I always had a love-hate relationship with the MGS series. One one hand, it's one of my favorite game series of all time, on the other, there are so many decisions and things they did with it that did not go so well in most games in the series, that it makes it hard to have blind faith in Kojima games. The guy is both a genious and a moron at times, often in the same game.
I still regards MGS1 and MGS3 as two of the best games ever created, mostly because they were self-contained, mostly coherent narratives with great, memorable characters and settings and that did so many things almost perfectly and because they nailed the gameplay for their respective time. They had a great mix of story vs gameplay, they had self contained plots that were well established and conclusions that befit and gave the game an emotional and narrative payoff.
Then there's games like MGS2 and MGS4, cutscene infested mess of a game filled with corny plot twists and that imho miss the mark overall. I mean, both MGS2 and MGS4 had great gameplay systems, but barely any decent gameplay segments to use them. I mean, thank god for MGO, cause otherwise MGS4's great combat system would have been barely used since the campaign only had two real acts followed by three linear acts that barely qualify as a game. MGS2 was pretty much a MGS1 reharsh on a bland location, constantly making you backtrack to disarm bombs with a non-charsmatic main character... And don't get me started on the loss of any believability this series had, something MGS4 made even worse by solving any plot hole with "it was nanomachines".
Games like Portable Ops and Peace Walker seemed like side diversions to milk Big Boss's timeline for as many games as possible before catching up to the past, just like Ground Zeroes does feel like a demo that was sold at retail. Overall, there's something I don't like about how Kojima keeps moving Big Boss's character transformation act at a snail's pace just so he can make as many games as possible before the rise of Outer Heaven. I mean, what we all wanted to see was the rise of Foxhound and Outer Heaven, instead we saw the San Hyeronimo uprising, the rise of a couple of oilrigs that get destroyed and now, maybe, if Kojima is feeling kind, maybe, just maybe MGSV will end with the setup for MG1 finally established, although I doubt it... Otherwise we would be building Outer Heaven proper and not another lame oilrig. I never really got why people love Peace Walker that much, it has short missions, the worse stealth in the series, it's a grindfest of repetitive missions and gmp and soldier farming and overall, the plot brings nothing new and kinda breaks the timeline and believability of the Big Boss games in regards to tech development (AI flying robots in the 70s, riiight).
It's somewhat annoying to see that Kojima absolutely nailed the mood and seriousness of war in the trailers and Ground Zeroes, yet pretty much all he showcases of MGSV gameplay depict an overused of corny peace walker-esque gadgets that break immersion and go for giggles over realism. Horse Poop that knocks out guards and sends jeep crashing, check, cardboard box with pinup, check, inflatable statues that keep saying "kept you waiting huh"... Check.
I also have a hard time believing Kojima will deliver on his promises. I mean, MGS3 was supposed to be an open jungle where you could take numerous paths to reach the main base, MGS4 was supposed to be a complex game about choosing sides and helping militia or PMC and influencing conflict, so I'm half expecting MGSV to be a series of not too memorable side ops set on a huge mostly empty map that's tedious to navigate due to it's scope, basically driving five kilometers to reach a small base and rescue a guy / get intel , with a couple real story missions every now and then to advance the narrative.
Go back and play Snatcher and Policenauts and you'll see just like in MGS4, that Kojima has this huge idea for a big mystery in numerous chapters , he stats making very large and interesting "acts", then it seems like he's pressured to complete the game and the latter half of the game extremely short acts/chapters with very little interactivity, wrapping things up hastility. You can spend hours in the first acts, then minutes completing the final acts, as if Kojima wanted to be able to claim "this game has 5 acts" when in fact it has two proper acts and a couple filler acts that act more like epilogues than anything else.
Overall, I say I have some faith in MGSV. If it can avoid being too ridiculous with fultons and poop jokes, if it can maintain the tense and dark vibe of Ground Zeroes, if it does not introduce a billion more high tech stuff that did not exist in the 80s and if truly advances Big Boss's story and not just have him build another nation that is discarded by the end... But like all other MGS games ,it has the potential to be the greatest game ever, or a plothole mess filled with going in circles in a big empty map... Guess only time will tell.
