A Small Slice of a Bigger Cake
This is the first part or the "tutorial" part of the whole MGSV game. This should have been free or included in The Phantom Pain, but Konami and Kojima Productions decided to cut this Ground Zeroes part and released it as a separate game. My question is, why?
Ground Zeroes takes place shortly after the Peace Walker incident. Paz survived her battle against Snake and was recued by a fisherman. She ended up being a prisoner at a U.S. prison camp, Camp Omega. It's Snake's mission to rescue Paz so that they can get information about Cipher from her. Snake have another objective: Rescue Chico whose also being held at the same prison camp after failing to rescue Paz.
GAMEPLAY
Just like the previous MGS games, MGSV:GZ is a stealth action game where you sneak inside enemy teritory to gather intel, procure weapons and complete the main objective. What's new in this MGS title is that it's an open world game where there are lots of entry points in the base and methods to complete the mission. It makes you feel like you're Big Boss himself because you decide on what to do on your mission.
The game features new controls in almost everything, because of the new weapon/item selection and also because Snake have new moves to survive this open world game. but they're easy enough to learn if you played the past MGS games (especially MGS4) and like I said earlier, Ground Zeroes serves as a tutorial game for new and old players. I think MGSV:GZ's gameplay is a combination and improvement of MGS3, MGS4 and Peace Walker's gameplay.
Being an open world game. You have the binoculars to do some recon. The binoculars marks the enemies, vehicles, surveilance cameras and gun emplacements automaically so it will be much easier to sneak past them. You can also ride some vehicles for faster traveling around the map, just be careful and don't get spotted by the enemy.
The A.I. have huge improvements. They're unpredictable, paranoid and they will see you even when you're far away especially during daytime, meaning the enemy soldiers have much better range of vision. As long as the enemy see you, they will get close to your position or might follow you as you move. If you get the A.I.'s behavior, you can exploit it.
In case you're spotted, the new Relfex mode will trigger. It slows up time and will auto-aim at the person that spotted you as you press the aim button (L1) so that you can prevent the Combat Alert phase.
Gunplay is improved and features bullet drop physics, this time bullets travel (not teleporting to the targeted solid objects) and affected by gravity. The enemy A.I. is not stupid, they will take cover if you point your gun at them and will do and use anything to flush you out of your hiding spot. Because of this, Snake have regenerating health, but sometimes if he sustained lots of damage (or injured) he can't regenerate his health unless you cure him.
It's up to you if you want to kill the enemies or just put them to sleep or knock them down.
For newbie MGS players, this game is really hard but still fun, as for veteran players, they just need to adapt to the new mechanics and harder difficulty. Don't get me wrong, I played all Metal Gear games but MGSV is really hard.
The gameplay of MGS:GZ is limited, because some items like the iconic Cardboard Box and Fulton Recovery System is not present here, still you can rescue prisoners and capture enemy soldiers by carrying them and putting them in your helicopter.
Got an iOS or Android smartphone? You're in luck! A companion app for MGS:GZ is made to further enhance your gaming experience. The companion app also serves as your actual iDroid. You can also play the Mother Base mini game in the app.
GRAPHICS
The Fox Engine is an efficient game engine, much better than the engine they used on MGS4. MGSV:GZ looks great and full of lighting effects, texture detail and shadows. The game almost looks real, it's photorealistic. The PS4, Xbox One and high-spec PC versions looks amazing and runs at 60 FPS
Character animations looks smooth thanks to the motion capture. Best example is Snake's stance transition while walking/running to crouching and crawling.
Older generation consoles like the Xbox 360 and PS3 (the one that I'm using) runs MGSV:GZ nicely but with less texture detail and effects. The frame rate is reduced (but still playable) that ranges from 30 to 20 FPS (just like MGS4).
MUSIC/AUDIO
Voice acting is superb. Most voice actors reprises their roles except for Snake's voice now voiced by Keifer Sutherland. He does a great job on voicing Snake by giving him a darker and much serious tone and voice. Sutherland's voice fits well on Snake as he becomes the villain. While I prefer David Hayter's voice, I can't complain on Keifer Sutherland's voice because in my opinion, he nailed it.
REPLAY VALUE
The main mission only lasts for approximately 2 hours, yes it's that short and if you do a speed run, it can be finished by less than 30 or 10 minutes. Completing the main mission will unlock some Extra Ops/Side Ops missions, 6 of them and takes in the same prison camp map. Completing missions will reward you with new weapons and unlock the mission's hard mode.
There are also collectibles in the game like the XOF patches scattered around the map and cassette tapes that contains some backstory about the game.
CLOSING REMARKS
Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes is a filler game that is a glorified demo that should have been free or included in the main game, The Phantom Pain. What you're paying here are the exclusive Mother Base staff members that will join you in MGSV:TPP and a downloadable cutscene at the end of the game. Other benefits of this game is the upload save data option, which will reward you with extra staff members (prisoners and soldiers you extracted via chopper in MGSV:GZ) and equipment for MGSV:TPP. It's not worth it to pay full price for this game. MGSV:GZ is for Metal Gear fans, like myself that wants to continue the story. I waited for the game to get cheaper so that it won't hurt my wallet. I bought MGSV:GZ and MGSV:TPP at the same time, if you do the math, both games are priced as one whole game. Anyways MGSV:GZ is a great and beautiful game, but it's too short.
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