Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater - M

Serious, complicated and violent, MGS3 is for adults -- the way C-SPAN is for adults.

Publisher: Konami Category/Genre: Video Games - Action/Adventure Platform: PlayStation 2 Price: $$47.88 Graphics: High. From beautiful vistas and gently swaying grass, to high octane cut scenes and detailed maps and menus, MGS3 pulls no punches in the graphics department. Playability: Hard. Reading Level: 11+. Extensive subtitling and supporting documents. Release Date: 11/17/2004 ESRB Rating: M

Common Sense Note

METAL GEAR SOLID 3: SNAKE EATER layers a fictional story over the real events of the early Cold War era of the 1960s. The game may serve as an entry point for discussing post-World War II Soviet/US relations and cultural climate that era created.

The game also features some images of nuclear destruction, images that will surely resonate more intensely with parents than with children. MSG3 could prompt some discussion of those threats, and of the experience of growing up with the fear of atomic destruction.

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Common Sense Review

Reviewed By: Aaron Lazenby

METAL GEAR SOLID 3: SNAKE EATER is the latest entry in the long running and popular Metal Gear series. The quality of the game's predecessors ensured that expectations would be high for next edition, and famed producer Hideo Kojima made sure MSG3 lived up to its lineage. Wrapping amazing graphics, countless gadgets, top-quality voice acting, a full-blown theme song, and hours of cut scenes around a complicated, history-based scenario MSG3 looks as good as any Hollywood summer blockbuster. Too bad it is so weighted with realistic detail that it's almost a chore to play.

The year is 1964, and players control a CIA agent code named Naked Snake, sent into the Soviet hinterlands to extract a famous scientist being forced to work on a super weapon that could change the balance of the Cold War. Snake is double-crossed and his mission fails; the scientist is spirited away by the menacing and seemingly supernatural Colonel Volgin, and a small nuclear device is detonated on Soviet soil along the way. Facing internal political pressure to respond to what looks like a hostile act by the US, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev tells President Lyndon Johnson that the US has one week to quietly remove his opposition and restore order within the Soviet empire -- or face a nuclear war.

If these big issues weren't enough, the vertigo-inducing plot spiral includes a number of esoteric turns. There's even a passing reference to Khrushchev's agricultural policies! While these particulars certainly add incredible depth to the experience, they are beyond what many players might come to expect from a video game. And while these details are augmented by creative battles and interesting characters, players will spend as much time getting plot details through cut scenes as actually playing the game.

Additionally, game play is so demanding that many younger players may simply give up after a couple hours of wrestling with the controls. Players have to hunt their own food, monitor their stamina, perform surgery on themselves when they are injured, alter their camouflage to match their surroundings, radio a variety of characters to get information about their surroundings, all as part of their mission. And this is apart from the actual action of moving through the jungle, a process that can be experienced through a number of views and requires a variety of tools (such as land mine detectors, microphones, motion detectors, etc) to even accomplish. Again, this all adds to the experience and raises the bar for what a game can deliver. But after a while you just want to go out, run around and shoot things. Instead, you feel like you're taking notes at a Senate sub-committee hearing on foreign relations.

There are a handful of scary and complex themes that should send up a red flag for parents, including nuclear war, betrayal of friends and country, and a dark and imperfect protagonist who excels at violence. But all of these issues are addressed with respect and often restraint. There's a lot to be said for Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater's tone and approach towards subjects the video game industry often gratuitously exploits. But parents may find this a moot point: it's unlikely any child of an impressionable age will have the patience or interest to play this game.

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Content		CS	adults	kids
Content
Sexual Content Some suggestive interactions with underwear-clad female agents.
Violence The game features torture. Otherwise, not too graphic. Blood is shed during battles, but players have the option of avoiding combat by using camouflage and stealth.
Language
Message
	Social Behavior In addition to sterotypes of women and Russians, the main character of MSG3 is often criticized by allies and enemies alike for blindly following orders, not having guiding principles in his life, and resorting only to violence to solve problems. These imperfections--coupled with the fact that he is still positioned as the hero of the game--send a complicated message to younger and more impressionable players.
	Commercialism
	Drug/Alcohol/Tobacco Snake always carries a cigar, although it has a medicinal use (removing leeches) and is described as dangerous and habit forming. That doesn't prevent the game from showing him smoking.
	Educational Value Despite all of its distracting adult themes, MGS3 actually contains some very detailed information the mid-1960s history, including fictionalized phone calls between president Johnson and Nikita Khrushchev, an account of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and some discussion of Soviet politics. It may be a bit over the top, but there is a lot here to learn.