Board Thread:Metal Gear Solid V/@comment-6747658-20150826194634/@comment-64.33.250.214-20150831133331

0nighthawk0 wrote: I fully agree, people are judging the story far too quickly purely based on the ending. Which is like picking up the book, reading only the last chapter and then claiming it's garbage because of that.

While I too, am disappointed that we are not played Big Boss but rather someone else, I am not going to make any judgements until I have experienced the story for myself.

Also, I notice that people keep comparing this to MGS2, but really it's by far not comparable. This isn't just a switcheroo with Medic replacing Big Boss like Raiden did with Snake. Raiden was never led to believe that he was Snake, he was Raiden, he had a history to him, an ongoing story with people involved with him. We learned about him as the game progressed.

With Medic, right from the getgo we're made believe that we are Big Boss and none other then Big Boss, we have his memories, his techniques, involvement with the people who know him. We are, by all means, Big Boss.

'''TL;DR: Don't judge the story purely by it's ending, experience the story, gather from it all that you can, every bit and piece of it. And then, and only then, judge the ending.''' MGS2 is perfectly comparable. First you have the facial customization, which amounts to nothing more than Raiden's dog tags. Big Boss tells Venom at the end of MGSV, "You're your own man." Solid tells Raiden at the end of MGS2, "Choose your own legacy." Venom punches the mirror, while Raiden tosses his dog tags. It's the same theme, it's the story of memes vs genes all over again. The only difference is how the presentation builds up to the final revelation, but the core message is very much similar.

The other similarity is that Raiden was meant to represent the player. He idolizes Solid Snake, and starts out the game living in his shadow. He gets peed on, slips in bird poop, has his crotch grabbed by dudes to make sure he's a man, and is generally humiliated in a variety of ways. His backstory says that he was programmed to be a soldier by playing games and watching movies. Raiden was still green during the events of Big Shell, and Big Boss was sort of his mentor up until the end. When you see his dog tags, it's your name or whatever you chose to call him/yourself.

It annoys me how many people are defending this plot twist like it's something new. No amount of the playing the game for ourselves will change the fact that these themes have been played out before. Kojima took MGS2's memes and self-insertion, and MGS4's hypnotherapy and combined them. All to explain some mystery no one really cared about concerning how Big Boss managed to survive the ending of MG1.

This twist only served to make me appreciate MGS2 more, one of the most least liked and controversial games in the franchise.