For starters, there's the regenerative health mechanic. Nitpicking aside, let's return to the many ways in which the release enhances and builds upon its predecessors.
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Unfortunately, there's no manual save option for you to take advantage of either – which means that you'll be relying solely on autosaves to record your progress for you.
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Full Stealth, for example, makes it so that any detection by the enemy is an instant failure, and you'll likely have to start all over again thanks to the instalment's less-than-forgiving checkpoint system. However – again, more so in the later sections of the campaign – some missions can begin to feel forced or perhaps frustrating in their fidelity, making you backtrack to clear uninspired objectives again, or requiring certain difficulty modifiers to be enabled before you can fully check them off your list. Because of this, your escapades rarely come across as repetitive or uninteresting, despite the amount of them provided – and this is even truer when addressing the numerous side operations that there are for you to sate your appetite with. In what might qualify as the greatest use of stealth in a video game ever, each assignment can be approached from countless different ways, and it's incredibly refreshing to be able to go about accomplishing things in the way that you want to. It's this sort of diversity that the title prides itself on, and this pays off massively in its mission design. Exploring these combinations only becomes more enjoyable with time, too, as you get access to more and more content. Even the aforementioned buddies that you can take into the field with you can be freely personalised, and, like Big Boss himself, can be dressed up in numerous unlockable outfits and armours. The sheer scale of the assortment available to you is instantly compelling for those looking to get experimental with things, and selecting the right loadouts and upgrades for the job can greatly improve your chances of it being a successful one. The same statement can be applied to almost every other aspect of the title: the gameplay as a whole feels like an evolution of older releases, and almost every staple gadget, weapon, and technique that you've ever had at your disposable is refined to perfection in this iteration. You can now take a 'buddy' with you to assist you in your escapades, and without spoiling too much – you can visit our guide for a more in-depth look at each companion over here – the feature effortlessly breathes new life into an otherwise lonesome formula. Ocelot, Quiet, and Benedict 'Kaz' Miller all feel remarkably genuine, in no small thanks to the game's astoundingly good voice acting, and the influence that these personalities have is only strengthened by recent additions like the buddy system.
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Thankfully, the cast of non-playable characters on offer are all very likeable – both the familiar faces, and the new ones alike. The same can be said for more than a few weakly resolved sub-plots, which pale in comparison to some of the grand conclusions that we've seen come out of Kojima's past ventures.įurthermore, a lot of background information is relayed to you via mission briefings and audio logs, and to those that find showing preferable to telling, this may seem a tad lazy. That being said, there are a few instances where The Phantom Pain appears to lose momentum, and the events taking place start to become worn thin or anticlimactic – particularly later on. The segment sees a significantly weakened Big Boss hiding from attackers, taking cover from helicopter gunfire, and fleeing on horseback from a giant, er, flaming man in order to escape the hospital that he's just woken up in.
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It's understandable that having a less talkative protagonist lends itself to a more immersive, self-indulgent experience as far as the player is concerned, but given the amount of time that you'll be spending exploring this Goliath of a game, a little more input from the iconic antihero would've been welcome.įor the most part, the story itself is fast-paced and intense, and this is no more evident than in the title's opening act. For example, David Hayter's classic portrayal of Snake has been swapped out in favour of Kiefer Sutherland's more subtle, mundane tones, and while he gives a fantastic performance – one that's certainly fitting for the release's sombre setting – we couldn't help but feel that his voice goes a little underused.