Impressions: Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance

Let me get this out of the way now: This game is by no means a game. Confused? You should be.

Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance isn't an action/hack 'n slash, it's a badass ninja simulator. In the few minutes I was able to play it at PAX, I have never felt quite as awesome in a video game before. It gave me that euphoric feeling of awesomeness that comes from getting an epicly long killstreak, getting through a stage on Mario without dying, beating a boss in Dark Souls, getting anywhere in Contra without the Konami code: It's just that awesome.

The demo starts as a scientist runs Raiden through an AR training ground. This is where the game introduces you to the slicing mechanic. With a press of a button, time slows down and the camera pans in to over Raiden's shoulder, allowing you to get a good, up-close view of your target. The slicing is all done through using the right stick. Every movement of the stick translates to a slice, allowing you to slice as much as possible. This much slicing lead to an awkward moment for me, though:

I crashed the game.

I looked back to the developer and asked for assistance. After he rebooted the game, I was back in the demo and cutting things up as fast as I could, or rather as fast I wanted to so I wouldn't crash the game again. Despite the crash, I was awfully surprised by how powerful the game was. In one area of the training grounds stood a picnic table with various watermelons on it just like the original reveal trailer. I sliced up the melons and looked at the area surrounding it. A Roman aqueduct looking-thing stood with twelve different pillars. Being curious, I ran around and cut each pillar and, unexpectedly, the whole thing came down. Even if the objects fade out quickly after hitting the ground, that's still a lot to render.

The demo continued into a scene showed off before at E3, the Gekko fight. I spent more of my time running around trying to find all the things I could slice. I was able to cut down a giant ferris wheel, and that made me happy :) There was one moment when I tried cutting a square into a wall and hoped the square would flop down and I could sneak up on him. To my dismay, it didn't work :( 

The game then transitioned into a set-piece moment when I was running away from a helicopter across a crumbling bridge. I decided I was done with the helicopter, and then I fought it in a crazy boss battle. I was jumping along pillars, running up missiles, and slicing the hell out of this thing until it blew up :)

It wasn't until I re-read this that I was using "I" instead of Raiden. I guess it goes to show how immersive the game was. The controls were fantastic, replicating every quick movement of a robot ninja badass among all these intelligent enemies. 

Metal Gear Solid: Revengeance cuts onto store shelves February 19, 2013. Pick it up and enjoy being a robot-ninja-badass :)

Frankie out.