Looking at: Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker

Hot Cold War

Ashley Wood;s artwork looks amazing, even in motion.

Ok, full disclosure here: I haven't beaten PW at the time of this writing. The reason I'm jumping ahead is twofold:
1) Peace Walker is an insane god-beast of a game that never ends, and I just found out I need to do like four hours of grinding to beat the second last boss, never mind proceeding to the final boss; and
2) MGS5 was on sale for 33% and is currently sitting in my Steam library.

I do plan on finishing PW, likely on my Vita so I can take more time and enjoy the side missions, but the fact is I'm tired of playing it in straight sittings, and thanks to MGS5 and Ground Zeros I sort of know how it all ends anyway. Regardless, here's my review based on the twenty or so hours I did put into the game.

Small Scale Conflict

Despite the PSP's limitations, detail has been pumped into every facet of the game.

The story of PW returns once again to the cold-war setting that MGS3 had, albeit ten years later in 1974. Naked Snake, now called Big Boss, has formed his own pseudo-nation of mercenaries called the Militaire Sans Frontieres (Soldiers without Borders) and makes a living solving problems for people in need. One such person is a professor of peace from Nicaragua and his student Paz. Paz and the professor implore Snake and his men to save their country from a rouge CIA unit that seeks to destabilize the entirety of Central America, believing that Central America is the key to winning the cold war. Snake agrees, mostly because there are echoes that his former mentor The Boss may be involved.

What follows is one of Metal Gear Solid's more normal plots, a breath of fresh air after the downright insanity of MGS4, and a return to the simpler form of MGS3. There's no big ideas at play here, no pan-global conspiracies with different parties, just the good guys, the bad guys, and a nuclear missile.

In a lot of ways, like MGS3, it plays like a misinterpretation of a James Bond film, with infiltrations, damsels in distress, and the occasional full on fire-fight. But it all remains relatively grounded in reality, as long as you can believe that a team of super-scientists could create fully functioning AI weapons in 1974. If you've played the rest of the series like I have, that won't even phase you.

There are some concessions to be made in PW's story telling, however. The PSP wasn't capable of the grand, expansive cut-scenes of actual consoles, so instead the story is told through somewhat interactive comic-style movies. The art in these scenes is amazing, thanks to Australian artist Ashley Wood and series artist Yoji Shinkawa's work. I've always admired the use of art in the MGS series, and here it's presented front and center like an underground comic from the 80's. There were times that these scenes got annoying, especially any of the QTE's presented, and two later in the game that damn near broke my poor gamepad's triangle button, but for the most part they're great to look at and do a perfect job of telling the story.

Portable Operation

Aiming, like MGS4, is more natural and closer to a traditional third person shooter.

There's no way I can discuss the gameplay, or graphics, of PW without making one thing abundantly clear: this was not a game meant for it's original system. The fact is the PSP just wasn't that great of a console, and in terms of both gameplay and graphics PW is pushing it well beyond it's limitations. It's worth noting that I played PW on both the PSP Vita and PS3, the latter of the two being an "HD" version.

On the Vita, at least, the controls were... strange. the original PSP only had one joystick, so the face buttons are used to control the camera. It's as awkward as you'd expect, even worse then MGS3's camera. Lining up precision shots became a chore, and it's only slightly remedied in the PS3 version, which makes use of both joysticks. Other than that controls are kept to a minimum, mirroring MGS1 in many ways. There's aim, shoot, and interact, and that's about it. You can't crawl this time, but crouch-walking is available for extra sneakiness.

The actual gameplay is serviceable, making subtle improvements over MGS3 and learning from MGS4. There's a camouflage system again, which I promptly ignored since enemy line of sight is hilariously small, once again thanks to the PSP. Sneaking is reasonably easy and I found it no challenge to remain stealthy through most of the missions, removing threats as needed either with a well placed shot or through the easy to use CQC close quarters combat system.

The big change is that this time around there's a tangible benefit to remaining silent and, more importantly, utilizing a non-lethal weapon. You're scored after each mission, with higher ranks granting rewards, but that's not the best part. There's now a base building meta-game around maintaining Snake's private army. Incapacitated enemies and captured prisoners can be removed from the fight using a Fulton recovery system, where they're extracted to your base and put to work, developing new weapons, researching enemy forces, or even fighting battles for cash and weapons. It enhances the game without being too distracting, and it's all very simple to command through a series of easy to use menus.

Compounding this is a massive laundry list of side objectives, playable either as Snake or or one of your soldiers. There are dozens upon dozens of missions to partake in, miniature bit-size offerings to test your skills and give you cash to upgrade weapons and items back at base. None of them are particularly special, except maybe going on one of video-gaming's worst dates of all times. These are best enjoyed in short bursts, and reinforce the idea that PW is, all told, a mobile game, meant to be played on a bus trip, or in the back seat of a car.

Graphically PW is... well it's a PSP game. On the Vita it looks like a PSP game, and on PS3 it looks like a PSP game that someone tried to fix in MSpaint. For the PSP, it's a great looking game, filled with detail everywhere. But the fact is, it only barely looks better then the original PS1 game, and nowhere near as good as either PS2 game. It's blocky, awkward, and levels are absolutely tiny. It's a game straining against it's own confines, and very easily could have been an absolutely amazing console game.

Last Walk

The Fulton Recovery System, or "attach a balloon to fucking everything"

Peace Walker is a game that, in many ways, shouldn't have existed. The PSP wasn't capable of handling it, and some would say didn't even deserve it. It's some of Kojima's best writing, crammed into some of his most awkward gameplay.

Despite all of this, Peace Walker does exist, and in it's moments that work it feels like a perfectly fine entry into the series. Moreover it does a great job of carrying on Big Boss' story arc, creating a memorable character and a sympathetic villain for the later games. It's a great game to play, best enjoyed in short bursts and over a long, long stretch of time.

It's worth noting here, I just found out there's a MGS game I missed, called Portable Ops for the PSP, preceding PW both in terms of plot and release. I'll probably play Portable Ops at some point, but the entire plot was outlined in MGS4, so it won't be part of my series reviews.

Next up: the latest and greatest game in the series, and one of the greatest games of all time? (I haven't played it yet, I really don't know)

images sourced from:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAi7xd4YPuY

Looking at: EA E3 2015 show

twitch fucked up and generated this at one point.

EA is, so far, the worst at the show. There's no doubt. They just failed miserably to excite me at all throughout the their entire conference. I already didn't like EA, but man, did they flop here.

Mass Effect: Andromeda

Ok, I completely screwed up and forgot to capture any screenshots for this announcement. Sorry.

They didn't show any gameplay footage, but based on the trailer it looks like this is a spinoff of the ME franchise rather then just another sequel, which is probably the smart way to go, rather then force a sequel like the Halo series.

Need for Speed

A culmination/reboot/remake of the long-running racing series, built on the Frostbite engine. It features an open world, cops, and some form of multiplayer integration. All of that sounds ok, but man, the douchey chatter going on throughout the demo ruined it for me.

At the very least, they promise that its going to take the best parts out of all the previous Need for Speed games. For their sake, I hope that doesn't include The Run.

Star Wars: The Old Republic

No one is playing TOR. No one. It's one of the worst flops in gaming. How do you fix that? Fuck it, try throwing out some new content. That oughta do it. It'll introduce a new faction to play as, with some new story, and no one cares because NO ONE IS PLAYING TOR.

Unravel

Ok, it's hipster indie horshit physics based puzzle platformer, but Unravel has two things going for it:

First, that was, hands down, the most genuine pleasure I've ever seen in a developer's face. I felt sad for him that he had to work for EA, but he looked like he really liked his game, and it made me want it that much more.

The other thing is the mixture of the yarn character and the amazing looking backgrounds. I don't play EA games as a rule, but I might have to break that just for this. it was just to precious to hate.

Plants VS Zombies Garden Warfare 2

Good god, EA has no idea how to properly do a segue. Coming off one of the most emotional and genuine game announcements EA has ever had, an idiot in a zombie outfit comes out on stage to Kenny Loggins' Danger Zone.

Even worse is the game looks awful. It's probably the first game at E3 I really don't want to play, since no point of the "live demo" (horse shit) looked enjoyable.

EA Sports

I have to compile this section, since EA doesn't know how to structure a show and placed their spots games willie nillie throughout the show.



For all of the EA sports titles there's some sort of new card game system? I'm going to apologize right off the bat here, people start talking about sports games and my mind starts wandering.


Ok, basketball. The new game features horrifying, ungodly face scan tech that makes every player look like a monster. EA had something called a Hoop Gawd show it off and it looked awful. There's also new physics to player movement, which is probably a lie.

Hockey... looks the same. I don't think they did anything to the hockey games this year.

For Fifa they dragged out Pele to talk about... soccer or something. People like Pele, so it's probably not a bad idea considering all the bad press around Fifa right now. Like basketball, it's got new physics and allows for better ball handling. OH! There's women now too, which is pretty neat. Not sure why they weren't there before, but whatever.

Football. New physics again, and the ability to create custom fantasy football teams and play them against other people.

Mobile Games

There was a Star Wars mobile game that I immediately forgot about. and I have zero notes for it.

The big one was the Minions mobile game. I haven't seen either Despicable Me movies, but thanks to the internet I have nothing but disdain for the Minions. It looks like more Simpsons Tap Out, but with little yellow dudes and a Tiki bar.

Mirrors Edge Catalyst

No gameplay, at least none that I could see, but it running on the Frostbite engine, so at the very least it'll look pretty. It's going to open world, which is probably a good move for a game like that. There's sidequests and the main story will be Jade's origin story.

They also gave it a release date of Feb. 23 next year, meaning it's not going to be a holiday release.

Battlefront 3

Easily EA's biggest ticket this year, and it shows. The world debut of gameplay footage running on PS4, so expect them to reappear at the Sony conference tonight. Gameplay wise it does look a lot like the old games, that is to say it's Battlefield: Star Wars, which is exactly what a game made by DICE should be.

The coolest reveal, at least for me, was Luke and Vader as playable characters. We only saw this for a split second, but they looked a little more versatile then in Battlefront 2.

not sure where the IGN watermark came from, I captured that screenshot live.

That's it for EA. Sorry if it seemed rushed, but I really have to pee and Ubisoft's conference starts in about 20 minutes.