Ah what the hell I’ve come around completely. I still really don’t like certain bits (Mei ling scenes, marriage story) but god I love the art direction and cutscenes so damn much. It’s also just fucking fun. The story is so much better to me now that my expectations no longer rest solely on the mammoth shoulders of MGS2. I really picked up what MGS4 put down in the end. As ridiculous as the plot beats are, when you grow to accept them for what they are you find a game just as if not more poetically poignant than anything else in the metal gear series. I no longer feel cheated. I’m very happy that MGS4 is what it ended up being. Less sexual harassment wouldn’t have hurt though. Why is Johnny a thing man…

I don’t fucking know man. I respect the ambition, I guess. I rock with its art style and bleak tone heavily. I like the evolution of cqc. Some of the concepts are really cool! Cyborg raiden is a fun concept and so are those geckos. This just feels so agonisingly unessential to me. I cannot stop thinking about the metal gear trilogy. So much themes to latch onto and ponder, which I hoped this would add on to but its afraid of its own shadow! Nothing was really learned from mgs2 so everything just feels disconnected. We get what to me feels like a shockingly inoffensive and safe story to wrap up the supremely abstract nature of the world. It feels so... cheap. It cant commit to itself at the very end. What makes this game feel special is how it betrays the series, only for it to double back on that and deny the viewer a more melancholic, noir story. I felt tricked by this game. In some ways I appreciate it. In others I simply do not. I didn’t really like it but I really want to!