• Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!

MGSV's pacing is... off(bad). Some spoliers

Gameplay isn't just mechanics. What's the point if the level design and pacing is bad (see: MGSV)?

pretty much. i really enjoyed the missions but literally everything else around it is bad or half-assed.

but because the missions were so fun I'd still give it a 7-8/10 lol
 
Sorry, immediately and fully wrong.

You can kill tens of bad guys, get a whole huge base on alert, and do some experimental shit, and still get S-rank on most missions in the game.

Efficiency and speed are what get you ranks. They're the game's only criteria for "playing right".

Plus you can replay any mission at any time. There is no right way to play. There's just near-constant gameplay of a high calibre with literally no risk around experimentation.

Ironic, considering this post. The game has a huge emphasis on building up your army, and you need staff to build new unique weapons and equipment, and various other shit. So the game absolutely nudges the player towards a non-lethal approach so they can fulton recruits.
 
... But he didn't. He meant it in the original sense of the word. He was essentially saying anyone who thinks the game is rewarding played action or experimentally is literally playing the game wrong. He literally used the word "right". Not that there is a right or wrong way of using the word.

I literally
not literally
said non-rewarding, not wrong.
 
... But he didn't. He meant it in the original sense of the word. He was essentially saying anyone who thinks the game is rewarding played action or experimentally is literally playing the game wrong. He literally used the word "right". Not that there is a right or wrong way of using the word.

I think you're taking things too cereal, literarily speaking.

Why not just debate him on his point and why you think it's wrong, and not on his word-play?
 
very few die. it removes the threat enough that you're not forced to rush but keep some sense of urgency.

and they die because you get new recruits, so if you continue to constantly recheck people you're pretty much ok.
 
I've put in about 200 hours and I'm only like halfway through the missions. It has been a blast, but I don't think I'm going to see the end at this rate.
 
Ironic, considering this post. The game has a huge emphasis on building up your army, and you need staff to build new unique weapons and equipment, and various other shit. So the game absolutely nudges the player towards a non-lethal approach so they can fulton recruits.

The point is that, while it is obviously important to fulton and build MB, that is not 'the only way to play the game', and it's not the way the game 'wants' you to play, which is what the person was saying. Once you've gone fulton happy on tens of missions and you have an oober MB, then what are you going to do? You don't need to fulton any more. The game isn't going to say 'well now there's no need to fulton people and go non-lethal, so game over!'

More importantly, each mission can pan out in hundreds of different ways, and the game gives you the freedom to replay any mission at any time, usually with different variables (deployment places, etc) and with literally no repercussions. So saying the game wants you to play a certain way is moot. You can play however you like. There's always time to go again and fulton more if you want.
 
You're attitude ain't making this any easier, bub.

Fighting on the internet is sooooo 2007.

Makes me pretty cool then, retro is in right now.

We've been over this exact point like twenty some times in the spoiler thread, ain't nobody actually interested in talking here
 
No way. They give you so many toys to play with, repetition is the fault of the player not using different tools, not the game.
Game never really challenges you to actually make use of a large majority of the stuff at your disposal. I could use sleeping gas mines to knock some guards out, or use decoys to send them flying. Or I could just tranq them in the face and get it over and done with (or use cqc if they have riot suits).
 
For me it wasn't so much that the pacing was bad as it was so bad compared to the previous Metal Gears. MGS3 had some of the best pacing ever-- the ladder, the peaks and valleys before and after boss fights... MGSV had none of that.
 
We've been over this exact point like twenty some times in the spoiler thread, ain't nobody actually interested in talking here

This is why I never delve into Outer Heaven.

For me it wasn't so much that the pacing was bad as it was so bad compared to the previous Metal Gears. MGS3 had some of the best pacing ever-- the ladder, the peaks and valleys before and after boss fights... MGSV had none of that.

Going from liner game to open-world made segments like the ladder moot. the ladder was meant to be a break in the gameplay between heavy plot and heavy action. That's not needed in V because of its open-world design.

Of course, that also can lead to less memorable moments in the overall plot.
 
Ironic, considering this post. The game has a huge emphasis on building up your army, and you need staff to build new unique weapons and equipment, and various other shit. So the game absolutely nudges the player towards a non-lethal approach so they can fulton recruits.

You can build up your army without going on a fulton spree, killing everyone else in your way.
 
I literally
not literally
said non-rewarding, not wrong.

Fun is its own reward. Not everyone is playing for fultons. But it's clear you meant 'wrong' anyway.

My original response was also picking up on the fallacy that the game 'wants' you to play that way. Yeah, you get rewarded by MB growing, but you also get rewarded in ranks. If we take the game's actual reward system, it doesn't matter how the fuck you play. Speed and efficiency is all that matters. That was my original point.

I think you're taking things too cereal, literarily speaking.

Why not just debate him on his point and why you think it's wrong, and not on his word-play?

I responded to him picking on his rhetoric, and immediately explained why I thought he was wrong and what my opinion was. He ignored my opinion and argument and instead responded only to the first sentence - which picked on his rhetoric. He moved it away from the game discussion and into 'ohoh this guy's a fanboy lol' - which I'm not anyway.

Basically, you can play the game however the fuck you want, and imo it's a great game either way. I prefer to play stealthy and fulton lots, but there is 100% a time and place for not playing stealthy and not fultoning. Even mid-game. I've done tens of missions that way just for fun.

Again, fun and good gameplay is its own reward.
 
The point is that, while it is obviously important to fulton and build MB, that is not 'the only way to play the game', and it's not the way the game 'wants' you to play, which is what the person was saying. Once you've gone fulton happy on tens of missions and you have an oober MB, then what are you going to do? You don't need to fulton any more. The game isn't going to say 'well now there's no need to fulton people and go non-lethal, so game over!'

More importantly, each mission can pan out in hundreds of different ways, and the game gives you the freedom to replay any mission at any time, usually with different variables (deployment places, etc) and with literally no repercussions. So saying the game wants you to play a certain way is moot. You can play however you like. There's always time to go again and fulton more if you want.

Getting to the point where you no longer have to fulton anyone takes a pretty long-ass time. So until you get to this belated mark, the game is still pushng you to use non-lethal methods. Sure, you can just kill everyone. Resulting in you being ill-equipped for the later game.
 
depends. you can farm missions and get volunteers a lot faster by just killing everyone.

especially as you get closer to 50-100K Heroism

after about 400-500K Heroism you basically never have to fulton anyone again either except maybe S+/++ FOB guards or mission targets
 
Getting to the point where you no longer have to fulton anyone takes a pretty long-ass time. So until you get to this belated mark, the game is still pushng you to use non-lethal methods. Sure, you can just kill everyone. Resulting in you being ill-equipped for the later game.

I played however I wanted, and then when I noticed there was something advanced I needed X MB rank for, I just went and did some fultoning and some missions, and unlocked said thing quite quickly. In my experience, the balance of this was pretty much perfect, I never felt frustrated I didn't have enough soldiers (and I didn't fulton that much at all).

Also, again,

More importantly, each mission can pan out in hundreds of different ways, and the game gives you the freedom to replay any mission at any time, usually with different variables (deployment places, etc) and with literally no repercussions. So saying the game wants you to play a certain way is moot. You can play however you like. There's always time to go again and fulton more if you want.

It's not like we're all in some insane rush to fill up MB as fast as possible. I certainly wasn't, at least. I just enjoyed the freedom the game offered me and had a great time.

But you can see why some fans of the MGS series would be disappointed at the lack of an expansive story and plot, right? For the past four games story was the reward, not really the gameplay.

Oh absolutely, and I feel that, too. But that's not under discussion.
 
But you build up your army a lot faster by fultoning dudes.

It can be really fast too without doing that, since you get a lot of volunteers anyway.

What I'm saying is that by not fultoning many soldiers but just sticking to volunteers, POWs and other important people, you can still be well-equipped throughout the game.
 
It can be really fast too without doing that, since you get a lot of volunteers anyway.

What I'm saying is that by not fultoning many soldiers but just sticking to volunteers, POWs and other important people, you can still be well-equipped throughout the game.

Eh, not really. Its at a fraction of the speed.

Volunteers should have scaled inversely with kills and directly with rank. So high ranks, high kills, high volunteers to compensate.
 
But I didn't bro. I meant in game rewards. Thats why I typed the words I chose. Because they meant what I wanted to say.

Okay, that's fine. But you didn't say in-game rewards:

No, he's right. It is literally never rewarding to forgo stealth and fultons. That is, by definition, the most optimal way to play.

In my experience and opinion, it is "literally rewarding" to forgo stealth and fultons very often. Most of the time I went stealth and fultoned, but there were many times (even in important/main missions) that I went action and messed around. That's because it was fun.

And it felt immensely rewarding.
 
Oh absolutely, and I feel that, too. But that's not under discussion.

Actually, I feel like the lack of a story rewards ties directly into pacing for the game. The gameplay is fun and you are building up your base, but there's no real carrot on the end of the stick for people expecting a payoff of information. There comes a point when building your base turns less into a fun activity, and more into a checklist. A timed-checklist at that, forcing you to play in the sandbox even more whether you want to or not.

It doesn't help that Venom Snake is the blandest protagonist I've played as this year.

Well, expect for the main character of Dying Light.
 
Sorry, immediately and fully wrong.

You can kill tens of bad guys, get a whole huge base on alert, and do some experimental shit, and still get S-rank on most missions in the game.

Efficiency and speed are what get you ranks. They're the game's only criteria for "playing right".

Plus you can replay any mission at any time. There is no right way to play. There's just near-constant gameplay of a high calibre with literally no risk around experimentation.
Try reading the rest of my post? I said much more then just the ranking pushes you towards playing a certain way and I never claimed doing Stealth/not killing was the only way to get an S Rank I said that it rewards you and is easier to do that way then just trying to go in guns blazing (which it is and it does).

If there is no 'right way' to play as you claim then why can you not complete all of the sub objectives by killing everyone? If I want to play the game and never capture anyone and kill everyone its a wrong way to play it as my base will be useless and you'll never be able to upgrade any weapons or anything making it pretty much impossible to progress. I'm not saying there is only 1 way to play the game but I am saying the game is largely designed around you playing it in that one way.

If you really want to get into this lets talk about how the game also lies to you during missions, frequently you'll be asked to take down a specific target and eliminate them or kill them, however you generally find out AFTER already completing that mission that no the game actually wanted you to capture this person and not kill them (including bosses!) and if you have the forethought to capture the person the game then tells you that was a much better idea and this isn't something that happens once or twice it happens a dozen times and sure eventually you'll catch on but it just supports what I'm saying in that the game actually wants you to play it this one way to do everything correctly. You can still do the entire game without doing that but when its an open world game there shouldn't be any one right way to play it, it goes against the idea of being an open world game you might as well have a linear game on a big map if that is all you are going to do (which is actually closer to what MGSV did then being a real open world experience).

Again this is just my opinion but if you want to discuss this, read my entire post (both of them now since you didn't read the first one) and don't just cherry pick 1 thing and say I claimed things I didn't.
 
Okay, that's fine. But you didn't say in-game rewards:

Well, you know what they say about assuming.

You can make some kind of "fun is its own reward" philosophical argument, but its hollow. Basically reduces every discussion to "well that's just your opinion."
 
Actually, I feel like the lack of a story rewards ties directly into pacing for the game. The gameplay is fun and you are building up your base, but there's no real carrot on the end of the stick for people expecting a payoff of information. There comes a point when building your base turns less into a fun activity, and more into a checklist. A timed-checklist at that, forcing you to play in the sandbox even more whether you want to or not.

It doesn't help that Venom Snake is the blandest protagonist I've played as this year.

Well, expect for the main character of Dying Light.

Frankly that's another reason I focused on just enjoying the gameplay in any way I can. Mother Base was a great system but it clearly wasn't going to add up to any specific story payoff.

A point came, after hearing of the putrid hatrid for the game's story in the spoiler thread, that I lowered my story expectations to 0, and just started playing MGSV for the gameplay. I did this around Mission 24 or so. From that point on, the story was just a bonus for me. I can't deny this is brutal for people who had high expectations, and it would have fucked the pacing for them.

Also I didn't think the Dying Light protag was that bad! He was pretty sincere and even had a couple of good lines. He was a generic person though, and dat ending.
 
The game should be held up as an example of how gameplay isn't all.

It baffles me that Kojima got the gameplay so right but managed to make everything else bad to....serviceable.

I still think the media would have been much harsher on this game is the cult of personality surrounding Kojima didn't exist.
 
Eh, not really. Its at a fraction of the speed.

Volunteers should have scaled inversely with kills and directly with rank. So high ranks, high kills, high volunteers to compensate.
depends on the mission. if you kill/bomb missions like Hero's Way, C2W, Footprints of Phantoms, Close Contact, War Economy, you can farm these every 5-10 minutes and few top rank recruits and a few others one letter grade below. Even at 50K-100K Heroism. Fultoning everyone is fastest until about 50K Heroism but after that it begins to even out if you farm the right missions that basically allow you to kill a target with a few minutes and farm it every 5 minutes or so. either is still good, i like that it let's you choose your style and pacing.
 
Gameplay isn't just mechanics. What's the point if the level design and pacing is bad (see: MGSV)?

Yeah well said. In a total vacuum, all of MGSV's systems are really wonderful, it's just that the game never compels you to do anything other than just crawl into a base, shooting people in the head as you go. There is a ton of depth, hypothetically, but the scenarios and level design never seem interested in taking advantage of it.
 
I stopped playing MGSV, I might get around to beating it someday but I just don't have any interest in the game which is unfortunate because the MGS series is one of my all-time favorites.

The combat is great, the controls all of that are first rate quality. But the game feels like Ubisoft obtained the rights to the MGS engine and made their own game. It felt like a very generic AAA title in a lot of ways that really put me off. One of the first things that bothered me is that we're supposed to be in this open world in Afghanistan but I don't think I saw a single Afghan person in my time playing. They would have been better off continuing with their old more contained world to develop the game in.
 
Wait... We're talking about mission 33? The first subsistence mission? How does the chopper play into it?

If you destroyed the anti-air radar at that base you can fly right into it with the chopper and destroy the objectives with the chopper's mini-gun, no need to touch down at all.
 
Well, you know what they say about assuming.

Wasn't an assumption, as I just showed. But okay.

You can make some kind of "fun is its own reward" philosophical argument, but its hollow. Basically reduces every discussion to "well that's just your opinion."

... Which is what all discussion is. It's not hollow. Your opinion is 100% as valid as mine (or just as hollow as mine, you could say). We're just discussing the difference and our justifications. There's no objective right answer here.

Try reading the rest of my post? I said much more then just the ranking pushes you towards playing a certain way and I never claimed doing Stealth/not killing was the only way to get an S Rank I said that it rewards you and is easier to do that way then just trying to go in guns blazing (which it is and it does).

If there is no 'right way' to play as you claim then why can you not complete all of the sub objectives by killing everyone? If I want to play the game and never capture anyone and kill everyone its a wrong way to play it as my base will be useless and you'll never be able to upgrade any weapons or anything making it pretty much impossible to progress. I'm not saying there is only 1 way to play the game but I am saying the game is largely designed around you playing it in that one way.

If you really want to get into this lets talk about how the game also lies to you during missions, frequently you'll be asked to take down a specific target and eliminate them or kill them, however you generally find out AFTER already completing that mission that no the game actually wanted you to capture this person and not kill them (including bosses!) and if you have the forethought to capture the person the game then tells you that was a much better idea and this isn't something that happens once or twice it happens a dozen times and sure eventually you'll catch on but it just supports what I'm saying in that the game actually wants you to play it this one way to do everything correctly. You can still do the entire game without doing that but when its an open world game there shouldn't be any one right way to play it, it goes against the idea of being an open world game you might as well have a linear game on a big map if that is all you are going to do (which is actually closer to what MGSV did then being a real open world experience).

Again this is just my opinion but if you want to discuss this, read my entire post (both of them now since you didn't read the first one) and don't just cherry pick 1 thing and say I claimed things I didn't.

Sorry, I got frustrated because I took total issue with that first point, and I'm tired of people diarrhoeaing all over this game when it is something special regardless of the problems. (Even though it has deep flaws, the reaction is often so OTT). There are things in your post which are spot-on, even though I still disagree on the whole.

That's a good point about fultoning people we should 'kill' in theory, or not being able to complete sub objectives if going lethal - but again, you can just replay the mission. This entire discussion about how the game incentivises certain gameplay styles is moot when you factor in the fact that you can replay any mission at any time, and play it however you want, with no repercussions.

The game does not, at any point, actively punish you for playing however you want and going as lethal/loud as you want. Arguably it does in the long term, if your MB isn't good enough later on or you can't get 100% from side objectives, but in my experience it took no time to build MB up to match my needs when I got down to it, and re-doing the side objectives is fun. It's not like the whole game's on a time limit. You can just go and fulton more people when you need to. It gives you an insane amount of freedom. It's also designed for replays - see the side objectives again.
 
One of the first things that bothered me is that we're supposed to be in this open world in Afghanistan but I don't think I saw a single Afghan person in my time playing. They would have been better off continuing with their old more contained world to develop the game in.
I don't disagree so I'm not pointing this out to say you're wrong.

But everyone that speaks pashto is meant to be an ethnic local... including the hostages in Missions 6 and 10.
 
I'm pretty sour on the game too. The game built up these unique people (a mute naked sniper, a psychic child, Liquid fucking Snake, a literal man on fire and Big Bosses shadow) and never delivered on any of them. I don't think Skull Face and Venom Snake even exchanged words once. Quiet had the most development of them all, and I'd have liked to see little arcs dedicated to the others aswell, culminating in a boss fight each time (or immediately in Quiets case). I'm going to reiterate what I've said before and say that having Skull Face chase you around spouting silly details the player noticed in Operation Snake Eater (like where the ga-ko uniform is found) as a boss fight would have been amazing!

Instead the game throws throwaway missions at you and while they may be fun, they're nothing without context. I'll forever remember escorting Emma Emmerich through bugs on the way to shell 1s core, but not Mission [insert number here]. Originally I was going to do a new playthrough of only the story important missions and see how it compares to the other games, but the twist made me not want to bother. I think I'm done with the game.
 
The game does not, at any point, actively punish you for playing however you want and going as lethal/loud as you want. Arguably it does in the long term

It doesn't punish you except when it does.

Look we're presumably doing more than just swapping opinions. We're trying to critically evaluate the game and its systems. Systems which directly encourage fulton use and discourage killing - an incentive scheme you admit in the quoted post.
 
Try reading the rest of my post? I said much more then just the ranking pushes you towards playing a certain way and I never claimed doing Stealth/not killing was the only way to get an S Rank I said that it rewards you and is easier to do that way then just trying to go in guns blazing (which it is and it does).

If there is no 'right way' to play as you claim then why can you not complete all of the sub objectives by killing everyone? If I want to play the game and never capture anyone and kill everyone its a wrong way to play it as my base will be useless and you'll never be able to upgrade any weapons or anything making it pretty much impossible to progress. I'm not saying there is only 1 way to play the game but I am saying the game is largely designed around you playing it in that one way.

If you really want to get into this lets talk about how the game also lies to you during missions, frequently you'll be asked to take down a specific target and eliminate them or kill them, however you generally find out AFTER already completing that mission that no the game actually wanted you to capture this person and not kill them (including bosses!) and if you have the forethought to capture the person the game then tells you that was a much better idea and this isn't something that happens once or twice it happens a dozen times and sure eventually you'll catch on but it just supports what I'm saying in that the game actually wants you to play it this one way to do everything correctly. You can still do the entire game without doing that but when its an open world game there shouldn't be any one right way to play it, it goes against the idea of being an open world game you might as well have a linear game on a big map if that is all you are going to do (which is actually closer to what MGSV did then being a real open world experience).

Again this is just my opinion but if you want to discuss this, read my entire post (both of them now since you didn't read the first one) and don't just cherry pick 1 thing and say I claimed things I didn't.

The game caters to myriad play styles. Just because you can't get 100% (though there's been plenty of missions that have gone south and I've been able to complete all objectives) doesn't mean there's something wrong.

Pretty sure the game never tells you to outright kill targets, only eliminate them.
 
Top Bottom