Metal Gear Solid 4 review

By BatRastered — December 27, 2010
Tags: kojima-productions konami ps3-exclusive review

I bought this game with my PS3 slim over a year ago. I finally got around to playing it.

MGS4 has been sitting in the shrink rap since I bought it. I felt obligated to play this game since IGN wanted to increase their rating scale to 11 to handle this game, and it got perfect scores from Gamespot, Gamepro, G4, and Game Informer as well as the official US Playstation magazine, which I expect is biased.

My PS3 was up to date thanks to a Modnation Racers revisit last week, so thankfully I didn't have to apply a patch, however the game does require an install. This takes about 10 minutes during which time Solid Snake is on the screen chain smoking cigarettes. Seriously, he just takes one out, lights up, smokes it, and repeats the whole process over and over while the game is installing. Awesome. Meanwhile the game is displaying helpful hints on the screen like "If you feel ill, stop playing immediately." Great advice!

The first level, if you can call it that consists of a cut scene of you arriving into a war-zone on a truck full of other Jimmies with a voice over by Snake about how much war sucks and how far up his ass his underwear is riding. After 10 minutes of this blithering and blathering, you finally get off the truck and are given control of Snake for the first time. There's really nothing to do in the tiny area you're dropped off in except take a look around at the fighting and crawl under the truck to get to the other side. As soon as you crawl under the truck, you are shown another cut scene before being given control of Snake again. This time you need to walk around the side of a building. Cut scene. Now some walking tank things show up. Avoid them and walk into a hallway. Cut scene.

Getting the picture? Yeah, I played about 3 minutes and watched about 25 minutes of cut scenes at this point. It doesn't get better. The graphics are good and the cut scenes are at least done in-engine, so at least the experience is seamless.

The shooting controls were designed by a 3-armed retard, requiring you to push the L1 button (and hold it) to bring your weapon up, triangle to use the targeting system (a laser sight for your pistol, or scope for a rifle, etc) and finally R1 to shoot. Note that the triggers are not used for this, they are for the menu system to switch between weapons and item. WTF?

The "stealth" gameplay basically consists of you stepping two inches out of cover, getting spotted, killing the guy who spotted you using the horrible shooter controls, running away to hide somewhere and putting the controller down while your waiting for the alert to be called off two minutes later while you go make yourself another drink.

The story only makes sense to Jimmy, who thinks he actually understands it but couldn't tell you even one of the character's names besides Snake and will tell you that he's beaten the space mission 7 times. (What?) I'd rather spend 45 minutes trying to get the third star on level 2-12 of Angry Birds than sit through another Kojima cut scene.

Verdict: Flush it

Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots

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Release Date: Jun 12, 2008

Buy it! 76% - Rent it! 5% - Flush it! 19%

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Metal Gear Solid 4 review

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