Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops
Kojima and co. deliver with one of the PSP's finest. Full review within.
Published: February 12, 2007
Again, and understandably so, the whole idea of building up a team of soldiers and putting them to use comes off as unappealing at first. “Play as someone other than Snake? Why the hell would I want to do that?” And yes, while, begrudgingly enough, you can actually play as these guys on the field –the advantage being that you can blend in with the enemies on-screen with a chameleon icon depicting whether or not you’re hidden, though we weren’t too wild about it ourselves -- the real appeal comes in utilizing these newly-coerced comrades in a strategic fashion. When you’re not in the heat of an in-game mission (which, perhaps fitting for the play-on-the-go spirit of a portable system, are usually pretty brief and to the point), you have the ability to manage your allies in a menu-like setup.
Where an ally is best intended for use depends upon their strengths, as explained in the character details. There are an established few units that you can deploy them to. For the soldiers that are proficient in battle or possess a crucial skill for being on the field (Deliverymen can send weapons and items back to the truck, while Rescuers can drag enemies much more quickly than even Snake himself), there’s the Sneaking Unit. These are the guys you can switch to on-the-fly during a mission – while you play as Snake or an ally, everyone else in your team will hide near the truck in cardboard boxes, “unnoticed.” The Sneaking Unit is comprised of four teams, each with a four member capacity, bringing into the play the challenge of comprising and maintaining some effective, well-rounded teams (especially for online play, but more on that later).
The more strategic benefit, though, involves your Spy, Technical, and Medical Units. These are the ones whom you don’t have to toggle with on the battlefield, but rather, they will do all their dirty work behind the scenes. The Spy Unit, arguably the most useful of the three, can be assigned to certain locations on the peninsula (ones you yourself will be deployed to on missions) and obtain key data on the happenings of their station. Sometimes their reports will plot-related and crucial to progressing in the game, but more often than not they will inform you on less essential details (commonly, that a special weapon or item has been located and can be “procured at any time”) and open up what are more or less side-missions that can completed at anytime during the actual campaign. Three cheers for interesting replay value.
The Technical and Medical Units, as their names suggest, are solely responsible for inventing new equipment or healing up your allies during some downtime, respectively. There isn’t too much second-guessing to be had in terms of who belongs here: doctors and nurses roaming the levels -- as frustrating as it can be to subdue them before they scream bloody murder and alert all nearby guards -- are perfect for beefing up health and stamina recovery, while resident engineers and arms specialist have “Tech Unit” written all over them.
And their contributions to your team can be as invaluable as they are passable. There’s no explaining the relief to having your stamina freshly rejuvenated before embarking on another mission (which, beforehand, had us slamming our heads against the wall over how unreasonably quick it would deplete), but we were a bit less emphatic to see our tech guys working away on another pair of binoculars, knowing it was just going to collect dust in our inventory. Count that as a knock on Portable Ops for not putting a majority of the equipment to ingenious use in gameplay or boss battles, as done in previous games.
Speaking of which, in classic MGS fashion, the game pits you up against another tight-knit posse of bosses with superhuman powers, each with their own grueling story to how they ended up that way. This cast is noticeably fewer this time around, though all much more centripetal to the developing plot. That said, don’t be surprised if a boss or two is just obsessed with throwing down with the legendary Big Boss.