Metal Gear Rising: Raiden Kills Everything
Console ports are something a regular PC gamer fears the most.
If a game was not developed for the PC (alongside console versions) in the first place,
the chance that the (usually) inevitable PC port will suck on a variety of levels rises exponentially.
Whether it's piss poor controls, graphics issues or a simple lack of graphics options,
locked frame rates, there's usually something wrong with the console port.
That sadly means that PC gamers are deprived of some decent, and some more-than-decent titles.
Most often, it's the games from the far east, the land of the rising sun, that don't get the preferred PC treatment.
But sometimes, a gem slips through the cracks, and we get a very nice surprise, something that gives us hope, and lets developers and publishers see that there's this whole new world for them, ready to embrace them, and their bastard-lovechildren.
When I finally saw Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance appear on the Steam store as a Pre-Purchase, I was excited beyond words. I've followed the development of this game since it was first announced, then dropped, then picked up again.
I was thrilled knowing that it was Platinum Games, the makers of Bayonetta, that took the reigns of this project.
The game was originally hinted to come out for the PC as well, and I couldn't be happier.
Some of my most favorite games are from the action-adventure/brawler genre, so these,
at the time, latest news made me as giddy and tingly as a schoolgirl at a Justin Bieber concert.
Now, of course, as it always is, happiness and dreams get shattered, and they ended up cancelling their previous statement, saying the game would come out for the running generation consoles only, and the PC version was going to be put on hold.
But then, in January of 2014... My heartfelt gamerection came back.
First of all, I must ask of all of you reading this right now, raise your hands up,
and give a round of applause for Platinum Games.
They stepped out of their comfort zone, and ported this insane thrillride to the PC.
Now if they would only do the same for their sexy, gun-totting Witch.
MGRR is an amazing looking/feeling/sounding game.
It feels like everything in this game is finetuned to make you, the player, feel like you're actually there.
The movement, the fighting, the mechanics and the music. Oh my god, the music.
The genre-sticker people slap on this game is "Spectacle Fighter", and I think that it suits the game perfectly.
Swinging your sword around, avoiding and parrying hits, slicing enemies into tiny, bite-sized bits with the game's Blade Mode, everything is there to put on such an awesome show for you. And all that in the VERY FIRST MINUTES of the game, placing a huge grin on your face that will stay there until the badass end.
You play the game as Raiden, a cyborg working for the Private Military Company (PMC for short) "Maverick", on a protection detail for a peace-propagating Prime Minister of an unnamed country.
After a brief introduction, the convoy is attacked by members of "Desperado", another PMC, who kidnap and execute said Prime Minister, instead propagating war and terror as opposed to peace for having a larger influence,a more meaningful impact on the advances in technology, and, in the end, a more positive side for everyone else.
Aaaand one hopeless, one-sided battle later, which leaves us with an almost-dead Raiden, we get equipped with a new, stronger cyborg body, and start trekking on a new path.
A dark path... a path of revenge...and vengeance... ¬.¬
God that was so cheesy.
Now, I shan't spoil the game for you, so I won't talk about the in-game story much.
What I will talk about is the mechanics and the gameplay.
As with most of these games, you have your light, and your heavy attack moves, and all the combo moves you can pull off with combining these two variants of attacks.
You have a variety of subweapons, like grenades, EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) grenades, Lock-on and dumbfire rockets, as well as two variants of stealth items, the all-powerful CARDBOARD BOX, and a steel drum, which are by themselves a nod to the whole Metal Gear franchise, and its stealth gameplay, and more of a comedy relief than an actually useful item.
And on top of that, there are unique weapons that you obtain by defeating bosses, and researching and unlocking them in the lab.
Alongside the regular story missions, you have VR (Virtual Reality) Missions, which more or less serve as TUTORIALS for the game, showing you how some moves are done, how you can approach or eliminate enemies, and so on.
You need to pay attention to the VR missions, because they WILL teach you some of the things you'll NEED for completing the game, such as the use of the AR Visor, Ninja Run, Blocking/Parrying, Blade Mode and the Zandatsu.
The Augmented Reality Visor lets Raiden look for collectible items in his immediate surroundings, and even lets him see through walls. If you're a completionist nut, you'll want to keep using this mode as often as possible.
Ninja Running is achieved by moving while holding the designated button pressed. This allows Raiden swift unimpaired movement over uneven terrain, running over small fences, up walls, deflecting enemy bullets or simply moving faster than regular walking. Keep in mind that using Ninja Run will disable the AR Visor.
Blocking and Parrying are the moves that are going to save your life in this game.
Without a proper dodge move in the beginning, you're going to have to learn how to do these moves.
Blocking at the exact moment of impact of an enemies attack parries the attack, and leaves the enemy vulnerable to a devastating counter-attack, letting you finish them off,
or prompting you to enter Blade Mode with a blueish flash of the screen.
Upon entering blade mode, the time slows down to a crawl, and you're given the ability to either manually and precisely choose the direction and angle of Raiden's next sword swing, or slash swiftly in either the horizontal or vertical direction by pressing the light and heavy attack buttons.
Blade Mode allows you to precisely attack vulnerable enemies, slicing off their limbs, their shields, cut missiles and various flying things out of the air.
When in blade mode, and when finishing off an enemy, you'll notice a red rectangle somewhere on their body/frame. Cutting through this area will allow Raiden to perform a Zandatsu move, stealing the enemie's reserves of self-repairing nanomachine paste, and replenishing his own health and energy bars.
The game itself just feels amazing to play.
Everything is nice and responsive, the controls work flawlessly for a PC port, and even the on-screen prompts are replaced with the buttons you're currently using, whether it's a keyboard/mouse combo, or a gamepad.
I have noticed that it's slightly easier to get out of grapple moves by rotating or jerking the thumbstick than it is by mashing the keyboard keys, but that's not such a big thing, really, and I've actually found it easier to play the game using the keyboard/mouse combo than the gamepad, but I'm a fullblown PC gamer, so that just comes natural, I guess.
The boss fights are some of the most over-the-top fights in similar games, and each bossfight is accompanied by its respective boss theme, which makes it feel just that much intense.
And I'm not kidding with this, sometimes I'd replay a boss fight for their theme ALONE.
Now, I've dodged spoilers as much as possible in this review, but I'll do a few more additional entries about this game later on, and just gush about more of the amazing things about the game.
And there will be spoilers, so YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance is available on Steam for 20$ or your regional equivalent, and includes all of the DLC released.
For 20$, this is an insanely good deal.
If you're even remotely into games like Metal Gear Rising Revengeance, games like Devil May Cry, God of War, Darksiders, you should get this game.
Because, for 20$, you don't have an excuse not to.
Allow Steam to perform a Zandatsu on your wallet, you'll thank me.
Also, who knows, maybe we persuade Platinum to do more PC ports of their amazing games.
Get it here, what are you waiting for !?!
http://store.steampowered.com/app/235460/
OOH, ALMOST FORGOT. WE HAVE FANART !!!
This awesome piece of a cyborg version of yours truly, wielding the Murasama HF Blade was done by "Chef" !
Thank you so much Sir !
If a game was not developed for the PC (alongside console versions) in the first place,
the chance that the (usually) inevitable PC port will suck on a variety of levels rises exponentially.
Whether it's piss poor controls, graphics issues or a simple lack of graphics options,
locked frame rates, there's usually something wrong with the console port.
That sadly means that PC gamers are deprived of some decent, and some more-than-decent titles.
Most often, it's the games from the far east, the land of the rising sun, that don't get the preferred PC treatment.
But sometimes, a gem slips through the cracks, and we get a very nice surprise, something that gives us hope, and lets developers and publishers see that there's this whole new world for them, ready to embrace them, and their bastard-lovechildren.
I was thrilled knowing that it was Platinum Games, the makers of Bayonetta, that took the reigns of this project.
The game was originally hinted to come out for the PC as well, and I couldn't be happier.
Some of my most favorite games are from the action-adventure/brawler genre, so these,
at the time, latest news made me as giddy and tingly as a schoolgirl at a Justin Bieber concert.
Now, of course, as it always is, happiness and dreams get shattered, and they ended up cancelling their previous statement, saying the game would come out for the running generation consoles only, and the PC version was going to be put on hold.
But then, in January of 2014... My heartfelt gamerection came back.
First of all, I must ask of all of you reading this right now, raise your hands up,
and give a round of applause for Platinum Games.
They stepped out of their comfort zone, and ported this insane thrillride to the PC.
Now if they would only do the same for their sexy, gun-totting Witch.
MGRR is an amazing looking/feeling/sounding game.
It feels like everything in this game is finetuned to make you, the player, feel like you're actually there.
The movement, the fighting, the mechanics and the music. Oh my god, the music.
The genre-sticker people slap on this game is "Spectacle Fighter", and I think that it suits the game perfectly.
Swinging your sword around, avoiding and parrying hits, slicing enemies into tiny, bite-sized bits with the game's Blade Mode, everything is there to put on such an awesome show for you. And all that in the VERY FIRST MINUTES of the game, placing a huge grin on your face that will stay there until the badass end.
You play the game as Raiden, a cyborg working for the Private Military Company (PMC for short) "Maverick", on a protection detail for a peace-propagating Prime Minister of an unnamed country.
After a brief introduction, the convoy is attacked by members of "Desperado", another PMC, who kidnap and execute said Prime Minister, instead propagating war and terror as opposed to peace for having a larger influence,a more meaningful impact on the advances in technology, and, in the end, a more positive side for everyone else.
Aaaand one hopeless, one-sided battle later, which leaves us with an almost-dead Raiden, we get equipped with a new, stronger cyborg body, and start trekking on a new path.
A dark path... a path of revenge...and vengeance... ¬.¬
God that was so cheesy.
Now, I shan't spoil the game for you, so I won't talk about the in-game story much.
What I will talk about is the mechanics and the gameplay.
As with most of these games, you have your light, and your heavy attack moves, and all the combo moves you can pull off with combining these two variants of attacks.
You have a variety of subweapons, like grenades, EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) grenades, Lock-on and dumbfire rockets, as well as two variants of stealth items, the all-powerful CARDBOARD BOX, and a steel drum, which are by themselves a nod to the whole Metal Gear franchise, and its stealth gameplay, and more of a comedy relief than an actually useful item.
And on top of that, there are unique weapons that you obtain by defeating bosses, and researching and unlocking them in the lab.
Alongside the regular story missions, you have VR (Virtual Reality) Missions, which more or less serve as TUTORIALS for the game, showing you how some moves are done, how you can approach or eliminate enemies, and so on.
You need to pay attention to the VR missions, because they WILL teach you some of the things you'll NEED for completing the game, such as the use of the AR Visor, Ninja Run, Blocking/Parrying, Blade Mode and the Zandatsu.
The Augmented Reality Visor lets Raiden look for collectible items in his immediate surroundings, and even lets him see through walls. If you're a completionist nut, you'll want to keep using this mode as often as possible.
Ninja Running is achieved by moving while holding the designated button pressed. This allows Raiden swift unimpaired movement over uneven terrain, running over small fences, up walls, deflecting enemy bullets or simply moving faster than regular walking. Keep in mind that using Ninja Run will disable the AR Visor.
Blocking and Parrying are the moves that are going to save your life in this game.
Without a proper dodge move in the beginning, you're going to have to learn how to do these moves.
Blocking at the exact moment of impact of an enemies attack parries the attack, and leaves the enemy vulnerable to a devastating counter-attack, letting you finish them off,
or prompting you to enter Blade Mode with a blueish flash of the screen.
Upon entering blade mode, the time slows down to a crawl, and you're given the ability to either manually and precisely choose the direction and angle of Raiden's next sword swing, or slash swiftly in either the horizontal or vertical direction by pressing the light and heavy attack buttons.
Blade Mode allows you to precisely attack vulnerable enemies, slicing off their limbs, their shields, cut missiles and various flying things out of the air.
When in blade mode, and when finishing off an enemy, you'll notice a red rectangle somewhere on their body/frame. Cutting through this area will allow Raiden to perform a Zandatsu move, stealing the enemie's reserves of self-repairing nanomachine paste, and replenishing his own health and energy bars.
The game itself just feels amazing to play.Everything is nice and responsive, the controls work flawlessly for a PC port, and even the on-screen prompts are replaced with the buttons you're currently using, whether it's a keyboard/mouse combo, or a gamepad.
I have noticed that it's slightly easier to get out of grapple moves by rotating or jerking the thumbstick than it is by mashing the keyboard keys, but that's not such a big thing, really, and I've actually found it easier to play the game using the keyboard/mouse combo than the gamepad, but I'm a fullblown PC gamer, so that just comes natural, I guess.
The boss fights are some of the most over-the-top fights in similar games, and each bossfight is accompanied by its respective boss theme, which makes it feel just that much intense.
And I'm not kidding with this, sometimes I'd replay a boss fight for their theme ALONE.
Now, I've dodged spoilers as much as possible in this review, but I'll do a few more additional entries about this game later on, and just gush about more of the amazing things about the game.
And there will be spoilers, so YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance is available on Steam for 20$ or your regional equivalent, and includes all of the DLC released.
For 20$, this is an insanely good deal.
If you're even remotely into games like Metal Gear Rising Revengeance, games like Devil May Cry, God of War, Darksiders, you should get this game.
Because, for 20$, you don't have an excuse not to.
Allow Steam to perform a Zandatsu on your wallet, you'll thank me.
Also, who knows, maybe we persuade Platinum to do more PC ports of their amazing games.
Get it here, what are you waiting for !?!
http://store.steampowered.com/app/235460/
OOH, ALMOST FORGOT. WE HAVE FANART !!!
This awesome piece of a cyborg version of yours truly, wielding the Murasama HF Blade was done by "Chef" !
Thank you so much Sir !
What is that...Sorry Raiden actually looks cool with a sword not so much an anthropomorphic fox? thing? either way stop this/
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