Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker (PSP)

Developer:

Kojima Productions

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Release Date:

2010

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Systems:

PSP, PS3, Xbox 360

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This week on Super Adventures, I'm playing the fifth of the main Metal Gear Solid games, Peace Walker on the PlayStation Portable! Or maybe sixth, depending on whether you count Portable Ops (creator Hideo Kojima doesn't). In fact it was originally going to be Metal Gear Solid 5 and it pretty much still is in everything but title, as it continues the story of the fall of Big Boss.

I've never been keen on handheld exclusive sequels to console exclusive games (or the opposite) as unless you're playing on a Switch it's going to really change the experience. Plus it means you have to get extra hardware to continue the story, which kind of sucks if you've spent all your money getting a PS3 to play Metal Gear Solid 4 and don't feel the need to take games outside with you. (Personally I had a PSP in the house before I had a PS3, but that's just the same problem backwards!) Ideally I'd want developers to port everything to everything, but if that's not possible and they really want to make a portable game, then they should make it a spin-off like Metal Gear AC!D that doesn't continue the storyline. In my opinion.

Part of the reason they went portable with this one is because Monster Hunter Freedom did really well on PSP, hitting a broader demographic, and they wanted some of that for MGS. Peace Walker was aimed towards a younger school-age audience and in Japan they found it, making the game a big hit. Outside of Japan, not so much. In fact the game sold so poorly in the West that they took one of its characters off the cover of the international versions of Ground Zeroes because no one knew who he was. The game did pretty well in reviews though, as it's one of the highest rated PSP games on Metacritic (sharing third place with Lumines and Persona 3). In fact it's actually way higher than Monster Hunter Freedom. It's also a pretty late PSP game as it came out a year before the release of the PS Vita. And a year before Peace Walker HD Edition was released on consoles.

Okay, I'm going to play this for an hour or two and hope that gets me past the first cutscene at least. Either way there's going to be a lot of SPOILERS here for both this game and earlier Metal Gears, so please don't accidentally ruin a game for yourself by reading something here you didn't want to know.

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The first thing the game did was ask me to choose a name (I went with Jack), then it started installing data. Man, installing games on a handheld... now I know I'm in the future. It's been a while since I've played the game so I totally forgot it did this.

It begins with a small install, then asks if you want to copy over more data to the Memory Stick™ so you can hear your people talking over the radio during gameplay. It also helps minimise loading times, apparently.

Then there's a short bit of opening text before the intro begins. Well actually there's about two and a half 'Star Wars movie opening crawl's worth of text displayed a couple of paragraphs at a time over a minute and a half, but I figured this bike would be prettier for you to look at.

It starts a lot like Snake Eater does, talking about the Cold War has the world split into two, East and West. Only this time it carries on and spoils the game's entire story, to get everyone up to speed. It doesn't mention anything about Portable Ops though I noticed.

It's now November 4, 1974, ten years after Snake Eater (and ten years before The Phantom Pain), and Naked Snake/Big Boss here has just failed to light his cigar in front of a sign that says "Militaires Sans Frontières"... which might have been a poor choice of name in hindsight. The HD version of the game comes with a disclaimer saying 'It's got nothing to do with Médecins Sans Frontières' and the sequels just avoid saying the name at all.

We're on the Barranquilla Coast in Colombia and there's a beach full of masked soldiers beating the crap out of each other here. I didn't get far in Portable Ops, but that was also set in Colombia so I assume these are the soldiers Snake procured during the game.

It seems like they couldn't animate the faces for whatever reason, so only people wearing masks get to talk, and most of the talking is being done by the drill instructor. He keeps yelling out things like "Hold the Crouch Button and keep it held down to lie down. However, you cannot move while you are lying down. I'll say that again! You cannot move while lying down! Is that clear?" with absolute conviction. It's great.

Snake of course knows all this, he's the Boss, but he's taking part in the tutorial anyway. It's all kind of new to me though as the game uses a very different control system to earlier Metal Gears, with the face buttons being used to control the camera and up on the D-pad being used as the action button. Well, by default anyway.

I could've done with being given less to remember in one go, but I suppose it's fairly simple stuff.

Now we're moving on to the basics of consecutive CQC, which basically just means that when multiple enemies are standing nearby I can keep pressing 'R' to slam them all into the wet sand. Though I have to wait for the icon to appear first and it's taking me a few tries to get the timing down.

By the way the graphics look a bit glitched here, with everyone having a grey halo, but this is exactly what it's meant to look like. In fact these shots are coming straight from an actual genuine PSP. The dot dithering effect is apparently due to the game putting the system into low precision mode to make better use of its limited resources.

After giving his troops the genuine honour of a personal ass-whooping from the greatest soldier in the world, Snake suddenly turns into a sketchy illustration and a cutscene begins.

Oh damn, it's Master Miller of Metal Gear Solid fame! (And maybe Portable Ops, I dunno, I haven't played that one). Though people just call him KA2 for short. Uh, I mean Kaz.

He's played by Robin Atkin Downes, who played a couple of demons in the Buffyverse and the most hated character in all of Babylon 5 before becoming a prolific voice actor with 412 credits on IMDb (including Travis Touchdown).

Turns out that Snake's group is laying low at the moment, that's why they have a sign up with their name on, but Kaz has brought some folks over to chat. Fortunately Snake is able to talk just fine when he's in a motion comic and he's still got the voice of David Hayter!

There are two visitors, a professor and a teenage girl, and for some reason it's given me the option to zoom in on the girl. Plus as you zoom in it removes layers of clothes, until Snake's standing there picturing her in her underwear. What the hell Hideo Kojima? Am I supposed to be looking for scars or something?

Anyway this goes on for 7 minutes, which isn't excessive for a Metal Gear cutscene, but it's certainly long enough for my attention to wander. I love how it's illustrated in the distinctive Yoji Shinkawa Metal Gear style but it's not grabbing me.

Prologue:

An Army Without Borders

Hey, this is a nice beach. I don't think Metal Gear's ever visited an actual beach before now and so far the game's had two of them.

Turns out that this is just another tutorial though, as Miller contacts me over the radio to run through how to shoot guns. This is pretty different to the PS2 Metal Gears, where radio/codec calls could only happen on a separate screen and were actual conversations. He's full of useful advice like "Grenades explode. You throw them, Snake," delivered with suitable sarcasm. He also mentions that they can "leave all that crap in San Hieronymo behind", which is a bit harsh to Portable Ops.

Then we get our first good look at Snake's character model close up.

Here he is compared to how he looked in Snake Eater. It's definitely the same guy, but he seems to have lost his razor in the last ten years and gone a bit 'Che'. Either that or the developers have gotten better at making it look like a beard instead of a wide jawline, it's hard to tell. I've grown my own Snake beard in preparation, so I'm ready for this.

It's interesting comparing graphics from the PS2 to the PSP, as the handheld hardware has less power, but it actually looks better in some aspects. For instance, Snake's shirt has some shine to it, which you didn't get in the PS2 games. I guess either the system has some newer features or the developers just knew more tricks by this point.

Surprise, turns out that tutorial beach was just a short intermission! Now I've been dropped into a 10 minute cutscene. Do they not even care that handhelds have batteries and people using them don't necessarily have a lot of time? I'm not stuck watching it, I could've skipped it, but then I would've missed out on the dramatic resolution to Snake's cigar lighter problems.

The professor has a robot hand with a lighter built into the thumb! Also he's actually a KGB agent and Snake's onto him. The KGB are supporting the rebels in Costa Rica in opposition to the CIA's activities in the country and it's all a bit depressing really. Definitely not something Snake wants his army involved in. But the professor is undeterred and switches to a different approach to get him working for the Soviets:

He pulls out a brand new Sony Walkman! The Walkman was released in 1979, so we're five years early, but then we're also a bit early for nuclear-equipped walking battle tanks, so Metal Gear's universe has always been a bit ahead of our own.

The cassette contains a recording of The Boss's voice, which is impossible as she died before the recording was made... Snake shot her. The Boss was Snake's mentor, so he was more than a little upset when the CIA had her fake her defection and then sent him to kill her. In fact he was so pissed off by how that all worked out that he left the US and formed his own PMC. And now there's evidence that she's still alive.

The professor goes to melt the cassette with his finger to get Snake to admit that he gives a damn... which means that he's got at least two lighters built in that hand! Anyway, this is why Snake's currently on a beach in Costa Rica right now on a mission for the KGB.

Okay here's the start of the actual game. It looks very Snake Eater, though the enemies are thoughtfully wearing yellow so I can spot them against the foliage this time. It's very helpful, seeing as I'm looking at a tiny screen with a lower resolution.

Miller suggests that I stay out of sight and take the long way around, you know, play it as a stealth game. I've got nothing against staying undetected, but I prefer to play as a predator instead of a ghost, so I'm going to need to find a way to take this guy out silently.

I could creep up and get him in a choke hold, but it'd be a shame to bring these 16 tranquilliser rounds and not use them. The silencer's going to be a concern though, as if this is anything like Snake Eater it'll wear out with each shot. But I really want to tranq some people so I'm using it anyway!

This weapon select screen really threw me off when I first played around with it on the beach, as the controls are really strange. But now that I've gotten the hang of it, it actually does make perfect sense. To change weapons I hold down right on the D-pad and then press □ and ○ to cycle back and forth through them. The PSP only has two shoulder buttons and no right analogue stick so they had to think outside the box for the controls.

Holding left brings up a list of my equipment instead, though I'm leaving my sound detector gadget equipped as it's the closest thing I've got to a radar.

You can't see them, because there's a big blue circle in the way, but there's a dude over there who had no idea he was about to get shot. The circle's indicating that it was on target and I was aiming for the head so that's an instant tranq take down. With any luck they'll be asleep forever now, or until someone kicks them awake at least.

The game might look like Snake Eater, but thankfully it has over-the-shoulder aiming instead of first person. This is a big improvement because it means the camera angle doesn't change when I hold the button to aim. Plus I can walk around while aiming by using the analogue stick to move and the face buttons to turn! Well okay it's an analogue slider, and tapping a button to adjust my aim is a bit awkward, but it's still an overall improvement over the PS2 games I reckon and it's way better than Portable Ops. Man that game has awkward controls.

There's a bit of aim assist here to make sure a shot that looks on target probably will be, and a toggleable auto aim for when you're in a rush and don't mind what body part you hit as long as something gets a hole in it.

One thing it does have in common with Snake Eater is that each area is bloody tiny. The map doesn't fully communicate how microscopic this section of forest really is.

Also I was almost caught by an enemy just now because I assumed I must have got them all and was just running around looking for spinning floating boxes before I moved on. These guys tend to leave things like health rations just hovering above the ground so I might as well grab them while I'm here. Though unlike Snake Eater there's no food to catch. In fact they've taken out the survival features entirely so there's no performing emergency first aid either. The camo index is still there but swapping camo in the field is now forbidden so I'll have to wait before I can change my pants.

Alright that's the tiny beach tutorial and the tiny forest stage done, time to move to my mysterious final objective. I'm starting to worry it might be a boss fight against The Riddler.

Right, there's three soldiers in front of me (there's one walking around the balcony, it's more obvious in motion) but there's probably going to be another one hidden somewhere. Fortunately they can't see very far so I've got some room to operate.

I can tell I'm still only in the prologue because the credits have started coming up. Apparently the original story/planning/game design was done by a guy called Hideo Kojima.

It's so much easier to aim in this game than it is the PS2 ones, so I'm just taking the enemies out from a distance one by one and then running over to loot the bodies. I don't have to pick them up to get them to drop prizes this time, in fact I'm not sure I even can pick them up anymore, but I can't be greedy or else they'll wake up.

I like how generous they're being with the anaesthetic ammo, but it would be a lot more helpful if one of them could drop a replacement silencer. I'm going to have to shoot the next one from a distance and hope the sound isn't loud enough to alert the guy on the balcony. Or I could creep over and hit him, my fists never run out of ammo, but I'm not confident in my CQC at the moment. Running over and waving my arms around seems like it'd be a shortcut to unnecessary catastrophe.

I did it, I tranq'd everyone and walked across the finish line unseen. But then the next cutscene surprised me with a bloody CQC QTE! First I had to hit 'R', then I had to mash △! I really hate mashing △.

If they're trying to make the scenes more involving, they've failed, at least for me. Plus the QTE means this cutscene's unskippable!

Anyway, bad news. All we found here was a reference to 'spears' and a whole lot of film badges for detecting radiation. Seems like the CIA have brought some nukes!

It's all good news for me though, as I did surprisingly well. I'm sure it probably goes up to S rank, but I'm more than happy to take an A. It's like I've ended up in a parallel universe where I don't entirely suck at Metal Gear (or it was just really easy this time).

I'm not sure what the experience points are for though; maybe they'll improve my M16A1 to RANK 2, or maybe they'll improve my performance using a M16A1 RANK 1 weapon. I've also obtained design specs for an M1C and a smoke grenade somehow, so I can look forward to having to level them up as well some day.

Despite all my screwing around, that mission only took as long as the last cutscene, and that probably includes the QTE sequence at the end, seeing as they've given me a Cutscene Interaction Bonus. It's not quite done with cutscenes yet though as I've got a long chat with Master Miller to listen to before I can move on.

By the way, they've made a sneaky change to the tagline for this game. The earlier Metal Gears had "TACTICAL ESPIONAGE ACTION" above the titles, but this time it's "TACTICAL ESPIONAGE OPERATIONS" because I've got an oil rig home base to return to and manage between missions!

It's a little bit Outer Heaven, a little bit Big Shell, and it's located out in the Caribbean... which I think is the only thing this game has in common with The Secret of Monkey Island.

There were 15 people fighting on that beach in the tutorial, plus the drill instructor, Snake and Miller, and now I've got to decide where to assign them.

Oh, seems like a couple of my soldiers have vanished in the meantime, but I've still got enough to get things started. Right now I only have the Combat Unit and the R&D Team, and I've got to go through all their personnel files and decide which department they should work in. Eagle Ray here has a lot of spanner and no swords, so he's a good fit for R&D. Judging by the bars he could also work in the mess hall or intelligence if I had those departments, he just wouldn't be as good.

Putting someone into the Combat Unit increases my GMP, which is my cash. I need cash to fund the projects the R&D boys are working on.

See, we can't just buy new guns, we have to invent them. Or, more accurately, make a perfect knock-off utterly indistinguishable from the actual gun. Not to sell, just for Snake to equip on missions.

Right now I can develop a Rank 2 silenced tranquilliser pistol with a better silencer, which just happens to be the thing I want most in the world right now, so that worked out. I wouldn't mind a silenced tranq sniper rifle as well, but I'm not sure these levels even have a distance for me to shoot people in.

Now I have to play a few more missions while I wait for my new gun to get developed.

There's no VR missions, but there are Extra Ops I can do outside of the main story with other characters from my Combat Unit, so that's cool. Sure they're probably just shooting galleries and remixes of old missions, but sometimes it's nice to have something else to do when you want a break from the plot.

I can also replay old missions to try to improve my score, increase my levels and acquire new stuff, which is a big change. It makes the game a bit more videogamey, but when has Metal Gear ever worried about that? There's also co-ops, so you can play it multiplayer! Why is it only the handheld game that has co-op?

Anyway I've got to go to the Sandinista hideout and make contact with their Comandante for reasons that Miller expands upon in a codec conversation. I mean it's not really a codec call, that hasn't been invented yet, but it plays out the same way. Plus now I can also call up the teenage girl and ask her for her input. It's okay, she's got a radio in school so she's not skipping class for this.

Chapter 1:

A Country Without an Army

I've decided to be a bit more sensible this time and sneak up to grab enemies whenever the opportunity presents itself. This means I get to do interrogations! They're not guaranteed to give me anything though: this particular guy was stubbornly refusing to talk, but he was more than happy to pass out.

Enemies that pass out have stars orbiting their head instead of 'Z's, and if this is anything like the earlier Metal Gears that means they're eventually going to wake up on their own. Fortunately a single tranq dart in the head will solve that problem.

Then I can use my new toys, the Fulton balloons, to send them floating into the sky for pickup! That's not entirely how the Fulton surface-to-air recovery system works in real life (the balloon's not the bit that lifts you into the air), but it lets me remove unconscious enemies from play and press-gang new recruits for Mother Base so I'm not complaining. Fulton balloons completely change the way the game can be played and I love them.

Wait, I didn't need to tranq this guy to use the Fulton, I could've just left him knocked out! What a tragic waste of silencer durability. In fact I could've thrown them to the ground, pointed the gun at them to make them surrender, then Fulton'd them without anyone being unconscious at all! So maybe I should do that instead next time.

A COUPLE OF AREAS LATER

Oh crap. I crept up behind him and raised my gun, expecting Snake to say "Freeze!" but things didn't work out that way. He turned around, alerted the others, and now I'm apparently supposed to run and hide. Run where? These levels are tiny and alerts carry on between areas.

I put a few badly aimed tranq rounds into him, and that eventually knocked him out, but he had lots of friends and they shot me from off-screen. Turns out that Snake doesn't have a lot of health, especially when I have the Fulton balloon equipped instead of rations.

The worst part of this is that I got kicked back to the start of the mission and now I have to do all the areas again! It's not that big of a deal, like I've said they're tiny, but it really feels like each exit should be a checkpoint. Like in Metal Gear Solid 3!

LATER

Okay I beat the mission properly this time and my reward is a drone shooting minigame.

Funnily enough "UURRRRRRRRRR" is the exact sound I made when I realised this.

Snake is successful at shooting it down, but then this massive thing flies over. It's some kind of unmanned drone with machine guns on it, and it dodged right out of the way of my missile! Fortunately I don't have to fight it. Unfortunately one of its little drone friends goes and kidnaps one of the kids working with the Sandinista rebels! A boy called Chico. It just yanks him into the sky with a cable; what kind of monster would do that?

The Comandante that Snake came here for is dead, but he did find his daughter, and she'll probably be taking over from him. The bad news is that she took off chasing the drones, as Chico was her brother. Looks like there's no time to waste, I'm going to have to race back home to Mother Base and then...

... hey there's a new target range mission to play!

I thought I was doing really well at this, getting more headshots than anyone that's using buttons to aim with a near invisible crosshair on a tiny screen should ever rightfully get. But then it gave me a C rank, so I guess I'm actually just crap.

LATER

Wow, this new area is actually fairly big. Well I mean it's not, it's still tiny, but I've got more ground to explore for treasure. I've also got prisoners to rescue here, which is a bit awkward as I thought I was carrying a lot more balloons than I actually was. I just putting balloons on every enemy I came across and sending them all into the sky, it never occurred to me I'd have none left when I reached people that needed saving.

The game took pity on me though and I found a box of Fultons just lying nearby. I suppose I might as well take them as they're not going to be much use to these guys. They don't have an aircraft overhead to hook the balloons, or an oil rig to trap people on.

OH SHIT IT'S A BOSS FIGHT! I DIDN'T THINK I'D GOTTEN FAR ENOUGH TO REACH A BOSS FIGHT ALREADY!! I'M NOT UP FOR THIS!!!

Those new soldiers look pretty tranq-proof, and that tank seems pretty everything-proof. Man, I really don't need to lose here and have to replay those last few areas all over again.

How do you beat Vulcan Raven tank battle in Metal Gear Solid again? It was grenades right, wasn't it? Hey, I've got some of them. I also picked up a rocket launcher, but I haven't got it equipped.

Oh... uh... okay?

In the story Snake is trapped and has to fight his way through these guys, in the game can just go back to base, manage some staff assignments, check in on weapon R&D and maybe replay an older level to get some experience.

By the way I haven't mentioned how much I like the Peace Walker logo yet. It's a stylised B-52-style bomber and it's a ☮ peace symbol at the same time! Metal Gear wasn't the first to come up with that idea though, in fact it's probably been around for so long that some people might assume that what it's meant to symbolise. The peace symbol is actually meant to be the letters N and D in semaphore (N for 'nuclear' and D for 'disarmament').

Right, I've had a bit of a break and now I'm ready to take down this LAV-Type G Armored Assault Vehicle. First though I need to deal with the squad of armoured troops backing it up.

Fortunately they were actually pretty vulnerable to tranq rounds, once I'd shot their helmets off at least, and I still had one round left over once I'd gotten them to stop kicking each other awake.

My next move is to Fulton them all away and then run very quickly from the armoured assault vehicle driving up to shoot at me. There's plenty of boxes here so I can get myself behind one and let my health (slowly) regenerate.

Miller said to shoot at its exposed fuel tank, so that's what I've been doing. Seems like a bit of a design flaw to put an obvious weak point you can hit for massive damage, but I'm not complaining.

Though I do feel like complaining about the way a whole squad of replacement troops arrived once I'd dealt with the first fuel tank. I had no tranq darts left, I had to gun them all down! I'm running pretty low on grenades as well and that thing still has most of its health. I've been running around looking for more traq ammo but it's all for my M16. I wish I had a co-op buddy or three around to distract them so I could go knock them all out.

The driver eventually took pity on me and popped his head out, but I didn't have any merciful rounds left so emptied a mag of bullets into it instead. Boss fight complete!

I caught back up with the new leader of the Sandinistas, Amanda, but she's been having grappling hook from the sky problems herself, and managed to end up with a broken leg. Turns out that Snake has X-ray vision and can zoom in to see the break right through her clothes. It makes a lot more sense than zooming in on that girl earlier.

Turns out I get to keep the LAV-Type G (but not to use myself). I've also obtained design specs for tortilla chips and canned soft drinks, so those will be handy.

Amanda is a bit too wounded to lead a revolution at the moment so she'll be hanging out in our new sickbay for a while recovering. Which means I need to find soldiers who have a bit of medical skill and reassign them to that department.

It's interesting that she gets a full character model I can rotate in this model viewer but the other story character in my team, Master Miller, doesn't...

Right, now I have to get back to rescuing Chico. Not just to keep Amanda happy, but also because he might know where the nukes are going.

Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker HD Edition (Xbox One)

LOVE PACK ♥ - The box with room for two!

Here's what the HD Edition looks like by the way. I was going to use a shot with characters in, maybe even put a PSP and Xbox One screenshot side by side, but there's no point really. It's the same, it's exactly the same. All the character models, all the textures, even the motion comics are just upscaled. The only visual difference is that it's in a much higher resolution and doesn't have dots all over it.

But the conversation to consoles has blessed the game with a couple of major upgrades: achievements and trophies a much better frame rate and a second analogue stick. I find aiming on a controller to be a bit frustrating because I'm so used to a mouse, but after using the PSP's face buttons to aim for the last hour or two this is so much better! I got a B rank in the firing range! I've been getting S ranks in some (but not all) of the missions!

I just walk around, tranq everyone, Fulton them, and then I'm free to carry on with what I'm meant to be doing. In this case I'm peeking through blue doors looking for Chico.

Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker HD Edition (Xbox One)

Yay I got a codename! I'm now Naked Butterfly. Or maybe Butterfly Snake? Lullaby Butterfly, that's what people should call me, seeing as I specialise in sending everyone to sleep.

I found Chico by the way, and yanked him into the sky with a cable. Because I'm a big damn hero. Still no sign of Harpo, Groucho or Zeppo though.

And then I bravely got ran over by a tank on a later mission while I was trying to tranq seemingly endless waves of armoured troops. The boss fights are probably pretty simple when you know what you're doing, but getting to that point can be hard work. And I'm too lazy to try again right now.


CONCLUSION

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The original PSP has its power cable in a really awkward place. It plugs in near the bottom of your right hand. I know you're supposed to play off the battery, that's the point of a handheld, but this one's getting on a bit now and I don't know how much life the battery's got left in it.

Anyway, Peace Walker is definitely a Metal Gear Solid game, that much I'm sure about. It's still made of confined areas with 3 or 4 soldiers to get past, it's still got the exclamation marks above their heads if they spot you, and it's still got the different alert modes which cause their friends to come over and shoot you if you're spotted. Plus even though they aimed for a younger demographic and put literal kids on your team, it's still dealing with serious adult themes. I mean it features revolutionaries backed by the KGB who use child soldiers and sell drugs to buy weapons, and these are the good guys. It seems like there's just as much dialogue as ever and they got David Hayter back to play the elder Snake as he continues his journey from hero to villain.

But he doesn't really feel like Snake to me.

There's a real disconnect here between the 2D cutscenes and 3D cutscenes that the earlier games didn't suffer from. The only time the characters get to talk or express themselves is in the motion comics cutscenes, so 3D Snake is always a dead-eyed expressionless puppet. Metal Gear Solid 1 managed to give blocky triangle-nose Solid Snake a personality and his face was just painted on, so this feels like a real step backwards. MGS1 is also more cinematic than this is, making it less obvious that you're just playing through levels until you reach the cutscene at the end.

I wasn't that keen on the cutscenes in this at all to be honest, but I don't think they're the only reason I wasn't getting into the story this time. The earlier Metal Gears have a mad claustrophobic intensity as you're infiltrating an enemy lair, facing opponents like a telekinetic psychic who can read your memory card, a man who controls swarms of bees, or an immortal vampire. They're like Die Hard as you go from one set piece to another, taking the occasional break to chat with your friends on the radio so they can help you get through it. This time though you're not John McClane, Casey Ryback or even Snake Plissken, as you get to return to your Caribbean home base between missions to do a bit of personnel management and relax. The other games wanted to be a movie, but this is much more episodic.

Though what it loses in immersion, it gains in gameplay. The structure of the game is like Snake Eater and the VR missions combined, as you can now replay previous missions for a better score, more experience, loot you missed, or just because you want to. Plus you can Fulton up soldiers to remove them from the battlefield and then take them to your base to force them to make dinner for the other soldiers you've kidnapped! I really genuinely love this new feature, because a: soldiers kicking my unconscious dudes awake in the other games was really getting old, and b: giving people a job that lets them be their best selves is actually kind of satisfying. I haven't even touched the auto-assign button yet, I give very careful thought where my new employees should work to maximise morale, profit, and the production of better weapons and snacks. Mother Base is a great idea in general, as it continually gives you gives you rewards and makes the things you find in the game feel more rewarding.

The gameplay in general has been improved by the new controls, which make getting around and doing simple things less awkward. Uh, I mean they're new to me, as I haven't played Metal Gear Solid 4 yet. This is kind of offset by the frustration of using an analogue slider to move and using the face buttons to aim, but fortunately that's fixed in the HD Version. It doesn't actually fix a whole lot else, but the controls and resolution are much better, and the frame rate is tripled from 20 to 60.

But the trouble with Peace Walker is that it's not a good fit for the handheld it was designed for and it looks incredibly dated on the consoles it was ported to. I mean judging it by the standards of a PSP game it's actually very good, but they chose to make this a main series MGS game that continues the plot, and coming between Metal Gear Solid 4 and Metal Gear Solid V it looks cheap and nasty. It's definitely the missing link in gameplay though. Phantom Pain plays something like a cross between Mercenaries and every modern Ubisoft game and this really doesn't, but you can see the foundations being put down here.

Right, I think I'm going to have another go at beating that tank.

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Thanks for dropping by and reading my words! If you've got any words about Peace Walker you want to share with the internet you can put them in the comment box below. You can also take a guess at what the next game's going to be, though it's a little more obscure this time.