Ground Zeroes: solid stealther or pathetic prequel?

With Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes due to be released on Friday 21 March, we give to those who are still on the fence about buying the game a review round-up.

While the overall impression of Ground Zeroes is a positive one, reviewers expressed disappointment at the length of the game and its deviation from classic Metal Gear Solid gameplay.

Below are the top reviews, and Metacritic’s average score for each platform.

Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes – Aggregate review scores (18/03/2014)
Platform	Metacritic
PS3	N/A
PS4	74%
Xbox 360	N/A
Xbox One	78%

*PS3 and Xbox 360 scores were not available at the time of publication.

IGN (PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One) 8/10

Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes is a short but challenging game, and those willing to cast aside conventional expectations will find a lot more here than first glance might suggest. While I’m unconvinced that Kojima is quite ready to tackle more controversial narrative material, for the most part Ground Zeroes represents a new, more sophisticated era for Metal Gear. A Big Boss/Snake adventure has never looked or played better, and in it lies incredible promise for its enormous big brother.

GameSpot (PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One) 8/10

Unfortunately, if you hope to be entertained by an equal helping of Metal Gear’s typically perplexing and intriguing narrative, you’ll most certainly be disappointed. There’s some fat to savour here, hints of what’s to come in the next chapter of Metal Gear Solid V, but once you’ve digested the cut scenes that bookend the main mission, it’s a pure gameplay-driven experience from then on out. Though it’s unusual for everything to take place in a single location, there’s so much to do and see, and whether you take a stealthy or head-on approach, infiltrating Camp Omega is a thrilling experience that shouldn’t be missed.

Polygon (PS4, Xbox One) 5.5/10

It’s admirable that developer Kojima Productions was willing to toss long-held franchise tenets out the window in favour of re-imagined Metal Gear Solid gameplay. And it’s possible that in a more complete game, these additions might shine more brightly. But Ground Zeroes is hardly the right venue to demonstrate the future of the franchise. It’s staggeringly short and unsatisfying, feeling more like a cash grab than an honest-to-goodness instalment in a beloved franchise.

Eurogamer (PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One) 9/10

Thankfully, its more wayward moments are left in the background, ferreted away for those in tune with Metal Gear Solid’s twisted lore to discover for themselves. For everyone else, the very best thing about Ground Zeroes is how the series has cast away so many of its cinematic pretensions and fallen in love with being a video game all over again. As a precursor to Phantom Pain, it suggests that greatness awaits, but even on its own terms Ground Zeroes is something special. In the purity of its systems and the focus of its action, it’s not just an antidote to the glut that had begun to weigh down Metal Gear Solid but also to the bloat that weighs down so many of the series’ big-budget peers.

US Gamer (PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One) 3.5/5

It’s a decent little package, and I enjoyed hunting assassins and blowing up AA batteries in the subsequent side missions, despite my slight disappointment at their reusing the Omega Base setting. Ground Zeroes is definitely fun while it lasts, and it offers an interesting taste of what is to come in Phantom Pain. As appetizers go, it’s terrific. Just don’t expect a full meal.

Joystiq (PS4) 3.5/5

The undoubtable quality of Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes feels carved from a bigger, better game, and perhaps that makes it a better showcase for players who don’t know their Snakes from their Otacons. Too good to be a cash-in, too calculated to be satisfying and too intriguing to spurn, Ground Zeroes is a fiscal test of patience. If you can’t wait for the next stage of Metal Gear Solid, I’m afraid you’ll leave this about the same as you went in.

Game Informer (PS4) 7/10

Even for longtime fans of the Metal Gear franchise, Ground Zeroes may not be worth playing. It spreads its strengths thin over too little space, relying on the repetition of a handful of unremarkable missions in the same area. That’s the bad news. The good news is that the core stealth is fun, and the innovations on the gameplay front are promising. When supported by enough variety, progression, and story development, these mechanics could form the foundation of a fantastic game. The Phantom Pain could eventually be that game, but Ground Zeroes is definitely not.