For me to play a game twice is uncommon and three times is extraordinarily rare, but this is what I’ve done with 'The Phantom Pain'.
This is peak 'Metal Gear Solid' from a gameplay perspective. Every approach feels great, whether you’re into full stealth or don’t mind getting a terrible mission score by blasting your way through an encounter. It’s all just such high quality, so polished and clean. Overall, it’s a stellar experience in every technical aspect, as well as almost every facet of its gameplay.
I love the loop of extracting enemies and converting them to your side. It developed into a fun risk/reward system for me, where I was in the middle of missions where I had perfect stealth so far, but in the distance, I spot an enemy that has some fantastic stats and all of sudden, I’m taking a risk to get this guy on my side, even at a detriment to the mission. It’s a lot of fun and although I know it’s in other MGS titles, this is the first one I’ve fully played with this system and it’s very well done.
My biggest complaint is something that plagues a lot of modern games, which is having a large open world that can feel empty at times. I don’t think the solution to this problem in modern games is to clutter up the maps with crap (like Ubisoft does), but rather to scale back the size. Bigger isn’t always better, a more concise and satisfying experience is often the better one. For example, Ground Zeroes is extraordinarily small, but the map it does have feels jam packed compared to any of the enemy bases in this game and it’s such a shame. I feel that the world could have definitely been trimmed with more density added to the areas (especially those bases). Small areas have however plagued this series for a long time, so I must praise a different approach, even if it doesn't hit the mark.
I also like that when you go back to earlier missions later in the game to try and get the S rank, that the level/equipment of the enemies has changed based on how far you’ve gotten in the game. It’s a nice touch to maintain a difficulty level and to ensure you have the chance of getting great recruits. It makes replaying missions more fun for me. I actually love the lack of traditional difficulty options in general. You can decide to make it easier by equipping the chicken hat or using air support or active camo, but this reduces your rank on any mission. It's much better than the standard "easy, normal, hard, very hard".
The story is pretty spotty, but frankly I don’t care too much. A better story would only catapult this above 'Sons of Liberty' in my ranking. For this game to be below only that game in a series of such high quality is a testament to the fun that the gameplay provided for me over my three playthroughs.
Played on PlayStation 5 via backwards compatibility
This is peak 'Metal Gear Solid' from a gameplay perspective. Every approach feels great, whether you’re into full stealth or don’t mind getting a terrible mission score by blasting your way through an encounter. It’s all just such high quality, so polished and clean. Overall, it’s a stellar experience in every technical aspect, as well as almost every facet of its gameplay.
I love the loop of extracting enemies and converting them to your side. It developed into a fun risk/reward system for me, where I was in the middle of missions where I had perfect stealth so far, but in the distance, I spot an enemy that has some fantastic stats and all of sudden, I’m taking a risk to get this guy on my side, even at a detriment to the mission. It’s a lot of fun and although I know it’s in other MGS titles, this is the first one I’ve fully played with this system and it’s very well done.
My biggest complaint is something that plagues a lot of modern games, which is having a large open world that can feel empty at times. I don’t think the solution to this problem in modern games is to clutter up the maps with crap (like Ubisoft does), but rather to scale back the size. Bigger isn’t always better, a more concise and satisfying experience is often the better one. For example, Ground Zeroes is extraordinarily small, but the map it does have feels jam packed compared to any of the enemy bases in this game and it’s such a shame. I feel that the world could have definitely been trimmed with more density added to the areas (especially those bases). Small areas have however plagued this series for a long time, so I must praise a different approach, even if it doesn't hit the mark.
I also like that when you go back to earlier missions later in the game to try and get the S rank, that the level/equipment of the enemies has changed based on how far you’ve gotten in the game. It’s a nice touch to maintain a difficulty level and to ensure you have the chance of getting great recruits. It makes replaying missions more fun for me. I actually love the lack of traditional difficulty options in general. You can decide to make it easier by equipping the chicken hat or using air support or active camo, but this reduces your rank on any mission. It's much better than the standard "easy, normal, hard, very hard".
The story is pretty spotty, but frankly I don’t care too much. A better story would only catapult this above 'Sons of Liberty' in my ranking. For this game to be below only that game in a series of such high quality is a testament to the fun that the gameplay provided for me over my three playthroughs.
Played on PlayStation 5 via backwards compatibility