Update: Sky Edition [08/15/10]

Update

Sky Edition

The perhaps biggest news of the last week was Ken Levine's (from Bioshock and System Shock fame) new game, Bioshock Infinite. Infinite takes place in an American utopia situated in the sky, kept afloat by a combination of Hot-Air Balloons, and propellers and called Columbia. The focus of the game is as Levine puts it on the notion of American exceptionalism, a stark change from Andrew Ryan and Bioshock's overwhelming notion of objectivism. Bioshock Infinite is interesting in that it shares the Bioshock title yet tosses away the iconic Bioshock symbols, in essence Infinite is as close to a new IP as we can get without actually getting one and for that I cannot complain that Irrational's latest endeavor was not new and original.

July NPDs came out this week as well and for the first time since September 2007 the 360 finds itself on top of the sales chart despite a decline in sales. This is in large part due to the continued boost from the latest 360 skew, but also the decline in DS sales that I assume can be attributed to market saturation and excitement for the upcoming 3DS. On the software side football proves popular yet again with NCAA topping an otherwise heavily Nintendo dominated top 20, a quarter of which are Mario titles. Red Dead Redemption continues to sell well, and Super Mario Galaxy proves yet again that Nintendo can develop titles that sell consistent numbers. CrackDown 2 manged to land the #3 spot despite not coming with a Halo Beta Code this time around.

July Hardware Sales

1. Xbox 360            444,000 (Down 02%)

2. Nintendo DS       398,000 (Down 22%)

3. Nintendo Wii      254,000 (Down 40%)

4. Playstation 3       215,000 (Down 30%)

5. PSP                       84,000 (Down 31%)

July Software Sales

1. NCAA Football 11       (360)  368,000    

2. NCAA Football 11       (PS3)  298,800

3. Crackdown 2                (360)  208,800

4. Super Mario Galaxy 2  (Wii)  193,000

5. Lego Harry Potter        (Nds)  141,700

CW: Metal Gear Solid 4 [Act 1]

Metal Gear Solid 4 
Act 1: Liquid Sun

"In The Not To Distant Future. On A Tired Battlefield. War Has Become Routine."

Metal Gear Solid 4 is a game that has received a range of both positive and negative critical reception. Personally I've adored the series yet I am perfectly willing to admit it has its fair share of issues, this feature will take you through my personal experience with the game from beginning to end. Preferably it would be nice if you had played the game prior to reading this feature but if you have no plans on ever picking up this title I'm sure you could follow along and perhaps I could change your mind. Spoilers begin here.

Just one of many bizarre MGS moments

Metal Gear Solid 4 opens with a set of television programs, all of which seem bizarre yet share similarities to modern programming with a touch of the twisted MGS world. These scenes offer the player a glance into the world outside the battlefield in the MGS Universe, and aspect of the world previous games had not shown us. 

As the commercials end we realize that much of popular culture at the time has become influenced by the ongoing conflict, to be more exact the world is caught up in a proxy arms race between PMCs (Private Military Corporations). 


As the true game begins we a greeted by a black screen with the phrase above written, the camera pans around a desolate Middle Eastern battleground, imagery that has become all to familiar to gamers and the mass public as well. As the scene continues Jackie Presti's Love Theme plays atop the imagery. The song is sung in Hebrew and written by Kojima, it is just one of many amazing songs off the Metal Gear Solid 4 soundtrack, composed by Harry Gregson-Williams. The score for this game should be commended as it had a huge impact on some of the most emotional scenes and is a standout amongst Video-Game Based Soundtracks. The game's opening is exposition heavy, and to anyone who knows anything about film-making the first 15 minutes of the game may be cringe worthy. Yet for one reason or another (I'm not afraid to admit that I am a huge fan of the series and am willing to put up with far more than the average gamer when it comes to MGS Tradition) the first few scenes really hit for me. 

Kojima's influence is felt throughout the game

Snake's opening monologue occurs to the background of an armed conflict between Middle-Eastern Militia and the Praying Mantis PMC, a highly armed and funded military organization that has been sent to this region for reason's not readily known to the player. Metal Gear Solid 4 should be commended for painting the Middle Eastern Faction in a positive light, as far to often in games do we see people form Middle East as the emotionless evil-doer, a presumption that frustrates me in many contemporary conflict oriented games. 
Snake then proceeds to exit the ME force's vehicle, where he immediately sees the effect of the system, Snake's gun jams, and Snake is left without weaponry to continue the mission. A second truck is driven in front of Snake blocking his path, this teaches the player to crouch and crawl without being overt about it. 

The Middle Eastern Militia

To the average observer or to someone that does not follow the Metal Gear franchise to closely this scene seems like a mere conflict, but to someone who follows the series this opening scene is actually pretty unsettling. The way I saw this scene was the fulfillment of Liquid's idea of what Big Boss' Dream was, the world has become his Outer Heaven, controlled and fueled by conflict, a soldier's world. This begins the game on an incredibly somber tone, a huge feeling of failure on Solid Snake's part. 


One of the games most redeeming features is the ability to form a partnership with the Middle-Eastern Militia, by assisting them you won't need to worry about them firing at you and you'll receive some added support from them. On higher difficulties however I found myself avoiding forming the bond as earning their trust was far to much of a risk, and I opted to play the first Act as a lone wolf. 

The game continues on and you are introduced to the Gekko, a large highly mobile Metal Gear capable of sweeping entire battlefields. If the exposition at the beginning of the game hadn't informed you that this was a Metal Gear game than the Gekkos defiantly will. The Gekko's help to inform the player that direct combat is not always the best coarse of action.

Octocamo is a great addition to Snake's arsenal.

The following Cut scene subliminally teaches the player how to use MGS4's greatest feature Octo-Camo, a suit that allows Snake to mimic the patterns of objects he is touching in order to hide from enemies. In a way the octo-camo is the successor to the Cardboard Box of MGS fame.


The game then begins to open up and the player is set free to experiment with any and all the tools at your disposal. Although Metal Gear Solid 4 has been criticized since it did not shoehorn stealth into the game, I feel it is MGS4 most redeeming quality that it never forces you to play a certain way (in the first 2 acts at least). Through several play-throughs you will acquire an assortment of tools to replay the sequences. If you want to play the game stealthily , if you want to play the game like a Third Person Shooter, if you want to play as a sniper, if you want to play without killing a single person the game allows you to.

Perhaps my favourite new character

As the game continues you are introduced to Drebin 893, a gun launderer who acts as the games roaming merchant and helps Snake throughout the experience. Drebin gives in my opinion one of the greatest performances in the game and not surprisingly since he is not at all tied to the games past legacy. Drebin and his monkey act as both comic-relief and another exposition dumpster, yet the mystery that surrounds his character makes his sequences far more interesting than Otacon's rants. 

The entire 1st Act demonstrates some of the best level design in the Metal Gear Franchise. Every Level seems to trick the player into feeling like you are in an open world environment, but the design of the levels is clever enough to allow several paths to take yet still be coherent enough that the player never feels lost. The background conflict helps to make the otherwise desolate environments feel life like, although if I were to lodge a complaint the animation for the soldiers is quite comical at times and feels rather misplaced.

As you progress forward Snake finally meets up with the informants, RAT PT 01, an undercover group that has infiltrated Liquid's Ranks. it is here that Snake meets Johnny (Akiba) and is reunited with MGS1 love interest Meryl Silverburgh. Meryl's changed however, she is more experienced, wise and by no means the damsel in distress from MGS1, while Kojima's games have been known to be rather exploitative of their female characters, Meryl has always been one of the more respectable female characters in video-games. The following cut-scene which stretches over 10 minutes, all though somewhat spectacular to look at the first time through, is one of several instances in the game where they feel the need to beat you over the head with what is going on. It would make sense if it worked but from watching several people play the game they were just overwhelmed by the mass of information that is thrown at them. The cut-scene delves into Meryl and Snake's former relationship as well as spends 8 minutes describing SOP (the system).

A mere shift in gender makes 

the FROG unit far more 

interesting

Let me try to explain SOP in its simplest. SOP allows those in control to monitor and control all aspect of a soldiers body, weaponry and emotional stability. That is all they really needed to say, and then put a little fate into the audience that they can see the consequence of such a system, yet instead Kojima's team decides the audience couldn't grasp such a concept and makes sure you do. 

We are then treated to the first real action sequence in the game, and the first time the player faces the FROG Unit. The Frog Unit is one of many interesting enemy design choices. While some criticized MGS4 for lacking the strongly characterized bosses of the past, I found the bosses to be quite unique while still paying homage to past MGS bosses. The Frog unit is entirely female, one of many attempts by Kojima's team to make disturb your mental process while combating enemies. The Gekko's alluded to earlier make a crying cow sound, the bizarre innocence and vulnerability of a Cow coupled with the tremendous destructive capability of the Gekkos made for a far more psychologically manipulative game-play experience. Perhaps simply for the reason I am a male, shooting a screaming female felt far worse than slaughtering hordes of male PMC soldiers, despite the fact the female FROGs were far more lethal. 

It is also in this action scene that we first see Johnny's infatuation with Meryl's character, in a rare act of subtlety, Kojima's team hints at Johnny's interest by merely showing that he uses her name for his password. This small instance is easily missed but far more effective than any exposition.

Liquid!

Following this scene Snake splits up from Rat PT and we are back to the open-ended MGS4 formula. The final sequence in this act resembles level design from the earlier games. Narrow artificial corridors made from supply crates and small crawl spaces make this level more reminiscent to MGS1 than 4. A welcome addition to an impressive opening act.

The act closes with a cut-scene that introduces series antagonist Liquid Ocelot, as well as MGS1 double agent Naomi Hunter. The scene is effective in demonstrating the sheer power of the 'system' as Liquid uses it to corrupt the minds of every soldier within his confines as well as Snake who doesn't seem immune to the System either. The act closes with far more questions then answers but sets up for whats to be an action packed globe trotting chase.

Critical Walk-Through [01/01]

Critical Walk-Through: 

Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots

I've decided to begin a new feature on my blog I like to call a, "Critical Walkthrough" (Pretentious yet necessary). Basically what this feature encompasses is me playing through a game and examining it from moment to moment in more detail than possible in a review. The feature will not go into great story detail but will spoil an abundance of elements, especially toward the end. For the first walkthrough I'd like to examine a game I am fairly familiar with, Metal Gear Solid 4. Having played it more than 8 times I think I have a fairly solid (pun intended) grasp of the game. I'd like to share my complaints and commend the game for being an experience I've enjoyed so much, and continue to enjoy. So over the next few weeks I'll be looking at MGS4, Act by Act ... so until next time ... [!]