MGS Documentaries

Separated by almost two decades, Metal Gear Solid 2 and 4 had very different approaches to the development of their game. Besides the main story and key characters, the main difference that I noticed between the two games was the play testing. In MGS 4, they constantly had players play the game and look for ways to improve the game. Meanwhile, MGS 2 didn’t seem to have much player testing involved within the process. I believe this is the case because MGS 4 was released in an era where the gaming market was more saturated and the quality of games needed to be excellent. Therefore, they needed to make sure that all the gameplay worked and made sense. What I found interesting though is that when they found something that needed to be fixed, there were consequences to making adjustments. Making adjustments in the game would cause a series of bugs that needed to be fixed. I appreciate that Kojima still risked the time and resources to make the game perfect and the way he wanted it to be released.

What I appreciated about both games is that there extreme care to detail. Especially in 1990 when MGS 2 was released, the developers thought about everything possible. From the script, to the score, to the entire structure, everything was carefully planned out. For games that came out over a decade ago, they still look pretty good for the amount of years that passed. I feel like these games were ahead of their time.

One thing that I feel would be beneficial for my process was the idea of using a notebook and writing an idea in it everyday. I know I won’t be able to come up with something spectacular everyday but there might be some ideas that could bring a lot of rewards. It was amazing that for the development of MGS 2, they made every single employee own one of these idea books. And a lot of the ideas that were in the notebooks were used in the game. That brings me hope that the stuff I would write down can actually be used for something great as well.