fence, the, "I like it which means it's good" school of thought implies that EVERYTHING is good. Period, end of story, it's all awesome. Once again, I have no issue with people enjoying things, but their enjoyment isn't the bar by which something is judged and they should stop using it as one in a discussion. If they're all like "Yeah, but I like it." Fine, be happy and frolic, I'm happy you're happy...Think of it this way, someone out there likes Superman 64 and Alone in the Dark. I dare anyone to defend either of those games as being good.
 

Klonoa Prower

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Jul 23, 2008
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There no such thing as a good or bad game... it all a matter of subjective personal opinion.

All... I think there's a formula or something for this...

chance of your post being read = number of words * .978 / current level of smug on the forums * 100

Anyway... I'm going to look up journey lyrics...
 

z121231211

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Jun 24, 2008
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GreyFox785 said:
Hey now, to be fair, it's obvious why Yahtzee had such a breeze playing. As it stands it's obvious he was playing on easy, how do I know? A tranquillizer that has infinate ammo? Anyone who's played the game knows that difficulty levels above easy do not have infinite ammo for anything but the Patriot. That explains the dulled down AI and the fact that it was easier to just run and gun, so don't get too mad at Yahtzee, he's just alittle insecure about his playing skills.
You know these things in the game called Drebin Points? I ran out of ammo for my tranquilizer during a boss fight, so I bought 100 more rounds on Normal.
 

metagaia

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Jul 23, 2008
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Klonoa Prower said:
All... I think there's a formula or something for this...

chance of your post being read = number of words * .978 / current level of smug on the forums * 100
Really!? I always assumed the opposite. Unless I really care about the debate, anything longer than 150 words has a chance of eliciting a tl:dr from me.

I would construct a better formula, but I need more data, I like a smug bit though.
 

Silver Patriot

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I liked MGS 4. I enjoyed it because I got out of it what I thought was worth it, the Story. I got Halo for the gameplay, The Orange Box for the. . . well everything and Geometry wars for the action. I knew what I was geting out of it. Though I do admit it has it's flaws. I also want to say I liked the cutsceans but then again I also enjoy reading the ten paragraph long arguments going back and forth between Sandoggg and Tempdude0. So whatever.
 

Mr. Purple

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May 1, 2008
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Yahtzee does a good job on touching down on foul points of a video game, which is why we want reviewes. That way we dont spend our time and money to find out a game sucks, but he fails to project that some of the games he reviews are great games behind the inevitable flaws. :\
So i tend not to take his reviews into actual consideration.