Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes is a demo of sorts to give you a taste of what you can expect from the full fifth main entry into the franchise known as Phantom Pain. It was released in 2014, a full year before the main title and sold for a full forty dollars, which was pretty absurd for reasons we’ll get into later on in the review. We play as the legendary super solider nicknamed Snake, or Big Boss, after his multiple successes while out on the field. Being the leader of a mercenary corporation in possession of a nuke has its perks, a surprise inspection by the UN not being one of them, which is where the events of this game unfold.
Things quickly escalate from there and you soon find yourself in a solo mission on Cuba to rescue some prisoners. It’s worth noting that you don’t have to have prior knowledge of the Metal Gear universe to understand the gist of what is going on, though if you wish to delve into the lore there are near a dozen pages detailing events of prior games and a boatload of in-game audio tapes. Once you get past quite a lengthy opening cut-scene, you’ll find yourself directly outside of a heavily fortified base full of US soldiers. Now your goal isn’t to shoot up the place as it is primarily a stealth title, but it is designed to be very open-ended and how you approach things is up to you.
Your equipment consists of an assault rifle for when things go south, some hand grenades, and your trusty silent pistol. Said pistol is one of the non-lethal ways to take down your foes as it fires tranquilizer rounds that take a while to kick in, unless you shoot them right in the head, in which case they are out cold immediately. There are other weapons such as an anti-armor bazooka, smoke grenades and suppressors to get your hands on should you find an armory or interrogate an enemy until he gives up their location. To interrogate an enemy is a risky affair since you do need to get in close enough to put him in a choke-hold and it will take some time to get him talking, leaving plenty of room for someone else to notice. Once you got what you need you can either slit his throat or knock him out.
Leaving bodies around the place will get the base on alert if they are discovered so it is worth the time to pick up the body and hide it somewhere. Killing an enemy makes sure that he won’t get back up, though it will net you a nice penalty at the end of your mission’s score, regardless of how & why you killed him. The AI won’t just let you walk around like you own the place, they have pretty decent vision and will quickly pick up on the strange old man half crouching behind inside of a bush right in front of them. If you get out of sight quickly enough, they’ll do a quick search of where they saw something suspicious and go back to their patrol after some time. On the other hand, if they manage to get a good look at you, time will slow down and you’ll have a brief opportunity to take them out before they radio it in. This slow-mo feature can be turned off if you feel that makes it too easy.
Easily the most important object you possess are your binoculars. Locking on to an enemy long enough will let you pick up on someone’s body temperature and allow you to see where they are at all times. This is made even more useful thanks to the game lacking a mini-map, with the actual map being in a menu that doesn’t freeze time, making it dangerous to pull out carelessly. Getting spotted is hardly the end of the world, considering you are not going for an S rank for the mission. You have regenerating health making it all too easy to go in shooting and mowing down tons of soldiers for those moments when you pick up a new weapon then can’t resist the temptation. There are also vehicles to commandeer like a truck, jeep, and a turret equipped APC. It has a lot of options for players wanting to cause havoc and play around with the Fox Engine’s fun physics as bodies fly about.
Playing this game like someone who isn’t a psychopath is equally as enjoyable with many tense scenarios such as carrying someone out of this heavily patrolled base. The game is rather generous with its checkpoint system as well, so you’ll rarely have to replay large sections if things go badly. It will affect your end mission score, however. Aside from the bragging rights of acing a difficult mission, you’ll also receive new weapons to immediately start off with when replaying it. And replay it you will since Ground Zero only features a single main level with the optional ones all being set on the same base.
Optional levels do feature the map during different times of the day and have unique objectives such as destroying anti-air guns or assassinating two people that will flee at the first sight of trouble. With how many ways you can approach any situation, playing in the same environments doesn’t get old quickly, even if it is slightly silly you keep going to the same location time & time again to solve different issues. The problem here is the asking price for what’s on offer and the fact that you can get the main game now. This title’s base price has been cut down to 20 dollars, yet that too is a tough sell despite how fun this entry is. You can beat the main mission in about half an hour and while they do try their best to keep the single small environment feeling fresh, it can only go so far. Ground Zero is by no means a must play addition to the series and unless you get it on sale, I’d recommend reading up on what happens story-wise during it and hop straight into Phantom Pain.
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