Metal Gear Solid: The Essential Collection

"A game series that isn’t made for everybody. Don't fall into the trap."

Before we begin let me state that I am a fan of stealth games like Splinter Cell and the Thief series, and of games with lengthy cutscenes such as Yakuza and Final Fantasy VII. This was the first PS2 game I've bought in over a year, so I was expecting a great experience.

GRAPHICS 10/10: MGS2 and MGS3 have phenomenal graphics that still look great today. I'm not going to rate the PS1 game for graphics.

STORY 2/10: Did not enjoy this part at all. 30-minute cutscenes are no fun. Especially when the plot is as poor as a B-movie on basic cable.

The basic premise of each game is basically you have to stop a weapon from getting into the hands of terrorists. There are traditional cutscenes as well as codec transmissions, which are radio transmissions between you and your allies. Cutscenes are skippable but codec transmissions are not. You can scroll through all the text, which means pressing X about 100 times. These occur far too often and break up the gameplay. Expect to play 10 minutes then get interrupted by a 15-minute cutscene once you reach the next room.

MGS1 contains a love story between the main character, Solid Snake, and an agent he just met, it's just plain pathetic. MGS2 has a pointless love story as well (all done through codec transmissions, just sad) , and totally lame bad guys, including a vampire and a stealth ninja. Remember this is a series that prides itself on a historical timeline, mentioning the Cold War and nuclear weapons among other things, but then has outrageous characters.

When you kill a boss in MGS1, expect them to wax philosophical about something random you don't even care about for 15 minutes. Out of the last hour of MGS2, I might have played 15 minutes at most. I actually fell asleep and woke up while the cutscene was still playing. The cutscenes really, really kill an otherwise excellent game. When I reached MGS3 I finally decided to skip most cutscenes.

MGS1 and MGS2 have a character named Dr. Otacon who might be the worst character in video game history. He will talk to you about the meaning of love and his long-lost sister while you're busy figuring out a way to stop the helicopter outside from blasting a rocket through your flesh.

Some say that MGS was the first action game to make a deep story. That may be true, it certainly has popularized stealth games (although Thief was released the same year), but that's like saying 2001 Space Odyssey is the best film simply because it's the most influential. It is worthy of respect yet boring by today's entertainment standards.

At the end of every game, the writers try to twist as many things as possible, which quickly loses its touch.

SOUND 3/10: They hired professional voice actors but I didn't really care about it because the codec transmissions are so long that I just pressed a button numerous times to read through the text. The main character's voice in MGS2 has an annoying clueless teenager voice. MGS3 is very quiet during gameplay.

The death sounds in MGS1 and MGS2 are really annoying. Someone yells “Snake, Snake, Snaaaaaaaaaake!” or “Jack? Jack! Where are you? Jaaaaaaack!” Thankfully they cut this out in MGS3.

GAMEPLAY:

MGS1 5/10: The Good: Bosses require strategy, you can only beat the first boss by blindly firing. You are provided a radar on the top right that shows the enemy's line of vision and you must sneak past them to reach your target. You can kill, injure, or sneak silently past enemies by distracting them off their patrol routes. If you are caught they put up an alert, in which you can't use your radar and guards come searching for you. If that happens you have to find a place to hide until the alert goes away.

The Bad: Infrared glasses help you to see laser beams, which are needed to get past the warehouse at the beginning of the game. However the room with the IR glasses locks after you reach the elevator, so you need to get the glasses as soon as you enter the warehouse. I wasted an hour before I realized I had to restart the game.

You have to be completely still in order to choke a guard from behind, otherwise you flip them and they get right back up and call an alert on you. When I got an alert I just ended up taking the death so I could restart in the same room. In MGS2 they fixed this problem because guards go unconscious after you flip them to the ground.

Additionally MGS1 has too much backtracking. The other games have backtracking but it isn't nearly as bad.

MGS2 9/10: I loved the gameplay of MGS2 up until the last quarter of the game. Otherwise it contains a near-perfect mix of elements including sneaking, sniping, disarming bombs, and disguising yourself as an enemy guard. MGS2 is easily has the most simple and fun gameplay of the series.

Boss fights are a downgrade, they no longer require real strategy except for one that plants bombs while you have to disarm them and kill him at the same time.

The only really bad thing is that once you get about ¾ through the game it becomes so focused on the story. The rest of the game including the last boss fight is not even any good.

MGS3 3/10: Takes place in the jungle in the 60s, so it slower-paced. A lot slower-paced. The game uses a separate stamina meter where you have to eat food in order to maintain. Food is gathered by finding mushrooms, rations, or killing animals. It quickly becomes burdensome to constantly gather food.

Some food can make you sick and you have to go to the medicine screen and cure yourself. You also do this for injuries. Since you cannot see enemy sights, you have to use camouflage, which you must change depending on your environment. Some paint is good indoors, while some suits are suitable near trees. As you can see it is very detailed but I found it boring. You have to constantly press start and navigate through menus in order to do well. The alerts are really long in MGS3. You have to hide in the bushes for 4 minutes before you can move on without guards on your tail.

MGS3 has two cameras but both are terrible. I always seemed to run into enemies after spending minutes making sure the area was clear, then had to blast my way out of trouble or take the death and restart.

FINAL SCORE:

MGS 1: 5/10
MGS 2: 8/10
MGS 3: 2/10

This is not a review meant to bash the Metal Gear Solid series. There is a painstaking amount of detail in each game, and it would be ignorant of me to completely dismiss it outright. However I did not fall in love with this series despite being a fan of stealth games and of story games.

If you still play PS2 games I recommend Metal Gear Solid 2. It is easy to find in used bins at Gamestop, unfortunately I told myself I wasn't going to play it unless I beat MGS1 first. Each game contains a lot of references to the previous versions; even MGS1 refers to the Nintendo games. But since the story is terrible, don't worry about playing the earlier games first. I've suffered through most of it so you will have a better gaming experience.

My advice is to get MGS2 and if you like the story play the other games. The prices are essentially equivalent for buying the collection or buying the games separately, mainly due to the original MGS being hard to find. Don't fall into the trap of buying the collection without playing any of the games. You have been warned.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 07/15/09

Game Release: Metal Gear Solid: The Essential Collection (US, 03/18/08)