(NOTE: I will talk a lot about gameplay features and presentation. There will be talk about the story but there won't be any actual story/plot spoilers)



Is this the best stealth action game of all time? Is such a thing possible? Yes it is!


-BUDDY SYSTEM- This was my favorite part of the game so I will talk about it first. You can take animals, robots or an overly attached sniper along for the ride with you. The entire feature is probably the best AI buddy thing any game has ever done. I can't even think of a linear game that does what MGSV does when it comes to having a friendly npc with you let alone an open world game. The entire experience was kind of surreal and mind blowing. The game is so ahead of its time.

-AUDIO PRODUCTION- Amazing just like every MGS game in the past. The music, sounds and effects are all sublime. The intro song to the game is very good too. The dialouge is very engaging and well written just like all MGS games in the past. Lots of humor. Lots of nonsense.

-GAMEPLAY- Have you ever wanted to play a game whose developers are a bunch of talented overachievers? Yea this game is for you. Being able to infiltrate enemy outposts from any direction in an open world is an amazing thing. An open world where you roll on the ground while interrogating enemies and use dozens of fun gadgets to help you clear out enemies. There is nothing like it. The running, animations and controls are so well refined its rare to see so much depth in a video game. All of this paired with the buddy system created so much fun. The real great thing about this game is your helicopter. The entire game was designed around it. You will actually be rescuing people. You actually have to call extraction and carry your objective to the chopper. All of this happens under stealth world rules. Its really unique and methodical. Unlike most games out there that trigger a cutscene. This game will actually make you play out all the scenarios. Now of course you don't have to play stealthy if you don't want but it really is rewarding if you do. There are many options and so many different combinations for infiltration.

-MOTHERBASE- Some people probably didn't like this but I thought it was an excellent minigame within the bigger game itself. Managing motherbase and gathering high ranked soldiers was actually a very fun simulator. There was a lot of micromanagement and maintenance but its great. Its like metal gear manager :D

- FOB - This is a very controversial feature in the game but I felt it was a very innovative feature. You build a base and have to defend it from other people who might invade it. You can also invade other peoples bases and steal their resources, soldiers etc. This is very divisive among the community because you can be invaded while you are offline. As a result many people are terrified but at the end of the day its not a big deal because its not that hard to obtain money and resources in the game. Its actually very easy. Anways if you are into risky multiplayer feature you will like this. I spent a good 100 hours invading and actively defending. I had a blast and many close calls. The stealth gameplay and all your singleplayer tools are very well implemented into the feature. This section of the game is like VR Missions + Steroids + Dark Souls PVP + Kojima + lots of fun. You can easily lose hundreds of hours doing FOB stuff. This feature also introduces optional microtransactions but its not necessary in any way. The microtransactions don't really do much other than speed up the development time of items. But it doesn't matter because you will still be grinding resources to start the development. Whether you spend money on microtransactions or not you will grind a lot in this game. A lot.

- FOX ENGINE- The game is really well optimized and the gameplay is perfectly refined. The industry can learn a lot from this game. This is what happens when you leave a project in the oven for so long. It plays so well and you can tell Kojima productions poured their soul into this. Its really special. I played for over 100 hours and never had any crashes. The framerate was always smooth with the exception of like one cutscene. No bugs at all tho some reported a save bug which was quickly patched by the dev team.

BOSS FIGHTS - There were very few fights in this game compared to other MGS. The few fights that are here are very good tho. Its a completely different experience this time around so its really hard to judge. The game is open world and you don't have a life bar in the top corner telling you how much health you have. You don't have some magical rations to equip and use. The health is regenerating as a result you can die wthin seconds of taking damage. Some things like explosions will kill you in one shot. Overall I would say MGS3 and MGS1 had the best boss fights. MGSV is definitely better than MGS2 and MGS4 tho.

-STORY- Kojima probably got real tired of people making fun of MGS4 for having like 10 hours of cutscenes and only 5 hours of gameplay. This time around its very different. You are looking at a stealth action game with over 100 hours of gameplay and only like 5 hours of cutscenes. Its so different compared to all the previous games it kind of split the community. The presentation and pacing is very different this time around. You don't really see a bunch of silly over the top anime characters like you did in MGS4. Instead the story is much darker and you won't find as much cringe in it. The long pointless briefing cutscenes from MGS4 are not in this. Instead you get a lot of tapes briefing you with lots of information. You can listen to these tapes whenever you want. Some tapes are very good and contain a lot of important information. Some I wished Kojima made cutscenes but for what ever reason he didn't. Either way its absolutely critical for you to listen to these tapes. Not listenting to tapes in this game is equivalent to skippin cutscenes in previous MGS games. Some tapes are kind of long so make yourself some food and eat while listenting.

The only real flaw with the story and this game is that the ending was rushed. The ending itself was great but everything leading up to it was just not there. Its missing like a good 5-6 missions. The ending also raises a lot of questions about this long near 30 year story but unfortunately Kojima has left Konami and sadly we will never get any of those answers. Previous MGS games always had future titles to continue elaborating on the story but this time around we probably won't get that type of treatment. It is what it is.



CONCLUSION- Kojima pushed the stealth genre like 15 years into the future with this game. Its a must play and best game of the year without doubt. Take every stealth game released in recent years and all of them combined aren't even 1% of what MGSV is.

28 years of excellence from Hideo Kojima. Thank you for all the fun memories.

BigBossSalute.jpg

(NOTE: I will talk a lot about gameplay features and presentation. There will be talk about the story but there won't be any actual story/plot spoilers) Is this the best stealth action game of all time? Is such a thing possible? Yes it is! -BUDDY SYSTEM- This was my favorite part of the game so I will talk about it first. You can take animals, robots or an overly attached sniper along for the ride with you. The entire feature is probably the best AI buddy thing any game has ever done. I can't even think of a linear game that does what MGSV does when it comes to having a friendly npc with you let alone an open world game. The entire experience was kind of surreal and mind blowing. The game is so ahead of its time. -AUDIO PRODUCTION- Amazing just like every MGS game in the past. The music, sounds and effects are all sublime. The intro song to the game is very good too. The dialouge is very engaging and well written just like all MGS games in the past. Lots of humor. Lots of nonsense. -GAMEPLAY- Have you ever wanted to play a game whose developers are a bunch of talented overachievers? Yea this game is for you. Being able to infiltrate enemy outposts from any direction in an open world is an amazing thing. An open world where you roll on the ground while interrogating enemies and use dozens of fun gadgets to help you clear out enemies. There is nothing like it. The running, animations and controls are so well refined its rare to see so much depth in a video game. All of this paired with the buddy system created so much fun. The real great thing about this game is your helicopter. The entire game was designed around it. You will actually be rescuing people. You actually have to call extraction and carry your objective to the chopper. All of this happens under stealth world rules. Its really unique and methodical. Unlike most games out there that trigger a cutscene. This game will actually make you play out all the scenarios. Now of course you don't have to play stealthy if you don't want but it really is rewarding if you do. There are many options and so many different combinations for infiltration. -MOTHERBASE- Some people probably didn't like this but I thought it was an excellent minigame within the bigger game itself. Managing motherbase and gathering high ranked soldiers was actually a very fun simulator. There was a lot of micromanagement and maintenance but its great. Its like metal gear manager :D - FOB - This is a very controversial feature in the game but I felt it was a very innovative feature. You build a base and have to defend it from other people who might invade it. You can also invade other peoples bases and steal their resources, soldiers etc. This is very divisive among the community because you can be invaded while you are offline. As a result many people are terrified but at the end of the day its not a big deal because its not that hard to obtain money and resources in the game. Its actually very easy. Anways if you are into risky multiplayer feature you will like this. I spent a good 100 hours invading and actively defending. I had a blast and many close calls. The stealth gameplay and all your singleplayer tools are very well implemented into the feature. This section of the game is like VR Missions + Steroids + Dark Souls PVP + Kojima + lots of fun. You can easily lose hundreds of hours doing FOB stuff. This feature also introduces optional microtransactions but its not necessary in any way. The microtransactions don't really do much other than speed up the development time of items. But it doesn't matter because you will still be grinding resources to start the development. Whether you spend money on microtransactions or not you will grind a lot in this game. A lot. - FOX ENGINE- The game is really well optimized and the gameplay is perfectly refined. The industry can learn a lot from this game. This is what happens when you leave a project in the oven for so long. It plays so well and you can tell Kojima productions poured their soul into this. Its really special. I played for over 100 hours and never had any crashes. The framerate was always smooth with the exception of like one cutscene. No bugs at all tho some reported a save bug which was quickly patched by the dev team. BOSS FIGHTS - There were very few fights in this game compared to other MGS. The few fights that are here are very good tho. Its a completely different experience this time around so its really hard to judge. The game is open world and you don't have a life bar in the top corner telling you how much health you have. You don't have some magical rations to equip and use. The health is regenerating as a result you can die wthin seconds of taking damage. Some things like explosions will kill you in one shot. Overall I would say MGS3 and MGS1 had the best boss fights. MGSV is definitely better than MGS2 and MGS4 tho. -STORY- Kojima probably got real tired of people making fun of MGS4 for having like 10 hours of cutscenes and only 5 hours of gameplay. This time around its very different. You are looking at a stealth action game with over 100 hours of gameplay and only like 5 hours of cutscenes. Its so different compared to all the previous games it kind of split the community. The presentation and pacing is very different this time around. You don't really see a bunch of silly over the top anime characters like you did in MGS4. Instead the story is much darker and you won't find as much cringe in it. The long pointless briefing cutscenes from MGS4 are not in this. Instead you get a lot of tapes briefing you with lots of information. You can listen to these tapes whenever you want. Some tapes are very good and contain a lot of important information. Some I wished Kojima made cutscenes but for what ever reason he didn't. Either way its absolutely critical for you to listen to these tapes. Not listenting to tapes in this game is equivalent to skippin cutscenes in previous MGS games. Some tapes are kind of long so make yourself some food and eat while listenting. The only real flaw with the story and this game is that the ending was rushed. The ending itself was great but everything leading up to it was just not there. Its missing like a good 5-6 missions. The ending also raises a lot of questions about this long near 30 year story but unfortunately Kojima has left Konami and sadly we will never get any of those answers. Previous MGS games always had future titles to continue elaborating on the story but this time around we probably won't get that type of treatment. It is what it is. CONCLUSION- Kojima pushed the stealth genre like 15 years into the future with this game. Its a must play and best game of the year without doubt. Take every stealth game released in recent years and all of them combined aren't even 1% of what MGSV is. 28 years of excellence from Hideo Kojima. Thank you for all the fun memories. BigBossSalute.jpg