This game is like kojima giving fans everything they want but crossing his arms and doing it angrily. Oh? Oh u want to play as solid snake again? U thought raiden was lame? Ok, here, you’re snake and he’s old and lame and has back problems and raiden is a badass lightning ninja cyborg now. Remember snake’s girl from mgs1? Poopy pants Johnny just married her. He’s not as good at sneaking as u are, player, but he is nice. It’s no accident that every other character ends the game dancing and chilling at a wedding together and snake/player is wasting his short remaining days being exposited to. Spending more and more time being stuck within the metal gear story, milking and draining every bit of information from it until eventually the player hates it. The game gives you fanservice the same way eating lasagna every meal for every day wil give u lasagna poisoning. I feel it’s a critique of the culture where everything is theorized and discussed and answers for every mystery are demanded. The game’s so stuck within itself that every boss is a remix of an old one. You literally press x to see pictures of whatever metal gear moment this scene references. I’m not qualified at all to talk about meta commentary and stuff but there’s a part in this game where snake asks why they kept big boss’ body alive. She says “because people need their hero to stay forever” and looks directly at the camera. I don’t think it’s really an avoidable topic when discussing this game.

I love Kojima but this is prob his most flawed dialogue and exemplifies a lot of problems I have with his later games stories. This and peace walker are the only mainline mgs games I’ve never replayed. There’s obviously too many cutscenes and the gameplay segments are mediocre after the first act. The game’s psych meter system is an interesting concept to shift the physical health first aid care system from mgs3 to mental health and make it more about ptsd, but it does quite literally nothing with it. The therapist character on your codec doesn’t even give you therapy she just says to wait in the corner until ur stress level goes down. Or says some shit like “the boss you’re fighting, unhappy armadillo, is unhappy. According to psychology, this is caused by lack of happiness. Good luck snake.” The bosses are terrible and the boss roster themselves have no personality (unless you like their wattpad trauma backstory that is omnisciently told to you by the gun merchant after you beat them) which is such a downgrade from every other game’s boss rosters, every single one of which I would have a drink with. I don’t even drink but I would defile my sacred mouth with the poison that is alcohol just to make fatman or sniper wolf or the pain happy. But there’s much to appreciate with what this game does.

“Don’t waste the life you have left fighting”
=
“Stop playing this video game 😡”

Maybe I’m completely illiterate or I’m projecting but my interpretation is valid and yeah. Also the ray fight and the ocelot fight are amazing. The end. Sry for the serious review.