Why the Hate on Metal Gear?

[Redwall]

While I'll agree that MGS2's second half/ending (or, more specifically, last 3 or so hours) can be quite unnerving to the point of madness, it's not even half as nonsensical as the past couple of hours I've played FFX. Then again, since I'm at a boss that apparently I'm too weak to beat right near the end, maybe it resolves perfectly.

I think the comparison of storylines might have something to do with the fact that the MGS series is not an out and out "fantasy" setting like many adventure games. This does not necessarily mean knights and elves type of things, but stuff like Sam and Max, Grim Fandango, Space Quest etc.

1. I can't stand Final Fantasy either.

2. My favorite adventure game is the Fate of Atlantis. Additionally, I really enjoy military stories when done well; in fact, one of my "games I'd like to play but have never seen" is an adventure game exploring the military as an organization.

On the guns bit: this may be somewhat unrelated, but in Splinter Cell (SP) I never shoot anyone unless I am absolutely forced to. It makes it much more challenging (shooting everyone makes it laughably easy) and there is nothing so satisfying as grabbing a guy from behind and putting a pistol/knife to his head/throat.

[General Fuzzy McBitty]

I always get pissed that I only get the one gun.

I played MGS2... it felt like it was constantly leading up to something really big... but it never got there.

[Karimi]

I only played the first 2 , the first one was a great great game , one of my favorites. But the second was a great game that became a mindrape at the end. I was alienated.

[Dingo Chavez]

I LOVE Wes Anderson as well. However, I just rewatched The Aquatic Life yesterday after I bought it on DVD and I have to dispute your point just a bit.

You didn't think

Ned's death, although foreshadowed briefly by the helicopter scene

was a "shocking" twist?

I honestly think that's a different type of twist.

It wasn't a secret that a certain character/s knew and kept from the protagonist until the end (the villain's exposition, don't you love it? ). It didn't have Ned realizing that Zissou is or isn't is dad by a frivolous experiment or something similar to the usual "shocking" twist, they let the audience decide and I like that because it really doesn't matter if they're related or not. And his death was part of a continuation, it wasn't that big of a twist, it was more like an end, and it's not like it was a conspiracy.

So I think it's different.

Rushmore, and The Royal Tennenbaums are much better examples than The Life Aquatic. I also like them a lot more.

In Rushmore Max Fischer didn't discover that Blume is his dad or something soapish like that. Blume falling in love with Ms. Cross is hardly a twist. It started and continued, that's it.

In The Royal Tennenbaums you know from nearly the beginning that Royal is faking having cancer to get close to his family and their money, you know that Margot has an affair with Eli, you know that Richie is in love with Margot. (Good God, it is a soap oprah. I never noticed 'till now.) They tell you in the first ten minutes of the film and continue with it. It was simple and there was nothing that tries to make you think needlessly.

You know what's going on, and it has no real secrets for the end (especially the over the top ones in Metal Gear or the majority of story telling). That's why I think it's different. And that's just what I want in stories, I'm sick of clich'es.

And what also made those films fantastic for me is their outstanding atmosphere. It's very unique and maybe one percent of games and movies had a similar feel.

[Aussie Ben]

It's strange - I tried to play Metal Gear Solid and it didn't interest me at all, but Boktai? Man, that's some great fun-in-the-sun right there. And you get to do some vampire bustin'.

[jokemaster]

It's strange - I tried to play Metal Gear Solid and it didn't interest me at all, but Boktai? Man, that's some great fun-in-the-sun right there. And you get to do some vampire bustin'.

I stopped playing that when I got some really really bad sunburns

[Bc9b]

I found this article that kinda explains why the hell the creators made MGS2 so weird. It's a little "new games journalism" *fright* but it's pretty good and mentions Ico.

dreaming in an empty room

[Karimi]

I found this article that kinda explains why the hell the creators made MGS2 so weird. It's a little "new games journalism" *fright* but it's pretty good and mentions Ico.

dreaming in an empty room

What a great link , thanks for that , really helped explain MGS 2 to me. Though I still feel it was too out there and not necessary. Mainly because Mgs was much more real and believable so that mgs 2 stabbed it in the back ; while if it was a new game on its own then it would have been more interesting and I might have accepted it.

"I say you always wake up before you fall because your mind has no memories of death, so you can't recreate it. Our dreams use pieces of cognition we don't know they're using." - is gold.I always believed that you never dream about something you don't know or have never seen or experienced; but I never though about it in terms of death.

[painaxl]

Yeah, I was going to post the link to the Tim Rogers article, but there are some many Tim haters that I didn't want to offend anyone

It's really a neat way of thinking about the moments in that game. There's also this analysis of the ending to MGS2 that's really deep. Not really for the faint of heart, since it gets pretty scientific, but interesting all the same.

Mainly because Mgs was much more real and believable so that mgs 2 stabbed it in the back ; while if it was a new game on its own then it would have been more interesting and I might have accepted it.

This is something else that Tim's article mentions. People were on about MGS2 not being out there, when MGS wasn't exactly super straightforward: psychics, a cyborg ninja who comes back from the dead, foxdie, Vulcan Raven...

[loonyboi]

Hideo Kojima is overrated.

Snatcher is brilliant.

Okay, maybe not brilliant, but it's very, very, very good. The gameplay's old-school menu-driven adventure gaming, but the story's great (even if it does shamelessly rip off Terminator, Blade Runner and other movies).

[Steve]

I am a Tim Hater. He is game writing's Brent Dicrescenzo, after you up the pagecount by about twelve times.

o btw