And when we say extremely short, we mean two hours. That’s right, the highly anticipated Metal Gear Solid title priced at $40 will feature a measly 2 hours of gameplay, at least as far as the main storyline is concerned. According to a Kotaku hands-on test of Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes, it took the editors no more than two hours to finish the game. Game Informer mentioned that they had a 4 hour long gameplay in which they could experiment with the main story and some of the game’s extra modes. Even at 4 hours, that’s not too much. Let’s pretend to make an average of the two, and assume a regular player will need 3 hours to complete the main campaign. Is that a good bang for the buck, considering the game is priced as a full release?
Of course, in Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes’ defense, there will most likely be a wide array of side-missions and extras to do. After all, it’s aiming to be an open-world type game. In addition, there’s no indication that the quality of the gameplay will be sub-par, so while short, the game will most likely be extremely fun to play. Lastly, and with this I conclude my defense lawyer career, Ground Zeroes is in fact a prequel to the complete game that The Phantom Pain will be. Ok, I lied, I have one more ace up my sleeve, and this one is rather obvious. It’s a Hideo Kojima game, and well, Hideo Kojima is a well-established brand by himself.
Still, here are the facts. Playstation 4 and Xbox One users will be shedding out $40 for the hard-copy version of the game and $30 for the digital version. Old-gen console users will be paying $30 for the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 versions from retailers, and $20 digitally. So, at least the digital version for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 is cheap, priced at about the same price most recent DLC’s are released for. That seems somewhat manageable and fair. But twice that for a plastic box, a DVD and next-gen support? That’s stretching it a bit thin. This sounds to me like paying full-price at a restaurant, expecting a comprehensive dinner, and ending up with some appetizers instead. And that’s not something people like to see.
Given these circumstances, is it perhaps better to skip getting Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes and waiting for the full release of Metal Gear Solid: The Phantom Pain instead? There will most likely be a collector’s edition for The Phantom Pain which will include Ground Zeroes anyway. What do you think?