Culture 18

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Review: Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain

Colin Slark
Editor In Chief

After a lengthy and challenging development
cycle during which the studio developing the
game was dismantled by its parent company,
Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is finally
out, being the first new full length entry
(excluding handheld games, remakes, and
side stories) since 2008’s Metal Gear Solid 4:
Guns of the Patriots. Taking place immediately
after last year’s mini-sized entry Ground
Zeroes, The Phantom Pain is both a terrific
achievement, and a disappointment.

Gone are the awkward controls of previous
entries in the series, replaced by not just
competent, but excellent controls. The
gameplay is more accessible than ever
because of easy to acquire methods of
transportation and the way the game lets
the player solve problems in many different
manners according to what supplies they

have with them on a mission. The open world
maps, a first for the series, are seamless, and
frame rates are rock solid. It manages to look
fantastic on current-gen consoles, while
managing to hold its own in its previous-gen
iterations. Technically, the game is a marvel.
It is too bad that it falls flat in the area where
Metal Gear games usually shine; the story.

The stories in previous Metal Gear games
have never been masterpieces, but they
have always managed to be absolutely
fascinating. Their blend of science-fiction
technology, commentary on real world
events and issues, and super spy stories are
typically flamboyant, but are very subdued
in The Phantom Pain. MGS4 had 8 hours of
cinematics, and that drew complaints from
fans who kind of wished they could skip
some of the endless exposition and get

right into the action. Director and series
creator Hideo Kojima’s response seems to
have been to drastically neuter the length

of cutscenes. They are still present, but

are much shorter, and much of the game’s
backstory and narrative is contained within
cassette tapes that the player can listen to

as they play. Do you want to find out what
happened to several characters that have
disappeared since 2010’s Peace Walker? That
information is hidden away in tapes. Want to
figure out basic details about some of your
partners in arms? That information is found
in tapes. The main character, Snake, having
been quite verbose in previous entries (and
now voiced by Kiefer Sutherland), is much
quieter than he used to be. The story still has
some interesting moments, like the scare-
inducing prologue and some interesting
discussion of the power of language, but fails

to explain some of the stranger choices they
made, or come to a satisfactory conclusion.
Some subplots remain unresolved, and cut
content that has been discovered amongst
the game’s files suggest that the game

was not finished when it was shipped.

All this leaves MGSV in a strange position.
Its easy to learn controls make it accessible
to newcomers to the series, but the lack
of explanations within the narrative make
it incredibly obtuse except to people

who already know a great deal about the
series’ lore. Ultimately it is worth playing
because it is so fun to play, but since series
creator Hideo Kojima no longer works for
Konami, the last Metal Gear game fails to
answer questions fans wanted the answers
to, and wrap the series up properly.