• Contribute
• What's New
• Submit News

Never has a game been more anticipated than Metal Gear Solid 2. Now that it has finally arrived, does it live up to all its hype? Yes and no. The gameplay is definitely there - if you loved Metal Gear Solid, you'll adore MGS2. The story is also there, but in a different way to the original. The story takes over at times (15 minute cutscenes) and gets incredibly complicated (bordering on obfuscated) with many twists and turns.

Nevertheless, everything that made MGS so enjoyable is present in the sequel along with many, many additions including a vastly improved AI system.

Graphics

The graphics engine is shown off in all its glory during the cutscenes, especially the opening scenes when the tanker is boarded by the Russian army. The motion-capture, modelling, environmental effects (rain and waves), as well as the incredibly well directed camera movements give MGS2 the flair and style of a Hollywood movie. Indeed, there are sections of the game that definitely "borrow" from certain films - such as The Matrix - with a lot of the action done in slow motion.

The dynamic lighting and reflections make the environments in MGS2 look ultra-realistic especially when combined with the subtle and artistic lighting placement that occurs during many parts of the game.

One of the most impressive features of the MGS2 engine lies in its character animation system. Shoot an enemy near a wall and he will slump against it realistically. While this doesn't sound much, when you see it in action you can understand how much realism it adds to the game. Similiarly, when you shoot an enemy, blood will hit nearby walls, the enemy will even start bleeding. If the enemy is near a riot-guard, the blood might even splash on his shield. Gruesome, yes...but a great effect nonetheless.

Actually, MGS2 is a lot more gruesome than its predecessor mainly due to the inclusion of Vamp (pictured right), one of the new bosses. Vamp is definitely one of the coolest bosses to hit any videogame in quite a while. Additionally, as you can tell from the screenshot, the characters have a huge number of polygons, making them look very realistic. Facial expressions are modelled well, although the lip synch is normally completely off (a Japanese trademark). The new high-detail models also mean that the CODEC characters are now completely 3D.

Gameplay

As with MGS, the aim is to stay out of sight as much as possible. There is an additional emphasis in MGS2 against violence. You can technically complete the game without killing a single person! To start off with you are armed only with a tranquilizer gun. The darts will affect their victim differently according to where you hit them. Shoot them in the leg and they'll have trouble walking, shoot them in the arm enough and they might drop their weapon, but shoot them in the heart or the head and they'll drop like a fly (quickly and silently!).

There are a large number of additional moves in MGS2 that really add to the gameplay. My two favourite are the hold-up and corner shoot. If you sneak up on an enemy without being seen, then aim at them, Snake will say "Don't move!" and the enemy will hold his hands up in surrender. If you're lucky and the soldier is nervous enough, he'll give you an item. You have to be careful when you're holding someone up, because if you drop your aim or move away, they'll try to take advantage of the situation. What I got in the habit of doing was holding someone up, waiting for them to give me an item, shooting out their radio (so they can't call for backup) before executing a mean martial arts kick and running away!

The corner shoot was also a neat trick. You could press yourself against a corner, wait for an enemy to get close, hit the aim button and Snake would pop out from the corner and aim at the nearest enemy. This was incredibly useful for sneak attacks or the heavier action sequences that relied on taking cover. For any of you that saw the MGS2 trailer where Snake takes on two soldiers in a pantry with an assault rifle will have seen the highly impressive corner shoot in action.

Other new moves include hanging, flipping and rolling as well as the ability to pick up bodies to move them (or shake them). Hiding in lockers is also possible when you're trying to avoid patrols of soldiers.

The most prominent improvement is the inclusion of a first-person perspective. While you can't move in the first-person, it makes the gun battles a lot easier and realistic. Since many of the gun battles involve more than blindly shooting, the first-person perspective really adds to the gameplay. For example, when reinforcements are called in, many of them have riot shields that are bullet-resistant. The only way to really get around these guys is to shoot them in the knees so they drop their guard. One large gun battles takes place in a narrow ship corridor lined with steam pipes. If you want to hamper the soldier's movements, you can slip into the first-person perspective and shoot out one of the pipes, releasing steam and reducing visibility.

The gameplay in MGS2 is brilliant, you can do just about everything you'd want to do in such a game. The story is well tied in to the game's action, although like I mentioned before, sometimes the game's story does tend to take over. The story seems to fall apart slightly toward the end where it contains more twists and turns than a bag of Pretzels! Nevertheless, you won't find a game more immersive on the PlayStation2.

Artificial Intelligence

If they do see you, they provide each other with covering fire as they move between areas of cover. They'll run away from grenades, throw their own to weed you out of places and advance slowly to corner you. If you don't take them on but go hide instead, the team will search the area often using SWAT-style tactics (breach, bang and clear). A strike team will enter a room and check every last area for the enemy (apart from the all-important lockers!).

Even if you manage to take out a guard quick enough, the radio controller will get anxious if he doesn't check in and send a squad to investigate anyway. If the squad finds the soldiers, they'll increase presence in the area by adding reinforcements to the patrol routes.

The added AI is definitely welcome and makes certain sections of the game a lot more difficult (in a good way).

Conclusion

	9.0
	Platform: PlayStation 2 Liked: Gameplay, graphics, AI, cinematics. Disliked: Story got a little obfuscated. .: Buy at Amazon.com :. .: Buy at Amazon.co.uk :.