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I can't get over how bad Metal Gear Solid is

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MGS1 is one of the first examples of 'actually good' voice acting and to call it trash is coming at the game with a modern mindset. In the context of the year it came out, MGS1 was mindblowing and perhaps trying out the more modern MGS3 or MGS5 will suit OP better.

People don't understand that this is a Japenese game made for the western audience, where the dialogue was written in Japanese first. People don't understand that this is when 100% voice-acted dialogues were considered impossible. People don't understand that this is a PS1 hardware with only one analog stick. People don't understand that this game is the reason your Blacklist and Arkham exists. People don't understand that a lot of things we take from granted right now was not possible back then and yet Kojima made it happen and showed the world you can make a really good narrative game with engaging characters and missions and gameplay and espionage and double crossing and a Hind D and codecs and mind blowing soundtrack and fantastic boss fights and villians and cutscenes and supporting characters. People don't understand that MGS was doing so many things that developers only HOPE they could do on a PS1 hardware.

People don't understand how to appreciate history.
 
1. Stealth. What happened here? There's no stealth in the last 75% of the game. It's just a ton of boss fights and forced shooting.

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I have no words. OP just stop, you don't deserve the game.
 
Excuse my ignorance, I plan to get into the series eventually as I respect what it is, (Barely played the spin off Metal Gear Acid and loved it) but whats wrong with twin snakes?

I am pretty unknowledgeable of Twin Snakes, but what I think I remember is that it embellishes on parts that made it seem dumb (I mean, Metal Gear is already super ridiculous, but still), and introduces mechanics from MGS2 while still keeping the core gameplay and design of MGS1. Most notably is the tranquilizer gun, which I think I remember reading just made Snake OP.

I've also heard that the opinion of Twin Snakes becomes better if you treat it as Raiden playing through a VR simulation of the events of MGS1, where Snake's legendary mission is embellished.
 
People don't understand that this is a Japenese game made for the western audience. People don't understand that this is when 100% voice-acted dialogues were considered impossible. People don't understand that this is a PS1 hardware with only one analog stick. People don't understand that this game is the reason your Blacklist and Arkham exists.

People don't understand how to appreciate history.

Enough said. Shameful thread.
 
In the end Big Boss > Solid Snake. Metal Gear Solid 1, 2 and 4 never managed to capture my interest at all, but MGS3 is one of my favorite games of all times, Peace Walker was good, Ground Zeroes was a really good demo and MGS V is shaping up to be another one of my most favorite games.
 
Don't bother with the rest of the series. Many of your gripes won't be resolved in the sequels and each successive game is a gateway to its sequel. There won't be a light bulb moment that makes you "get it".

The MGS games are the only ones in the stealth genre that I kind of enjoyed, but it was more for the crazy-ass story & characters than for the stealth stuff (which I really don't enjoy).
 
One question, were you riding off with Otacon into the sunset?

Yes.

Question: Is there more stealth in the rest of the games? I wanted to play a stealth series, but really I was forced into shooting almost everyone after the half way point. A perfect example of this are the elevator sequences.
 
5. Solid Snake. This must be the worst main character I can remember.

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His voice is ridiculous, but the real problem is that he is nothing like he should be. They say he is a combat legend who only cares about surviving, but then he falls in love with a girl he has know for all of 5 minutes. And at the end of the game, he is unable to pull the trigger at a critical moment.

That was kind of the point. He's not an 80s uber-action hero, he's a subversion of them.
 
I knew this would happen. People who have no exposure to it, goes back and plays a game from 1998, and there is just no way, that the thematic integrity and emotional impact you felt back then will resonate with you the same way.

When this game came out nobody had seen anything like it. People collectively lost their shit. the graphics where amazing, the story was fascinating. the entire game was spell binding and intense.
You going back to an old ass game and judging it by modern standards. You can't.



MGS1, 2, 3 and 4 all need proper remakes. Even 4 is 8 years old and need AI/UI/Combat/Camera/Control upgrades. But to give them the MGS5 treatment is a complete series rework.

But they could sell each of them for 60 dollars. 240 dollars is a lot of money if Konami got on this for real.
 
This too. MGS1 is basically as old as I am, and when I played it a few years ago, I played it with the mindset of a PS1 game. You can't go into a game that's old with the expectations of the same things games have today.

The first time I played MGS1 the PS3 was already out, and I still consider MGS to be one of the best game series out there, and a lot of it was due to that game.

The first game is one of the PS1 games that have aged the best actually.
 
I marathoned the series having never played it back in 2011 starting with Metal Gear Solid 1.

MGS1 is fucking fantastic even over a decade later, one of the finest gaming experiences I ever had, the best in the series. Yes, I think it is better than MGS3 which is also an incredible experience.

If you hated MGS1 then I don't know what to tell you. I absolutely hate stealth games so thus dislike MGS's gameplay, but everything else in the game is so good it overpowers it. Like I said, the games are experiences, and they are incredible ones.

If you had a bad time with MGS1, move on, there's no hope for this series for you as you already played the greatest in the franchise.
 
Keep playing! MGS2 is one of the greatest experiences ever and then MGS3 will shatter you into a shell of a human, wondering why video games are even allowed to be made.
 
When this game came out nobody had seen anything like it. People collectively lost their shit. the graphics where amazing, the story was fascinating. the entire game was spell binding and intense.
You going back to an old ass game and judging it by modern standards. You can't.



MGS1, 2, 3 and 4 all need proper remakes. Even 4 is 8 years old and need AI/UI/Combat/Camera/Control upgrades. But to give them the MGS5 treatment is a complete series rework.

But they could sell each of them for 60 dollars. 240 dollars is a lot of money if Konami got on this for real.

Just because it's old doesn't inherently inhibit a response from you. Needless to say, I agree he shouldn't be judging it on modern standards, because if you do, it becomes a lot harder to enjoy it.

And nah, 3/4 don't need remakes. 1/2 I would argue are fine as is, but that's a diff argument. But yeah, 3 especially, it's pretty perfect as it is, weird controls and all.
 
If he hated MGS, I think he'll really struggle with MGS3s controls.

Then again, I also agree with everyone that it's a superb game, and I know a lot of people that love it.
 
I think it was the best game in the series and I really liked it when it came out, one of my favorite games on the PSX... that said, I don't think you are off base completely. Storytelling in these games is atrocious, characters are unique and have interesting abilities but are batshit insane at the same time and everything is woven into an illuminati story about a serious topic, war, mixed with occasional slapstick and tits. It's a very strange mixture, I always thought this must seem insane to anyone who comes in contact with it unprepared for the very first time.

I'm not trying to shit on the series by the way, there are many fans of this formular but on the surface, this is what the series is, at least to me.
 
That reminds me of another two complaints I had.

1. The torture scene was awful. Being forced to press a button super fast is stupid.

2. The backtracking. Ugh, it was awful. Please, someone try to defend the backtracking in this game.

Torture is supposed to be terrible.

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I don't even understand how you complain about this much voice work when voice acting was still a back of the box listed feature. It's certainly the first game I played that tried to make me feel bad about killing the enemy. I can see how the gameplay could seem dated (even at release) i was pretty much a 3D remake of MG2.
 
That reminds me of another two complaints I had.

1. The torture scene was awful. Being forced to press a button super fast is stupid.

2. The backtracking. Ugh, it was awful. Please, someone try to defend the backtracking in this game.

Backtracking was BIG in 3D games. There's a limited memory you can shove in a game. You will be required to find Key A to access Room A. It's essential to storytelling in a video game. It takes NOTHING from the experience in MGS. Etc etc etc.

MGS backtracking in misicule!!

HOW OLD ARE YOU?!!!
 
Are people on the first page just going to one-liner shit-post their way through here, or what?

You bring up valid points about the controls and combat, but your comments about dialogue and story points are disagreeable beyond repair. The betrayals were easily understood and the characters were meaningful despite just being codec conversations.

Regardless, you should play MGS3. It's the best in the series and is completely playable today (despite the controls still having quirks from being analog-sensitive and 10 years old).
 
2. The backtracking. Ugh, it was awful. Please, someone try to defend the backtracking in this game.


There are only 2 or 3 sections that require any sort of backtracking, and at least one of them (getting the PSG1) can be skipped if you explore/know about it beforehand.
 
So... I played the game a few month back for the first time and I really liked it, but honestly? Everything the Ob said Sounds reasonable to me. Personelly I don't agree, though.
 
I had never played the MGS series, so I decided to borrow a friend's PS3 and buy the MGS Legacy Collection. I didn't have much interest in the series before, but I've begun to love stealth games, and the series is so well received, it must be worth playing, right? I thought I would begin with Metal Gear Solid as I imagine the NES games are too frustrating to play in 2015.

I didn't expect much from a game that is 17 years old, but wow, this is without a doubt the worst game I have ever completed. Let me just list a few of the problems with this game:

1. Stealth. What happened here? There's no stealth in the last 75% of the game. It's just a ton of boss fights and forced shooting.

2. The controls. Okay, I expected there to be problems with the controls, but they're novelty bad. And the worst part is, the game insists on having you shoot enemies over and over again. The aiming is god awful; often I had no idea where my bullets were going.

3. The dialogue. Christ, what a disaster. I'm sure everyone who's played this knows what I mean, so I won't even go into detail here. The dialogue felt like it was written by a 15 year old virgin in an honors English class.

4. The story. Tons of revelations which have no impact because they are not connected to anything else in the game, a convoluted mix of betrayals which ultimately don't even affect the game play, and characters that you don't give a damn about.

5. Solid Snake. This must be the worst main character I can remember. His voice is ridiculous, but the real problem is that he is nothing like he should be. They say he is a combat legend who only cares about surviving, but then he falls in love with a girl he has know for all of 5 minutes. And at the end of the game, he is unable to pull the trigger at a critical moment.

So, having said all that, I still have the rest of the Legacy Collection. If I hated MGS this much, is there any point in playing the remaining games? MGS2, 3, and 4 have incredible reviews and have won many GOTY awards. But if they are like MGS, I don't want to waste my time. Should I continue on with the series?

I 100% disagree with you...

BUT

I really liked reading this. Please play MGS2 and do a write up for that one.
 
First the thread about the witcher 3 being too short and now this one? Is gaf on some weird thing where all the planets align and people are in the twilight zone?
 
When is the last time you people have played MGS? I literally just finished it tonight. I went in with an open mind (afterall, I committed to $30 for the Legacy Collection) and I was extremely disappointed.

As for my comment about the writing being done by a 15 year old virgin, I am talking about the discussions of love in the game, as well as how the characters fell in love with people they didn't even know. Am I supposed to laugh at Otacon's love for Sniper Wolf? It didn't seem that way at the end of the game, but it was really pathetic.

I've played the game this year, it's fine. The controls are not as refined as later games in the series but they're perfectly functional for most of the situations it puts you in. It does suffer some serious faults such as egregious backtracking in some areas.

In regards to your second paragraph Otacon is a pretty pathetic character all around. He's consistently portrayed throughout the game as a sheltered person, one who was naive enough to believe that his weapons research wasn't actually going to be made to use, y'know, weapons. He self identifies as an 'otaku' and wets himself in the first scene he's seen in. It's not unreasonable to think he'd develop an immediate emotional attachment to anyone who treated him nicely.

There are games with better writing than MGS1 today, including games within its own series, but at the time it was released voice acting, script, cutscene production and overall presentation were miles ahead of anything else in the space. Frankly to call it the worst game you've ever played is probably either extreme hyperbole for the purpose of getting attention, or shows an incredibly limited range of games you've played. I'm not even saying you have to like the game, but you're just being sensational.
 
What a troll post.

If you hated it this much, you wouldn't have taken the time to beat it. And then posted about how you completed a game you hate so much, with a click-bait title no less.

The fact of the matter is you just wanted to get a rise out of people, in which case you've succeeded without fail.

My bias aside, a lot of the specifics you mentioned aren't untrue, but they did nothing to take away my enjoyment of the game.

If I'm playing devil's advocate, I'm guessing you are of the younger generation and weren't playing MGS when it first came out. In that respect, I suppose I can see how the clunkiness of the game compared to modern games could turn you off.

With that said, if you didn't think the game was stealthy enough, you were playing it wrong or on too easy a difficulty. If you didn't like the melodramatic dialog and story, that's just part of Kojima's charm. If you thought the controls clunky, well... you're right, but... "get gud?".

I hope you got what you wanted out of creating this thread in the manner you did.
 
That reminds me of another two complaints I had.

1. The torture scene was awful. Being forced to press a button super fast is stupid.

2. The backtracking. Ugh, it was awful. Please, someone try to defend the backtracking in this game.

Backtracking was common design, often for practical memory reasons. This was hardly the worst example of it. Most games weren't linear progressions and required backtracking.

When did you start gaming? Serious question.
 
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