I beat MGS5.
I finally finished a game that was already more than ten years old, and in doing so fulfilled my wish to beat every game in the MGS series. After fifty hours, I reached the end and realized: it really had to be Hideo Kojima. He ultimately crafted an intricate identity switch.
Absolutely brilliant.
The third game in the series may be the one with a premise most like an exciting spy movie, and its characters are incredibly profound. I feel like by the fourth game, he had told the entire story of the series. The endings, identities, and destinies of all the characters had been explained. MGS5, on the other hand, was an exploration of gameplay. Still, I really admire how Hideo Kojima took a series that had spanned more than twenty years and turned its final installment into a radical reinvention of gameplay.
When I played Death Stranding before, I thought its world and story were masterfully crafted. But after playing MGS5, I realized there was already a clear thread connecting them. The first four games in the series had already taken the plot, storytelling, and character development to their limits.
With the fifth game and then Death Stranding, though, he took a more advanced approach: weaving the game into the story, making gameplay and the player's experience part of the overall narrative. It's not just about telling a story; the experience itself is the story. Very sophisticated. I won't go into the specifics, since there are already plenty of articles and discussions about it online.
The story of MGS5 is about how identity and language can alter a person's identity and role. At first, I thought it was just a wish of the villain, Skull Face, but by the end I realized the protagonist was in the same situation. That's brilliant. But what I like even more is Hideo Kojima's absurdist approach: on the one hand, the game explores how identity is manipulated by the hegemony of language, alongside chilling subjects like child soldiers, torture, and AI; then, in the very next moment, it asks if you'd like to wear a little chicken helmet to make the game easier!
Only Hideo Kojima could balance those two things so well.
I finally finished a game that was already more than ten years old, and in doing so fulfilled my wish to beat every game in the MGS series. After fifty hours, I reached the end and realized: it really had to be Hideo Kojima. He ultimately crafted an intricate identity switch.
Absolutely brilliant.
The third game in the series may be the one with a premise most like an exciting spy movie, and its characters are incredibly profound. I feel like by the fourth game, he had told the entire story of the series. The endings, identities, and destinies of all the characters had been explained. MGS5, on the other hand, was an exploration of gameplay. Still, I really admire how Hideo Kojima took a series that had spanned more than twenty years and turned its final installment into a radical reinvention of gameplay.
When I played Death Stranding before, I thought its world and story were masterfully crafted. But after playing MGS5, I realized there was already a clear thread connecting them. The first four games in the series had already taken the plot, storytelling, and character development to their limits.
With the fifth game and then Death Stranding, though, he took a more advanced approach: weaving the game into the story, making gameplay and the player's experience part of the overall narrative. It's not just about telling a story; the experience itself is the story. Very sophisticated. I won't go into the specifics, since there are already plenty of articles and discussions about it online.
The story of MGS5 is about how identity and language can alter a person's identity and role. At first, I thought it was just a wish of the villain, Skull Face, but by the end I realized the protagonist was in the same situation. That's brilliant. But what I like even more is Hideo Kojima's absurdist approach: on the one hand, the game explores how identity is manipulated by the hegemony of language, alongside chilling subjects like child soldiers, torture, and AI; then, in the very next moment, it asks if you'd like to wear a little chicken helmet to make the game easier!
Only Hideo Kojima could balance those two things so well.
