Ever since its reveal, we knew that Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain was going to be a special game. From the fake reveal as a new IP from a mysterious Swedish team called Moby Dick Studios, it was pretty clear that Hideo Kojima was attempting to do something really out of the ordinary with the final game of the series starring the legendary soldier Big Boss. Did Mr. Kojima truly manage to accomplish what he set out to do? He definitely did.

Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain is the sequel to Metal Gear Solid V Ground Zeroes, picking up the story from where the previous game ended. Following the events of Ground Zeroes, Big Boss enters a coma from which he wakes up after 9 long years. A lot has changed since: Mother Base has been destroyed, Militaires Sans Frontières is no more and many of the survivors have been hunted down and killed. Burning with revenge, Big Boss and his close ally Kazuhira Miller set out to reclaim everything they have lost and seek revenge against Cipher, the organization that destroyed Mother Base and MSF.

Right from the beginning, it’s clear how Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain is different than past entries in pretty much every way. The prologue of the game is set in a hospital in Cyprus which gets attacked by Cipher’s agents soon after Big Boss wakes up from his coma. With the help of the mysterious Ishmael, who has apparently watched over him during the past 9 years, Big Boss manages to escape the hospital following a really intense sequence. Together with Ocelot, Big Boss later sets out to rescue Miller, now in the hands of the Soviets in Afghanistan. The prologue is not really representative of the open world experience of The Phantom Pain, being nothing more than a tutorial, but it’s still one of the best sequences of the game and one of the best intros of the series ever. The oppressing atmosphere of the hospital under attack and its nightmarish feel is something that very few players will be able to forget.

From the prologue onward, Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain starts opening up in all its glory. The first mission, where players have to rescue Kaz Miller from the Soviets, is only the first taste of what players will experience during the course of the game. Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain features two huge maps set in Afghanistan and in Africa filled with enemies, enemy outposts, bases, wild animals and much more. In the game, players have complete freedom and can complete missions in any way the want. Stealth is still the best way to go but it’s also possible to play the game as an action shooter and shoot down anything that moves.

By playing the game as an action shooter, however, players would be missing everything that makes Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain great, as the amount of stealth options is truly staggering. Pretty much everything in the game’s world can be used to players’ advantage. See a dumpster on the side of a building? You can hide inside and take down an enemy as soon as he gets close. See some buckets? You can shoot them to make noise and attract the enemy attention to sneak past or take them down. Want to prevent enemies from calling reinforcements in case you’re discovered? Destroy communication facilities and devices. Additional possibilities are given by vehicles, which can also be brought on the field straight from Mother Base, and by the buddies players will be able to bring along whenever they enter the field. D-Horse can be used to travel quickly, Diamond Dog can sniff enemies out and mark them on the map, find plants and animals, distract enemies and more, the silent sniper Quiet can work together with Big Boss to take down enemies and vehicles and more. There’s really no way to talk about all you can do in Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain and keep it brief at the same time: the game wants players to experiment as much as possible with objects, tools and buddies and to be ready to adapt to any situation. Any method is a valid one in The Phantom Pain, as long as it helps players complete missions. The huge amount of possibilities contribute in making the game engaging throughout all the many main missions, which require around 40 hours to complete, and Side Ops.

The development of the new Mother Base is another central gameplay element of Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain. Like in Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker, players will have to manage staff and assign it to different departments. Once a certain level has been reached in each department, it will be possible to develop new weapons, items and tools and enjoy some nice benefits on the field like knowing the predicted field of movement of enemies and more. Recruiting enemy soldiers through the Fulton system and gathering resources on the field is fundamental in developing Mother Base to the fullest, making the actual action and the management features go hand in hand and giving players more incentives to explore locations fully and play stealthy to avoid killing enemies that could be good additions to the Mother Base staff.

The development of Mother Base is also tied to an interesting online mode. Once Mother Base has been developed enough, players will be able to build Forward Operating Bases, which will give players sound advantages during the main campaign. These bases, however, aren’t as safe as Mother Base is and can be invaded by other players. This mode is quite interesting on paper but it’s ruined by micro-transactions which greatly limit its potential. If you don’t want to spend real money, you won’t be spending too much time on FOBs.

Being the game that brings a close to Big Boss’ story, fans of the series expected Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain to be really heavy on story. If you’re expecting the same long cutscenes featured in Metal Gear Solid IV Guns of the Patriots, you are going to be disappointed: cutscenes in The Phantom Pain are less in number and way shorter. Much of the story development happens in cassette tapes, where Big Boss and his closest allies discuss about what is going on in the world and more. Cassette Tapes are entirely optional like many of the Codec conversations in past games so the difference is only minimal in this regard. What’s really different this time around is that Big Boss is almost a silent protagonist, not counting these tapes. I have to admit that this approach feels really weird as there are several times when Big Boss hardly reacts to what happens in cutscenes. Considering Hideo Kojima wanted players feel even more part of the story, this is very underwhelming: an almost silent Big Boss, a character with a definite and strong personality, does the exact opposite of what Mr. Kojma set out to do. This approach made me feel somewhat detached from some of the game’s major events and I’m sure I’m not the only one who felt this way.

Despite my dislike for an almost silent protagonist, I did enjoy the game’s story. Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain features all the themes and crazy twists players have come to expect from Hideo Kojima’s games so there’s a lot to like. There’s some controversial stuff as well but I won’t say more to avoid spoilers. The excellent voice acting also helps the story quite a bit, with strong performances from the whole cast, Robin Atkin Downes and Troy Baker as Miller and Ocelot in particular. For the little he is heard in the game, Kiefer Sutherland also does a very good job as Big Boss.

Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain not only plays great, but also looks great. Graphics are quite good, with all locations and characters being incredibly detailed. While generally looking good, locations are unfortunately not all that varied, especially in Afghanistan, making lighting effects not as impressive as the ones seen in other open world games released this year such as The Witcher 3. Performance, on the other hand, is really solid, with the game suffering only from minor frame rate drops that are generally very hard to notice. It’s not easy to make an open world game run at an almost steady 60 frame rate on consoles so Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain is definitely a technical marvel on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

Everything considered, Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain is doubtlessly an excellent game, but is it the best Metal Gear Solid game ever? It’s too soon to say, in my opinion. Gameplay wise, there’s no doubt that it’s the best of the series but only time will tell if The Phantom Pain will have the same lasting impact as the original Metal Gear Solid and Metal Gear Solid 3 Snake Eater. As far as open world games are concerned, The Phantom Pain is definitely one of the best titles released this year thanks to the freedom the game gives to players for pretty much everything. If you felt that Big Boss was a legend in previous game due to what he has accomplished, in The Phantom Pain you will finally feel like you’re actively contributing to the legend of the greatest soldier of all times by actually doing these great deeds. The Phantom Pain isn’t completely flawless but from a gameplay perspective alone, the long wait was very well worth it.