{"id":19475,"date":"2016-03-15T22:12:27","date_gmt":"2016-03-15T12:12:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/?p=19475"},"modified":"2016-03-15T22:12:27","modified_gmt":"2016-03-15T12:12:27","slug":"metal-gear-solid-v-the-phantom-pain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/?p=19475","title":{"rendered":"Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"mgs5poster\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Platform: \u00a0<\/strong>Playstation 4
\nDeveloper: \u00a0<\/strong>Kojima Productions
\nPublisher:<\/strong> \u00a0Konami<\/p>\nW<\/span>hen Big Boss, the hero of Metal Gear Solid V,<\/em> confronts an enemy soldier in the arid terrain of Afghanistan, he is presented with many choices.\u00a0 He could shoot to kill the soldier using weapons ranging from handguns, rifles, semi-automatics to grenade launchers.\u00a0 He could choose to incapacitate the soldier with a tranquilizer dart.\u00a0 He could sneak past the soldier, maybe crawling on his belly, tip toeing around them or using the cover of darkness to aid him.\u00a0 He could take him hostage by drawing a gun on him or putting a knife to his throat, interrogating him for useful intel.\u00a0 He could knock him out and zip him out of the hotspot using a \u2018fulton\u2019 balloon.\u00a0 He could sick his dog on him.\u00a0 He could order a sniper to take him out.\u00a0 He could use a bi-pedal mech to dispatch him.<\/p>\n

Or he could turn around and go the other way.<\/p>\n

When it comes to gameplay mechanics, Metal Gear Solid V<\/em> is the first ever open world game in the series and it offers players an unparalleled number of choices.\u00a0 Not only are there a multitude of ways to approach enemies, the choices you make can be influenced by a whole host of other factors.\u00a0 Is it daytime or nightfall?\u00a0 Are there other soldiers around?\u00a0 Is your mission briefing predicated on discretion or can you charge in guns blazing?<\/p>\n

Metal Gear Solid V<\/em> is Hideo Kojima\u2019s swan song with the series, which he has poured his heart and soul into for over twenty five years.\u00a0 It is by far the biggest game in the series and the switch to an open world environment has improved the game in the best way possible.\u00a0 MGS V<\/em> feels fresh, re-invigorated and is far more contemporary than Metal Gear Solid IV<\/em>, a much more linear game which has its own merits but was showing its age when considering its core gameplay.<\/p>\n

Metal Gear Solid V also takes a base building concept first introduced in the handheld title MGS Portable Ops<\/em> and adds it to the mainline series for the first time.\u00a0 Players are able to capture mercenaries and extract them from the hotspot using a weather balloon device called a Fulton.\u00a0 The Fulton is a glorious addition to the game and has a hilarious animation that dramatically whisks people skyward.\u00a0 The in-game record keeping tells me that I have fultoned over 500 people in the game and it never, ever got old.\u00a0 Better still, once upgraded, the fulton can basically capture anything that isn\u2019t pinned down to the ground.\u00a0 Animals, artillery, vehicles, shipping containers\u2026even tanks.\u00a0 It\u2019s a unique mechanic that becomes compulsive in a Pokemon \u2018gotta collect \u2018em all\u2019 sort of way.\u00a0 Once you master the art of quickly incapacitating an enemy hotspot, it feels incredibly satisfying and cathartic to run around strapping a fulton onto everything in sight.<\/p>\n

The base building mechanic is both substantial and disappointing at the same time.\u00a0 After accumulating enough troops, you can begin to unlock new features including the ability to expand your base, research and unlock new weapons and send troops out on missions of their own to produce more resources.\u00a0 Unfortunately the base building aspect of the game became worse<\/em> after the game\u2019s launch as an ungainly \u2018freemium\u2019 model was shoe-horned into the game, encouraging players to spend real money to speed up construction and unlock extra content.\u00a0 A pity, since the core base building system is pretty sound.\u00a0 It\u2019s certainly not anything that\u2019s egregious enough to spoil what is otherwise a superb game however.<\/p>\n

\"mgs5scene\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Metal Gear Solid V<\/em> has a ton of content.\u00a0 For his final hurrah, Hideo Kojima appears to have pushed his team to the hilt and produced a mountain of challenges for the player to tackle.\u00a0 If anything, I would venture to say that at a certain point, perhaps he\u2019s spread the game too thin.\u00a0 It is an absolute thrill to play but after the fifty hour mark clocked over, I felt that I had my fill of the game and had revisited some locations one time too many.<\/p>\n

On the flip side, if there is one aspect of the game I would like to have seen more of, it is Kojima\u2019s signature excess and flair with regards to the cut scenes.\u00a0 In a genuine shocker that few people would have predicted for the esteemed game designer\u2019s final MGS<\/em> game, MGS V<\/em> is weirdly lean on story content with cut scenes being few and far between and the content doesn\u2019t come close to rivalling either the length or the craziness that takes place in MGS IV<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Although most of the game is bereft of Kojima\u2019s usual cinematic stylings, the notable exception is the games incredible introduction which is set in a hospital.\u00a0 This sequence which runs for roughly an hour is one of the most jaw dropping opening passages of play that I have ever experienced in a game.\u00a0 It is part horror, part action and sets the players expectations for a level of storytelling intensity that the rest of the game can\u2019t sustain.\u00a0 It\u2019s a real pity and perhaps the absence of more cut scenes is one of the concessions to the game development getting cut short when Kojima and Konami parted ways in acrimonious circumstances.<\/p>\n

\"mgs5\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It should be noted that after a run of four games, voice actor David Hayter was replaced by Hollywood actor Keifer Sutherland for the role of Snake.\u00a0 This was a source of much controversy with fans prior to the game\u2019s release but ultimately, Sutherland was a reasonable replacement and it didn\u2019t take me long to get used to the switch.<\/p>\n

In many ways, it still seems hard to believe that Kojima has parted ways with Konami and this is really it.\u00a0 Kojima and Metal Gear<\/em> feel as synonymous as Miyamoto and Mario<\/em>.\u00a0 He was one of gaming\u2019s true auteurs and although it remains a valuable and cherished IP, it seems nuts to think in future, Konami will forge ahead with a Kojima-less successor.<\/p>\n

But if this is to be the send-off then at least it\u2019s a fond farewell for Kojima and his fans.\u00a0 Moment to moment, there wasn\u2019t much else in 2015 that could top the thrill of riding a chopper across the savannah to the accompaniment of a David Bowie soundtrack.\u00a0 The Man Who Wasn\u2019t There blares over the PA as you land a click away from the enemy base camp.\u00a0 You scout the area.\u00a0 Count up the troops.\u00a0 Make yourself a game plan.\u00a0 Then move in.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Platform: \u00a0Playstation 4 Developer: \u00a0Kojima Productions Publisher: \u00a0Konami When Big Boss, the hero of Metal Gear Solid V, confronts an enemy soldier in the arid terrain of Afghanistan, he is presented with many choices.\u00a0 He could shoot to kill the soldier using weapons ranging from handguns, rifles, semi-automatics to grenade launchers.\u00a0 He could choose to …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":19476,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1869,1647,2470,1871,1872,1702],"class_list":["post-19475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gaming","tag-hideo-kojima","tag-konami","tag-metal-gear","tag-metal-gear-solid","tag-metal-gear-solid-v","tag-playstation-4"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19475","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19475"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19475\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19480,"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19475\/revisions\/19480"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thefatwebsite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}