So The Phantom Pain is out (have you heard?) and has done exceptionally well with most reviewing outlets. Not that I enjoy consulting Metacritic, but there is not one single mixed or negative review for the game. Needless to say, the game is incredible.
It is no secret that I am a huge Metal Gear Solid fan with a pretty long rap sheet of things I have done. I managed to earn the Big Boss/Fox ranking for every game in the series (except Peace Walker and every mission in Ground Zeroes where I got a tad lazy), collected all of the Dog Tags in MGS2, cleared Snake Eater on PS2 over 30 times, and bought just about every re-release, including The Twin Snakes, the PSN version of Metal Gear Solid, Substance, Subsistence, HD collection on PS3 and HD collection on Vita. The most sickening part? On every play through, I never skip the cutscenes. If it needs to be said, it is my favorite video game series, hands down. It's a bit sad to see it come to an end, but now there is closure. Somewhere in my life, I could have died before seeing it through to the end. I can't say enough how glad I am to witness the end of an era. Frankly, I could probably quit heavy gaming after this generation easily without a new Kojima Metal Gear.
That, however, does not explain why I spent $130 on Metal Gear Solid V. I bought Ground Zeroes at launch and The Phantom Pain Collector's Edition which came out to the aforementioned price. I regret nothing for a couple of reasons. For starters, Ground Zeroes, despite having some great controls and fluid gameplay, was slammed for its length. The Phantom Pain however may have OVER-delivered in justifying its $60 entry fee. I get consumers wanting more bang for their buck, but there's a degree of mercy that should be had on developers and publishers behind titles like this. I might wince at a much steeper price, but you can practically feel the love and care coming from The Phantom Pain. All of the minute details and vast landscape. The fact that the game looks fantastic and still embarrasses every other open world game this generation in terms of balancing visual fidelity, mechanics,and frame rate. Frankly, I do not believe The Phantom Pain would be what it is without Ground Zeroes. I'm sure that money went right back into its development and fine-tuning the FOX Engine, and everything. It turned out to be pretty incredible and feels like the first truly next generation game I have played so far. So, in that sense, we who bought Ground Zeroes helped to create The Phantom Pain. It was sort of a physical form of crowdfunding that gave you a prologue. I know I sound crazy, but I believe The Phantom Pain is worth the $90-$130 cost. Sure, no one asked Kojima to be so intricate, but it just reeks of thought, scale, and even throwbacks to other Metal Gear Solid titles (Ocelot training the troops and the lad with revolver-style shooting got a pretty big grin out of me when I listened to their exchange). I do believe The Phantom Pain sets an unprecedented standard and I do believe both games are worth it, especially if it meant (a) getting to experience Metal Gear Solid on the current generation consoles early at a reduced cost and (b) aid in funding The Phantom Pain. The best part in my opinion was having Ground Zeroes spaced out so far from The Phantom Pain. After the events of Ground Zeroes, it was just a great point to let it all set in and incubate. Cue over a year later when The Phantom Pain drops (nine years in game), Venom awakens. It felt a lot like a TV series or movie where the events at the end of the movie/season set up for a later release of something sincerely intense and the wait becomes that much more explosive. But let's be honest: the money made from Ground Zeroes going back into The Phantom Pain was money well spent. Everything since then has improved tremendously. And the game is so deep, I cannot at all fault Kojima for worrying that people would not finish this game. So much to do, so much to see.
While I do believe it is Konami's loss for losing Kojima, I really have to thank them for footing the bill on this game. It really is a masterpiece and I cannot say enough that the money went towards great ends.
Is it worth it? That much, I probably should not say, but at the very least, I can say that I do not regret it.
Microsoft announced its financial results for Q3 of fiscal year 2026, including an update on its gaming Xbox business and more.
Not looking good. Hopefully Asha Sharma is able to turn Phil’s disaster around.
To me it's still quite remarkable how they can cash-in 5.3bn in revenue in a single quarter, since their hardware is basically dead.
The stock mark is what makes Microsoft remarkable, They have convinced every institutional and retail investor to just keep piling money into them. Like many big tech giants they are just a big growing pyramid scheme. As long as people keep dropping money into ETF's that cover the market Microsoft will always be liquid. At the same time it is completely stifling innovation and competition. People need to start being more discreet in how they invest their money as it's killing the system.
Riiiiight because people will just flock back to them for one or two games per year.
15+ years of bad performance is what they call irreparable in business. It is time for them to sell off the assets and get out of entertainment.
These declines are on the back of extra revenue received from releasing games like Forza horizon 5 on PlayStation. So I’m being sarcastic here when I said they should go back to exclusives. Killing off a revenue stream from Ps5 sales will only make things worse
The charity event will be streamed live from Gamescom in August.
Thanks to the slip-up of an artist working on the title, we now have more evidence that a new Injustice game is in the works.
it's your money, you can spend it how you wish and if you feel you got your money's worth who i am to tell you otherwise? still haven't played it but i will. won't be spending $130 though.
Well you are a big fan that's why you spend 130$.