Here are some quick impressions on Konami’s mega franchise MGS4.  I’m just giving impressions because I have yet to complete the game, but it is fair to say that what I have played has been one of the best gaming experiences I’ve had in a long time.  Keep in mind that I plan to mak ethis spoiler ffree, so some details will be vague on purpose.

Controls:
So far, they have been alomost perfect.  The control scheme is still very similar to previous MGS games and also adds new options (such as what has been seen in videos, I won’t say here in case you haven’t seen any…in which case, why do you live under a rock?)  Everything ties together fairly well and is easy to do.  It may be my experience with past games, but I still find the controls, even the new ones, easy to handle.  My gripe here is that you can’t do enough free roaming at times.  For some reason you can’t choose to, for example, climb over a desk to reach an item behind it.  That gets annoying when you see somethign you want and you can’t find a way to it since you can’t just climb over a wall.  Blame Snake’s ___ for that I suppose (Spoiler removed).

Sound:
No surprise here, it rocks.  The gun fire is great, the music is on key right from the very start of the game where you see (HA! Thought I was going to say didn’t ya!)  No complaints here, the sound folks did great work.

Graphics:
For the record, good graphics do not a great game make.  That being said, the graphics are still great, especially in cutscenes.  Codec communications are also much cooler due to new tools our hero has.  Everything in game fits the enviroment it is in to my eyes.  No issues here, no tearing or any other crap you hear about with other games.

Gameplay:
Of course the most important part of the game.  This is where the game is dominating everyone’s face off.  You really have to think and plan out your actions this time around, or so I’ve seen.  In previous games, if you got into a fire fight, you could simply kill everyone and then no more issues would happen in that area.  In the new world, troops are smarter and act better as a team meaning you need to be on your game even stronger.  The “no where to hide” Mantra initially quoted by Konami is right on, but is also “everywhere to hide”.  With the right camoflage (assisted by something….still not telling you anything), it is possibly to literally be right under the noise of your enemies without them detecting your presence.  It’s hard to say much more without some game details so I won’t other than to say there are many welcome additions to the gameplay that old fans and new players can enjoy.

MY major gripe about the game overall?  You can only save at checkpoints, which means if you should get some item you really wanted, you had better not die on your way to the next checkpoint or you’ll have to repeat EVERYTHING you did since your last checkpoint.  That’s right, no middle saving.  This also creates a problem (for some of us) in length of game sessions because you reach the next checkpoint fully intent on saving and quitting, to find yourself again traversing to the next checkpoint before you realize you did it to find out what happens next.  The game also manages to be funny (or perhaps trying to protect from a lawsuit?) by reminding you to take a 15 minute break every hour and also letting you know when it’s past 1am and you should take a break….

The initial game install is 8 minutes and there is an install between chapters which provided an opportunity to get up and walk around since you’ve most likely been glued to your seat while playing.  The chapter install between 1 and 2 was about 3 minutes long.

So there you have it, spoiler free.  The game thus far has been absolutly fantastic to play and would be a welcome addition to any game player’s library.  Go check it out!