Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
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Hideo Kojima's farewell to Metal Gear Solid is a dream: the best ever stealth game, and the high point of a remarkable series.
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Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain is a gameplay marvel, rewarding intelligence and creativity in a way few games do.
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A new standard for open-world interaction, and an incredible sign-off to a spectacular, often infuriating, series. This is one of the most ingenious, lovingly crafted games of all time.
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Many missions feel like puzzles, forcing you to use your available resources to find one of many ways to complete your objective. Applying your rewards to building, expanding, and improving your base is an irresistible joy
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The Phantom Pain is a bittersweet but impressive send-off for the series' creator
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Kojima's open-world opus succeeds in delivering incredible gameplay and captivating storytelling.
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Metal Gear Solid V practically redefines the notion of what open-world gameplay can be.
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Metal Gear Solid V is the best Metal Gear yet, and has immediately become one of my favorite video games of the last few years. It's an impeccable stealth-action game, clearly inspired in all the right ways by modern series like Far Cry, and it's got a level of moment-to-moment joyfulness that kept me satisfied even when I was slogging through harder versions of levels I'd already beaten just to see the "true" ending.
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The story loses a lot of momentum in the back half, and F.O.Bs aren't much more than a fun novelty, but otherwise it's a stunningly enjoyable game that almost perfectly integrates a sizable open world environment with solid stealth fundamentals and a huge arsenal. Even at its most frustrating, it's an incredibly absorbing play. We'll be talking about this one for a long time to come.
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To everyone who grew up with Metal Gear Solid, especially the ones who bought Zone of the Enders for the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo, Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is an experience that will never be forgotten. While it is sad that we may never see another Metal Gear with Kojima's vision, he gave us one hell of a goodbye.
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Despite the fact that I hit a few snags along the way, Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain feels like a simultaneous celebration of the series, and a decidedly new chapter. It's equal parts tough and flashy, and it's fitting that if this is Kojima's last Metal Gear, he goes out on a high note.
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Make no mistake, though, the Phantom Pain is excellent. It expands and enriches Metal Gear Solid without compromising the qualities that make the series so beloved. Despite the huge scope, hollywood talent, and technical flashiness, there's a subtlety to the Phantom Pain that's truly captured our hearts.
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This isn't just the best Metal Gear game, nor is it just the best stealth game, it is one of the best games ever made.
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Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain will go down as the best-looking, best-playing, and most ambitious game in the series -- one that utilizes the new-gen hardware and the incredible Fox Engine to deliver both a visual masterpiece and more robust gameplay experience than its predecessors.
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I'm confident in calling Metal Gear Solid 5 the best game of the year, a vast undertaking where Kojima's reach hasn't exceeded his grasp, a game where a big story doesn't happen to you. Instead, you happen to it, slowly but surely. You may be surprised who you end up becoming.
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Ultimately, the story isn't the thing in MGSV, or at least not the one that Kojima wrote like a funhouse for you to weave your way through. No, the real story is the one you make yourself as you play through each mission, making new decisions each time and writing an action thriller of your own making. That's what makes Metal Gear Solid V brilliant, and that's why people will still be talking about it years from now.
Top Critic
Such player-driven drama, comedy, and action eclipses anything in the disappointing scripted narrative. The Phantom Pain is one of the worst Metal Gear stories ever told. It functions neither as a standalone narrative nor as worthwhile insight into the series overall. And yet, The Phantom Pain is the best stealth-action game ever made, one where playing flawlessly is just as thrilling as outright failure. And boy – what a thrill.
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That I can be so critical of it, that it can have damn microtransactions in it, and still get one of my highest recommendations, speaks volumes about what Kojima's done. Because this is a game in which I made a tank fly away on balloons and then rode a horse that pooped whenever I told it to. Yes folks… this truly is a Hideo Kojima game.
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Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain successfully translates the iconic stealth action gameplay that has defined the series into a massive open world adventure.
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