Review: Metal Gear Online

It’s not over yet, Snake

I’ve spent a considerable amount of time this week with Metal Gear Online, and despite my initial positive impressions, I’m having some big-picture issues.

In short, I’m not sure how long this train is going to be chugging along, especially when you take Konami’s recent history into account.

Metal Gear Online (PC, PS3, PS4 [reviewed], Xbox 360, Xbox One)
Developer: Kojima Productions
Publisher: Konami
Release: October 6, 2015 (Consoles), TBA 2016 (PC)
MSRP: $59.99 (PC, PS4, Xbox One) $49.99 (PS3, Xbox 360) / Included with MGSV

As previously mentioned, Metal Gear Online only has three modes currently. There’s a decent amount of variety within those gametypes, but the issue is how everything is playing out right now in the game’s meta. In essence, players often aren’t using any form of stealth (outside of Cloak and Dagger, which forces one team to do it), or aren’t going for the objectives in general. Instead, most games end up being slugfests and devolve into team deathmatch situations. That’s not to say that these basic strategies aren’t handily countered by players who have the know-how, it’s just what’s happening.

While it’s not wholly the fault of the designers, Metal Gear Online doesn’t do a great job of facilitating objective play, as the whole thing is kind of a laissez faire situation. That both excites and concerns me. On one hand, I love that MGO is just as vague as Phantom Pain. Instead of spelling out every facet for players, you’ll have to just figure out everything on your own, from advanced tactics to the best way to counter enemies. On the other, I’m not confident in Konami’s ability to effectively police and update the game in the slightest.

It’s very possible that there could be a ton of content from Kojima’s team waiting to be pushed out in waves over the course of the next year. But since this is all speculation, we only have what’s currently in MGO to assess, and it’s lacking in areas, chiefly how servers are handled — or, I should actually note, a lack of servers. It seems as if the game is P2P based, which creates all sorts of issues for players. First off, hosts can remove people from the game, and if they disconnect, everyone gets booted with no XP or rewards. It’s egregious to say the least, and not something you really see in a major shooter in 2015.

Then you have issues like the party system not actually placing you on the same team as your party constantly, or the basic inability to join a friend’s game in progress through a quick menu option. Thankfully the microtransaction element hasn’t bled through for MGO (yet?), but cosmetic equipment is too expensive currently, as it would take hundre꧃ds of games to earn some of the higher-up rewards. I would be more ok✨ay with the expensive price of gear if the aforementioned booting issues were rectified with dedicated servers.

Now, the gameplay is still superb. That’s due in part to the fact that it’s literally Phantom Pain, online, which is completely fine by me. Every movement is fluid, gunplay handles like a dream, and the sheer flexibility of the engine makes for some breathtaking moments. Aiming, running, and dolphin diving feels better than pretty much every shooter on the market right now. It’s crazy how it feels like a natural extension of my adventures with Venom Snake, and how all of my training instantly pays off online.

When you distill it down to individual matches, Metal Gear Online is just fun to play. You can boot up a session, and provided that you don’t have any connection issues, generally enjoy yourself, even if a lot of people are ignoring objectives. It’s a rush to use stealth effectively and have an enemy run by your prone body completely, then dash up to them, choke them out, and Fulton them. Getting to use the Snake and Ocelot special loadouts from time to time is a joy as well, as are all of the little Easter eggs and details locked within MGO.

I’ve seen a lot of complaints that the Walkers are overpowered, but I’ve found them easy to deal with. Not only are they incredibly easy to spot (and show up on the radar), but they can be swiftly taken out with a quick sniper shot or a few well-placed bullets. Plus, both sides get them, so it’s not like one team is at a disadvantage — people just need to learn how to counter them. For the most part I don’t think balance is an issue for MGO — it’s the technical side that drags things down.

Even though we don’t review what might be (could you imagine how cool it would be to see co-op Metal Gear missions? Now we may never see the day), I’m still torn with the current state of Metal Gear Online. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend picking up the entire Metal Gear Solid V package just for online play, as it still has a lot to prove. I’m pulling for it to get better, but I don’t trust Konami.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}