Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence
Kojima Productions' masterpiece is an absolute must-buy. Seriously, go buy it now.
Published: April 6, 2006
Okay, I'll admit it: I never played Snake Eater when it first came out. For whatever reason (likely just too many games), and despite others in the office telling me I had to play it, it just fell through the cracks. I am so, so glad I dove on our copy of Subsistence when it came in, not just because of all the new goodies that Kojima Productions added to Snake Eater, but because I finally got to experience the original game itself, and with a pair of virgin eyes that beheld the masterpiece without knowing what it was like to play it with a top-down camera.
I know it's probably not fair to criticize the game for having a camera angle that obviously worked well enough to keep people in the game; there wouldn't have been nearly as many accolades if it didn't, but having a freely movable camera fundamentally changes the gameplay experience. It goes beyond the obvious convenience of not having to jump into first-person mode to see enemies beyond where the top-down camera can see, it pulls you into the game more, makes boss fights more involved, and just lets Hideo Kojima's storyline hooks sink in that much more.
But the beauty of collections like this is that they’re more than just the original game. Far more, in fact, and the whole of the post-game content is so good that it’s quite honestly worthy of a purchase on its own. But then I’m getting ahead of myself here.
Snake Eatin’
Regardless of whether you play the original Snake Eater or the updated camera version in Subsistence, the storyline and gameplay are the same. MGS3 is something of an origin story, taking place before the first Metal Gear Solid – indeed before the first Metal Gear game period. In the 1960s, before Snake was “Snake,” those that knew him called him John. If you were really chummy with the guy, you could call him Jack.
That’s about all the new info you’ll get on the guy, of course, and even with that little snippet of info, MGS freaks could extrapolate out into infinity all the parallels with other characters in previous games. Eventually, though, everyone settles into calling him Snake, you’re knee deep in long blades of sickly green Russian grass on a mission to capture Nicholas Sokolov, a Russian scientist with the key to winning both the race to the moon and ending the Cold War.
Snake’s missions never go smoothly, however, and I honestly don’t even want to start getting into the plot of the game for fear of giving too much away. Inasmuch as Snake returns home, his mission is something of a success, but after a chance encounter with his mentor and could-be lover The Boss, Sokolov is captured once again and Snake is given a new task. Killing his mentor happens to be part of this task.
And so begins the game proper, with an absolutely massive lead-in to the title and credits screens. Admirably, the game not only captures a bit of the brassy James Barry-era Bond soundtracks, but actually manages to offer a little glimpse into exactly how close the US and Russia were to an all-out nuclear attack. See, Sokolov was a defector but during the Cuban Missile Crisis, MGS3’s narrative tells us, the US made a deal to give Sokolov back to keep the tenuous peace between the countries.
I know it's probably not fair to criticize the game for having a camera angle that obviously worked well enough to keep people in the game; there wouldn't have been nearly as many accolades if it didn't, but having a freely movable camera fundamentally changes the gameplay experience. It goes beyond the obvious convenience of not having to jump into first-person mode to see enemies beyond where the top-down camera can see, it pulls you into the game more, makes boss fights more involved, and just lets Hideo Kojima's storyline hooks sink in that much more.
But the beauty of collections like this is that they’re more than just the original game. Far more, in fact, and the whole of the post-game content is so good that it’s quite honestly worthy of a purchase on its own. But then I’m getting ahead of myself here.
Snake Eatin’
Regardless of whether you play the original Snake Eater or the updated camera version in Subsistence, the storyline and gameplay are the same. MGS3 is something of an origin story, taking place before the first Metal Gear Solid – indeed before the first Metal Gear game period. In the 1960s, before Snake was “Snake,” those that knew him called him John. If you were really chummy with the guy, you could call him Jack.
That’s about all the new info you’ll get on the guy, of course, and even with that little snippet of info, MGS freaks could extrapolate out into infinity all the parallels with other characters in previous games. Eventually, though, everyone settles into calling him Snake, you’re knee deep in long blades of sickly green Russian grass on a mission to capture Nicholas Sokolov, a Russian scientist with the key to winning both the race to the moon and ending the Cold War.
Snake’s missions never go smoothly, however, and I honestly don’t even want to start getting into the plot of the game for fear of giving too much away. Inasmuch as Snake returns home, his mission is something of a success, but after a chance encounter with his mentor and could-be lover The Boss, Sokolov is captured once again and Snake is given a new task. Killing his mentor happens to be part of this task.
And so begins the game proper, with an absolutely massive lead-in to the title and credits screens. Admirably, the game not only captures a bit of the brassy James Barry-era Bond soundtracks, but actually manages to offer a little glimpse into exactly how close the US and Russia were to an all-out nuclear attack. See, Sokolov was a defector but during the Cuban Missile Crisis, MGS3’s narrative tells us, the US made a deal to give Sokolov back to keep the tenuous peace between the countries.
