Board 8 > MGS2 was so far ahead of its time (replaying after 10+ years) *spoilers inside*

(+) Yeah! (+)

I've played through the game once more and I was completely blown away despite knowing everything that happened. It's incredible this game came out in 2001 and almost 20 years later, it's more relevant that it ever was. When I played the game many years ago, I ranked them MGS3 > MGS4 > MGS > MGS2 with quite a bit of confidence. I was moslty unsure on the middle two. I think that's still correct, but goddamn if I don't have my doubts now. They're all just so good. Those last parts of the game are crazy.

Here are my thoughts as I played through the game:

Tanker:

It's like they instantly realized Snake and Otacon were the best characters of the first game. If I didn't know better I'd probably think the canon ending of MGS1 was that Meryl died, because she's not mentioned at all.

The controls are more similar to the first one than I recalled for better or worse.

Dog Tags are a terrible collectable, fortunately they only matter for replays by damn, they're ass. Part of is it probably that the controls for doing it is outdated, I never enjoyed it though.

I'm playing the HD version on PS3 and that means I'll be collecting trophies for the first time. There's no way in hell I'm gonna attempt a platinum on this one though. It requires you to collect every single dog tag on every single difficulty, which is btw another reason that they suck.

The tanker part feels empty in that you don't have much equipment and items, but there are so much detail here. Lots of small gems to appreciate. Locker room fun, soldiers without pants, sending pictures to Otacon for fun reactions. There's more to it than it initially.

Olga is a fun boss fight, it's a shame she's the only one for this part of the game.

I'm still not very good at the game, but it leads to some fun times occasionally. Rolling straight into bombs attempting to crawl because I hadn't completely stopped moving it a recurring event.

At one point I was hiding in my box and they shot it for blood to splatter all over the wall behind it clearly blowing my cover, only for them to wander around not being able to find me. That was weird. Most of the time I get caught is attempting to "freeze" enemies. I feel like sometimes Snake just points the gun at them without saying it and then they turn to punch me. I've looked into this and I don't know what's wrong.

Puppet master Ocelot being way too arrogant yet everything works his way.

I would've really liked another boss fight on the tanker, but oh well.

Plant:

I never had a problem with Raiden. I also knew ahead of playing that it would happen, but I think he's a good character that does exactly like he was supposed to. Be as confused about the crazy things going on as the player is and show Snake from a different point of view. I like him.

The early parts of this one are pretty similar, it takes a bit to get going. The Plant rooms are not all the different from each other.

Snake taking a nab right after you meet him is hillarious.

Vamp is awful and I also never liked Fortune very much.

Finding the bombs is a fun break from the usual stuff you're doing. Some of them are fun to find especially with hints given.

I died once because I found the socom supressor, but forgot to actually use it, then everyone heard me while I shot one of the others.

Fatman is a surprisingly good boss fight from a gamplay kind of perspective. Though the game also lacks those. It's probably the point where the game picks up.

They really went out of their way to make sure you would disguise yourself in only one part of the game, because it makes no sense that the AK is a shell 1 core specific weapon. It also makes no sense Raiden loses the clothes walking into someone of course.

Rose is awful. It becomes better later on when we learn what's going on, but at this point of the game, you just hate her for having no sense of situation.

Destroying all the bombs on the bridge and then fight the harrier with help from Snake and Otacon is a really cool place. Raiden really gets screwed by the chopper fighting.

I fell into the water a bit too many times to not be embarrassed.

Ocelot manages to confuse every damn time he appears. He just shoots the president and leaves you be. That seems so weird at the time.

From the point you meet Emma is when the game starts really showing off. Her part of the game is so short lived, but in the small amount of time you still feel attached to her. The sniping part is fun although once again, Vamp is awful and being the reason Emma dies doesn't help. Emma's death is handled really well, though it's a bit weird when Otacon explains his relationship to his stepmother. "Don't be so honest. It... hurts..." is a fantastic line. Otacan not calling her Emma before she dies is heartbreaking and the bro moment Snake and Otacon have not long afterward is fantastic. It's such a good small part of the game, even when you know wh

Harrier > RAYs > Solidus > Vamp > Olga >> Fatman

ctesjbuvf posted...

If I didn't know better I'd probably think the canon ending of MGS1 was that Meryl died, because she's not mentioned at all.

Snake can make an indirect reference to her if you call Otacon after beating Olga, which very clearly implies that their relationship didn't work out and they're no longer together. He'll say something like, "Meh, I've had enough of tomboys."

(or it'd make Snake look super ice cold to say that about Meryl if she were dead)

I absolutely love the Tanker. It's almost the perfect level. Also, I save as often as possible just so I can hear Otacon botch all of Mei Ling's proverbs and get yelled at for it at the end.

The Plant is kind of hit or miss because Dead Cell is by and large pretty terrible, and a lot of the missions you do just aren't that fun, but when it's good, it's really good.

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MGS2 definitely feels like it only gets better with age. To this day the Tanker intro is still quite possibly the best in gaming.

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It is beyond outstanding

I don't think I'll ever like a game more

From your other topic:
XIII_rocks posted...

Man 2 just does so many little things so well

Like how just before the RAY fight, Solidus jumps off and escapes. Raiden instinctively raises his gun to fire at Solidus before he jumps away, but he takes a split second longer to turn his head in that direction - he's still looking at the three RAYS that are advancing on him, distracted by them. Because of course you would be. It's freaking masterful.

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I love in that fight how you can see all the RAYs in the background. You have no idea how long it goes on or if you're doing the right thing by just keep on attacking them.

LeonhartFour posted...

Snake can make an indirect reference to her if you call Otacon after beating Olga, which very clearly implies that their relationship didn't work out and they're no longer together. He'll say something like, "Meh, I've had enough of tomboys."

(or it'd make Snake look super ice cold to say that about Meryl if she were dead)

Interesting. That's really easy to miss.

The tanker intro is so cool, yes. So happy Smash took inspiration from it when doing the everyone is here bit.

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I forgot to comment that I thought it was funny to have a couple be Jack and Rose a few years after Titanic.

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i know a lot of people disliked raiden after snake, but man, i really liked that loser

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Yeah, same, he was perfect for they wanted to do here. He's not as cool as Snake no, but that was clearly the point of him.

I remember when we were having a Worst Character Ever contest and Allen used Raiden as an example of that. Like, what the hell, they accomplished exactly what they wanted with him.

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MGS2 is the only MGS I've owned and fully beat. The ZotE demo disk got me hooked.
Never understood the hate it got, the game was freakin' awesome.

Oh, I never played the others because the only Playstation console I owned was the PS2. Never thought about buying the original game because I played and watched many people play it years leading up to that point.

Edit wait, I do own both MGSV's when they were stupid cheap. GZ didn't like my graphics card at the time, when the drivers were fixed I didn't care anymore. Then TPH, I played the intro...then went back to Zelda

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Great game, but it just isn't as memorable as 1 or 3 for me somehow.

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LOLIAmAnAlt posted...

Oh, I never played the others because the only Playstation console I owned was the PS2.

I mean, that console had another one of them too!

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a pretty good one at that!

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Yeah, I'm super excited to play that one again, though I might a little bit starting it. Next week I'll have less time and I have other things I want to progress with in my spare time.

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Na-thing here.

Over and over... cant do anything about it, trapped under a set of shelves because being spotted is basically a death sentence...

I think this was a misstep between the first and third games.

Is it? There's plenty of places to hide and break their line of sight and the M9 is rather OP

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Touch them and the game sends a team out to check on them, followed by a strike team to kill you dead.

Hide in the vents? Move to a new area to throw them off?

There really aren't that many guards who regularly report with "nothing here" either. Feels like you're exaggerating that, personally. Also if they're asleep and not dead, the guards will just kick them awake. Won't even go into caution mode iirc.

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Yeah never had that much problem there, at least not on Normal.

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If you ever alert a guard but they don't actually find you, they'll always say, "Nah-thing here" when they give up. I heard it exactly in my head the way they say it when he posted that. It's definitely a frequent occurrence if you're bad at stealth, like I am.

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MGS2 is art.

My complaints about the game all have to do with the fact that the plot makes no logical sense. It does a good job of setting tone and creating memorable moments, but it falls apart if you look closely, or even at an average distance.

If you look at it through a more allegorical lens it's better. The Patriots predicting every physical movement everyone on the rig takes is asinine, but as an over-the-top metaphor for how governments and businesses use information in the information age it's pretty neat. This is doubly proven by how much people like to go back and quote it.

There's a reason MGS3 went into the past instead of into the future- Kojima painted himself into a corner of nonsense that needed 40 hours of backstory to even pretend to be logical.

The actual gameplay is solid. I think I'd rank it 2nd, maaybe 3rd out of the 5. ( 5 > 3: subsistence > 2 > 1 > 4 > 3 ). i'd have to replay subsistence to confirm, i remember the wound and food systems being very irritating

Raiden being annoying didn't bother me. I like protagonists that are different/unique/interesting and have real flaws.

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I can see why coming off from the first game, you kind hide in the same ways, it's not as effective. Vents almost always work, especially if you can turn inside them.

It was only frustrating to me if I hadn't found the nodes yet.

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ctesjbuvf posted...

It was only frustrating to me if I hadn't found the nodes yet.

Did you say... nerd?

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banananor posted...

Raiden being annoying didn't bother me. I like protagonists that are different/unique/interesting and have real flaws.

having at least one major character flaw or otherwise oddity is almost a prerequisite for me liking a protagonist these days honestly

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Xiahou Shake posted...

Did you say... nerd?

Literally the worst first impression in video game history

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I fucking loved the nerd line

It was completely out of the blue and I laughed for ages. It's still an in-joke with a friend of mine.

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The perfect introduction

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pjbasis posted...

The perfect introduction

and you make fun of me for liking the tree frog line in Snake Eater

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Ha, yeah, that's really weird.

I looked at the platinum for Snake Eater and it's MUCH more doable. I'll probably go for that one.

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