A half decent pit of ideas blatantly stolen from other games cobbled together into a survival game based mess. Coming from a developer who is openly and aggressively into making AI the future of everything, jerking themselves off while doing so. Nothing about this game is original, even down to the shitty clashing artstyles evoking a kind of "Nintendo Hire This Man" aura. There's no life, no charm, and god forbid any sort of reason to pick this game up.

If you get it, you're better off getting other games. If you want to spite Nintendo, congrats you're not buying their games anyway so why bother buying this one instead? If you're staying away because you were educated on what the fuck is going on behind the scenes? Good, stay away.

There's nothing good or interesting about this game and it should be treated as it truly is: A soulless cash grab made by a handful of AI bros. If the trailer wasn't widely circulated, nobody would buy it and nobody would give a shit about it. Good timing for bad circumstances.

The true reveal of Metal Gear Solid 2 is not that we play as Raiden instead of Solid Snake - it's that the antagonist of the game does not exist. It's pulling back the curtain to find that the man behind it died a century ago. The most powerful nation on Earth is essentially an algorithm with a mind of its own, akin to a runaway train that everyone "in charge" pretends they are responsible for. There is no individual you get to blame. Not the politicians, not the CEOs of major corporations. Not even the current or former presidents of the United States have any idea of what's really going on. The algorithm will replace these people the second they stop being useful. In my opinion it's a much better conception of "the system" than what you see in most conspiracy fiction: a small, shadowy cabal of people pulling the strings from behind the scenes. The reality is that all of the powerful people we blame are just the ones who managed to latch on to the algorithm of capitalism and milk it for all they can. There is no grand design, nobody is in control, everyone responsible for setting this system into motion is long dead. Which is why Otacon says the Patriots "have been dead for 100 years".

Every choice you (and Raiden) make perpetuates this status quo, and every radical political cause (like Snake and Otacon's 'Philanthropy') is effortlessly co-opted by it. MGS2 conveys this idea in a way that only a video game could: By playing as Raiden, you are forced to directly confront the futility of any resistance. You can approach MGS2 in a million different ways with an expansive arsenal of tools, getting no kills or alerts and discovering every secret in the Big Shell, or do the exact opposite. But the end result is always the same: You kill Solidus, the only threat to the Patriots, after they explicitly tell you it's exactly what they want. If you opt out entirely and "turn the game console off" you're still doing something you were ordered to do. Even if you choose not to play, you lose to the Patriots. MGS2 places you in the position of the post-information age, digital subject: Imbued with detailed knowledge of every single way you are being oppressed and exploited, you still choose to follow orders. You are so overwhelmed by information, some true, some false, that is causes a kind of exasperated compliance.

This is simultaneously a commentary on the nature of video game stories as an immutable, pre-programmed series of events not as different from film narratives as we like to think; Any "choice" is always an illusion, whether it's in Metal Gear Solid or a Telltale game. Any game that sets out to fulfill the concept of "player freedom" in its story will always fail. Video games stories are (at their best) about interactivity, not choice. They let you play out a pre-ordained role and do some improvisation, not write the story. Kojima understands this, and it's why he borrows so much from film. It's also why the criticism that his games are too much like movies is kind of pointless; he's just recognizing the inherent similarities of the two mediums.

On a less meta level, this lack of free will in MGS2 underscores the reality that capitalism, American empire, the very norms and values of American society, whatever the antagonist of the game is - cannot be destroyed from within. It is a system that has achieved self-awareness. Any possible attempt to destroy it has already been anticipated with an infinite number of contingencies. Emma Emmerich gave her life to destroy the GW AI and it was just replaced with a backup. The battle has already been lost, and it was decided by a microscopic processor in a fraction of a second. Solidus (a perfect stand-in for the kind of right-wing populist we wouldn't see for awhile in 2001) was the only person in power trying to oppose the Patriots, but his fatal mistake was believing that the Patriots were essentially a deep state globalist cabal, rather than the nigh omnipresent force they really are (they aren't really a "they", but an "it"). Like Snake said, "the Patriots are a kind of ongoing fiction". But even the legendary Solid Snake, the archetypal hero who opposes the system with clear-eyed determination, is completely dumbfounded after the credits roll.

And that's because this enemy is simply beyond the abilities of one man, even if that man is a Snake. It can just create its own soldier to surpass Solid(us) Snake and even mass-produce them, and your actions throughout the game prove it. No tactical espionage action can defeat what is essentially an idea - one that has infiltrated the furthest depths of the human soul. The only hope lies on a society-wide level: An alternative has to be built by everyone from the ground up, through finding what is true and meaningful in life and passing it on to the next generation. Slowly, generation by generation, an alternative capable of opposing the great algorithm can be built. And it has to be one that people can have faith in, in a spiritual sense.

But the encroachment of the internet into our lives is making this less and less feasible. By replacing the traditional nuclear-armed metal gear with Arsenal Gear, an AI that controls the internet, Kojima is essentially framing the internet itself as a threat equal to or greater than that of nuclear weapons. It is an instrument of human separation much more powerful than the splitting of an atom. The quote at the beginning of Raiden's chapter tying computers and nuclear weapons together bolsters this interpretation.

The digital age has turned human life into a scrambled mess that is impossible to parse. We create entirely idiosyncratic, patchwork realities for ourselves by finding various "truths" through our own individual exploration of the internet and jury-rigging them together. We relate to each other less and less, and mental illness is widespread. This overload of information makes us increasingly neurotic, isolated, and unable to determine truth from fiction. The collective human mind is being broken (or at least pounded into a new shape) against the collective neuroses of the internet, and nobody knows what to do about it. We're all alone right now, each of us left with the isolating task of finding our own truth amidst the cacophony. Even the algorithm fears for our future, yet it's still the only entity with a solution: Censorship. Make the noise stop. Honestly, has anyone thought of a better idea?

On the first day of christmas my true love gave to me...........Banban...........

I'm so tired dude.

(Edit- I just realized this was my 1000th review........................god I just.......fuck my life dude honestly.)

While it's by no means perfect, I think Indigo Disk is a very solid DLC for Pokemon Scarlet and Violet. The actual story is fun if simple, and I like how it directly carries on from the story of Teal Mask. The Blueberry Terrarium, while feeling artificial (since it literally is in-universe), is oddly a lot more satisfying to explore than Kitakami. I also really appreciate how challenging the trainer battles are in this DLC; they're all very well put together, so beating them may present a challenge even for those with extensive knowledge of Pokemon. There are also just tons of Pokemon to catch, which is always good, including several new ones. This does tie into my main complaint though, that being the amount of grinding for stuff is kind of grating. The new area has a side quest system, where you can do quests to earn BP, which can be used for all sorts of different upgrades. I love the idea on paper, and it can be fun in some regards, but to find every Pokemon in the DLC (namely the starters of past regions), you need to upgrade all four regions of the Terrarium, which takes a huge amount of BP. It took me somewhere between 30 and 60 minutes to grind enough for one upgrade, and that was playing with someone else, which allows for a MUCH faster grind since you can work on quests together. That all being said, grinding isn't at all necessary for the main story of Indigo Disk, and I do appreciate how full this DLC feels, especially compared to Teal Mask.
It is also worth mentioning that the new areas of the DLC suffer from all the same performance issues as the base game. I'm not sure that they're really any worse, but if you were bothered by the terrible frame rate and resolution of Scarlet and Violet then you are probably not going to have a good time here.
Overall, I think Indigo Disk is a really strong DLC. I'm not sure the whole DLC is worth the price given that Teal Mask was fairly middling and both run worse than a three legged dog, but if you don't mind the entry fee then and enjoyed the base game, Indigo Disk is definitely worth checking out.

Score: 80/100