Just started last night, got to and beat monsoon. I am trying so hard to not play this as a metal gear title, but I keep sneaking everywhere and running behind enemies. Only realized by chapter 3 that you could zandatsu during the ninja kills. I'm not terribly fond of the lack of sneaking skills, like wall leans and taps, crawling or silent walking, and so on. When Raiden said sneaking is my specialty, he was lying. Every fucking step he takes, he bangs the damn floor. This is NOT STEALTHY.
However, groaning aside the game is pretty cool. The music is awesome, I wore a headset just to hear it better. The fighting is fun, though the fact that parrying is better than anything else you can do sucks some fun out of it. I keep going DMC and start mashing out button combos, but things die so much faster with a parry->blade mode->zandatsu. I never "liked" Raiden, but his little spaz out is sucking any appreciation I had for him as a character. I mean, when he came out in 4 with all his nonsense about scouting and tracking, I was already annoyed, he was such a novice in MGS2. This samurai nonsense of his was stupid to begin with, then he goes Jack the Ripper....what the hell? Raiden is a terrible character. I liked Quinton Flynn better when he voiced Johnny Storm on the old fantastic four cartoon. At least when Snake got fucked with, he didn't have a whole character-breaking persona change...hell he just got more Snake-like. I'm ranting though, and I should stop, because that one complaint doesn't really take away from the game itself. It's fun, and looks amazing, plus it sounds awesome. You should rock a headset for it, it's worth it.
