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greenmedic88 on 02 September 2015
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Two days in and I'm hooked on MGS5; I have to cut the amount of time I spend on it otherwise it's going to be Far Cry 4 all over again for me, which took an embarrassing amount of my time.

It's rare these days for me to find titles that I hit even double digit numbers playing in a time when people seem to love complaining about any game they can finish under ten. Since 2013 with the PS4, it's been Resogun, which I'm still killing time on because of the regular updates, then it was Infamous Second Son (First Light gave me a bit more mileage), Far Cry 4 and now MGS5. About 30 other PS4 games have not been played more than a handful of times as I can afford to be very selective about which games deserve my time.

I've already crossed into double digit hours and I'm 6% complete. Granted, it's not necessary to complete anything near 100% to see the best of what MG games have to offer as they cater to players who like to play the same level/sequence over and over like an Achievement/Trophy hound, but I don't see any way I'll be playing for less than 40 hours, which is a really big investment of time for me.

For all its popularity, Metal Gear is not, or at least shouldn't be such a commercial hit because it should be a smaller niche franchise; clearly it is not for most gamers, but it has been one of mine because of the themes explored, the characters and universe created and of course the overall batshit crazy elements that make Metal Gear so ridiculous far too often.

The OP complaints really just go to show that MGS should not be such a big title even though the size of the franchise pretty much dictates it is by default, but it really isn't a mainstream game at all.

MGS4 played like 10 hour movie with interactive play sequences that could be played to be shorter than the cut scenes, which is a bit ridiculous and terrible for any player not invested in the story, but given the constraints of the hardware relative to the vision and the huge number of franchise subplots that had to be concluded, it probably shouldn't come as a surprise.

MGS5 on the other hand, starts out just like MGS4; linear level design and play to support the story which expands into a do what you want the way you want type of proposition by the third stage. After that concept is in circulation, the game really becomes more about building an army and a sovereign territory from which they can operate through abduction/recruiting, theft/collecting of resources, and construction of territory and war material resources. It feels like building Outer Heaven. The thing is building an army is an administrative exercise (recruit, collect resources, build) as it was for Peace Walker. But not being able to see and explore the tiny nation state being built was an omission; one that MGS5 does not suffer from.

OP says Mother Base is boring; my reason for doing missions, collecting resources, recruiting personnel is because I want to build it up and then explore it to see what I've built. My whole motivation for going on missions is to collect resources and abduct recruits so I can build Snake's army.

I can totally see how MGS5 would not be most players idea of fun, but to me, it takes the army nation building concept of Peace Walker and turns into something more tangible rather than a series of charts and numbers. It takes the divided level design of MGS4 and provides a more open approach to achieving an objective. By comparison, MGS5 seems short on story in the way of cut scenes, but it's too soon for me to say.

I suppose my biggest complaints with MGS5 would be it lagged a bit in the prologue and if the entire game takes place in Afghanistan, I have to say plot reliance upon the Solviet/Afghan War aside (as the most significant war of the 80s), Afghanistan is a very ugly environment in which to spend the majority of a game. Infamous' Seattle was interesting. Far Cry 4's Himalayan Kyrat was captivating. I can't help but think just how shitty an environment Afghanistan is to be caught in a war.