I guess it depends on what we look at. Storywise is MGSV a disappointment? Sure. It could have been so much more. But the story in MGS games have always been just glorified well executed Hollywood homages. Kojima is a huge film fanboy and it shows. So that to me isn't the core of what MGS is. I feel that pretty much every structured proper mission in MGSV is a great MGS game experience. There's a great balance of the weird, the mysterious, the exciting, and the wacky - although much it it also depends on what you want to bring into a mission and how you want to do it. I had a blast. I know that some people felt really burnt out by the empty open world and the crappy and repetitive side ops, but I never really wasted a ton of time on those.
It's a funny one, because I entirely see what you mean about every mission being like a mini-MGS adventure. In the future, rather than booting up MGS 1, 2 or 3 to get my Metal Gear fix, I'll be booting up MGSV and creating my own adventure through the open world. MGSV is essentially an 'espionage infiltration operation simulator'. A create-your-own-MGS.
However, it's not quite the same as the old games IMO, because:
1) there's no brilliantly designed 'gathering your equipment on the field' experience, which included scouring corners and crannies for advanced/secret items, which was key to root-MGS (calling in ammo/suppressor drops in MGSV was a mistake IMO and it all should have been in the game-world)
2) there's no intelligent roadblocking, in a Metroidvania sense, e.g. getting keycards, unlocking new parts of the map, etc - which works even in open world
3) there was no disguise mechanic - which is classic MGS and would have shone in MGSV
4) the fact that you can only enter missions on-foot via helicopter drop-off is disappointing to me - a classic MGS staple was always the very idiosyncratic ways of getting into your operation; underwater personal-sub, HALO jump, in-cognito with enemies, etc. Imagine if we could pick 'underwater entry' or 'parachute entry' or 'disguise entry' etc on the map, rather than just 'chopper'
I still understand what you mean, but the key things which made the older MGS games satisfying in gameplay are absent from MGSV. It has its own massive suite of brilliant gameplay systems, which I adore, but they don't feel like what originally made MGS great.
Again, I don't really think this is a problem - I'm just arguing the terms.
Its lack of story is bad. Its barren open-world is bad. Chapter 2 is very, very bad. Its repetitive missions, some of which feel very similar, are bad.
- There's loads of story content. In terms of hours and words,
more than several of the older MGS games. Not to mention the late-game cassette tapes match the best cutscenes of MGS2 IMO, they are utterly brilliant
- the open world isn't a sandbox and isn't based around side quests. So it's not empty at all. The game's levels are
only 'open' to facilitate any angle/approach the player wants. You have to stop thinking about it as an open world ala an RPG or action game (e.g. GTA or AC). MGSV is a series of large bases/levels which are connected by a larger meta-space, so that you have complete freedom of approach.
There isn't meant to be any substantial content between bases
- the missions only feel repetitive if you one-shot them and pure-stealth them. Boot the game up and try getting the 'Side objectives' on the Main Missions. That's when MGSV really shines. Every single mission has countless permutations, variations, depth of objectives and depth of approach. But if you play it as a straight up stealth game it
will become monotonous
The fact that it's an unfinished product is bad. Its lack of boss fights is bad.
These are definitely huge problems, though, yeah.
