I've never played Metal Gear Solid before and everyone says that MGS4 on the PS3 is by far the best game they've ever played/seen. So I really wanted to get into MGS so I can experience MGS4, so I bought a used copy of Metal Gear Solid: The Essential Collections, it contains MGS, MGS 2 substance, and MGS 3 substinence.

So I just finished MGS the first one (great game), and I go to open MGS 2 and theres a disk of MGS3 in it....so I open the box for MGS 3 and theres another MGS 3 game disk in it, so now I have two MGS 3 games...(don't you love used games).

So anyway I plan on buying MGS2 on ebay, but that'll take like 2 or 3 weeks to get here and I was wondering if it'd ruined the story in any way if I play MGS 3 before I play MGS 2, because I've noticed that MGS 3 takes place in 1965, and MGS 2 takes place two years after MGS 1, in 2007 so it seems like it wouldn't really matter if I play MGS3? would it?

Also I'm really big on the story but desprate to play another Metal Gear Solid game and I don't have the patience to wait for the MGS2 to come in from ebay, and I kinda just want to crack open MGS3.

No Spoilers please!

No, actually MGS3 takes place before the original Metal Gear.

yeh I noticed that on wikipedia, so it wouldn't ruin the story at all, and would I need to know anything from MGS2 before I play 3.

seen this on Wiki

You can probably find MGS2 for less than $10 at a video game store. MGS3 is probably in my top 3 video games ever (sometimes, I consider it THE top game). Don't play it until you beat part 2. There's plenty of inside jokes you'll miss otherwise.

thanks thats all I needed to hear if theres one little tine bit of story that I don't understand because I skipped a game then I wont like that at all. But it looks like I'll have to wait for ebay, I  pretty well in the bush and the nearest big city is an hour drive away and it doesn't have a video game store and I dought Wal-mart has MGS2. Maybe I might get lucky and I'll get the game in under 2 weeks from ebay...

yeah, don't play MGS3 until you beat MGS2...and get/finish MGS4 you'll understand where Liquid gets his good looks from ;)

Story progression MSG 3,1,2,4... So you are good there. But I am pretty sure playing the open (so to speak) world in MSG3, you will feel restricted in MSG2.

ahhh spoiler! I'm going to be thinking about that all night trying to figure out what you mean, I better not figure it out! lol

I would say that out of those MGS3 is by far my favorite! While you would be able to understand there story there are little hints that tell how things came to be, and while its not a pivotal thing, you might not get the "wow thats really cool" feeling. I say wait until you play MGS2 :P

IMO MGS2 has aged waaay worse than 1 or 3. 1 has simplicity on it's side in that it's pretty much just a top down sneak and shoot. 3 has evolution on it's side, that it fixed alot of the problems with 2. 2 just has god awful control and combat mechanics by todays standard. I can play 1 and 3 just fine but I can't play 2 without being completely pissed off at how lame the control is.