Phantom Pain - Second Playthrough

[A.G.]

So one of my Christmas gifts was MGS5 Ultimate Edition. The game does create a new save file so I decided to take the opportunity and start a fresh game. Nothing carried over from my first run. I'll post my thoughts as I move through the game. I won't focus too much on the story as it relates to other games, but more as a stand-alone release.

So far I cleared Episodes 1-12, rescuing Emmerich. I also did a few Side Ops, at least some that mattered. I went more systematic this time, already having DD and Quiet available. Ignoring where I know the story is going, the first 12 chapters work rather well. And I love being around Russian soldiers. Though already you can see cracks. Eliminating a random tank unit and "helping" invisible guerrillas blow up Russian machinery are Main Ops while finding Emmerich is a Side Op... really?! The Skulls work fine early on. Pitty they don't evolve them in later battles. Not a fan of saving structure. I am enjoying starting over much more than replaying these chapters with everything unlocked. This game simply doesn't allow you start over. MPW was more forgivable since replaying the chapters later on was actually more enjoyable.

In any case, the Afghanistan section was enjoyable. I do recall liking Africa much less. We'll see how it goes.

[A.G.]

Cleared a few missions in Africa, just beat the Skulls hiding in the truck. Definitely slower. Each mission, though in a big area, feels empty. The Ground Zeroes sandbox was smaller, but it felt more functional. More things happened and you could handle the mission objectives in various ways and order. You don't get that in the Phantom Pain missions. I think they should have combined many missions. 2 or 3 episodes combined into one would give more substance to the experience. For example, how about you take the episode where you infiltrate the oil plant with the one where you tail a translator to find the prisoner and then wrap it up with the Skulls in the truck. It would minimize empty space where you literally do nothing or sneak through pointless check points. You could tackle them in any order you want and let hem connect organically, like in Ground Zeroes. Let's face it, the episodes in Phantom Pain are limited in operational area, it's not a true open world. So why not fill it up like in GZ? The amount of content would be the same, but the story would flow better and you would be more engaged instead of being bored. Seriously, this is the only game where I get bored during gameplay. Sneaking through the story-relevent areas is fun, but the empty areas are a killer!

[A.G.]

Additional problem. The repetitive missions with low story payoff end up being a chore. Save this guy, assisnate that guy, grab a truck, blow a tank... and these are the main story ops. At first in was bareable. But by the time I got around mission 20 it took its toll. It's just hard to get motivated to spend 1-2 hours sneaking around with no payoff. It amazes me that the very man the pioneered the notion of making story and gamplay blend into each other could drive them that far apart in this game. The two feel completely separate.

Side note, the idea that Snake conveys his emotion without speaking is BS! The cutscenes are terrible! Especially when other characters get emotional. When you save Miller and he is pouring his heart out Snake just stares at him. It's a very strange moment that just doesn't work. The notion that Kiefer brought something special to the table is crazy. Facial and voice acting we see in Uncharted and The Last of Us are far superior.

We'll see how much longer I can keep going. But chances of moving into chapter 2 are slim.

[A.G.]

Just wrapped up Chapter 1. So 31 episodes (32 counting the opening). I was determined to get silencers on my sniper rifles so I cleared all the needed side ops to get the Legendary Gunsmith. Ironically, when I went back to the main Ops it was more prisoner saving. This further highlighted the problem that there is no real difference between side and main ops. Fighting Eli at Mother Base is a side op but taking out a random commander is a main op... ugh... And as Chapter 2 opens we see further cracks in design. The very first episode is yet another rescue of a random guy followed by two episodes were you repeat random tasks from Chapter 1 but with frustrating difficulty. It's simply bad game design. Also, Psycho Mantis is far too powerful, operating and even lifting Sahelanthropus. Someone with that level of power would've killed Solid Snake in 2005. I mean, lifting statues and books seems weak now.

As for the story... well, this playthrough didn't change my mind on it. It's bad. Just bad. All of it. The whole XOF/Skullface story led nowhere. His master plan is terrible and reaks of a cheap SciFi movie. Just seeing how much of a piss this game took on the other titles is frustrating:

- Volgin is a fire demon driven by hate? WTF?!
- Mantis has god-like powers... what happened to those by MGS1?
- Ocelot is basically Roy Campbell and shows none of his personality from the other games. None!
- Big Boss is barely in it and we get no real insight into his character.
- Liquid has interactions with Ocelot, Mantis and Metal Gear in 1984? Why?! They start out so good with his intro as the leader of child soldiers and then completely ruin it.
- What is up with Sahelnthropus using that sword whip that can create exploding rocks! What kind of BS is that? No explanations given on such magical tech in 1984!

Yes, the gameplay is super refined and the mechanics are fantastic. Everything is intuitive and smooth. Clear indication of near-30-year evolution. But the story and the game design are laughable. Amateur even. There is no structure to the game or the plot. A true Phantom Pain, leaving me feeling like a true Metal Gear game is somewhere in there. While some may want to think it was intentional, I feel it was a product of poor vision and lack of respect for existing canon. Ironically, it was the opposite that made me interested in Metal Gear. I always respected that MGS1 was not a reboot. It continued the story of the 2D games and referenced their events with respect. MGS5 shows no such respect for any titles except MPW.

[A.G.]

So after 56 hours I completed Phantom Pain. This run was much smoother than my first, no doubt. Not much to say on Chapter 2. It has nothing in it that warrants a new chapter. The most memorable episode is the quarantine platform infection, but that could've been done during the first outbreak. Emmerich' exile was amusing, but again they stretched it out. In fact, that is the general feel of this game, stretch. Even story specific missions end up being repetitive, like the 10 wondering Mother Base soldiers or the escaped children. That's 15 separate missions between those two initiatives. Ironically, I feel that by simply condensing and combining things you could get about 30 hours worth of a main story. It would be far smoother and coherent.

In any case, below is my score for this game after a second play through:

Gameplay: 9/10. It's fun and handles better than any other title. However, I hate the ridiculous healing system and lack of actual first person view. I don't want to use the goggles each time.

Visuals/Audio: 8/10. The game looks good but the open world design downgraded a lot of the visuals. I still feel that a remastered MGS4 would look better. Voice acting was very legit, especially Miller. I would not have minded Kiefer Sutherland if he was limited to Phantom Pain. Ground Zeroes was set months after MPW and should've used Hayter. The soundtrack was good as well, but I really missed the MGS theme. I guess that's another reason MPW and MGS5 felt different to me. The music is completely different.

Game Design/Structure: 3/10. As outlined, the game structure is broken with little logic to the organization and flow.

Story/Characters: 1/10. Bad all around. It lacks everything that typically makes a Metal Gear game great, including attention to detail. Characters were poorly developed and the game lacked any sort of emotion and heart. The idea of having Venom say very little or in most cases nothing at all was a colossal failure as it ruined potentially good scenes. Nothing was more painful to watch than the jeep ride with Skullface. When Sins of the Father started playing I couldn't stop laughing. It was a true face palm moment.

Overall: 52.5%. F-

[fgdj2000]

I agree with your first two points fully. Gameplay and Visuals/Audio.
I'd have to replay it some time to really comment on Game Design/ Structure and Story/ Characters. From memory, I say it isn't as bad as you say, but admittedly I haven't played the game in a while but for an occasional 20-30 minutes of running and messing around in the open world. I just have too many other games I want to catch up on (The Witcher 3, Yakuza series, The Last Guardian, AC Syndicate, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Deus Ex 2011 & 2016) and too little time.

[Cerberus_0408]

Yeah, a sh*tLOAD of games seem to have significant replay value but eventually wear out. MW3 for one. Survival initially seems fun. After a while, however, crap gets boring. Same goes for zombies in BO and WAW.

[fgdj2000]

My point was, these days I rather play something new and fresh than replaying the same old games over and over again. I will replay MGSV and of course some of the older ones at some point. But as I find myself having less time, I don't find replaying games that I've known inside and out for years (particularly MGS1-4) not that appealing, when there are other really good games on my shelf that I haven't had time for yet.

[A.G.]

I'm the opposite. With less time to play I prefer to play things that I know I enjoy. I don't follow gaming news as much. The thing that always fascinated me before was how games tried to evolve a virtual world. That's why Metal Gear was such a good fit, always being ahead of the industry. But as we got to the PS3 era, creating such worlds became easy and less manual. All games look great now and borrow from each other. So I'm just not as interested in following it.

Side note, I do want to list the MGS5 chapters that I enjoyed and will replay in the future:

Ground Zeroes main mission
Ground Zeroes DejaVu mission (a true goodbye Kojima chapter)
Awakening/Truth
Phantom Limbs
Where Do The Bees Sleep
Pitch Dark
The War Economy
Retake The Platform (best chapter in the game! Total MGS2 feel!)
Voices
Shining Lights Even In Death

[fgdj2000]

I have replayed the prologue. Probably not a good idea since I have to learn for my exams.^^
It was a bit of a roundabout way, but I backed up my saved data and then deleted it from my PS4 harddrive. Thus I retain all DLC (from the CE) and Update files and can start a new game.
Overall I enjoyed the prologue. The hospital looks great. Great level of detail, lot's of NPCs, impressive visuals. I also liked how the whole Ishmael and Ahab dynamic played out, now that I know the twist. It's a bit like watching The Prestige for the second time and I'm wondering how well this feeling holds up. What bugged me, however, was that at times it felt like you were wrestling with the game for control. Every 10 seconds or so it would wrestle control away from you, do cinematics and then hand the controller back to you. In the beginning you can literally only push forward. I don't like this highly scripted trend in modern games and it's sad that the game adopted it here. Luckily, this lasts only this mission as far as I remember. It also goes on a bit too long imo. It's similar to MGS3 where you have to sit through an eternity of set-up cutscenes until you can start the game for real. It's like a threshold guardian which you have to fight past and are then rewarded with the real gameplay and story. The appearrances of tue Man on Fire are actually the most tedious here. I was much more engaged when the soldiers were slaughtering the doctors, nurses and patients. Great horror element. Overall the positives overshadow the negatives for me, dispite the terrible gameplay and the overused Man on Fire.

[A.G.]

Man on Fire was too much, completely agree. Even by crazy Metal Gear standards a fire demon just seems out of place. It really doesn't relate to Volgin's original powers. Plus the notion that I can drive him away with a super soaker kinda kills the intimidation.

I love the tense feeling and the soldiers slaughtering everyone. But more freedom of control would've been nice. Also, how blind are these guys? The bit on the staircase where the go up then down seemed strange. The soldiers can only seem to be able to see 2 feet in front of them.

So, in all honesty, how much better would this have been if Ishmael was Gray Fox? Or Solidus? It would've been short, but I would've enjoyed that cameo. Plus having Big Boss and Venom in the same hospital (and the same room) was just dumb. They had 9 years. Move Big Boss somewhere else. Not mush of a trick if the original and the copy are in the same room.

[fgdj2000]

I think the man on fire himself wasn't too much although it was a bit out there. I thought he appeared too much in the opening and slowed things down quite a bit. I think Mission 46 should have been playable from Ishmaels perspective or somewhat shortened. Similar to how the opening of UC2 was shortened once you reach the same point in the the main game. As an optimist, I think Kojima wanted to do more little changes, but ran out of time, but who knows.

Just finished Mission 3. I like Episode 1. The world really opens up here and you have a chain of mission objectives. Gather intelligence of Miller, free Miller, escape from the Skulls. And everything is dynamic. You can opt to not gather intelligence and you can even manage to pass by the Skulls without them detecting you. However, admittedly rebuilding Motherbase seems a chore to me and also playing through all the filler missions that don't develop the story. On principle, relegating much of the story to cassette tapes so you can freely listen to them in the field sounds good. In practice, however, you end up missing parts of the tapes during gameplay because you have to pay attention to the game and - most annoyingly - Miller and Ocelot always talk over the tapes. The tapes should at least pause or you should be able to silence MIller and Ocelot at the touch of a button.

I still think gameplay is great - the missions are extremely dynamic and it is really up to you to make them interesting and turn him from a suspense thriller into an action feast - and I like how Venom Snake plays out as a character now that I know the twist. I also like Ocelot a lot more now. He is so friendly and nice and calm, but in reality he is using you just as much as Big Boss is using you. There are also little setups like Miller asking, if it's really Snake.

[A.G.]

Episode 1 is very well done. I replayed it several times.

Ocelot bugs me though. With the personality change and the voice all I see is Joel from The Last of Us. Don't get me wrong, very pleasant character. But it's not Revolver Ocelot. Even if it's an act, we should've seen the real Ocelot personality towards the end. But we don't. Even in the secret Zero tape he is the same.

So far, looking at the list of episodes I listed as enjoyable we are agreement.

[fgdj2000]

Jan 18, 2017 20:19:24 GMT -5 A.G. said:

Episode 1 is very well done. I replayed it several times.

Ocelot bugs me though. With the personality change and the voice all I see is Joel from The Last of Us. Don't get me wrong, very pleasant character. But it's not Revolver Ocelot. Even if it's an act, we should've seen the real Ocelot personality towards the end. But we don't. Even in the secret Zero tape he is the same.

So far, looking at the list of episodes I listed as enjoyable we are agreement.

Yeah, who would have thought?

I also listen to more of the cassette tapes right away. Usually when I am on my way and crossing empty terrain. Ocelot and Miller chatting in can get quite annoying, but overall it is a bit like MGS3 Existence when they would use codec conversations over gameplay footage. Maybe that is the reason for the empty landscape? So you have time to listen to cassette tapes? xD
Once again, I like how they characterised Venom Snake and how Ocelot "reminds" him of all the things he is supposed to know. Honestly, the first time I thought that Venom Snake didn't feel like Big Boss and I am pleased that apparently this was all intentional. I used also a model that was very similar to the medic in GZ and made him a little older.

It is also good to know what items are important beforehand and focus on great weaponry in developement. Hopefully, this will turn some of the bosses into less of a bullet sponge.

[A.G.]

I just focused my development on maxing out just a few key weapons:

Tranq gun
Assault
Tranq Sniper Rifle
Missile Launcher

Overall it made the fights much easier.