With the release of Metal Gear Solid HD for the Playstation 3 many of those who missed the PS2 outings finally have a chance to see what all the craze is about.  Those who already played those get to re-play them in hi-def at 60 frames per second.  The Metal Gear games always looked great on their respective consoles.  Its safe to say those old PS2 graphics hold up well to today’s standards when plumped into an HD resolution.  Just recently alongside the release of Gravity Rush, Konami released the Metal Gear Solid HD remake for the PlayStation Vita.  As a high population knows by now the games are good.  But how do the controls and style of the game translate to Vita?  Read on to find out

For those who don’t exactly know what MGS is or have somehow not been drowned in the amount of information about these games, MGS is a self labeled tactical espionage action game relying heavily on stealth mechanics.  Usually your mission is to save someone, then take down whatever hulking mechanical beast is threatening the world with a nuclear holocaust.  Story always plays a giant role in Metal Gear games and the missions are laced with conversations and cut-scenes.  Sometimes its hard to keep up with the story as their are so many twists and turns, circles and betrayals that keeping a notebook next to you could actually be a good idea.  Politics and Government plots and missions tend to get obscured by crazy boss fights and enemies that sometimes even have strange powers and even stranger/darker history to them.  Each character in the MGS universe has a back story and purpose for being there.  You can always tell Hideo Kojima (director of MGS series) meticulously works out the smallest details of everything before the game is complete.

In the MGS series you may mostly as a man names Solid Snake.  Sadly this isn’t entirely the case with the HD collection as two titles that are included are MGS3 and MGS2.  MGS3 acts as a prequel and has you in the shoes of Naked Snake who is later to become Big Boss.  While in MGS2 you do get to play as Solid Snake for a short time but then take control over a player named Raiden.  Packed inside MGS3 are the original Metal Gear and Metal Gear 2:Solid Snake, both games have you playing as Solid Snake at the origin of his debut on the NES.  So technically that means there are 4 games in this collection.  But one game is missing from the Vita collection that was present in the PS3 collection.  This title is MGS: Peace Walker which was actually a PSP titles.  So its kind of hard to understand why a handheld title would be missing from a game collection that was made for a handheld console.  All gripes aside how does MGS look and handle on the Vita?

The 5-inch OLED screen help this title shine with ease.  The game simply looks great on the Vita. Even being PS2 titles MGS HD collection looks very crisp and detailed.  Lots of effects and small detail pop out much more than the SD versions.  The steady framerate  keeps the cinematic flair of the game held firmly in place.  MGS3 looks quite a bit better than MGS2 but thats not to say MGs2 looks bad by any means.  Simply put the game looks great on the Vita.  There is a bit of aliasing going on but it doesn’t deter you much from the meat of the graphical presentation.

Thanks to the much needed second analog that the Vita boasts.  The controls have become much better to work with than the PSP MGS counterparts.  Also with the added touch screen functionality we can simply touch our item/weapon boxes to slide through our options.  This makes it quick and intuitive for on the fly item switching.  During cut scenes you can hold on the screen to zoom in to get a closer look.  peaking around corners can take some getting used to because for some odd reason some of the directional get a bit confused though it may have been user error or just getting used to the controls on a handheld.  MGS3 is the only MGS with 3d directional camera in the collection as it was the first one to use the directional camera in the series.  Also  sadly the multiplayer portion of MGS3 is removed most likely due to the PS2 MGS3 servers being taken down.

As said above MGS is a stealth type game.  This means the purpose of the game is to try to not be seen.  You can lean against walls and peak around corners, crouch, crawl.  You can hide in boxes and lockers, under tables etc.   Enemy interaction goes beyond just shooting as well.  You can stick enemies up and make them shake down for items.  Punch, kick, choke.  You can break enemies necks and slit their throats as well.   You can do a running roll (i dont suggest doing so while going down stairs though).   Many make an effort going through the game killing no one and only using tranquilizer darts and weapons.  If you do happen to get seen.  An alarm is rung and enemies pour in, usually until you hide long enough for the alarm to cut our.  In which case the enemy doesn’t know where you are but is still looking for you.  This makes it a bit inconvenient to try to run and gun you way through because most of the time you will end up dead.

Personal Opinion:  As a huge MGS fan i had to get this game.  I don’t regret it one bit.  Being able to play these amazing classics anywhere and them looking better than the first time i played then is an awesome thing.   I am a little disappointed that Peace Walker wasn’t included as that is the only MGS i have yet to play.  It doesn’t really make sense to not include it when its originally a handheld game and it was included with the PS3 version of the HD collection.  Either way if your a fan of the series or like stealth games with big stories this game is right up your ally.

With that said, i give MGS Vita HD Collection

10/10 ~ A perfect re-creation of two amazing and memorable games