Love it or hate it, Metal Gear really has changed the face of gaming quite a number of times, the first Metal Gear on MSX changed what was the norm for the action genre, MGS1 on PS1 changed how cinematic action games could be and MGS3 showed us that a series can evolve and adapt to changes on how we view games now.

So enter the MGS HD Collection, the story of one man against the odds, a terrorist group, a sneaking mission and a nuclear equipped walking death mobile.

MGS2 focuses on the aftermath of MGS1, Snake (the series protagonist) is tasked with obtaining evidence on a new metal gear named RAY. I'll get this out the way first, MGS2 is the worst of the MGS games but its still a very good game, it put new mechanics in that was absent from the first game such as a first person view, hanging and a lot of cool spots like fire extinguishers, glass and other stuff that can be shot for effects, its a great looking game with amazing gameplay even by todays standards but its over shadowed by poor ideas, namely Raiden, an hour in you suddenly change characters from the cool badass to a whiny brat, now I love Hideo Kojima but I have to ask what he was thinking with this. The plot is also confusing with it being easy to follow then strange to bizarre, in the end you'll be scratching your head thinking what just happened, Its a weird game but still has a lot of great moments.

MGS3 is arguably the best MGS game and addresses all the issues of 2. You play a snake's father as you find out how he earnt the title of Big Boss. As the game is set in the 60's there is less technology to help you out this time, now more than ever you must use your senses in a way a game has never done before, looking and hearing is more important than ever and it, more than any other MGS, makes you feel like you are on a sneaking mission. The plot is also more focused and easy to follow, the characters are amazing with Snake's mentor, The Boss, is one of my favourite game characters ever and the games ending put a tear to my eye, its that good. You must also treat wounds, salvage food and ammo and even sabotage a food store in the area to make the guards hungry and less focused, overall MGS3 is worth the price of the game alone and is personally one of my favourite games ever.

MGS: Peace Walker, originally on the PSP, rounds off the collection in impressive fashion, more of a streamlined version of the series, PW offers offline or online bite sized missions in which you create your own origins of Big Boss's private military group, Outer Heaven. The games main hook is that you are the one to build up outer heaven by recruiting soldiers for various tasks like recon, cooking or to send off to battle in another area, its amazing how every member counts and how one can't survive without the other, if you don't put enough into catering it will effect your soldiers in different ways, theres a lot to do in PW and its the game that you'll spend most time with plus any issues with the controls from the PSP version is addressed here so this is the most complete version of PW.

Theres so much more I can say about these games and how much it affected my life, the graphics, the music, the bosses, the characters are all outstanding but its the series style and atmosphere that shines on even to this day plus with the inclusion of MG 1&2 from the MSX in full english theres every reason to relive one of the great series of all time, its a must buy.

Pros-

5 Amazing games
MGS3 and PW are still as good as ever
Great HD treatment

Cons-

No MGS1
MGS2 still has its problem
MGS3 missing some of its extras

In 2001, the sequel to one of the biggest games ever if not the biggest was released. It was critically acclaimed for the recently released PS2 and stood as one of the flagship titles. That game was Metal Gear Solid 2.

Fast forward 10 years when the collection was released, or 12 now and you get the HD mix of this once great game, it's successor Snake Eater, a PSP offering and the two retro titles which started it all.

I will start with the most recent, PSP offering. This game has modern controls, multiplayer and a solid episodic storyline. However due to the limitations of the handheld the game isn't that bright and colourful. It's playable and enjoyable, just the areas you will visit are uninteresting. This isn't the games fault, but the limitations of its original medium.

Snake Eater, or the third game was a break from the norm. Instead of the traditional sneaking, this game utilised food, camouflage, fake death tablets and upgrades. This game is fantastic. It's completely different from the second set in a lush green setting. No longer are just soldiers a concern, you will have to brave the wild animals as well, most notably crocodiles who choose they are hungry when your wading through a swamp. It's an engaging storyline, which has since not been surpassed. The biggest let down however is the outdated controls, which are completely different from the current generation. Sometimes getting Snake to crawl under a tree log is like fighting with fire. It just isn't easy. And when trying to evade when you don't have the right camo is frustrating!

The second game also has this control method. This game is brilliant, and what started everything. But it feels and plays like a 2001 game. A bit like Silent Hill 2's outdated controls, these have a lot to be desired. They are blocky, and again in evade situations is difficult! If you don't believe things can get better, look at these graphics. MGS2 had jaw dropping graphics back in the day. However they are now certainly outdated.

Controls aside though, no one should miss out on these games. They are works of art, and should be played. They might just take some getting use to.

Absolutely perfect, worth every penny and even a little more, I am a massive fan of the series and have been waiting for this since the PS3 came out.

Ordered this yesterday as a little birthday treat for myself today! Just started playing Sons of liberty and it is a fantastic HD version! The originals were blockbusters in there day and these are as good with added polish!! If you are a metal gear fan you won't be disappointed ! If your not? Get it anyway would be a shame to miss out

Following the Shopto.net review, I actually can't wait for this to turn up on Friday (or before depending on post). I still think that a code should have been included to download to first part in the series from PSN.

From the videos I've seen from people in the States, this looks excellent, with MGS3 being the most graphically appealling of the set, with MGS2 coming close and MGS: Peace Walker being included for the fun measure.

Are we able to access the multiplayer side on Peace Walker?

Europe finally sees the release of the long awaited HD version of the Tactical Espionage Action that is Metal Gear Solid. However, has the longer wait been worth it and do we really want games from yester-generation again?

The answer to anyone who has played or even sniffed a Metal Gear Solid title previously will be a massive positive. Within a few minutes of hearing the score spark into life the memories come flooding back, unlocking some of the most seminal moments in gaming history. However, you can’t help but feel like there is a missing link in the collection as it lacks the first title in the Solid series. The lack of beginning could cause confusion for newcomers to the series, the fact that you can pick up the game from the PS Store is beside the point, it would have been nice to have all the games in one single pack. The collection sets the games out in a chronological order instead of the numeric order of the games, therefore starting you off with the Cold War Era, Snake Eater and moving through the years to Peace Walker and finally ending with Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty.

Snake Eater is the most technically accomplished of the pack, but that more than likely amounts to the fact that the game is the youngest of the console entries. The up scaling looks almost native in definition, there is no jagged edges in the cutscenes nor in the game itself. However, there is one problem when it comes to the graphics. At random points when you are curing Snake of broken bones, cuts or burns, a small insert video kicks in showing him completing the required actions to heal. This video takes the higher resolution back down to PS2 standard, with some pixelation included. This really breaks the overall look of the game, which is incredibly impressive.

The worst looking game in the collection is Peace Walker which is to be expected in some respects as it is a massively up scaled PSP game. Strangely, the up scaling doesn’t show too badly inside the actual game, there are some jagged edges and the environment looks pretty flat compared to the grand vistas of Metal Gear Solid 3. However, it really comes to light when you open up the quick select menus, the words are pixelated and so are the little images of the weapons or items. While these icons were of the same design in the original PSP release placing the game on a HD TV makes something which you could have glossed over on a smaller screen that much more obvious. Interestingly, Metal Gear Solid 2 plays the middle ground between the two, which is more than impressive considering the fact that it is over 10 years old. The carbon copy soldiers with blank unblinking faces is very annoying, especially when you look at the faces of the main characters and see the amount of detail in them. However, the overall look of the environment don’t look any worse than what you might see in some PSP games, but the difference between 2 and 3 is a massive leap; especially with 3’s more dynamic environment.

The two console games are definitely from a different time in gaming history, one where the formation of a story took precedence over the guns-blazing gameplay. Throughout the 2 and 3 you are interrupted in your one-man fight for Codec (radio) chats filling you in on other goings on of offering new insights into the area you are currently in, also there are the notoriously long cutscenes. These scenes can and more often than not will stretch over the course of tens of minutes. But they offer such depth to the game and bring you closer into the story that the jot of being pulled out of the game doesn’t matter. Peace Walker on the other hand was designed for a portable system, therefore the game has a more bite-size and action packed orientation to it. Instead of long cutscenes there are short burst like scenes, or if there is a longer one it is punctuated by interactive QTE sections. This is more likely down to the fact that you can’t put a portable console down and watch a scene like you can with a console controller, so the interactive scenes give you something to do while you watch. But that isn’t to say that they lessen the storytelling to any extent.

One thing you cannot say about Hideo Kojima and his direction of the series is that it is easy on the player, these HD versions are the original games down to a ‘T’. In MGS2, the camera is still static, even though MGS3 brought in a dynamic camera, this can make things a little tricky at times as the camera is fixed to one position and pans left and right (or up and down) which can mean you walking straight into an enemy guard or security camera that the game’s camera didn’t let you see. However, the inclusion of the First Person viewpoint (which was revolutionary at the time) does make the annoyance of the locked camera easier to deal with, but the switching of perspective can get a little disorientating at times. Something that was introduced into the series in Snake Eater that was and still is revolutionary, is the camouflage system, allowing Naked Snake to adapt his clothes and face paint to match the surroundings. This is still something that isn’t used in any other series to great effect.

Out of the three games Metal Gear Solid 3 has the most standout moments, with some amazing boss battles. Due to the limited technology of the era in which it is set, there are some very tense moments within the game, but there are also some brilliantly funny moments too. As much as I would love to give examples of these, they would be too big a spoiler for those who haven’t experienced the game before. Needless to say when you reach them you will see what I mean.

Both of the main console titles are in their re-release forms, with MGS2 and MGS3 packing additional content. For MGS2, you have all of the VR missions and the Snake Tales content, with MGS3 there is some content missing, additional content like Snake vs. Monkey mini game and the Secret Theatre are missing, which is a shame but not game breaking. What is included is the original Metal Gear titles from way back on the MSX2, allowing you to experience the origin of the series. Peace Walker, while it hasn’t had an additional content re-release, does include the multiplayer function from the PSP release. While we could actually get a game before going to press, the co-op and versus options are both there.

The advent of HD collections of previous games has allowed a new generation of gamers to enjoy some very classic titles and this collection doesn’t break that flow. While Metal Gear Solid isn’t for everyone, to be able to experience the story of this amazing series it is worth the money. This is the definitive way to experience the series made miles better by the inclusion of a higher resolution.

I'll have the one !!!

ps 3 60 gb ps 3 is broken in the new ps 2 games not played Metal Gear Solid 3, this drives me crazy was not answering the longing to end eventually ...

Maybe it's because TTS was made partially by Silicon Knights under Nintendo, so I guess there's a dispute to whether who owns the full rights to that remake.

I hope instead they will make a complete remake of the game with MGS4 graphics - maybe even remake the first 2D games.

As for this collection, since I've played MGS2 and MGS3 already (which are great games in their own respect) the game I am looking most forward to in this is Peace Walker, which has finally come to a stationary console with true online mode and normal/classic controls.

But why not re-incorporate the MGS3 online multiplayer as well? It was popular and just as cool as any other MGOs.

I am in total agreement with Mega2000, wheres 1? simple port over from twin snakes. Shame, but will still get it, just for Snake Eater which was the best one for me.

Worth the price for just for Snake Eater.