In my opinion this is a great game, but a bad MGS Game

[livinin82]

I got into the series because of the cinematic and linear structure of them all.


However I am missing that in this and the other non Kojima iteration. Does anyone else feel this way?

[Wayno]

A lot of people feel this way. It's a great game. I think the mechanics and gameplay are some of the best of the generation. I mean tactical horse pooping is fantastic. But MGS should never be open world even if the open world is good, which it's not. The environment being claustrophobic brings lonearity which brings critically, pacing. Locking the story away on tapes on Peace Walker Dog Watwr was semi understandable until you realised MPO could deliver the story just the same way on the same hardware. For MGSV to do it was awful and there's no excuse considering the budget.

What also doesn't help is for the most part the protagonist does not react to stuff. It's all outsourced to Kaz for the whole "Venom" shtick." Why should I be invested in the story if my character isn't?

[Departed]

I get why a lot of people feel that way because MGS1 through 4 really do have such a tight structure to them that also makes them a lot of fun to come back to, decades later. For me, the reason why I never agreed with the sentiment of MGSV being a bad MGS game is because I truly don't believe such a thing exists. For me, every MGS game is a mix of good and bad with a total sum that makes each entry a game I still love in spite of their flaws. In the case of MGSV, there's a lot of stuff it does that I love way more than every game before it and a lot of stuff it does that I love a lot less than the games that came before it. That's also how I feel about every MGS game, especially when it comes to their narratives.

What I think would've helped MGSV a lot would've been restructuring the missions, because some missions would've been better left for Chapter 2, and others could've come at different times to strengthen the pacing better. What would've also helped is including more cutscenes to punctuate more storybeats, show more of Kiefersnake's characterization, as well as the characterization of Kaz and Ocelot, and especially having a few more human boss fights instead of just recycling the Skulls for half the fights of the game. Like more XOF assassins who can talk and have personality during the fights, and a fight against Skull Face in the same vein as Cliff / Neil in Death Stranding, where it's you versus him and his forces in more of a predator stealth battle instead of a direct one-on-one.

Some things are just MGS staples and while I believe there's a lot you can change, many of which I approved of with MGSV, those were the ones I felt were the biggest step back.

But again, I'm one of those people who doesn't feel that MGSV is a bad MGS game at all. None of these games are perfect, but each one is so distinct from one another that they all give you something unique to come back to, which for me, was always to MGS's benefit.

[Tricerius]

I'd say that a good deal of its failings (as a MGS game) lie with the fact that it was simply incomplete, and so, a good number of things are just left hanging loose, even if we do have some knowledge of what was supposed to happen.

There were some other issues beyond it which laid in its inherent writing, such as that SF was possibly the biggest letdown of a villain in the whole franchise. A lot of setting up with him being a genuine threat (he got to Zero of all people; that's no mean feat), just to flop as he did. Departed's also right in that the lack of a proper boss roster, which has otherwise been something of a staple in MGS games, did it no favors.

Beyond that, my impression of the game was that it was good for one playthrough. It kind of fell apart beyond that/once you looked into it. On the flip side, a single playthrough was much longer than other games' one playthrough, but I'd still say that as a matter of enjoying the story and such (which I think is fair to say is the main appeal of MGS games), other games are just more replayable (and enjoyable in said replays).

[Roger]

I've played MGSV 3 times so far. And each time, it really does baffle me on how Kojima made a really solid gameplay loop. It is a fun game. But is it a MGS game? Honestly, no idea. Death Stranding at times has a lot of charm from MGSV, does that make Death Stranding a MGS game? Yes, there are some plot twists, and some characters "double crossing", and some information being withheld until the very end. Did the conversation between Ocelot and Miller at the end of the game give the same amount of shock and awe as the secret conversations in other games? I think what makes MGSV stand out so much is because it holds so many new and different things not typically associated with the previous games. And that difference might just be enough to not make it a MGS game. But for me, the fact it is so different makes it a MGS game for me.