The Bill's Now Playing Video Game Thread (Now with Bames)

[spacehamster]

Skipping the cutscenes makes all of the MGS games 90% better

Yeah. At this point, this is really just discussing the humidity of water, but I still think it's weird how Kojima doesn't seem to understand that the actual gameplay is strong enough to stand on its own. Even with the first one, I'm pretty sure I spent three or four times as much time just playing the VR training missions.

[riley-o]

The funny thing about it is that the gameplay is really only there so Hideo Kojima can tell his bloated sci-fi military industrial complex tale. It's almost a fluke that the gameplay itself is actually good..

[spacehamster]

You kinda have to wonder if the problem is basically that Kojima knows the people who design the gameplay for him are the real stars, and that's why his bullshit takes up so much space - he's jealous. That would explain why it feels like the games sort of begrudgingly hand control over to you every now and then between the hour-long cutscenes and then suddenly explode into awesomeness for 20 minutes at a time.

[riley-o]

When they story-tell within the game itself it works so well. That's the most confusing part for me with the MGS games; all the back story about the patriots, about nukes, about the metal gears; when they do it while I'm playing, I care because I'm involved. When it goes into an hour long cartoon movie fifteen times over the course of a single game, I just skip it or go on the internet while paying 10% attention. If the cutscenes were like, two hours in length total, cut up over the course of the game...

[Pooeyegg]

Metal Gear Solid 2 is the Highlander 2 of the series.

The suvivalism aspects of the 3rd one break up the action even more, but I had fun with it. Switching camo every time you get to a different patch of grass got retarded real quick.

[copstache]

Switching camo every time you get to a different patch of grass got retarded real quick.

i feel like i have to say this every couple of months but if you're doing that, you're playing it wrong. it's really not that hard to tranq or ko guards before they see you, even in normal camo

[riley-o]

Why aren't you participating in the rest of the MGS discussion

[spacehamster]

When they story-tell within the game itself it works so well. That's the most confusing part for me with the MGS games; all the back story about the patriots, about nukes, about the metal gears; when they do it while I'm playing, I care because I'm involved. When it goes into an hour long cartoon movie fifteen times over the course of a single game, I just skip it or go on the internet while paying 10% attention. If the cutscenes were like, two hours in length total, cut up over the course of the game...

One of the weirdest moments as far as that disconnect between cutscenes and gameplay goes is in MGS4 just before that base in South America where you see Laughing Octopus for the first time - there's this completely mystifying cutscene of Snake crawling through the bushes like he's auditioning for Catherine Zeta-Jones' part in Entrapment with a bunch of blah-blah over it that makes basically no sense, then it cuts to gameplay and Otacon tells you everything you need to know in a five-second voiceover, repeating stuff from the cutscene word for word. It's beyond weird.

I really wouldn't mind the gameplay/cutscene storytelling as much if it wasn't for the fact that the cutscenes are just really shitty for the most part. I can totally understand if people have issues with it because it doesn't play to the strengths of the medium (i.e. it's not interactive), but it can be perfectly serviceable if there's a reasonable balance and the cutscenes aren't a bunch of melodramatic barf where you want every single character to be raped with a lamp post.

[riley-o]

hahahah How about when Raiden saves you from the AT-STs and after every single string of kills pauses in kneeling tableau of quiet reflection with his sword extended to the side and his back turned to the battlefield

I counted this happening six times. Once at the very end, sure. Twice would be a bit excessive.

SIX TIMES.

[copstache]

Why aren't you participating in the rest of the MGS discussion

Because I've already admitted to being a Mgs apologist faggot who eats the silly cutscenes up like a chump and gets teary eyed at the end of 4

[fallbacktostone]

i feel bad for you guys in a way but i shouldn't..

[riley-o]

YOU VOLUNTARILY WATCHED THE TWILIGHT MOVIES

PLURAL

[riley-o]

Why aren't you participating in the rest of the MGS discussion

Because I've already admitted to being a Mgs apologist faggot who eats the silly cutscenes up like a chump and gets teary eyed at the end of 4

I guess I'd just like to hear your rationalizings on that

[copstache]

I did that too.

Multimedia masochism

[fallbacktostone]

YOU VOLUNTARILY WATCHED THE TWILIGHT MOVIES

PLURAL

yep i know i know. so you see what kind of position you put me in here?

[copstache]

Why aren't you participating in the rest of the MGS discussion

Because I've already admitted to being a Mgs apologist jimmy buffet fan who eats the silly cutscenes up like a chump and gets teary eyed at the end of 4

I guess I'd just like to hear your rationalizings on that

I dunno. It's weird in an age where games take absurd money and tons of dudes working on it that you can still find games like that which are so incredibly authored. there's really no doubt that Kojimas entire workforce is a cult of personality dedicated to realizing a crazy person's whims in grotesquely high fidelity.

When it works its awesome and even when it doesn't really it at least fits within the whole aesthetic and character of the overall property.

There aren't many game dudes that are an analogue to movie directors who have a really strong identity with the things they produce. He's influential enough that he gets to make vanity games for his own amusement and I find that fascinating. How many other major games could be made now that have a sequence that involves climbing a ladder for 4 uninterrupted minutes with no punchline?

[copstache]

Oh no I am 100% with you. I'd say 3 is the "best" but I fucking love 4 probably the most of all

[fallbacktostone]

i do appreciate his dogged tone deafness to whatever bullshit vision he has but i really cant celebrate in a way i normally would because i just can't take that kind of shit in a game. films are different. and i never felt like i could just SKIP IT for some reason. its alright if someone is a small f metal gear fan but anyone with a capital F can get fucked..

[copstache]

well i mean i play through all the games every couple of years and i've actually taken the time/effort to piece the story together but i'm not out there writing fan fiction or proselytizing it to anyone who will listen

then again it does have the tendency to affect me on an emotional level so i'll take whatever capitalization i deserve for that one

[fallbacktostone]

ok fine, you excluded, but everyone after you.. just lock the hall behind you i guess

[CoconutBackwards1]

This is probably as good of a place to put this as any:


Did anyone else see Wreck it Ralph?

I loved it. Best movie I've seen in a long time.

[The Schwartz]

It was okay not the movie I wanted went to stupid bullshit pretty fast

[james]

I think it is time for me to play Metal Gear Solid.

I own the game. I have simply never played it.

[valgalder]

This is probably as good of a place to put this as any:


Did anyone else see Wreck it Ralph?

I loved it. Best movie I've seen in a long time.

going to see this sunday. can't wait.

[spacehamster]

i do appreciate his dogged tone deafness to whatever bullshit vision he has but i really cant celebrate in a way i normally would because i just can't take that kind of shit in a game. films are different.

It's different in a game because you're more involved. You're not just watching Kojima masturbating, you're being forced to participate in the enactment of his nutty artistic vision, and that just feels more tedious than watching a movie somehow.

I tend to lean more copstache's way here because I do appreciate the feeling of authorship in these games; for better or worse, they have more character than most videogames, especially today, and Kojima is one of the last game creators left that can get away with this sort of thing. But at the same time I'm often thinking that doesn't automatically make it good. Crappy game design choices made for the sake of "art" are more forgivable, but at the end of the day, they're still crappy choices. I'm probably going to get burned at the stake for this analogy, but it's kind of the same problem as with 2001 - I have all the respect in the world for Stanley Kubrick, but I'm still not going to sit through 10 minutes at a time of space stations rotating to classical music more than once in my life.