Beat it.
+ Good production values, some of the best this generation.
+ The best controls in the series, although it takes a while to adjust to them.
+ The stealth gameplay takes the best bits from Metal Gear Solid 3 and enhances them.
+ Acts 1-3 were very good, stealth wise, when they didn't have stupid action bits in them at least.
+ Some of the fanservice can be good. I liked the Snatcher fanservice and it makes me wish Kojima and Konami would no longer ignore Snatcher, especially considering it has a better story than any Metal Gear put together. Having the MK-II follow you and dressing up as Gillian Seed in Act III were great.
+ I feel that when actually using stealth, the gameplay is tremendous. I am particularly fond of Acts II and III, for their use clever use of stealth.
+ The new characters (Drebin, Sunny, the monkey) were all awesome. I adored Sunny because she was cute in every scene she was in, Drebis was badass, and the monkey is the best character in the game by far.
+ The first boss fight with Octopus is one of my favorite Metal Gear Solid boss fights. It was extremely clever, didn't rely on the overuse of minions like all the other (shitty) boss fights did.
+ Storywise, I was quite fond of Snake's arc. Seeing the man be torn down limb by limb, his body in shambles and still have the balls to continue really made an impact on me. I've always hearted Snake.
+/- The game has quite a variety of locations. This gives it a great visual variety other Metal Gear games don't have. The flipside is that:
1. Metal Gear isn't Bond.
2. One of the best things about past Metal Gear games is that you get attached to one specific location and each game has a specific theme. Metal Gear Solid 4 has no theme, setting wise, that holds the whole game together. It makes the location feel more personal. For example, when you go to Shadow Moses Island on Act 4, you know every nook and cranny for a reason.
3. I am of the opinion that Metal Gear games, particularly the 3d games, are a subset of the action-adventure genre, this means the exploration is a big part of the gameplay for me. Finding the thermal goggles in MGS1, for example, is completely optional. You have to go out of your way to get them. So is finding the croc hat in MGS3. You have to work to get some stuff in these games, and exploration is a big part of that. MGS4 throws this entirely out of the window, unless I missed some items. You don't really have to look or explore for items. If something is hidden, it's just underneath that table or inside that truck. You don't have to work for it at all and this makes the game feel far too linear. The past games weren't exactly non-linear, but they had multiple branching paths full of items you couldn't find anywhere else.
+ / - The whole sneak on a battlefield can be pretty cool when done right (act 2) or just annoying when done wrong (act 1).
+/- They brought back the amazing system from MGS3 where you're awarded the bosses camo or weapon or both if you tranquilize them to death. The flipside is that you don't have to work for it. In MGS3, you had your work cut out for you to pull that shit off. Tranqing The Fear, for example. It was ALWAYS harder to tranq them than killing them with normal weapons. In MGS4, all I have to do is throw a few stun grenades at the "beasts" when they're in their beauty form and I instantly get awesome rewards. Just like everything else in the game, you don't have to work for shit, which goes against anything MGS when it comes to gameplay.
- The pretentious storyline is distinguished mentally-challenged drivel that I feel, shits on the faces of fans who have been following this series for so many years. I'm not one who worships Kojima, nor the stories Metal Gear games. In fact, I find them cheesy. But that cheese is pure icing. I like that cheese. I *like* Volgin saying "Kuwabara kuwabara". I *like* the president grabbing Raiden's nutsack in MGS2 to see if he's a guy or not. Beyond the stupid talk about ideologies, war, and Kojima trying to see if he's better than Yoshiyuki Tomino of Mobile Suit Gundam fame (hint: he's not), there's a great cast of characters who I've loved for years. I'm not entirely fond of MGS4's way of dealing with them or the situations they are in.
The game's story is entirely ham fisted and has an extreme over reliance on fan service and nostalgia. I like the occasional nostalgia trip, which is obvious from praise for including Gillian Seed costume in MGS4 and more above. Okay, so Snake runs into Meryl who was ordered by Camble to go to the middle east. Snake is working with Otacon and Sunny who was the daughter of Olga. Raiden saves Snake in South America after they rescue Naomi who was kept prisoner by Ocelot...I mean Liquid. Drebin somehow knows every single Beast in the game and their backstories. Mei Ling shows up for good measure. Snake eventually runs into Eva, Big Boss, and Zero. Johnny, who has always been a series in joke somehow has ALWAYS loved Meryl, even though in the first MGS they know each other for all but 5 minutes and he's merely the guard for her prison cell. Naomi is the same as Vamp! Wow! Look at all these character links! Everything is linked by pure coincidence!
This is a tad convenient. It is as if the writers threw in every major character in Metal Gear history, put them in a blender to see what would happen if they all appeared in the same game and you have this trainwreck of a story. I like fan service. Metal Gear games often are filled with it, but the amount of recycling, old characters popping up reeks of an extreme lack of creativity. Why is it necessary for the beasts to be named after the bosses in MGS1? No reason other than stupid fanservice. Why is the Mantis fight practically a facelift with the fight with Psycho Mantis in MGS1? Why does Psycho Mantis appear after you defeat that boss and do the tirade you saw ten years ago? He's dead, no reason other than stupid fanservice. Why does the game have you go to Shadow Moses Island? No reason other than stupid fanservice. There's more, but the more I played the more I was disgusted with the writing.
I find it insulting that the writers felt that all Metal Gear fans get their brains tingling just because,"Ooh! There's Mei Ling! She's got a nice butt too!" This game should be renamed Metal Gear: Greatest Hits.
- The emphasis on action is a big downer. It's about half stealth, half action. Pity. I want 95% stealth, 5% action that's reserved for the very end of the game.
- The level design is extremely weak. Acts 4 and 5 are dog shit. It's like the developers threw their hands up and said,"Welp we give up. Instead of creating interesting stealth gameplay let's make the player sneak past/fight a bunch of dumb robots. Both acts could have been better with less robots, more flesh and blood. Acts 1-3, however, have pretty good level design for the most part. Act 2 in particular. My favorite example of this hilarious attempt at level design is near the end where you're on a catwalk and a bunch of robots with legs come down the linear path as if the stop you. That was the laziest shit ever, and boring too.
- Due to the crappy level design and emphasis on action a crucial facet of MGS games has been sacrificed. Replayability. I'm the type of Metal Gear Solid fan who goes through all the difficulty modes, does speed runs, no kill runs, no alert runs and more. I can't imagine any of these being fun at all due to how the game is designed. It's pretty hard to not kill anything when you have 9999 robots chasing after you on an on rails section of the game! Past MGS games had on rails parts, but they threw less enemies at you allowing you to tranq at will. Such a thing is not possible in MGS4. On top of this, due to the overall gameplay:story ratio, speedrunning the game wouldn't be particularly fun at all anyway since there's little pushing buttons and gameplay in MGS4.
- The bosses suck. All of them. Except Octopus. The fight between Rex and Ray was cool, but that was it. Cool. It had no semblance of depth at all and was not particularly fun. The same goes for the final boss, which was a pathetic farewell to Metal Gear Solid, a series that has quite possibly the best boss fights in 3d gaming this side of anything Capcom develops. One crucial thing about MGS bosses is that it's always between you and the boss, and no one else. No minions, just a good ol' fashioned one on one face off. Not the case in MGS4, since all the bosses have backup except for a few exceptions. The only good exception being Octopus of course.
- Too many weapons. A Metal Gear doesn't need this many weapons. Buying weapons is dumb too. Completely kills any sense of exploration. Why explore when I can just buy supplies and guns from Drebin? Terrible idea.
- Entirely lacking of codec. The attention to detail in the MGS games is one of my favorite things. I liked Paramedic's talk about movies in MGS3, or Mei Ling's chinese accent in MGS1, or the cool stuff they'd talk about. Equipping and item and having your support dish the details was always awesome. MGS4 lacks this, and the codec is useful maybe 1 time in the game. Codec sucks in MGS4.
- The ending. I can't believe THAT was the ending to one of my favorite gaming series of all time. What a load of shit. It is essentially Big Boss talking about a bunch of crap I don't care about, Meryl and Johnny getting married which was completely random and stupid and no one gives a shit about. Thankfully Snake's drama and Raiden overcoming his past were there to tide me over.
- Otacon. Worst character ever. That little bitch cried 3-4 times in this fucking game, I counted. He does it every game. I hope the next MGS is in the far future so that walking vagina dead.
- The game isn't a solo sneaking mission.
- The cutscene ratio is out of whack. MGS3 perfected the cutscene ratio. The beginning had quite a few cutscenes, but after that it was smooth sailing and mostly gameplay throughout the majority of the game. Nothing pure, delicious stealth gameplay. The definitive MGS, with the definitive story:gameplay ratio. MGS4 ruins all this. I swear, there's at least 10-11 hours of cutscenes in this game. Which is entirely ridiculous.
Summary: Good game that is entirely too front loaded for its own good. The last two acts fuck it up tremendously, especially gameplay wise. Bosses suck in the game, but the stealth is good when it's actually there in abundance. The story is crap, and relies too much on fanservice and nostalgia rather than attempting to stand on its own. This game represents one thing I hate about modern gaming: over reliance on idiot storytelling, and sacrificing gameplay and personality for a bunch of fluff. It's obvious Kojima wants to direct movies, because this attempt at a game is pretty hilarious.
Series ranking:
MGS3 > MG2: Solid Snake > MGS1 = MGS VR Missions > MGS2 > MG: Ghost Babel > MG1 > MG2 NES >>>>> MGS4
