Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes - Review

Title: Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes

Format: PS4, Xbox One, Xbox 360, PS3

Release Date: March 18, 2014, JP March 20, 2014 (PS3, PS4, Xbox 360), EU March 20, 2014, UK March 21, 2014, AU March 27, 2014

Publisher: Konami

Developer: Kojima Productions

Original MSRP: $29.99 US

MSRB Rating: M

For this review, I'll be playing the PS4 version

of the game

As some of you may know, Ground Zeroes has been catching A LOT of flak for is short main mission, lack of information and depth, the game itself seeming as it is an affront to the Metal Gear series, and it's current $30 US price point. It's being questioned as a game that may or may not be worthy of the consumer's money, time, or even acknowledgement. I played the game for about 10 hours. Here's my review:

Story: In keeping up with the traditional fashion of recent Metal Gear games, you're dropped into your main mission with very little to go on. You play as Snake, a.k.a. Big Boss, and are told that, during your mission, you will be ex-filtrating two V.I.P.s that are being held captive on a U.S. military base. Like all the other MGS games, this will be a sneaking mission. Your job is to get these people out of harm's way as quickly and as quietly as possible, without letting anyone know you were there. 

Although it doesn't show it here, Skull Face has some kind of
electrical energy that is flowing from the top of his head and
down his neck. It's hauntingly beautiful how much detail went
into this character's design. 

Along the way, you can collect cassette tapes that further improve upon/enhance the story, giving you insight to each of the characters you're being presented. This is especially helpful when talking about the newest villain in the MGS series: Skull Face. It also adds some clarification about what has happened between this game and MGS: Peacewalker, which is the game that, chronologically, comes before Ground Zeroes. 

To do this, you are given, instead of the classic Codex, a device called the iDroid, which contains your mission data, as well as at least an hour of supplemental story which add to the depth of the world Hideo Kojima is trying to create. Kojima puts it upon the player, if they so choose, to look for the story at their convenience, as opposed to lengthy cut scenes, as is tradition. 

It's better not to question how, in the 80's, Snake has a device
that projects holograms, when there is such a strong
emphasis on letting the player know that you will be finding
cassette tapes everywhere. Again: Japan. 

Game Play: This is not your father's Metal Gear. However, veterans and newcomers alike will find that the game is fairly easy to jump into. I started playing the series since MGS1 and, after a few minutes, I figured out the controls enough to feel confident enough to start the mission. Instead of having to scroll through all of your weapons to find the right one, GZ takes the approach similar to what Gears of War has: you have one primary weapon slot where all your primary weapons are located (assigned to Up on the d-pad), your secondary weapon (Down), tertiary weapons like grenades, magazines, etc. (Right), and accessories like night-vision goggles (Left). By completing missions, you can unlock more weapons and start out with said weapons in your next mission. 

This was my second attempt. My first run put me at a
completion time of 50 minutes and change, but I did
murder a lot of soldiers. 

Once you beat the Ground Zeroes mission, four more missions unlock. There is a fifth mission that is console exclusive that can be unlocked by collecting all of the XOF badges in the main game. These are the Deja Vu mission for Sony consoles, and the Jamais Vu mission for Microsoft. Deja Vu reskins Snake and the enemies to look like thos e from MGS1, while Jamais Vu has Raiden fighting Bodysnatchers. 

What makes this game different from the others in the Solid series is that the area in which you will be exploring is completely open. You, as Snake, have an incredible amount of freedom to explore how you can get to your targets and achieve your goal. This is a welcome change of pace from the previous Metal Gear games, in which you basically move from area to area, gathering information, watching cut-scenes unfold the story, have a boss fight, rinse, and repeat. Things like throwing Marines from cliffs, running from bunker roof to bunker roof and lock-picking give the game a fresh look and feel to the series. 

You can shoot out lights, Sam Fisher style, adding new
variants to how sneaky you can be.

Having said that, do not go into this game thinking you will have the full 20+ hour Metal Gear experience. At it's core, this is a prequel to MGS5: The Phantom Pain. It's to help move along the story from Peacewalker to Phantom Pain. The main mission can take about an hour, with speedrunners knocking it out in 10 minutes or less. T3tsuyaV2, a speedrunner on Twitch, knocked this game out in 5 minutes 32 seconds. 

What is there is fantastic. The controls feel great, the environment is tense, guns feel like they are supposed to, enemies are highly intelligent on Hard mode, and the side-missions that are available after beating Ground Zeroes (although sometimes goofy) are enjoyable. After beating the main story, the game shows you that you've only done 10% of the total game. There's a ton of content here, it's just takes time to unlock it. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2x4zEtDEqo if you
want to watch it. 

Visuals: Both current gen and last gen consoles look great, but the PS4 is the definite winner in terms of visual prowess. With a higher frame rate and stronger processor than the other consoles, the environments look and feel natural. I found no latency issues or texture-popping, but it seemed that enemy guns' hit detection boxes were off. 

Kojima took a page right out of J.J. Abrams' book and threw TONS of lens flares and particle effects into his game. I didn't find myself getting as annoyed as I thought, as the weather effects, shadows, face textures and environments quickly put those fears to rest. Simply put: everything looks good. Even the part at the end of the mission that involves Kaz, albeit a rather disgusting part, looked beautiful. I found myself clenching both the controller and myself, waiting to see what happens next. 

This happened more than once: enemies were in an alerted
state, near my location, knew that I was in a room, and body
parts and guns would just phase through doors and walls 

Audio: Ground Zeroes' musical score, although minimal, provides the right atmosphere for the game: simple, soft in the necessary parts, heavy while in the fray. Classic sound effects like the sound made when an enemy is alerted is back, adding in a sense of nostalgia to the game. Weapons make the sounds that they are supposed to. There is a noticeable difference between a silenced SMG and a long-range sniper rifle, and time was put into making sure that the player recognized the difference among them. 

Voice acting in GZ is also superb. David Hayter is no longer in the role of Snake, and has been replaced by Kiefer Sutherland. After a few minutes of thinking to myself "Everybody get down!", I found myself rather enjoying Sutherland's work. Not only did he command the role, but for the few parts that he spoke, I became intrigued by what was going to be said next. The same can be said for Skull Face, voiced by James Horan, What little was spoken in the game was supplemented by the cassette tape recordings, turning Skull Face into a true villain, as opposed to the Saturday morning cartoon villain that he is initially presented. 

Online/Multiplayer: There is no online content or multiplayer in this game. 

Tossing an empty magazine down this hall will not only
alert the enemy down the hall, but the sound will resonate
much more than if you were tossing it outside. 

Pros: strong visuals/audio; the game fits well into the open world environment; high replayability; lots of bonus content; side missions are kinda fun

Cons: If you're looking for the full MGS experience, you're not going to find it for another year until The Phantom Pain comes out; location is somewhat small; may not appeal to all fans of the series; you have to dig for content

Final Score: 7.0/10      right direction, but could have easily been put into Phantom Pain as an optional side mission for the player. 

Agree/Disagree with the score? Have a suggestion for a game? Questions about the ratings system, or anything in general? Ask me on Twitter @AdHocMan, or on Google+ at +Zac Hockin

Next week - inFAMOUS: Second Son for PS4