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I am writing this review on behalf of my YouTube channel "Mammoth Games". Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is possibly the final mainline entry in the Metal Gear Solid storyline. The game takes place 9 years after Ground Zeroes with Big Boss in a coma, and having lost an arm. Not to mention he has a horn made of debris from the explosion during Ground Zeroes stuck in his head. Eventually Big Boss takes the code name "Punished 'Venom' Snake," and starts to lead his own mercenary group, which is referred to as Diamond Dogs, and sets out to exact revenge on those who are responsible for the events of Ground Zeroes. How's the gameplay? Simply amazing. You are given your own Mother Base which will play a huge role in the story as well. You have Fulton Device's in which you can use to bring soldiers, vehicles, prisoners, materials, or weapons back to Mother Base. Big Boss will embark on missions in Afghanistan and Africa. From the minute you begin your first mission in Afghanistan, the size of the playable area is impressive, and is truly worthy of the title "open world". How missions happen are totally up to you, there are so many different ways to go about them. Whether you want to be stealthy, aggressive, or tricky, you devise your own plan for how things work out. Even the time of day (which you can quickly change by using the Phantom Cigar) can be critical to your success in a mission. Reflex Mode is another amazing addition as it gives you a few seconds in slow-motion to get yourself out of a sticky situation, and allows you to test your waters freely while performing many risky moves. Every vehicle you see (as long as it's in working condition) is usable as well, and if you don't wanna drive it, then you can always extract it for later use. You get to take buddies with you on the battlefield now. The three main buddies are D-Horse, D-Dog, and Quiet. D-Horse will help you get around quickly by allowing you to ride on his back. D-Dog can sniff out and mark enemies from far distances, bark to distract them, or bite them on the hand to hold them off. Quiet is a sniper who can take care of enemies for you. She has 3 commands, the first is "Fire (kill enemy)," the second is "Take Aim," and the third is "Cover me." If you choose "Cover me" and go hide somewhere, she will take care of nearly all the enemies over time. Bring the wrong weapon? Need some more ammunition? No problem. You can call a helicopter from Mother base to bring you everything you need with your iDriod. As you progress in the game and collect more and more materials, you can develop better weapons. But your not limited to just weapons, you can also develop, new clothing, expand mother base, create stronger Fulton Devices, and make stuff for your buddies. How are the graphics? Very impressive, especially considering this game was released on 7th and 8th gen hardware. Visuals look very impressive apart from a few blocky patches in the screen when you change focus. The areas are a little repetitive considering you only visit 2 of them throughout the course of the game. However, those 2 areas are so huge that this isn't a big problem. How is the sound? For the most part it's perfect. Sound effects are very realistic, and music is very 80's themed just like the game. Throughout the game you will acquire cassette tapes with either conversations or music on them which you can listen to during gameplay. Listening to 80's music during a firefight can be quite epic. The only disappointing thing about the sound is that David Hayter didn't reprise his role as Snake. Oh well, Kiefer Sutherland does pretty good. The Phantom Story... Cutscenes are so sparse in this game that the main story itself feels broken. At times you go multiple missions without hearing anything significant about the game's story, and when you do, it usually doesn't last long. The MGS series has always had a very cinematic feel, so long time fans (like myself) will be really disappointed by this. We miss the unreasonably long cutscenes, cause they always contributed to a thrilling storyline. Without them, it feels like less of a MGS game. Another disappointing thing is the ending. It presents few answers and many questions, and seriously alters the meaning of the game. However, the prologue mission and mission 43 (Shining Lights, Even In Death) did have a strong story presence to them, and I found mission 43 to be by far the most emotional moment in the game. Still, that doesn't make up for the story being almost non-existent throughout the rest of it. Kojima spent all this time making the game look very climatic, like a sort of epic finale. However, it turned out to be more of a sandbox game. Sandbox games are great, but I don't think it's a card he should have pulled with a game that is likely to be the final Metal Gear Solid title. I know a lot of story elements exist in the cassette tapes, but many fans will agree in saying that just isn't how the story should be carried out. Final Judgement: Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is a great game that can easily last over 100 hours, and a must play for any Metal Gear Solid fan. However, due to it's lack of an interesting and thrilling story, it's failed to amaze me the same way Metal Gear Solid 4 did years ago. 8/10

So who's picking up Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain tomorrow? If you're on the fence about it, don't worry, you can't go wrong this game. It has already received positive reviews all around including a perfect 10 from Gamespot.

A video was leaked on IGN but they took it down almost immediately after that. Luckily people were able to snap screenshots. EDIT: Here is the video. http://assets.ign.com/videos/zencoder/416/1e5c19a47a4beeea60cfd96dbafc19ea-110000-1425396954.mp4