Simian plays Metal Gear Solid 4 post-trophy patch

Moose's MGS2 topic made me think about playing 4 again, and as it has been four years - where the hell does the time go? - since I beat the game, it now has the added benefit of finally having trophy support. I've also forgotten a hell of a lot of the game, so it feels almost like playing a new game rather than revisiting an old classic.

Starting off then, and... what the hell? A bizarre TV show style into, with the shoulder buttons flicking between various futuristic TV shows, including a post apocalyptic cooking show, a who-wants-to-be-a-millionaire type show, and a mock interview with David Hayter, the voice of Solid Snake himself. Utterly bizarre, but very Kojima. Anyway, into the game proper. Or at least, the first cutscene. It goes on a bit, Snake talking about PMCs and such which doesn't ring many bells with me. Into the game! Snake's movement feels stiff, there's not much... oh wait, I moved three feet and I'm in another custscene. Five minutes of cutscene, ten seconds of gameplay, another minute of cutscene. Pacing wasn't one of Kojima's strong points, was it. That's a statement, not a question.

Anyway, ran past some Gekko (mini Metal Gears basically, though they have no arms and organic legs) and succesfully sneaked through the first open area without detection. Otacon has a few goodies for Snake here, revealing he's made a tiny Metal Gear that can stealth and follow Snake around, so that Otacon always knows what Snake is doing. he also gives you your tranq gun and the Solid Eye - a glorified Eye patch that is required for your radar to function (though it works a lot differently in MGS4 than it did in previous games; there are no "cones of sight" here), but also highlights weapons and collectibles on the battlefield, as well as having a very handy night vision mode.

A few thoughts before pressingg on? Oddly, I remember the graphics being mind blowing, but they're good rather than great; there's a few too many rough textures for it to feel ultra-modern, and while the character models have aged well for the most part, there's some noticable rough edges to them as well as a little bit of slowdown in places.

Never mind, it's a four year old game, I mustn't forget that. Met Drebin, the arms dealer ( and his cola-drinking, nappy-wearing pet monkey), introduced via another needlessly long (ten minutes by my count) cutscene, then it's back outside into the mayhem. The sense of being in an active warzone is still very much present, there are troops running everywhere and while I'm trying to be remain unseen, it's only by ignoring some tempting items off the beaten path that I succeed.

For some reason there's a guy taking a dump in a barrel and after he's chased off by a rather disgusted militia, Snake thinks it's a good idea to confiscate the barrel for himself. Quite why is anyone's idea, and how he carries it around in his inventory is one of gaming's never-spoken laws - he's not just going to stuff it in a pocket is he?

Oh, and there's Meryl again. I recall her ass-shaking turn in MGS1. And of course, a chance for another lengthy cut scene talking about stuff I don't remember. Kojima can't resist any opportunity for a cutscene.

I vaguely recall this bit; Meryl and her crack squad, including a guy with rather obvious stomach troubles, escaping from what looks to be a hotel pursued by "frogs", highly agile and well armoured troops. It's been the toughest part so far, their machine guns quite capable of cutting through Snake if he's caught in the open. Still with care, and no fair amount of luck - seriously, the aiming system is kinda wonky, sometimes it'll auto-lock for you, others it just leaves you shooting at a wall - I made it through. Unlocked my first trophy as well, for using non-lethal force during my escape, though of course that followed another cut scene as Meryl and her crew departed.

Onwards! The local militia have themselves a tank. Earlier on Otacon expressed the desire I not involve myself in the civil war, yet siding with the militia has a few benefits, A) they won't shoot you, and B) take out the PMC and you have free run of the local area, including any items. Well, at least until you trigger another cutscene. This one was kinda cool though, introducing the Beasts, the four bosses you fight later on. Them I remember. After they make short work of the militia, Snake is left alone again.

Well, Otacon is calling for something, but I'll have to take that call a little later.

Trophies Unlocked: 1

Otacon tells me I'm going the wrong way. No, I'm not, I'm just collecting all the juicy weapons the dead militia left behind. A quick crawl around and I'm facing Liquid via - what else? cutscene. Half an hour later, I start Act 2.

Act 1 took a laborious 2 hours forty minutes, though I'd wager at least an hour of that is cutscenes, with 9 kills and 4 alerts. I've no idea how those happened because I literally never fired a shot from anything other than the tranquiliser gun.

Trophies unlocked: 2

Onto Act 2 and a few things ocurred to me; I have no idea how to hold people up at gun point, nor how to tackle them from behind. Not that i've really needed to either much up to this point, but I'm certain that both were options and neither have been mentioned during the early-game tutorials. I could read the manual, but... well, who actually does that?

Anyway, still opting for the stealthy approach, I've just seen Doctor Laughing octopus and MGS2's Vamp again and the former mercilessly slaughters some local rebels, all whilst wearing Snake's face. Yes, for reasons I don't remember, she has Snake's face and is telling the only surviving rebel that Snake must die.

Fat chance. When the level starts, with Octopus and Vamp safely out of the way, I sneak in and tranquilise all the guards at which point the Rebels get up and start shooting the place to hell. Cue ten minutes of mayhem as the shit hits the fan, and I'm suddenly storming a local power station. Well, I would be were I not interrupted by another cut scene. Turns out Raiden's MGS2 girlfriend is now married to Colonel Campbell for some reason, and they talked about how Raiden had gone missing years ago, and is presumed dead.

Or not. A guy sounding suspiciously like Jack/Raiden calls Snake to issue a warning not thirty seconds later, cutting off as soon as Snake asks "Jack...?"

Back to the assault on the power plant, and the Rebels are doing a decent job without me, though I moved around the side and took out a guy with a grenade launcher, at which point one of the rebels picked it up and blew the hell out of the entrenched guards manning a turret someway up the hill. Plant taken, there's another cut scene with our friendly arm dealer, who is now following Snake because shit gets blown up when he's around.

The Beauty and Beast Corps are under orders to kill Snake on sight as well, though Drebin seems more bothered by stopping his monkey smoking than he does with giving away anything to help Snake. Yes, MGS4 has a smoking monkey wearing a nappy.

MGS4 is such a crap game from a gameplay perspective.

I should rephrase that, the gameplay is fun but the the game becomes increasingly linear as it progresses. In Act 1 and 2, you can sneak through large areas in multiple different ways, but then by the time you get to Act 5, you realize the entire act is a few hallways and a few boss fights. The linearity means replaying it is such a chore (which you'll be doing if you want the trophies thanks to the patch - you need to complete the game at least nine times, and on one of those play-throughs you'll need to drag your completion time out to 50 hours. If you know what you're doing it's hard to take any longer than about four hours.).

And Act 3 is the worst thing in the world on the BBE run.

Plus, the removal of MGO still hurts to this day. The online was so damn fun.

Oh God, why did you have to remind me that awful motorcycle part?

MGS4 is a prime example of gameplay suffering in order to drive the narrative. Don't get me wrong, it blew me away four years ago, but looking at it now it's a solid (no pun intended) game with a fair share of flaws. Acts 1 and 2 suffer from odd pacing, mainly down to the frequency and length of the infamous cutscenes, and while i don't remember much of Acts 3 and 4, I do recall the final act being basically a corridor with a fight at the end.

Despite it's flaws, it still has a smoking monkey in it though. That has to count for something.

I'm going after Naomi Hunter now for reasons that I'm not completely clear on, but I'm sneaking through a mansion to do it. Well, I say sneaking, I mean trying-to-stay-the-hell-out-of-a-gunfight. The rebels are assaulting the place and I'm just staying out of the way.

Oh, and here's a secret entrance. Of course, it leads to Naomi's lab. Another cutscene or three, they talk and - despite Snake seeing one Octopus' tentacles scuttling over a nearby window - he agrees to strip off and let Naomi examine him.

Foxdie is mutating, Snake doesn't have long before it happens. They're interrupted by some troops, who are easily dispatched before Laughing Octopus attacks. Well, I say attacks, but really she's a pushover. She basically walks around trying to shoot you with a machine gun, periodically stopping to try and hide by blending into the environment. The fight is more tedious than difficult just because even a point blank shotgun blast does such a tiny amount of damage.

Anyway, dropped her and she sheds her armour then decides to walk at you. Two hits and she's down, followed by - what else? - another cutscene, though Octopus does at least leave behind her facecamo. Remember how she had Snake's face earlier? This was how. Facecamo seems to have two functions, one being to add to your overall camo rating and two being to reskin Snake's character model with a new face. Option one is more useful for the time being, because Snake having Octopus' head would look weird as hell. In any case, cutscene over, Snake is now outside, tracking Naomi. Raiden calls him and gives him some pointers after Snake grumbles that tracking isn't his forte, and your spend a few tedious moments walking through an essentially linear path following footprints shown by your night vision mode.

When you eventually catch up with Naomi she's boarding a chopper with an armed guard and Vamp in close attendance. Snake drops him and Vamp pulls off his trademark MGS2 move again, just as a load of Gekko arrive to move in on a hugely outgunned Snake. Drebin turns up in his armoured car and grabs Naomi and Snake before they make a getaway via a tedious on rails sections where Snake alternates between manning the mounted gun to destroy Gekko and punching off anyone who tries to climb aboard.

Another cutscene follows where Raiden shows off his new ninja skills to slice up some Gekko before he and Vamp go at it, stabbing the crap out of each other. Act 2 end with Otacon picking up Snake and Naomi in a helicopter before they head back to pick up a badly injured Raiden.

Act 2 over, another trophy.

Trophies unlocked: 3

.

Wow, Act 3 was dull as hell.

The Mission Briefing cutscenes lasted half an hour, then you get another ten minutes as Snake talks to Meryl. Gameplay wise, Snake must follow someone to try and find the hidden rebel base whihc entails follwing discretely at a safe distance whilst taking out the occasional enemy guard to enable your target to carry on.

Thing is, it's very slow paced and goes on far too long. It's a novel idea that would have been interesting had it lasted a few minutes, but it carries over through three or four seperate maps. It's just boring, and even having to avoid a patrolling truck whilst not losing your mark feels like a chore.

With that out of the way, you get another cutscene introducing Big Mama, MGS3's Eva, who reveals herself as Solid Snake's birth mother. Suddenly the base is attacked and everyone flees via van or motorcycle. Cue another on rails shooter section that far outstays its welcome. A couple of minutes in and you're attacked by Raging Raven, the second member of the B&B Corps.

She forces you off the bikes and into a confrontation with her in a tower, swarming with mechanised drones. It's tougher than the Octopus fight, simply because Raven tends to pepper you with grenades and keep at a distance, forcing you to try and fight her at a distance. like Octopus, beat her and she emerges from her shell and is easily taken down. Cue a codec call from Drebin about how she came to be, and then you get another lengthy cutscene as the shit hits the fan. I won't spoil it, but Snake and Liquid have a brief face-off, and Snake gets his arse handed to him in close quarters combat.

I did unlock another two trophies though, for finishing the Act and for picking up the Raging Raven Doll, by beating her with non-lethal weaponry. Still a really boring arc though.

Trophies Unlocked: 5

After the rather dullness of Act 3, we move into Act 4. How good this act is may depend largely on how fondly you remember the original MGS, but I thought it was ace so I freaking loved Act 4. At least, I remember loving it the first time around. Time to see if that still rings true.

In a really nice twist of nostalgia-shattering genius, the act starts with you playing MGS1. Literally, you get to replay a very small part of the original MGS and it's... well, suffice to say that what was once the cutting edge would now be effortlessly surpassed by most smartphone games. Still, it's a very nice touch, leading to Snake waking up and simply stating "he had that dream again."

Onwards then. Snake starts in a snowfield, but visibility is terrible and Otacon warns of "unmanned sentries" patrolling the area. Gekko, in other words. Luckily the Solid Eye's night vision mode can pick through the blizzard pretty effectively, and the Gekko are neutralised by tranqilising their legs. It doesn't destroy them but it does knock them down and allow Snake time to pass. Clear the snowfield, and we're pack to the heliport - the same place from the MGS1 flashback moments earlier. It's a little quieter now, yet the solid eye shows footprints leading into one of the main hangars. When you get a little closer, you can also see the hangar is crawling with Scarabs (tiny spheres with three arms). So that way is out.

Anyone remember crawling through the vents in MGS1? No me neither. However, thanks to the flashback, I know there are several ways into this hangar. I guess that scene wasn't just there for nostalgia then. Crawling through a vent, Snake emerges at the rear of the hangar where he can neatly sneak past the patrolling Scarabs. A few flashback later, including he and Otacon visiting the room they first met - a flashback showing a very PS1 looking Otacon literally wetting himself in a cupboard - and having to avoid a couple of full size Gekko and it's time for another boss fight, this time against Crying Wolf.

This is the toughest boss so far, at least for a no-alert run, which is what I'm trying to do. Wolf herself isn't alone, you fight on a huge snowy wasteland, (possibly the same area you fight Sniper Wolf in MGS1, though I wouldn't say that with absolute certainty) yet it's swarming with Frogs, Liquid's elite troops as well. It may be blowing a gale, but any unsilenced shots can still be heard carrying on the wind, so patience is key. Crying Wolf does one of two things; waits to snipe you with her ridiculously powerful rail gun, or runs about in her wolf suit trying to stomp you. The wind also means she can pick up your scent from a fair way across the level, as well as see and hear you so staying out of her way is tricky, moreso with troops everywhere.

Eventually I decided to simply sit tight and let her come to me. She charges at you, which is simple to dodge really, then runs away and prepares to shoot with the rail gun. At such time, she is vulnerable so a few well placed shots can take a chunk off her health (or psyche!) gauge before she retreats back to the suit and does the same again. I had to stop a few times to tranq any troops getting too close, but after a drawn out fight, she went down, I picked up another figurine for beating her non-lethally (which unlocked another trophy) then Drebin called to explain how she turned so twisted. Again, I'm not really bothered by her back story - some horrible shit happened to her, so she inflicted the same on a bunch of other people basically.

I also earned some new facecamo, which unlocked another trophy and I'm ready to descend into the belly of the facility. Or at least I will be once Snake stops seeing flashbacks of his fight with Sniper Wolf.

Trophies unlocked: 7

Remember the barrel Snake collected way back in Act 1? Well, it's still largely useless, but for shits and giggles I tried using it and after knocking myself on my arse and rolling about in it enough to make Snake physically sick, I unlocked a trophy for knocking someone down in the barrel.

Someone must have known players like to cock around.

Trophies unlocked: 8

A bit more sneaking and, in the shadow of Metal Gear Rex, I'm fighting Vamp. The fucker still won't die. I put him down and he just gets back up again. And again. And again. I call Otacon and he, in a roundabout way, suggests I try using the syringe Naomi gave me in Act 2. He doesn't specify how.

After a bit of arsing around, I finally work it out and inject Vamp with the syringe, nullifying the nanomachines in his body. Raiden arrives just in time to save Snake from Suicide Gekko (Gekko rigged to explode basically) and he and Vamp then have a rematch while Snake uses the rail gun he picked up from Crying Wolf to destroy more Gekko as they pour in.

Finally, Raiden beats Vamp and Naomi reveals she too is a walking corpse; her body riddled with cancer, kept alive only by nanomachines but in constant agony. She too chooses to finally accept her fate, and her and Vamp die together as Snake and Raiden hop into Rex's cockpit and flee the scene.

That was just as freaking sweet as I remember it being.

Rex cuts through hundreds of Gekko like ants, and just as the facility explodes, burying Raiden, Liquid emerges from the ocean piloting a Metal Gear Ray. You know, the one designed to counter Rex. Luckily, Otacon knows some of Ray's weak points so begins a really fun Rex v Ray fight as Snake and Liquid lay waste to a small part of Shadow Moses. Really, really good fun that fight.

Anyway, Liquid then trolls Snake by pretending to be killed by Foxdie, before getting up and laughing as Snake, suffering heavy injuries tries to keep up. He fails. Liquid's colossal battleship, his "Outer Haven" then surfaces and with Liquid safely aboard, and Rex's huge Rail Gun attached, moves to simply drive over Snake, who sinks to his knees. Meanwhile Raiden, pinned by rubble, dislocates his shoulder to reach his sword and then severs his own right arm to escape, before using his augmented cyborg strength to try and push back Liquid's ship. He succeeds, at least long enough for Snake to regain his senses, but not before Raiden is crushed, having a flashback of his and Rose's first date on the Empire State Building. To ensure Liquid flees, Mei Ling arrives in the USS Missouri, the only military battleship not under Liquid's control following the events of Act 3. Despite having massively superior firepower, Liquid turns tail and runs, leaving Snake on the verge of passing out and Raiden nowhere to be seen.

Act over, trophy unlocked.

Trophies unlocked: 9

Act 5 is proving a touch frustrating.

The game starts you off without the Mk 2 tranq gun in your possession, and you're instantly swarmed by guards so I keep having to reload. only, MGS doesn't have a fast reload system. Hell, it doesn't have a reload system full stop. No, if you get spotted you have to pause, exit back to the main menu and reload from there. All of which takes longer than it should and gets increasingly frustrating after the tenth time.

From a purely gameplay point of view, most of Act 5 sucks if you're being truly objective, but I'll be damned if it I didn't enjoy the hell out of it anyway, even if it was ridiculously overblown.

So you're all aboard the Missouri chasing after Outer Heaven, which Liquid plans to use to launch a nuclear strike against JD, allowing GW to assume control over the full range of the Patriot system. Anyway, okay, so finally got off the main deck by a mixture of well placed tranq shots, gratuitous use of cover and camo, and no small amount of sheer good fortune which leads straight into a fight with the final member of the B&B Corps, Crying Mantis. She's got control of Meryl too, so I can't count on her help.

There are some nods - some about as direct as it's possible to get - to MGS' Psycho Mantis during the fight, and it took me a while to work out just how you're meant to beat her. With that done though, I claimed the final B&B figurine, and another trophy.

A lot happens then. Meryl stays to help fight off the Frogs while Snake moves forward, but he's in bad shape, and collapses before being faced by another group of Frogs. Despite Otacon's protests, Snake is unable to get to his feet and Raiden intervenes, though clearly still suffering for he has now lost both arms and carries his sword in his mouth, Zoro style. With his aid, Snake carries on, though he's now being microwaved and is crawling along while his sneaking suit literally pops under the heat. It takes much mashing of the triangle button to proceed.

Trophies unlocked: 10

Snake makes it to GW, where Otacon, via the Metal Gear MK3 uploads the virus while Snake struggles to hold off a swarm of Scarabs. The virus suddenly kicks in, whereby it not only knocks out GW it takes out JD as well, effectively destroying The System entirely, and just in time to save Meryl, Mei Ling and everybody else from being destroyed. Snake is by now utterly exhausted, he can't even stand under his power, and a final video message from Naomi confirms that this was her intention the whole time.

Snake sees Otacon going for help, and he's somehow on top of the Outer Haven itself, with Liquid standing over him. Snake cannot move, so Liquid gives him an injection that allows him to stand again before they start to fight. The exchange lasts a few minutes, as they repeatedly land heavy blows on each other before injecting each other with Liquid's final syringes where player control kicks in. It's a four stage fight, the music moving through MGS, MGS2, MGS3 and MGS4 as the fight progresses, Liquid changing his fighting style subtly as the stages change.

Eventually Snake knocks Liquid down, then Liquid roars in pain as though afflicted by Foxdie. Then the cutscenes really begin; we see Raiden in a hospital with two arms, and Rose pays him a visit with a small grey haired boy. She confesses to him that her marriage to Campbell was a sham in order the keep the boy safe - Raiden's son. Happy families. Meryl marries Johnny as she and Campbell reconcile, whilst Drebin, Otacon and Sunny watch on. Sunny makes a friend, her first outside of Snake and Otacon's circle. Sunny asks where Snake is, and Otacon merely replies that Snake had to go away to get better.

Snake, having tried and decided against killing himself, is standing over Big Boss' grave when he's interrupted by... Big Boss. Yes, Snake turns to see Big Boss, very much alive, but also brandishing a big gun. Snake reloads, believing Big Boss to be a threat but Big Boss dropped his gun, easily overpowered Snake, and embraced him, assuring his "son" that he was not there to fight. Telling Snake that it was "time to put aside the gun and live," he proceeded to explain that his body had been reassembled (using pieces of Liquid Snake and Solidus Snake) by EVA and Raiden rather than simply kept alive on a machine, and that the body in EVA's van that was burnt to ashes by Liquid Ocelot in Eastern Europe was in fact the body of MGS2's Solidus. Ocelot was able to use the genetic code from this body to access the SOP system, because Solidus, unlike Liquid Snake or Solid Snake, was a perfect clone of Big Boss. He also admits that Big Mama and Naomi Hunter had also been involved in planning the events of Snake's mission.

Big Boss then explained to Snake how Ocelot, in order to fool the system, used a combination of nanomachines and psychotherapy to turn himself into "Liquid's mental doppelganger," as well as fully explaining the history of the Patriots from his point of view. Once the virus opened the gateway from GW to the Patriots, Big Boss was able to finally determine the location of Zero, the founding member of the Patriots. He then showed Snake an elderly, wheelchair-bound Zero on a life support machine. He mentioned the names of the founders of the Patriots that have passed on and claimed that the Patriots would not be completely destroyed until he "takes everything back to Zero" and "sends Zero back to nothing." With that, Big Boss pulled the plug from Zero's air supply, killing him.

With Zero dead, Big Boss was the last Patriot. When Snake asked if he would be "going back to zero as well," Big Boss replied that he would, although he doesn't have to do so by his own hand: The FOXDIE virus injected into Snake by Drebin that killed Ocelot and EVA was also set to kill Big Boss, and he was already starting to feel the effects, and also admitted that Naomi was the one who told him this, as well as the events of that mission. Big Boss also explained that Naomi also instructed him to tell Snake that this FOXDIE virus also replaced the original mutated strain that Snake was injected with by Naomi, and therefore there was no threat of him becoming a biological weapon; though the new FOXDIE would eventually mutate as well, that would only be if Snake managed to live that long. Snake helped his pained father over to The Boss's grave, where he saluted her, as he had done fifty years earlier, and sadly stated that he had been dead since the day he killed her. Big Boss also understood the original meaning behind The Boss's last will: that it was not about changing and reuniting the world as one, but rather leaving the world as it is. Sharing one last smoke with his son, Big Boss, as a last request, asked Snake to spend the remainder of his life peacefully and not waste it fighting, and the two finally made peace. In his last words, Big Boss simply said, "This is good, isn't it?", and dies at The Boss' grave.

The game ends with a dialogue only scene; Snake refuses a cigarette from Otacon and reveals that, as Big Boss requested, he's going to live his last few months in peace. Otacon says he'll go with him, someone to pass on the legend that was Solid Snake when he's gone.

And that's that. Solid Snake's journey is over, so I can see why David Hayter is rumoured to have not been cast in MGS5. Oh and I unlocked more trophies too; one for finishing Act 5, one for earning the bandana (granting infinite ammo), one for earning the stealth camo(invisibility), and one for picking up Solar gun (a solar powered non-lethal stun gun, by earning all the figurines via non-lethal takedowns).

Total play time was 12 hours and forty minutes though I did watch every single cut scene without exception, and I achieved my zero alerts / zero kills / zero continues / zero health items used objective to boot, which was nice.

Trophies unlocked: 14

As I said a post or two above, objectively Act 5 is poor; linear as hell and only offers around fifteen minutes of gameplay and around two hours of cutscenes including the epilogue. However, the sheer spectacle of it and the emotion - I won't deny I was genuinely a bit sad when Snake is calmly discussing his imminent death - does a decent job of glossing over it.

To sum up, MGS4 isn't the best MGS game. It's the most ambitious in terms of scale, and the most spectacular in parts, but the narrative does overwhelm the gameplay on too many occasions and the moments of true genius are too few and far between. I did still enjoy it though. When it's good it's very good, it's just a shame it's so pretentious in places and that some concessions couldn't have been made to give more control to the player in parts rather than forcing us to dance to Kojima's tune.

Cutscenes are precisely 8 hours, so that's a really good time! Did you get the Big Boss Emblem?

Meryl and Johnny deserve their own game.

Kaede wrote:

Cutscenes are precisely 8 hours, so that's a really good time! Did you get the Big Boss Emblem?

No, I was playing on Solid Normal, so the highest tier Emblem I got was Wolf. The BBE takes way too much knowledge of the game to be able to get on what is essentially a first play through, especially with a completion time of under five hours - way under half what it took me!