Metal Gear

[Prophetic Spirit]

That was sold separately on xbox. What makes it so different from Portable ops?

Is a whole different game.
I never know why Portable Ops isn't canon. You have Roy Campbell man, fucking Roy Campbell.

 

[Inafune Fanfiction]

Is a whole different game.
I never know why Portable Ops isn't canon. You have Roy Campbell man, fucking Roy Campbell.

This is the first I've ever heard of that.

 

[Ted's of Beverly Hills]

Is a whole different game.
I never know why Portable Ops isn't canon. You have Roy Campbell man, fucking Roy Campbell.

Kojima probably disowned it mostly because of how unfun (physically painful) it is to actually play. The idea of introducing an Anchuent Prophecy into the series and a boring villain like Gene probably didn't make it any more favorable. Then there's the way that it puts the OG Patriots (Zero et al) into too good of a light considering where Kojima took their character arcs in MGS4.

 

[Wesker]

Is a whole different game.
I never know why Portable Ops isn't canon. You have Roy Campbell man, fucking Roy Campbell.

Don't buy into Kojima's bullshit. He only deemed it non canon because at the time people liked it no matter what anyone says in hindsight. He couldn't make it anymore clearer he wanted out of that series yet he had to comment on it.

From my perspective, MPO can be canon while PW and TPP offer nothing to the story as a whole. MPO isn't perfect and it was clunky as a hell to play, and I think making Gray Fox be a fucking ninja in the 70s was retarded. But it didn't desecrate the previous games on the level the shit that came after did with the likes of The Boss AI and parasites explaining away the Cobra Unit.

My biggest problem with the pc port is that even with the v-fix, a lot of the graphics are still missing and the audio sounds like shit.
Still a good enough option, but if you can run it I still recommend emulating the hd collection version over it.

The HD collection is fine I guess, but I still see the PC port being the best bet if you can get it to work since the outer Tanker sections run like butter to anything that's ever been on the console versions of MGS2. HD col of Substance can get a game breaking bug in the credits where the game shits itself where it breaks at the very start and you can't get to the results screen and save. I only know about it through the speedrun community as they universally run the PC version if they had a choice.

I will say the free camera mechanic of the HD MGS3 ruined that game for me as I can only play that version now. There's a mod that just came out for the PC MGS2 port that does the same thing.

 

[Gravemind]

This is the first I've ever heard of that.

That's strange considering it's common knowledge that PO and PW are two entirely different games.

Kojimbo also has a sore spot when it comes to PO considering it wasn't made under his direction. It has a bit more of a grounded and slightly more interesting story than PW did, I feel, and I am actually of the camp in thinking that it should be canonized (aside from a snide remark by Miller at the very start of PW denouncing the events of PO), but still.

 

[Dom Cruise]

Portable Ops is the only... potentially canon entry I've not played, I regret that just for completionist sake, it's like the Castlevania Curse of Darkness of the series, the last one (of the Iga produced games) I haven't played in full but feel like I should even though they're not supposed to be great.

As for whether it's canon, did some research online and Kojima did disown it and PW does kind of contradict it if you really analyze it, but it is at the end of the day up to you, it did introduce concepts like recruiting enemy soldiers that would continue on into TPP, so it seems a little odd to ignore it completely.

Rising on a side note is evidently supposed to be an AU deal like Ghost Babel, but again, you can pick and choose what's "headcanon" with anything at the end of the day.

This brings me to a question, could one ignore 4 while still considering PW and TPP "canon"? Despite their flaws there's a lot that's interesting about them to make it a shame to throw the baby out with the bathwater since only 4 is the one that really pisses me off, which they do reference things from 4 in the other prequel games, but none of the stuff that bothers me too much directly I guess (ie Vamp) or am I wrong?

Everything's so much neater if you just pretend Snake Eater was the final game, but messy as they are, PW and TPP do have their merits, I always loved TPP's more ground's eye "you are there" view of the Metal Gear universe.

But this brings me to another question, how does one replay TPP on Steam? Can you just select mission by mission to replay (which does that save time on stuff like R&D?) or can you start fresh?

I'm definitely feeling like I'd like to revisit the series sometime this year as it's been a very long time since I've played most of them.

 

[Wesker]

Portable Ops is the only... potentially canon entry I've not played, I regret that just for completionist sake, it's like the Castlevania Curse of Darkness of the series, the last one (of the Iga produced games) I haven't played in full but feel like I should even though they're not supposed to be great.

As for whether it's canon, did some research online and Kojima did disown it and PW does kind of contradict it if you really analyze it, but it is at the end of the day up to you, it did introduce concepts like recruiting enemy soldiers that would continue on into TPP, so it seems a little odd to ignore it completely.

Rising on a side note is evidently supposed to be an AU deal like Ghost Babel, but again, you can pick and choose what's "headcanon" with anything at the end of the day.

This brings me to a question, could one ignore 4 while still considering PW and TPP "canon"? Despite their flaws there's a lot that's interesting about them to make it a shame to throw the baby out with the bathwater since only 4 is the one that really pisses me off, which they do reference things from 4 in the other prequel games, but none of the stuff that bothers me too much directly I guess (ie Vamp) or am I wrong?

Everything's so much neater if you just pretend Snake Eater was the final game, but messy as they are, PW and TPP do have their merits, I always loved TPP's more ground's eye "you are there" view of the Metal Gear universe.

But this brings me to another question, how does one replay TPP on Steam? Can you just select mission by mission to replay (which does that save time on stuff like R&D?) or can you start fresh?

I'm definitely feeling like I'd like to revisit the series sometime this year as it's been a very long time since I've played most of them.

You could look at it a lot of ways. But Kojima intended MGS2 to be the series end in his hands and his team or whoever with Konami was going to take over. He didn't make it with a follow up in mind. Snake Eater took the chance of going a completely different direction, and succeeded. MGS4 is certainly a lazy way to end the series since it takes MGS2 literally when the game explicitly states not to do that through it's narrative. And MGS4 was designed to be a complete bookend to the series... and then you start getting prequels that have no relevance to MGS4 at all.

It's the fundamental problem with the series. Digging plotholes over and over by answering lingering questions. Or, you just outright undermine the previous game entirely with lazy "this is why X is Y" writing. Although that didn't really become a thing until after the MGS trilogy.

 

[Becomemysoulreaver12]

Portable Ops is the only... potentially canon entry I've not played, I regret that just for completionist sake, it's like the Castlevania Curse of Darkness of the series, the last one (of the Iga produced games) I haven't played in full but feel like I should even though they're not supposed to be great.

As for whether it's canon, did some research online and Kojima did disown it and PW does kind of contradict it if you really analyze it, but it is at the end of the day up to you, it did introduce concepts like recruiting enemy soldiers that would continue on into TPP, so it seems a little odd to ignore it completely.

Rising on a side note is evidently supposed to be an AU deal like Ghost Babel, but again, you can pick and choose what's "headcanon" with anything at the end of the day.

This brings me to a question, could one ignore 4 while still considering PW and TPP "canon"? Despite their flaws there's a lot that's interesting about them to make it a shame to throw the baby out with the bathwater since only 4 is the one that really pisses me off, which they do reference things from 4 in the other prequel games, but none of the stuff that bothers me too much directly I guess (ie Vamp) or am I wrong?

Everything's so much neater if you just pretend Snake Eater was the final game, but messy as they are, PW and TPP do have their merits, I always loved TPP's more ground's eye "you are there" view of the Metal Gear universe.

But this brings me to another question, how does one replay TPP on Steam? Can you just select mission by mission to replay (which does that save time on stuff like R&D?) or can you start fresh?

I'm definitely feeling like I'd like to revisit the series sometime this year as it's been a very long time since I've played most of them.

Sadly the only way to replay the whole game is to either delete your save file, or to open another steam account.
The game has some scenes that happen between missions that you can only trigger once, so even tho you can play the missions you wont get all the main story, this could have been solved if a cutscene viewer was added and I think there may be a mod for it.

 

[Ted's of Beverly Hills]

That's strange considering it's common knowledge that PO and PW are two entirely different games.

Kojimbo also has a sore spot when it comes to PO considering it wasn't made under his direction. It has a bit more of a grounded and slightly more interesting story than PW did, I feel, and I am actually of the camp in thinking that it should be canonized (aside from a snide remark by Miller at the very start of PW denouncing the events of PO), but still.

I played Portable Ops before 3 but after 4, so it had the appeal of giving me some kind of window into the story of MGS3 that I had missed out on and that was apparently so important to 4. In hindsight, I have to believe that's the only reason I finished playing it at the time. I just remember it being such a nightmare to actually play on PSP hardware. As old as I am now, I probably couldn't contort my hands to play it the way I did back then. If it ever did get adopted back into the canon, I really hope they give it a control scheme meant for something other than chimpanzee-hands.

 

[Dom Cruise]

You could look at it a lot of ways. But Kojima intended MGS2 to be the series end in his hands and his team or whoever with Konami was going to take over. He didn't make it with a follow up in mind. Snake Eater took the chance of going a completely different direction, and succeeded. MGS4 is certainly a lazy way to end the series since it takes MGS2 literally when the game explicitly states not to do that through it's narrative. And MGS4 was designed to be a complete bookend to the series... and then you start getting prequels that have no relevance to MGS4 at all.

It's the fundamental problem with the series. Digging plotholes over and over by answering lingering questions. Or, you just outright undermine the previous game entirely with lazy "this is why X is Y" writing. Although that didn't really become a thing until after the MGS trilogy.

The prequels do set up ideas like the Patriots being AIs with the character of Strangelove, although only 4 explicitly shows "they're just giant computers lol" whereas 2 intends it to be more ephemeral, are they just that or have they evolved beyond something a human could really comprehend?

And it references things like Zero being connected to The Patriots, although they don't reference the more irritating aspects like the fate of Paramedic iirc.

They do, especially TPP, work under the acceptance of 4 as part of the overall storyline, including the timeline you see after the ending credits obviously, but I still wonder whether one can still treat them as "canon" while viewing the timeline as actually ending with 2.

Sadly the only way to replay the whole game is to either delete your save file, or to open another steam account.
The game has some scenes that happen between missions that you can only trigger once, so even tho you can play the missions you wont get all the main story, this could have been solved if a cutscene viewer was added and I think there may be a mod for it.

That's weird and disappointing, it's almost like Kojima intends you to only play it once.

I do feel like if I do replay TPP, it's probably best not to do so immediately after Snake Eater, but to give the classic games a little time to "breath"

I played Portable Ops before 3 but after 4, so it had the appeal of giving me some kind of window into the story of MGS3 that I had missed out on and that was apparently so important to 4. In hindsight, I have to believe that's the only reason I finished playing it at the time. I just remember it being such a nightmare to actually play on PSP hardware. As old as I am now, I probably couldn't contort my hands to play it the way I did back then. If it ever did get adopted back into the canon, I really hope they give it a control scheme meant for something other than chimpanzee-hands.

That's part of what kept me away from it is the awkwardness of the PSP only having one thumbstick, it's a shame they didn't just slap it onto the HD collection with twin stick support (though space on the actual disc could have been an issue)

It's weird that a significant part of the series is stranded on the original PSP of all things, even weirder than 4 being stranded on PS3, maybe even weirder than the whole damn series being officially stranded on older hardware and not readily available to younger gamers, it's like the Godfather trilogy going OOP.

 

[Tequila Jong]

I was thinking, as much as I love MGS2 for what it is, what would a sequel more along the tone of MGS1 have been like without going so metatextual?

MGS1's tone is very special, something was definitely lost from that point on, it struck the best balance of Kojima weirdness with grounded realism, with thought provoking content and Hollywood style drama.

I've often thought about this, I'd loved to have seen a game set in the Persian Gulf with the backdrop of weapon inspections and such, with Ocelot selling the specs for Metal Gear Rex after Shadow Moses and Gurlukovich's soldiers making an appearance. Discussions about chemical and biological weapons could be a similar theme to the anti-nuclear-weapon message in MGS, and the conversation points with Kenneth Baker in MGS about bribery and corruption could be expanded surrounding the UN or something, maybe a Middle Eastern madman putting anthrax missiles on a Metal Gear used to terrorise neighbouring countries, and the mentions of the Gulf War Syndrome/gene threrapy etc in MGS could be expanded on as well. Played straight, I think it would have been a fantastic story.

 

[xXx: State of the Union]

so even tho you can play the missions you wont get all the main story, this could have been solved if a cutscene viewer was added and I think there may be a mod for it.

Infinite Heaven

It makes TPP 100x more fun with all its options and yeah it has a cutscene viewer

 

[Dr. Geronimo]

So I want to play MGS3 Subsistence on my PC. The issue I have is that the game has pressure sensitive buttons. I'm not going to waste money hoping to get a working dualshock 3. Does RPCS3 support the pressure sensitive buttons on the dualshock 2 or the Retro Fighters Defender?

 

[Wesker]

The prequels do set up ideas like the Patriots being AIs with the character of Strangelove, although only 4 explicitly shows "they're just giant computers lol" whereas 2 intends it to be more ephemeral, are they just that or have they evolved beyond something a human could really comprehend?

And it references things like Zero being connected to The Patriots, although they don't reference the more irritating aspects like the fate of Paramedic iirc.

They do, especially TPP, work under the acceptance of 4 as part of the overall storyline, including the timeline you see after the ending credits obviously, but I still wonder whether one can still treat them as "canon" while viewing the timeline as actually ending with 2.

I'm perfectly fine with them talking about AI development in the prequels given where the series was going. The problem is Kojima is injecting tech that's far more advanced than anything pre MGS4. Like ZEKE comes off like he would wipe the floor with REX and RAY. Even more so with the ST-84. That thing is just a fucking Gundam.

I hate to use MPO as an example since I know it's really flawed, but I think they way handled the escalation of Metal Gear development was far better and felt more natural. I think that's the main reason I look at that game fondly since it still felt like it was attached to MGS3, while PW and TPP don't at all.

 

[Becomemysoulreaver12]

I don't want to shit on PO as I actually liked it, especially the multiplayer, bit as a single player game it is not the most enjoyable, the missions are extremely simple, the levels are not well designed for single player, capturing enemies is extremely tedious, and a lot of elements of the story, mainly null, Elisa and Ursula were not good imo.
Say whatever you want about Peace walker, but as a single player game it is far more enjoyable than PO, it also felt better to play even on the psp.

 

[Wesker]

I don't want to shit on PO as I actually liked it, especially the multiplayer, bit as a single player game it is not the most enjoyable, the missions are extremely simple, the levels are not well designed for single player, capturing enemies is extremely tedious, and a lot of elements of the story, mainly null, Elisa and Ursula were not good imo.
Say whatever you want about Peace walker, but as a single player game it is far more enjoyable than PO, it also felt better to play even on the psp.

I think PW's story stinks but it's gameplay was it's biggest strength. A very easy Platinum to get since it doesn't feel tedious at all.

 

[xXx: State of the Union]

I could believe that the Patriot AI's were being developed in the early 1970's and that Cypher/The Patriot AI itself just kept all other AI development suppressed or something.

But the ridiculousness of AI, especially AI The Boss, controlling a bunch of quasi gundams is retarded.

But even more retarded than that is Big Boss/Cypher having access to wormhole technology. For a bunch of fanboys that needed an explanation on how Big Boss survived a fucking rocket to the face in a fucking 8 bit video game, Kojima cultists seem to really not give a shit why Big Boss/Venom Snake/Cypher never seemed to use any of this advanced wormhole technology at all besides a brief moment in 1984, and especially seem to not wonder why the fuck bipedal tanks are somehow a better stealth nuclear weapon delivery system over literal teleportation.

It's why I consider the theory that Phantom Pain is just Big Boss having a coma dream or a complete disassociative episode to be far more appealing. If you even want to count it at all.

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole 2]

I could believe that the Patriot AI's were being developed in the early 1970's and that Cypher/The Patriot AI itself just kept all other AI development suppressed or something.

Personally I hoped the White House would be haunted.

 

[Wesker]

I could believe that the Patriot AI's were being developed in the early 1970's and that Cypher/The Patriot AI itself just kept all other AI development suppressed or something.

But the ridiculousness of AI, especially AI The Boss, controlling a bunch of quasi gundams is retarded.

But even more retarded than that is Big Boss/Cypher having access to wormhole technology. For a bunch of fanboys that needed an explanation on how Big Boss survived a fucking rocket to the face in a fucking 8 bit video game, Kojima cultists seem to really not give a shit why Big Boss/Venom Snake/Cypher never seemed to use any of this advanced wormhole technology at all besides a brief moment in 1984, and especially seem to not wonder why the fuck bipedal tanks are somehow a better stealth nuclear weapon delivery system over literal teleportation.

It's why I consider the theory that Phantom Pain is just Big Boss having a coma dream or a complete disassociative episode to be far more appealing. If you even want to count it at all.

I have massive problems with PW's story, but I can at least make a concession that it could be canon (to me anyway, we all have our own) but TPP feels so inconsequential to the series as a whole. To this day I don't understand what the point of it was. I get the whole Venom thing... but it just came off as the first real self suck fest of Kojima pretending he's a genius by stupidly fucking with his audience for lols again. For all the shit people give MGS2 (and I entirely get it) at least there was a method to that madness. TPP was again another player's avatar, but done so nonsensically.

PW at least was touching on shit that came later in the series. With primitive AI (that still felt way too advanced) which would be the grand parents of GW and the rest.

The vocal cord parasite bullshit does touch on the speech regulation that would show up in MGS2... but parasites... really? And somehow this explains the Cobra Unit? Fuck you. Why couldn't the CU just be freaks? Occam's razor is perfectly fine for most of this series.

 

[Dom Cruise]

I'm perfectly fine with them talking about AI development in the prequels given where the series was going. The problem is Kojima is injecting tech that's far more advanced than anything pre MGS4. Like ZEKE comes off like he would wipe the floor with REX and RAY. Even more so with the ST-84. That thing is just a fucking Gundam.

I hate to use MPO as an example since I know it's really flawed, but I think they way handled the escalation of Metal Gear development was far better and felt more natural. I think that's the main reason I look at that game fondly since it still felt like it was attached to MGS3, while PW and TPP don't at all.

Right, since GW is a major plot point it's ok to deal with AI, even the original implication with the rest of the Patriots was supposed to be something a little weirder.

I thought the implication with the ST-84 is what so advanced because it was actually moved around by Mantis, once Metal Gear had to go back to relying on technology and not the supernatural it was almost back to square one.

Kind of an interesting idea but I agree it sticks out weirdly when compared to the others.

I think PW's story stinks but it's gameplay was it's biggest strength. A very easy Platinum to get since it doesn't feel tedious at all.

What spoiled it for me was the comic book cutscenes, I get it was the PSP, but this raises the question of why it had to be a PSP game at all.

I mean I get it, it's 2010, the Japanese console market is shitting itself and mobile is the big new thing, but the game was only made worse by being a PSP title, a Big Boss game on PS3 wouldn't have been too shabby.

I could believe that the Patriot AI's were being developed in the early 1970's and that Cypher/The Patriot AI itself just kept all other AI development suppressed or something.

We don't know what the normal world of Metal Gear is really like outside of the world of the military, it's possible it's basically the same and only when you get into highly top secret stuff does shit get science fiction.

But the ridiculousness of AI, especially AI The Boss, controlling a bunch of quasi gundams is retarded.

I don't remember the mechs in PW seeming too out of place, but it's been a long time.

But even more retarded than that is Big Boss/Cypher having access to wormhole technology. For a bunch of fanboys that needed an explanation on how Big Boss survived a fucking rocket to the face in a fucking 8 bit video game, Kojima cultists seem to really not give a shit why Big Boss/Venom Snake/Cypher never seemed to use any of this advanced wormhole technology at all besides a brief moment in 1984, and especially seem to not wonder why the fuck bipedal tanks are somehow a better stealth nuclear weapon delivery system over literal teleportation.

It's why I consider the theory that Phantom Pain is just Big Boss having a coma dream or a complete disassociative episode to be far more appealing. If you even want to count it at all.

That's something purely for player convenience and I don't think you can take the wormhole thing literally at all, it's akin to eating food magically heals bullet wounds.

I have massive problems with PW's story, but I can at least make a concession that it could be canon (to me anyway, we all have our own) but TPP feels so inconsequential to the series as a whole. To this day I don't understand what the point of it was. I get the whole Venom thing... but it just came off as the first real self suck fest of Kojima pretending he's a genius by stupidly fucking with his audience for lols again. For all the shit people give MGS2 (and I entirely get it) at least there was a method to that madness. TPP was again another player's avatar, but done so nonsensically.

PW at least was touching on shit that came later in the series. With primitive AI (that still felt way too advanced) which would be the grand parents of GW and the rest.

The vocal cord parasite bullshit does touch on the speech regulation that would show up in MGS2... but parasites... really? And somehow this explains the Cobra Unit? Fuck you. Why couldn't the CU just be freaks? Occam's razor is perfectly fine for most of this series.

The trouble is Kojima kept getting cold feet on either remaking Metal Gear 1 or showing Big Boss's ultimate "Lord Vader, rise" moment of becoming truly evil, why I don't know.

Originally the ending of Snake Eater and Big Boss learning the truth about The Boss was supposed to be enough, then PW was supposed be the moment, then TPP was hyped in the marketing as finally the "big moment" and it's... BB riding a motor cycle.

Kojima was really gunshy about depicting anything from the MSX games head on in 3D, only the room glimpsed in TPP's was supposed to be Outer Heaven, in fact the game teases us because Venom Snake pops in what appears to be... Metal Gear 1, implying it was a game he programmed in his off time predicting how things would go and MG1 itself is not the "actual" events?

For whatever reason Kojima wanted 2 things, to quit the series while it was ahead and to leave the events of MG1 and MG2 as these semi-legendary things, he didn't get his first wish, but he did get his other.