Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol 1 - Review

If you’re a fan of gaming, Hideo Kojima would be a household name to you, especially if you grew up playing around the 90s (or beyond for the original Metal Gear game). Yes, he’s known for his latest game named Death Stranding. But before he started Kojima Productions, he created both the Metal Gear and Metal Gear Solid series, which popularised his amazing storytelling in gaming. New modern day gamers now have the chance to play these amazing games for the first time, whilst veterans are able to relive their espionage days through Konami’s Metal Gear Solid Collection. The question is, are these games from the 90s still relevant or do they feel dated and ‘from its era’?

The biggest call out with this collection is the fact that the Metal Gear Solid Collection comes with a heap of games. In fact, there are 5 to be named. Metal Gear, Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, and the Metal Gear Solid series (1 - 3). That’s a lot of Metal Gear games in the collection. For those who have enjoyed the Metal Gear Solid 2 and Metal Gear Solid 3 HD releases before, the versions here are the same ones that Bluepoint Games worked on a few years ago, which is a good thing. The question is, how much of it did they change. Did they keep it as close to the original, or designed an updated overhaul.

First off, one thing to keep in mind when playing the early Metal Gear (Solid) games in this collection is that they were released early on, starting in the late 80s, making it feel as though it’s from its era. Metal Gear & Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake’s top down angular view clearly shows its age, being a simplistic espionage game that started it all. If you’re like me and started on Metal Gear Solid, the original game to the Collection definitely mentions characters and fills in the gaps in character knowledge and information that always left me wondering who Grey Fox was and why was this character important, or why Snake spoke to him like they knew each other in Metal Gear Solid. It also kept a lot of features in the game such as using a cardboard box to hide from surveillance cameras to using a codec with specific frequencies to speak to characters, just to name a couple.

As for the game itself, though it was rather smooth and straight forward with no issues that I came across during my run, it was painfully dated. As mentioned early on, you’re either going to feel the era it was created, or you’ll be hit with massive nostalgia of your childhood if you grew up playing it. From my assumption and not playing this iteration of the original game when it came out, I’d imagine that this was a great remaster of the 1987 game as it really felt as though they kept it true to its original source, but updating the colour range while also updating and sharpening the visuals to suit the modern tv standards.

Much like its predecessor in this Metal Gear Solid Collection, Metal Gear Solid seems a little dated, though you have to keep in mind that the game was released in 1998. This could be clearly seen with the aspect ratio, which still sits at 4:3, and not full 16:9 as well as the graphics/animation having quite a pixelated edge. Saying that this is a direct port with minimal changes and slight improvement would definitely be the way to go. Unfortunately for new players, this might be a little difficult for them to swallow, especially looking at the standard of visuals out there in modern games. However, to the Metal Gear Solid fans, this will bring back a massive amount of nostalgia. One thing to note is the MGS Collection does also come with the variations of the Metal Gear Solid games with side missions and expanded versions. These are Metal Gear Solid Special Missions, Metal Gear Solid VR Missions and Metal Gear Solid Integral. Regardless of which version of the game you play, with or without the option of the expanded levels, the essence of Metal Gear Solid is still there. Yes, the graphics might seem dated as mentioned, but there’s something about it that has kept its charm, and definitely a great time warp for the fans.

As you move further along to the more modern games in the collection, being Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, the visuals definitely look more dated. Again like its previous games, it’s of its era and will take fans back to the day they first played them. However, this time around new players might make them a little more palatable due to its visual look and feel. And yes, though it’s still dated in comparison to newly released games, the leap from Metal Gear Solid to Metal Gear Solid had been a huge jump.

One of the great features of the Metal Gear Solid Master Collection is the extras it comes with for all the games. As mentioned in Metal Gear Solid and all its variations and international versions, Sons of Liberty and Snake Eater have the options of selecting the North American, EU or Japanese versions of the game. Not only that, but there are additional features such as a Master Book which gives players a type of art and information book, letting players look at the archives to learn a little about the Metal Gear world, characters, all versions of the games including the PSP versions. There’s definitely a reason as to why they have called this a Master collection. To add players can just listen and enjoy the score to each game in the music list section, all the way to even reading the dialogue scripts of the games under the Screenplay Book menu.

It’s very clear that this Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol 1, is mainly created for the fans, as stated before. The great thing is the ability to go through all the extra information, visuals, synopsis, score and script. To add, there are all the international versions of the games, which means players who reside in a specific region have the option to try something that they would have had to purchase internationally or source from overseas etc. If there were any fans of the series, this is definitely one to pick up… but again, keep in mind that this collection is definitely FOR the fans more than new players.

The Score

8.0

Review code provided by Konami

The Pros

All Metal Gear Solid games are as they are, giving nostalgia for the fans of the series

All regions/international versions of the game are available

Abundant amount of extras such as art/information book, music list and script

The Cons

The older games in the collection might seem dated to new players

Only small updates apart from slightly smoothing out edges and updating colours

It’s clear the collection is mainly focused only for fans of the series