Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-6747658-20130401084750/@comment-1.64.176.239-20130703110728

Misterbunnsy wrote: 175.159.163.39 wrote: Misterbunnsy wrote: My question is, who would be knowledgable enough to give a history for Skull Face? Ocelot comes to mind as the only one with the appropriate connections to find out who he is, so I wonder if Ocelot would be a radio contact? It does not have to be done completely by one of the "codec character" - in fact, they better don't do that! Look at how The Boss', Ocelot's, Liquid's and even Sniper Wolf's stories are delivered, they themselves played a big part (espcially Liquid).

Acutally, what made me think the MGS1 bosses are more impressive is that they take a more active role in the main story itself and have a lot more lines than most other bosses who were there mainly just for the fight. Having someone telling you the background of a fighting-alone-boss by a call during or after the fight doesn't help build the character much. I personally think a character's active role is what makes the character more "lively". I don't mean completely develop the character's story from the Codec contact.

But the awesome thing about MGS2 and 3 was being able to call up a contact, and have them tell you a bit about some of the enemies in the game. It was interesting. I could spend plenty of time listening to these guys tell me about The Pain, or Vamp.

And then when you meet the character, you have a basic understanding of them. I know, a mixture of both is needed, but then in MGS 3 or 4, they don't seem to be able to find a balance. Say for The Pain, Fear, End and Fury they have very little lines outside of their boss fights and we got most of their backgrounds via our codec team. For The Sorrow and Joy, things were different in that The Boss herself tells a lot about herself and The Sorrow. Not only that, she also has a lot of interaction with Big Boss. In addition, EVA (her tapes) and Big Boss also helped build up The Boss' character.

In MGS4, It was disappointing in that the most if not all of the B&B's background are delivered by a third person (especially Drebine), the B&B themselves said very little that build up their background (other than words that express their emotions). Vamp and Ocelot are the only bosses that really take part in the main story.

On the other hand, MGS1 not only give you the background of the bosses, even your codec team has their own stories, Naomi, Nastasha, Octocon, Campbell, Meryl even "Miller". The only weaker character is perhaps Mei Ling. MGS2 only gives you Rose and "Colonel" (I purposely don't count Ames and Johnson), while MGS3 gives you Zero, SIGNIT, Dr. Clark and EVA, it is still far from what we get in MGS1. As for MGS4, the codec is something they could have done better in my opinion.