Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker Hands-on

Konami recently gave us a chance to not only sit down and play the next Metal Gear Solid game (called Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker) for the PSP, but it also took some time to explain some of the new controls adapted for the game, as well as some of the story elements and the general setup. The first thing we see upon starting the demo is the mission selector screen, which, as you might suspect, lets you select missions that you've already completed. "As you know, up until now, Metal Gear has been a sequential game, you play the game from beginning to end," said a Konami representative. "And you can do that in Peace Walker. It has a very good story, and you can play it from beginning to end. But now you can go back and replay missions that you've beaten."

Of course, you might be wondering why you'd want to go back to play these missions--the answer is they change depending on how you progress through the game. Much like the Metroid and recent Castlevania games, Peace Walker's missions feature some areas that are only accessible by attaining certain skills later in the game, so while you might not be able to access these areas on an initial play-through, you can revisit them later with Big Boss' new abilities. Additionally, some other things change as well, such as enemy placement, so it seems like Kojima Productions is trying to give some extra incentive for playing through these missions.

After an explanation of the mission selector, we jump around to some of the other menus, including co-ops (which shows game lobbies for co-op games that are available), as well as the pre-mission launch screen where we see options for equipment and key configurations. There are actually two settings under the key configuration called shooter and action: Shooter is the setting we use because it's a similar to the control scheme found in Metal Gear Solid 4.

We then launch into the first mission, which starts with a cutscene of Snake (who is now Big Boss) riding to a beach area on his motorcycle. He gets off his bike and walks by a sign that indicates this is a training area for members of his mercenary unit called Militaires sans Frontieres. Here are a few story items worthy of note from this cutscene: The date is 1974 and the location is Colombia. The date is especially interesting because the Les Enfants Terribles project that spawns Solid, Liquid, and Solidus Snake supposedly started in the early '70s. This might also explain why we see that Big Boss has a massive scar on his chest (not entirely unlike the original Boss' massive scar) as he walks to the beachfront without his shirt.

Anyway (back to the game), this beach area is where we learn some of the basic mechanics in Peace Walker. The first feature explained is the camera system, which is completely mapped to the PSP's face buttons. You can change whether or not these controls are inverted, but for the purposes of this demo, triangle points the camera up, X pans down, circle pans right, and square pans left. We also learn that the up key on the PSP's D pad is used as the primary action button and the down key makes Big Boss crouch. Actually, like previous MGS games, Snake has three readiness states--the usual walking and running, low-detection crouch walking, and then the prone position. But the big difference here is that Big Boss can't move while in prone position, so you can't crawl around on the ground as you would in a normal Metal Gear game, and you can't shoot either. The analog stick is what controls Big Boss' movements, and using it in combination with different buttons produces various results. For example, pressing the analog stick in a certain direction along with a tap of the right shoulder buttons lets you perform a roll move.

As the training continues with some of Big Boss' subordinates on the beach, we see more of what he can do. Of course, he still has his standard punch, punch, kick move, which you can execute by simply pressing the right shoulder button three times in succession. We then learn to use weapons by taking a stun rod, readying it by pressing and holding down the left trigger. We then swing it by pressing the right shoulder button. Finally, we move onto some close-quarters combat. Peace Walker's version of CQC functions just about the same way it does in Metal Gear Solid 4--you press and hold the right shoulder button to take hold of an enemy and then decide what you want to do to him from there. In this tutorial, we're told to throw the soldier in any direction by pressing a direction on the analog stick. We're then told to do the same thing again, only to throw the soldier into another soldier. In either case, a CQC icon shows us on the screen, indicating when you can perform these moves.

This icon is actually important for another aspect of CQC that lets you perform continuous CQC moves when surrounded by multiple enemies. When you perform your first CQC throw, that icon pops up again to tell you that you need to press the button again to perform another CQC move on the next soldier without breaking the sequence. While it takes a few seconds to get used to the timing, it quickly becomes easy to execute these continuous CQC attacks.

We've thoroughly finished beating the snot out of the soldiers on the beach (essentially completing the tutorial), so we move onto some of the story elements in the game, specifically an early cutscene with drawings from famous Metal Gear artist, Ashley Wood. It's here that we get a glimpse of some of the characters in the game, including Master Miller or as he is known in the Japanese version of the game, Kazuhira Miller (who sort of made an appearance in Metal Gear Solid, but it was a ruse setup by Liquid Snake). We also find out through this cutscene that Snake hates being called Big Boss and that his soldiers also like to refer to him as Victory Boss or Vic Boss.

We also see a girl in red and a man named Ramon Galvez Mena join Big Boss and Miller around a table. Galvez tells Snake and Miller that about a year ago, an unknown military group has been operating near the border of Costa Rica--one of the few countries without an official standing military. Big Boss suggests that it might just be rebels or perhaps even the CIA (because of how well equipped it is) but Galvez says they're operating in Costa Rica as a security force. Miller, being the businessman of Militaires sans Frontieres, thinks it's a good idea, but Big Boss doesn't want to take just any mission nor does he want to feel like he's selling out.

As the scene progresses, we learn the name of the girl in red--Paz Ortega Andrade. Interestingly, Paz and Miller have something in common--both of their first names mean peace, which is something that will surely be pointed to over and over again throughout Peace Walker. We're told that you can move the camera around in these cutscenes and that some portions are even more interactive. During a specific part where we find out Paz's age (16) and the fact that she had been captured and tortured by this group operating in Costa Rica, you can press a button to examine the scars produced from her captivity. She then pleads with Big Boss to take the mission, as does Galvez who happens to do something quite curious: He calls Snake Big Boss, which is something that no one outside his mercenary organization seems to know.

After all of this, we get to another training area that's meant to give you a handle on how to fire weapons and use Big Boss' inventory system. Shooting is handled the same way as in MGS4--you simply press and hold the left shoulder button and press the right shoulder button to shoot. You can fire off some rounds on a dummy located near the beach or shoot some coconuts out of the tree. We then learn how to use the inventory system. Pressing left on the D pad opens the item menu where you'll find such things as rations and binoculars. Pressing right on the D pad opens the weapons menu where we find a stun rod, an M16, a mark-II pistol, and a grenade. To get out of this training area, you have to throw a grenade at the door of a fence located on the far side of the beach. Once you go through the gate, you move onto the next area as shown by a small map screen that indicates where you're going. It's here that we finally reach a jungle area with some enemies.

We decide to go the stealthy route and use Big Boss' mark-II pistol to take down these enemies quietly and from a generous distance. It takes some getting used to the controls, particularly when trying to shoot enemies from a distance because once you go into aiming mode, the face buttons control where you're aiming. At times, they almost feel too sensitive, and at other times, they don't feel sensitive enough, so going for those headshots can take a dozen or so seconds before you really come to grips with more precise aiming. It also doesn't help that this area offers few cover spots, so you have to mostly rely on skirting along the walls to avoid detection. After taking down enemies with tranquilizer darts, we make sure to move up to them and press the up button on the D pad to tap their bodies and receive items. Then, we move to the end of the area and complete the first mission.

After completing each mission, you'll see a ranking screen that shows clear time, kill count, number of alert phases, and your overall clear rank that can be C, B, A, or S depending on how well you do. As an added bonus for Tokyo Game Show attendees who download the demo, if you receive a high ranking, then you'll get a PSP wallpaper.

Now, we move onto co-op missions. At this point, co-op missions are broken down into a few different segments. Generally, missions that support up to four-players are usually boss battles, while missions that support up to two players are usually sneaking missions. We choose one of the two-player sneaking missions, but before jumping in, we learn how to set up the mission. It's actually quite easy. One player chooses to host the game and then selects a specific channel for other players to join. Once the other player joins (you'll see that the other player is in the game by looking down at the bottom-right side of the screen), you're pretty much ready to outfit your own version of Big Boss.

Yes, there are actually four different pre-outfitted versions of Big Boss that you can select before jumping into a cooperative match. There's the Battle Dress Snake who comes decked out with some heavy armor and weapons, but he basically has no camouflage. The second Snake is the Sneaking Suit iteration, which comes with light weapons that aren't lethal (as well as a riot shield); this version is optimal for people who like to use stealth. Then there's Jungle Fatigue Snake who has decent weapons and camo rating, which makes him a perfect fit for those that like to have strong weapons and decent sneaking abilities. And lastly, there's Naked Snake--a Rambo-like character decked out with some superheavy fire power, such as rocket-propelled grenades. He has some camo, but it's not his strong suit. Overall, the idea here is to have both players choose versions of Big Boss that complement each other, so we decide to team Sneaking Suit Snake up with Battle Dress Snake.

First, we get some details on how the co-op mode actually works. The first thing you'll notice is the orange ring surrounding either player. This ring basically indicates that you're in the immediate vicinity of your co-op partner and, as such, can perform co-op actions, such as sharing weapons and items or the close-up sneak formation. The sneak formation lets one player run ahead while the other automatically follows and can survey the area and even shoot if necessary. When the rings are orange, this also means that you can share hit points, so if one player is losing health, the other can run back and help use his remaining hit points to help boost the other player. It's pretty obvious you shouldn't just leave your partner behind, so there are some areas of a mission that are restricted unless both players go through at once. But there are some occasions where one player can also move forward without the partner being there.

Our actual co-op mission didn't go so well at first. Because both players are funneled in through a narrow passageway, it's hard to basically have one character sit back and do nothing while the other does most of the work--even though we tried. Our initial strategy was to have Sneaking Suit Snake move forward, do some initial recon, and take out some of the enemies in the path before moving into a more open area with hiding spots. Meanwhile, Battle Dress Snake would slowly make his way up and take out multiple groups of enemies or at least draw some attention and open paths for Sneaking Suit to move forward. Unfortunately, that all kind of went downhill after the first few minutes because we basically marched into the mission area and started shooting up the whole place. There were some points where that felt almost unavoidable, such as a narrow pathway leading into the mission and one of the narrow walkways about halfway through the mission. But we'll just chalk that up to not knowing the maps well enough to take full advantage of various spots for our respective Snakes to make the most of their abilities.

As our time with the demo wound down, we had the chance to look at another aspect of the interactive cutscenes. This one appeared to be a full-on boss battle with what appears to be an early version of the cypher unmanned spy probes. When one shows up, a reticle for Big Boss' RPG also appears onscreen, and you can move it around to target the probe. After defeating a couple of these, a massive version of the probe appears, and with that, our demo ends.

Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker is scheduled for release in 2010. We'll be interested to see how the controls change between now and then because it seems as though Kojima Productions isn't completely sold on the current setup. Indeed, making Snake move around isn't so much of a problem as trying to properly position the camera while just moving around and aiming. Based on our extremely brief time with the game, it almost feels like you have to constantly stop and adjust the camera as opposed to moving it on the fly to give you a better perspective of the immediate area. The same goes for aiming--it just feels like we're going to need to take some extra time with it to feel completely comfortable. But even at this stage, the game looks great and the co-op certainly adds a new dynamic. We'll have much more on Peace Walker in the near future.