Replaying Metal Gear Solid after 28 years is a mix of good and bad

It was one of the most influential games of the PlayStation 1 era, but how does Metal Gear Solid hold up almost thirty years later? A reader is surprised when he discovers this.

Alaska – Bering Sea. A submarine cuts through the murky depths of the ocean. Scenically and in terms of production values, the music playing suggests you are watching a scene from a Hollywood action movie. But this is not a film, although in many ways you get the impression that it wants to be. What I’ve described is the opening scene of Metal Gear Solid, a game I loved many years ago. Since I still have my original two-disc copy of the game, I thought I’d replay it from start to finish on a PlayStation 2 [presumably via The Essential Collection – GC]. Could this critically acclaimed classic be as good as I remembered?

You are Solid Snake. Your mission: infiltrate a terrorist stronghold, free a few hostages and investigate a possible nuclear threat. Do this with the clothes you are wearing, a CODEC receiver/transmitter, a rifle scope and a pack of cigarettes. For this mission, weapons and equipment are OSP – on-site procurement. In terms of real-world logic, our hero’s initial equipment is ridiculous. However, if you start with almost no items in your inventory, the game turns into one big treasure hunt. And in this case, that treasure is military hardware: thermal goggles, chaff grenades, C4 explosives, Stinger missiles…

Replaying Metal Gear Solid it took me a while to adapt to the top-down view it uses, which compared to the presentation of modern big-budget games seems simple and regressive, but provided you make use of the radar in the top right corner of the screen, Metal Gear Solid’s gameplay still works perfectly. Nearly three decades have passed and yet Shadow Moses Island still reigns as a wonderful game world to immerse yourself in. Who cares about blocky graphics if the interactive picture these graphics paint is so atmospheric and nuanced?

As you sneak around the overrun military base, the patrolling enemies yawn, stretch, fall asleep, and follow all the footprints in the snow that Snake makes. The heat from an enemy’s breath appears as mist. Make a guard suspicious and a question mark will appear above their head. Alert a guard and their heightened awareness is indicated by the now iconic exclamation point.

During this playthrough I surprised some mice in an air vent. Little exclamation marks appeared above the rodents’ heads as they saw me and ran away. Half the fun of Metal Gear Solid, and the franchise in general, is discovering these quirky and innovative details.

This time I had trouble beating every boss in this game, I expect due to a significant lack of practice. But Foxhound’s rogue elements are so atypical and entertaining that even when they kill you, it’s hard to blame them. The game certainly wouldn’t be the same without their presence.

For example, Cyborg Ninja still impressed me, or rather his introduction. Walking down a hallway littered with bleeding corpses being thrown this way, you feel like you’ve accidentally stumbled into a survival horror game. This part of Snake’s mission highlights another recognizable feature of the Metal Gear franchise, for better or for worse: tonal inconsistency.

Those melodramatic shouts on the cool-looking Game Over screen. SNAAAKE! Are those outbursts meant to be funny? Every time I heard them they made me laugh.

Then you get characters who seem to fall in love within an hour or so, even though they’ve never met. Otacon and Sniperwolf. This completely one-sided romance is so fake, and yet the game tries to tug at our emotional heartstrings when one of them dies.

Snake himself seems like a decent guy. A moral, humble underdog, it’s easy to side with him. And then the expert agent tells Meryl that she has a great ass. Wow. With talk like that, Snake, how can a woman resist you?

Having not attempted this stealth mission in at least a few decades, I predictably struggled to beat Metal Gear Rex towards the end of the game. This boss fight consists of two phases. Between the first stage and the second stage there is a cutscene that you will have to watch over and over if you keep losing the fight. I couldn’t skip this moment, which made it seem like a sadistic punishment for dying.

After finishing Metal Gear Solid, I wanted to play the game again. To me that is clear proof of its quality. The good parts of Solid Snake’s PlayStation debut certainly outweigh the bad. But what’s bad about the game is bad with a capital B, or rather misjudged in such a way that these flaws stand out.

That said, even after experiencing them recently, I can tolerate Metal Gear Solid’s annoyances because they are offset with flashes of brilliance. The location of Meryl’s CODEC frequency. Take aim at your target in a first-person perspective with a remote-controlled Nikita missile. Psycho Mantis breaks down the fourth wall and messes with your gaming console. Cooling down and warming up the PAL card. What other game lets you sneak around and fast travel in a cardboard box?

All that gaming gold is probably worth reading through line after line of the CODEC exhibit. And as sweet as she is, I wish Mei Ling would learn the value of succinct verbal exchanges while on an active mission. Yes, Mei Ling, I want to save. That’s why I called you. No, please don’t tell me another Chinese proverb unless it’s about the benefits of radio silence.

By reader Michael Veal (@msv858)

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