Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain - Brutal Backlog

Brutal Backlog is a semi-regular feature where the JDR team play through some of the unplayed games on their shelves (both digital and physical), disregarding their age or the technical limitations of their era. Only the very best titles will stand up to scrutiny today.

I’ll be honest, I really don’t understand Metal Gear Solid.

I’ve played most of the games in the series, and absolutely adored their gameplay systems. But even after reading countless wiki pages and watching YouTube videos, I have no idea what’s going on in their narratives. Setting aside their obvious anti-war messages, I can’t comprehend what’s going on with their supernatural elements. Or their timelines. Or why Hideo Kojima insists on having at least one scantily clad attractive person in each one of the titles.

It’s been almost a decade since I played Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. I was barely a teenager when it launched, and I poured more than 100 hours into it. I remember loving it. I also remember a floating child and a man with a flaming head.

So, because I apparently enjoy confusion, I decided to replay it. Maybe this time I’d finally understand what was happening. Or maybe I’d just rediscover why it was so universally praised in the first place.

Only time will tell.

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One Hour In

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If I didn’t already have a vague recollection of what Metal Gear Solid V was about, the opening hour certainly wouldn’t have helped.

In traditional Hideo Kojima fashion, it’s essentially an interactive cutscene. You wake from a coma. You create an avatar who is —or isn’t— Snake. You then immediately begin playing as Snake. Or your avatar. Or both. I’m still not entirely sure.

You follow Kiefer Sutherland’s barely clothed backside through a burning hospital, shoot at special forces soldiers, and attempt to escape a man who is literally made of fire. Revolver Ocelot shows up. Things explode. The actual game eventually begins.

It’s stylish. It’s chaotic. It makes very little sense.

The few minutes of shooting and crawling are excellent, though. The hospital sequence sets a grim tone, and mechanically, everything feels sharp. If I’d gone in blind, I might have been overwhelmed. But I know this is a Kojima production. Confusion is part of the package.

I will say that I’m not one to judge a book by its cover, or a game by its tutorial. But, man, Hideo Kojima really needs to learn when to tone it down. I’m all for experiencing weird stuff a few hours into a title. By that point, I’ll at least have a clue of what’s going on. 

Right now, though, I really don’t. The few minutes of shooting I experienced were fun. And seeing masked men gun down people in hospital gowns certainly set a tone for the title. But if I didn’t know what I was in for, I’d probably have refunded it by now. Thankfully, I know what I’m in for. So I’m excited to see what exactly happens next.

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Three Hours In

What happens next is a slew of tutorials, a lot of dialogue that clarifies Metal Gear Solid V is about, and a great couple of introductory missions. The first item on that list is the least interesting. The game is a quasi-open world title akin to Far Cry with a heavy focus on base building. You’re free to explore its Afghanistan environment at your leisure while going on lightly scripted raids. During those, you need to attach balloons to enemies and resources to level up your mother base. That’s fun, and the game does a great job at explaining its mechanics.

The narrative, too, is apparently straightforward. The first actual quest you take on in Metal Gear Solid V involves rescuing one of your old buddies who will help you rebuild your army to take revenge on those responsible for the events of Ground Zeroes. That’s simple enough, and while it doesn't explain the man on fire from the first set of cutscenes, I don’t really care. The title is about revenge and building a questionably moral army. I can understand that, so I’m just going to roll with it.

I’m also down with its gameplay, because man is it good. Like its tutorials suggested, it’s a mostly standard third-person stealth action affair. However, it’s also better than any other title in the genre that I’ve played, save for the two most recent Hitman games. Its first level alone has scores of different entry and exit points. You can dispatch Soviet Union guards with your knife, tranquiliser gun, or assault rifle. And the AI reacts to everything you do. The entire experience makes me feel like I’m an actual spy doing spy things. Or at least it does insomuch as any video game can.

I’m looking forward to seeing how the story progresses, and if or how its gameplay develops. But if the first few hours of the title have been anything to go by, I’m sure it won’t take long for me to remember why I spent so much time playing the game a decade ago.

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Twenty Hours In

I’m not sure if I’m surprised that Metal Gear Solid V has remained consistently great. I’ve done 17 more main missions, plus a whole host of side ops, and they’ve all been excellent. They all follow the same general formula as the first one, which explains why they were so enjoyable. In each, I was given a straightforward objective, like taking out an enemy leader or rescuing a hostage. And after some dialogue that’s usually played while you’re making your infiltration, you’re free to do so however you please. In almost any other game, that formula would get old fast. Metal Gear Solid V’s gameplay is so satisfying that I can’t really complain, though.

Despite the fact that I’m using more-or-less the same loadout as I started with, the enemy AI always manages to throw a wrench into my best laid plans. They started wearing helmets because I went for headshots too often (I think), and have night vision goggles whenever I’m doing a raid in the dark. I’ve had to consistently adapt. I can still complete a mission by blasting everyone in the face with a tranq pistol then ballon-ing them back to base. It’s increasingly difficult to get away with that, though. So most ops still make me feel like I’m actually a badass. 

Diamond Dogs, Snake’s private army, have also expanded to Africa. That new environment has its own set of challenges, and is a neat change of scenery from the drab deserts of Afghanistan. 

The game’s narrative has similarly remained well-written. Unlike other Kojima games, it has stayed somewhat grounded. There've been a few strange encounters, and has otherwise remained a game about tactical espionage operations. I understand why some fans of the franchise don’t like that, but I do. 

I think the series is at its best when it doesn’t get too weird, and focuses on anti-war messages and great gameplay. Which Metal Gear Solid V does, especially because of its amazing 80s track-filled soundtrack. I’m still confused about what the hell the introductory sequence was about. But at this point, I don’t think it matters.

The only parts of the title I’m not liking are its base-building elements. Which, thankfully, I’ve managed to completely avoid. Apparently all the resources I had during my last playthrough transferred over, so I’m not scrounging the map for containers of metal. Instead, I can craft whatever guns I want when I extract enemies with the right skills, which is just fine by me. I’ve also completely avoided its online component that allows you to raid or get raided by other players, as there’s nobody online to fight against. That suits me just fine, too. 

I’m having a wonderful time in the game, and doubt my opinion about it won’t change too much going forward.

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Fifty Hours In

I didn’t expect the past 30 hours, which translates to three days of non-stop gaming, to pass as quickly as they did. Which is a testament to how much I love Metal Gear Solid V. I still have to wrap up a few side missions, and a couple main ones before I’m actually done with the game. But unless Snake turns into a literal snake or something, I know I’m going to recommend it. 

I don’t actually think the title is as flawless as I did earlier. Its gameplay, which is satisfying and perpetually dynamic, does ultimately get somewhat samey. You can equip hundreds of different weapons and gadgets, deploy with any one of 20-odd vehicles, and choose between three companions. You do that on two distinct maps, which are filled with varied objectives.

However, the most straightforward option has always proved to be the best one in my experience. Scouting out an enemy outpost, taking out roaming guards with your tranq gun and jettisoning them off, and then shooting anyone who spots you until your suppressor breaks is the fastest way to complete any given set of tasks. That’s a problem inherent with the stealth genre, and games in general. Players will always find the easiest path to an objective. So I don’t fault Metal Gear Solid V’s devs for not figuring a way around it.

I will say that the game’s story has proven to be pretty disappointing, though. No spoilers, obviously, but it’s surprisingly boring. It has a commendable anti-war sentiment, and some language-related stuff that I dig as a guy who took way too many foreign language classes in college. It’s mundane, though. The big baddies, ugly as they may be, just aren’t actually compelling compared to ones from other Metal Gear titles. All of its twists are predictable, too. And the second half of the game, which it pointlessly refers to as a chapter, is filled with missions that are mostly just ones from the first half of the game with some gameplay modifier. 

I still love the game, though. I can’t think of any stealth game that’s as enjoyable. Nailing headshots is fun, and attaching a balloon to enemies that your dog knocks unconscious is perpetually funny. Almost no other titles have reactive worlds like Metal Gear Solid V, which keeps its gameplay at least somewhat fresh regardless of how repetitive its mission structures become. I still have to fully complete it to render my final verdict, though.

Final Verdict

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‍Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain remains one of the most universally acclaimed games of all time — and, for the most part, it earns that reputation.  The title isn't flawless. Its narrative doesn’t reach the operatic heights of earlier entries. Its base-building systems feel optional rather than essential. Its mission design eventually exposes its repetition. But its stealth mechanics are still unmatched. The AI reactivity, the player freedom, and the sheer tactile satisfaction of its gameplay keep it compelling even a decade later.

I still don’t fully understand how it fits into the franchise’s labyrinthine timeline. I’m not entirely sure I need to. What I do know is that very few modern games match its systemic depth, and even fewer sustain 50 hours of play without collapsing under their own weight. 

A decade later, it doesn’t just survive the backlog — it dominates it.