Reflecting on my First Ever Playthrough of Metal Gear Solid (PSX)

If there’s one thing about gaming I have heard my entire life it is that Metal Gear Solid is an absolute masterpiece. The game, and by extension the series and it’s complex and unique narrative, has always been a point of complete fascination for me. This idea really started to bother my subconscious after starting up Forever Classic Games and our podcast with Zach, who is a huge fan of the series and has a personal history with it. For the last few years, I’ve made promises to play through the games (I planned to play them chronologically at first), but I struggled with Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, unable to make it past the first couple hours due to boredom. I’ve owned the Legacy Collection on PS3, as well as Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain for many years now but it wasn’t until recently that I mustered the energy to dive headfirst, completely determined to settle the score and see why the game is so beloved by millions of players.

After a 12-hour marathon stream and gaming session (with about an hour or so of technical hiccups, more on that later) I have officially finished the main playthrough of Metal Gear Solid on PSX, played on a PS3, with minimal assistance aside from some pointers after many attempts and failures.

Following some reflection, I think my main takeaway from Metal Gear Solid is that it is a game far ahead of its time both in game design and technical achievement. It may not be my favorite game ever but I appreciate the design overall.

Solid Snake grew into his good looks.

To me, Metal Gear Solid is a course-based stealth game that typically flows by having the player clear an objective in a room or two, either through a puzzle or a challenge of dexterity and patience, and then piling on story through dialogue conversations and well-animated cutscenes. Gameplay is handled from a top-down perspective, akin to the original Metal Gear games on MSX2 which were later ported to the NES. The story in those games carries into Metal Gear Solid but it is not super necessary for those that would rather not play them. The narrative of those classic titles is summarized on the PSX game through an option at the main menu, which is handy for those curious.

Gameplay in Metal Gear Solid is fairly open-ended in the sense that there are multiple solutions, driving home the themes of the game’s hero who is an undercover super-spy sent to a secret base in a frozen tundra in Alaska to save a particular individual and stop a world-shattering superweapon from mobilizing. The gameplay becomes more complex as the series continues, at least from my understanding, and as technology evolves alongside Snake’s skills. I’ve always enjoyed games that give the player a set of tools to let them figure things out but many of the games I played growing up did not have these sorts of mechanics so I was surprised solutions were open here. I was into straightforward 2D platformers and RPGs like Final Fantasy IX or Legend of Dragoon in my teens. That said, I did really enjoy the open nature and challenge of Final Fantasy Tactics.

I’ve never been good at stealth games. I remember struggling with Hitman 2, a game that my cousin and I rented over a weekend. We did eventually stumble through the first couple of missions, but the game felt more complex than what we were used to and that made it abrasive to us. Even now I get bored playing games like Dishonored, a game that has many tools but heavily suggests through gameplay not to use most of them. Stealth has never been a genre I felt comfortable in as I’m never sure what elements are at play and just how far an enemy can see or what obscures my character. The only games I remember remotely enjoying in the genre are the first few Splinter Cell games, and I don’t remember finishing any of them.

What truly prepared me for Metal Gear Solid was my playthrough of Death Stranding. Maybe it has something to do with Kojima’s games being outside of my comfort zone, but I was ready mentally for something different. Death Stranding makes the player feel certain frustrations for a cathartic conclusion as a way to drive themes, ideas, and philosophies. Even though I don’t think I’ll play Death Stranding again anytime soon, it had an impact on me, which drove me to Metal Gear Solid so soon.

For anyone that watched me play through Metal Gear Solid on Twitch, it must have been super apparent that I’m not good at the game. Each zone was a new process of trial and error. Sometimes I would think of a solution that felt clever only to be trampled down repeatedly. Other times I wondered just how advanced the AI would be, only to have it catch me off-guard. In one moment I found a hiding spot during a boss fight with a tank and mused aloud if the tank could shoot me from this angle. Sure enough, from my vantage point in the vent, I saw the barrel of a tank creep into view. The machine gunner shot wide but did eventually clip me. Moments like these were so funny to me and I can’t deny that my time with Metal Gear Solid was entertaining.

I constantly fought with the game’s controls though. It is so strange to have to hold Square, then hold X in that order to be able to move around while shooting. It’s awkward and often feels inconsistent. Bosses also have moments of invulnerability after being hit, a regular occurrence during this era, but when that invincibility kicks in can vary. This is most apparent when using melee strikes, a three-hit combo, but a move that can be pushed in a rhythm for stun-lock potential. I never quite got the hang of timing jabs for longer combo strings but it often felt like I was at a severe and unfair disadvantage. I felt this most in the forced fistfight against Gray Fox, the immensely intimidating cyber ninja with a tragic history and broken mental state. That fight took me several hours and it felt like I had to play absolutely perfectly to succeed.

This particular scene is tough to go through both thematically and mechanically.

Shortly after this fight was the second big hurdle to overcome. There’s a famous scene where Snake is tortured for information by Revolver Ocelot. The player must mash the circle button to stay alive and losing this fight does not continue shortly before the event unlike every other moment in the game. Unaware to me at the time, I had not saved since the Psycho Mantis battle. I fought through two or three torture sessions and new what the solution was to escape but I couldn’t get the item to trigger properly and failed the next mashing section, setting me back 3-4 hours of playtime.

Thankfully, I was able to find a save file on GameFAQs that allowed me to quickly jump to where I needed to be to keep playing. At this point though, I was mentally drained, so I kept using the unlockable stealth suit and the wealth of ammo I got out of that save file. Even with that though, parts of the game remained challenging enough to keep me engaged.

With a stockpile of ammunition and some secret tools at my disposal, the rest of the game was a mostly enjoyable tour of quirky bosses, a plethora of narrative details, and several humorous moments.

Bosses in Metal Gear Solid are often built up, especially Psycho Mantis and Gray Fox. Early snips of Psycho Mantis are more akin to psychological horror, which is fitting considering the pervasive nature of the character’s psychic powers. As a teen, this character would have scared the hell out of me and scenes with Gray Fox can be equally unnerving. It does seem like each character gets an hour or so of tragedy following their demise, a pattern that can feel less impactful over time. The final confrontation, a fistfight with Liquid Snake, feels epic but the execution and awkwardness of the combat detract from this moment. Of course, anyone with a history with the franchise and other Kojima games knows that he loves a dramatic brawl and those scenes definitely get better over time. Death Stranding has an excellent high point in this fashion.

Narrative dumps can be tiring but I actually found them more engaging because of the game’s stellar voice acting. For the era, this aspect of the game is years ahead of its time. Voice acting started to show up more and more during the early 3D phase of gaming development but nothing was quite like Metal Gear Solid. Even now, the pacing, mixing, and writing feels well-crafted and modern. I couldn't get over how much I was connecting with some of the cast members despite many of them only appearing as a set of sprites talking through the Codec. This feature of being able to call in other characters also has some cool secrets and there’s a super famous meta moment where the game openly asks the player to check the game’s case for a clue. These moments may have lost their impact on someone like me who knows some of the weirdness of Metal Gear Solid but I can only imagine how cool that must have felt at the time of the game’s release. It’s also a built-in hint system for the player, which was helpful in certain situations. 

The solution to taking down Psycho Mantis is a moment of gaming legend.

Metal Gear Solid is funny in the weirdest ways. It presents itself as a super serious spy thriller full of espionage, over-the-top characters, and conspiracies but there’s an air of lighthearted humor sprinkled throughout. Early on, we get a scene where Meryl breaks out of containment and strips a guard to wear his clothes as a disguise. When other guards break-in for a high-action shootout, in the corner is the passed out guard, butt in the air with stars circling his head. Also related to Meryl, we later are tasked with finding her while she’s disguised. This is done by noticing how she walks, which Otacon notes as a pleasant behind wiggle. That walk is accompanied by a silly squeaking noise. I’m also aware of just how silly the series can be, inside and outside of the games’ main story or critical path so it was fun to experience these moments myself.

I cannot stress enough how impressed I am with Metal Gear Solid. There are segments that caused me great frustration but overall it was a unique experience that I did not expect. All those years of seeing people explain the game on G4 TV shows or the many breakdowns I’ve seen on YouTube just don’t do the game justice. For anyone who has yet to experience Metal Gear Solid, I highly recommend starting with either the PSX release (available on many platforms) or the remake Twin Snakes on Gamecube which is much harder to come by. It would be beneficial for Konami to at the very least repackage the series on modern consoles. A Nintendo Switch release of any of these games would sell hand over fist.  Twin Snakes seems like a logical place to start. Since Kojima’s departure though the series has only gotten one release, Metal Gear Survive, an absolutely terrible title (or so I’ve heard) that was critically panned. 

Metal Gear Solid influenced a ton of games and designers but there’s nothing quite like it that I have found, at least not yet. I am thankful that I spent the time to dive into this one and I am excited to play more titles in this legendary series. 

Despite Metal Gear as a franchise being in a strange place, it seems that weirdness and creativity lives on at Kojima Productions, a team that’s rallied behind a man that pushes boundaries. 

“I think I’m gonna like this new life. . .” 

Artwork by Yoji Shinkawa as shared by Konami in 2016.