Making Sense of The Phantom Pain

It's been a while, and while the Snake Eater Remake is announced, I figure this will be a good time to talk about MGSV again. This time, I want to talk about a very interesting observation I made about this game, now I realized this theory sounds quite ridiculous but bear with me, here goes-

A lot of the people who have played MGSV will tell you, that it is somewhat odd and unfinished. What is up with all these fake guns? Why is there so few boss fight and whatever boss fight is there is so boring? Why is the extra ops so boring and monotonous? Why is the open world so barren? Why does Chapter 2 felt rushed? Where is Chapter 3? Where is the missing episode 51?  It goes on and on and I don't think that this is an accident, not a result of Konami rushing to push the game out of the gate, not Kojima running out of budget halfway through and give up. Rather, I think this is all by design and it all has something to do with the main character, Venom Snake.

Who Exactly Is Venom Snake?

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain tells the story of Venom Snake, who used to be a medic in the MSF, Big Boss's PMC in Peace Walker. After the incident in Ground Zeroes, in which both himself and Big Boss are injured in the helicopter crash, Venom Snake was chosen by Zero to be Big Boss' body double. So, in true Metal Gear fashion, they implanted Big Boss' memory into Venom's mind using hypnotherapy then altered his appearance to look like Big Boss using plastic surgery. Et voila, a doppelganger was born.

But Venom Snake never really feel like the Big Boss we know, the Big Boss we see in MGS3, Portable Ops and Peace Walker. And I'm sure you can feel it too, because whenever he is in a cutscene, he never really felt at home, he never act like the leading character, mostly he just stand aside and let others do the talking. In a way, he is kind of an imperfect imitation of Big Boss. And I believe, herein lies the DNA of this game- an imperfect imitation.

Nothing Felt Quite Right About This Game

Maybe this is just me, but The Phantom Pain felt off. It's not bad, it's an amazing game actually, but it's just off. Look, I've played through every entry in the main series multiple times, and I like the story so much that I will sit through each and every cutscene, so I like to think that my opinion on what a Metal Gear game should be is not totally unfounded. Which is why for me, this is simply the least Metal Gear-ish game in the series.

Weapons and Technology

How so? Firstly, Metal Gear is a series that prides itself with accurate depiction of guns and weaponry. Remember in MGS1 how Solid Snake tell us about the FAMAS rifle and Pineapple grenade use by the Genome Soldier? Or how about the gun porn sequence in MGS3, where Snake accurately describe each modification done to the M1911 handgun given to him by Eva?

Metal Gear is a game series that absolutely fetishizes real firearm and real technology. Basically, everything had to sound real and scientifically plausible. Sure, there are certainly some more farfetched sci-fi element in it like the bipedal tank Metal Gear, nanomachines and the FoxDie virus. But even those element are thoroughly explained to us in a way that sounds plausible, like how Metal Gear REX has a rail gun so it can stealthily launch a nuclear warhead without creating heat signature that can be traced. See what I mean?

But in The Phantom Pain, we get fake guns, fake helicopter, fake jeep, all of it sort of looks like the real deal but comes with an alternate universe name that flies in the face of technical accuracy seen in the past games. Speaking about fake things, we also got Metal Gear Sahelanthropus, which is the least Metal Gear looking Metal Gear ever. Physically, it looks more like a Gundam than an actual Metal Gear. Also it has two arms and a sword? Wait, what? Honestly, this monstrosity from 1984 looks way more advance than the "state of the art during 2005" Metal Gear REX, how is it even supposed to be canon?

Characters

Of course, this game have many returning character from previous game as well, but they are all weird and wrong. It's like you wake up from a nine years coma into an upside down world.

Sure, Miller from Peace Walker is back, but this time, blinded by his anger, he is giving you all the wrong advice, asking you to kill Quiet, for example. He is no longer the trusty sidekick, instead that role goes to... Ocelot, who used to be the wild card of the series, who is always seen betraying people left and right. This time, he shows up as the voice of reason and helps you throughout the entire game. One might say he is doing all this to protect the real Big Boss, but still, this is a total 180 degree change in personality.

Next, Huey from Peace Walker is also back, and in a twist that come out of nowhere, it is revealed that Huey is evil now, he might be working with Skull Face and he also killed his wife. So, let's torture him for information. Yay!

And for some reason, Volgin is alive again, this time he controls fire instead of electricity. This game tells us he comes back to life because of his desire for revenge against Big Boss, and the young Psycho Mantis somehow have something to do with this. Go figure.

Finally, we also have a new villain in Skull Face. But he doesn't really do anything other than talking, talking, screaming "whooooooo" and goes straight back to talking. You don't really get to fight him, after the final boss fight, he just lays there as you execute him in a cutscene. Simply put, he is just not in the same league as the other way villains in the past games.

So, what gives? Did Kojima suddenly forgot how to make interesting character? Or, it's the theme of "imperfect imitation" showing up in the game again? Much like how Venom Snake is an imperfect imitation of Big Boss, these characters are also a broken copy of their past self. Granted, all of their changes are explained in the game, but still, they are broken nonetheless. Also, in the case of Skull Face, a broken copy of what a Metal Gear villain should be like.

With all these points in mind, the decision to replace David Hayter with Kiefer Sutherland finally make sense. This is not the Snake you know and love, just a pale imitation with a generic American action hero accent a.k.a Jack Bauer's accent.

Gameplay Variety

Let's face it, the open world of MGSV is not really a good open world design. The design of it felt barren. There is a total lack of NPCs, no one that you can talk to, interact with or give you missions. The only interaction you get is to fight the enemy soldiers, whether lethal or non-lethal, that's up to you but that's it. The mother base are like this too, but it felt even worse because it's supposed to be the result of your hard work. You built the Mother Base, and your hard work resulted in something mind-numbingly boring. The only way for you to interact with your own soldier is to punch them and interrogate them.

Then there are the side ops.

There is only one way to play almost every side ops mission, and that is to get on your belly, crawl around, use your tranquilizer gun on everyone, extract everything, and then shoot down the enemy helicopter. That's it, mission complete. The entire side ops comprised of mission like extract prisoner, extract soldier, extract old MSF soldier, extract wandering soldier, take out (read: extract) armoured unit, take out (again, read: extract) helicopter unit. There are as much variety here as there are black people in the KKK. All in all, it seems like Kojima and the team simply threw in the towel without giving much thought to it, no?

Anyone who have played the extra ops in Peace Walker can tell you, Kojima Productions are better than this. Even when working on a PSP game with shorter development time and what I assume must be a smaller budget, they can still deliver a much better extra ops in Peace Walker. To give you some perspective, in the extra ops for Peace Walker, you get to intercept missiles, shoot down Fulton balloon, do some ghost photography, revive dead soldier, do the marksmanship challenge, hold enemy up using only a banana and even go on a date with Paz or Kaz. So, what went wrong with the Phantom Pain?

The answer - Venom Snake. Keep in mind, Big Boss is a complex, vibrant, multifaceted character. Sure, he can be serious at times, giving pep talk to Chico but he can also be cartoonishly horny staring at Eva's boob, making jokes about mushroom recharging your battery and having nightmare about vampires. But Venom Snake is just a pale imitation of Big Boss, his supposed personality is just a very one dimensional memory of Big Boss, forcefully imprinted into his brain, which is why he rarely even speaks in the cutscene because he don't know what to say half the time.

All Zero wanted Venom Snake to be, is a doppelganger that can make enough of a splash on the news to divert Skull Face's attention away from the real Big Boss. To achieve this, Zero probably programmed Venom Snake's mind to emphasize more on combat mission, hence, fighting is all he knows, and that is reflected in the barren open world, empty mother bases and the monotonous side ops, which is all about fighting, taking out this armoured unit that helicopter unit or extract this soldier, which will expand your mother base and in turn, lead to more combat mission. No more fun quirky mission for you, not because Kojima Productions gave up but because it doesn't serve the purpose Zero set for you. And while we are talking about game design, let's get more meta.

Metal Gear Moments

And what is Metal Gear game without powerful, over the top and sometimes emotional Metal Gear moment, right? You know what I'm talking about, fighting The Boss in MGS3 and the Shagohod chase scene in MGS3, got "betrayed" by Solid Snake himself in MGS2, fist fight with Liquid Snake on top of Metal Gear REX. Even in Peace Walker, when The Boss AI commit suicide while singing Karen Carpenter's Sing, tell me that doesn't give you the chills.

But in Chapter 1, which is considered the main campaign of The Phantom Pain, there is no such moment. There is however, an imitation of Metal Gear moment during the jeep ride with Skull Face scene, where the conversation ends way too soon, and the rest of the ride is just an awkward staring contest.

The fight against Sahelanthropus also doesn't feel like any Metal Gear fight we have experience before, there is just one life bar, you deplete it, you win, super straightforward. No intermission cutscene when you manage to destroy 50% of its health, no villain to give a speech, no transition to a more powerful stage, no flair. Also, it attacks using magical blinking explosive rock that emerge from the ground, I mean what the hell was that, magic?

After the fight, you get to kill Skull Face, in almost the same fashion as when you kill The Boss in MGS3. In this scene you finally got your revenge, it's suppose to feel good, feel powerful, like you have saved the world from this man of pure evil, yet more than anything, this moment rings utterly hollow to me. As I shoot at him, I can't help but feel like killing him is the wrong way to do it, there is no satisfaction whatsoever, and I am just going through the motions.

The way I see it, everything wrong in Chapter 1 originates from the fact that Venom Snake is just an imperfect imitation of Big Boss, hence by extension, the entire campaign is just an imperfect imitation of what the audience expect Big Boss' adventure to be. So, when Venom Snake, a person with a one dimensional understanding of Big Boss takes on the role of Big Boss, naturally, his personality falls short and this translate into a subpar story in the campaign compared to the past entries. where all their protagonist are actual, real person.

It is only when Venom Snake starts to make this character his own, that's when the real Metal Gear moment begin to happen. Like when you decided to spared Quiet after the sniper fight or when you recruited certain soldiers to join your PMC.  All these relationships are real, it doesn't matter that you are not the real Big Boss, these relationships stay real. So, in Chapter 2 when Quiet sacrificed herself to save you or when you had to execute the soldiers you've recruited over the course of the game, these moments finally ring true. It's finally real and impactful, it finally become a real Metal Gear moment.

Conclusion

So how is The Phantom Pain able to juggle being both so good and so bad at the same time? I think there is only one logical answer, that the so called bad part of the game is only bad because it is by design. It is there to reinforce the idea that when you force something to become what it is not, it is just not going to excel, a theme Kojima explored once before in MGS2 with Raiden. But the question is, why do this again? Maybe it's just for novelty reason, that a fake Big Boss should be surrounded by elements that is just as fake? Maybe this a message to Konami and the fans? Maybe Kojima wants to show that if we keep forcing him to make Metal Gear game, it will only result in imperfect imitation in future sequel. Maybe it's finally time for him to break out of the Metal Gear mould, and do something different? From what we've seen in the Death Stranding trailer, the future sure looks promising indeed.

Or, maybe I am just a crazy conspiracy theorist slash blind fanboy grasping at straw, trying to turn the pretty average MGS5 into something it's not, a super meta allegory on the current state of affair within the Metal Gear fanbase. Oh well, it's time for my medication, guess I better take off the tinfoil hat and go back to the asylum. Thanks for reading, everyone.