@First_Gen_Gamer Personally I find it annoying that they awarded the game an 8.5 - which is significantly less than the perfect score of 10 - without stating any reasons. I mean, fair enough, rate it what you want and as much I love the game I don't think it's quite 10/10 material, but it's poor journalism to not fully explain all the reasons for awarding it whatever score you award it. If it is an 8.5, then there must be some reason not to rank higher, and the reviewer never mentioned what it was.
@esricardo999999 Well it's deliberately quite stylised - it's hard to tell whether they're cell-shaded or not, but tthey certaintly have that Borderlands-esque feel about them - so they're not meant to be realistic. I do agree that some of the textures look slightly bland, but the lighting is very well done. The graphics are meant to atmospheric, not realistic. I don't think they'll be a huge selling point for the game, but I don't think they're at all bad either.
@KadeStorm To be honest I'm not sure that it really could be justified from a development point of view: it's an old game appealing to a niche audience. On the other hand, Square Enix have already released it on PSN for PS3, so I guess it wouldn't take a lot of effort to port it over and throw a Vita version out. Extra brownie points if they somehow incorporate the Deus Ex HDTP or their own graphical overhaul, though I guess this wouldn't matter so much on the smaller screen of the Vita.
Hell, I'll ask them how many virtual copies they would have to sell to justify porting it and promise to cover that myself if that would make this happen.
Kojima has said that he isn't willling to re-release MGS1 unless it is a complete remake rather than simply a graphical re-hash.
Personally, I think a remake of MGS1 that played and looked like MGS4 would be awesome, but I would rather have the remakes you mentioned, Metal Gear 1 & 2.
That hope might not actually be too far away; We've already seen MGS5 material showing Big Boss and there isn't that much of a gap between Peace Walker and Outer Heaven. The setting is also rumoured to be in Africa, which ties in with the Metal Gear 1 theory. I don't know if MGS5 will be a remake (in fact I think it will probably be based around the founding of Outer Heaven), but it looks like Kojima is gearing up to do it at some point. Would would be really cool would be playing as Snake in the gap between MG2 and MGS1; i.e as a raving drunk.
As for petitioning, Dark Souls is finally coming to PC, so here's hoping Kojima can be persuaded too.
To be honest I think that it's not so much about 'everyman' characters as it's about believable characters, and if making a character an 'everyman' makes him more believable and complex then so be it. As a narrative tool, it certainly can help towards making a gameworld feel bigger and to some degree scarier.
Take Dark Souls as an example: sure, you may (or may not) be able to cast spells. you might even have magic health-restoring flasks and an enchanted greatsword. But when you're up against the Gaping Dragon or four of those mushroom-men things at once, it comes down to nerve and skill of the player character, not his magic abilities.
That kind of everyman - toning down the player character in order to make his or her enemies seem scarier and to ome extent more believable - can certainly be used to great extent. It really serves two purposes: firstly to make the enemies seem bigger, scarier and more challenging, secondly to make the main character more believable and latable to the player.
The same tactic is used across medias: Frodo is certainly the underdog compared to all the unspeakable evil between the Shire and Mount Doom.
But it isn't the only way to make a character believable. Take Superman. He certainly isn't ordinary and he actually has an often fair reputation for being one-dimensional. despite this though, put him in the hands of great writers and they'll turn him into a layered, complex character. One example worth mentioning is Millar's Red Son, an alternate-reality kind of story in which Superman lands in the Stalin's USSR instead of the American Midwest. The result is a communist Superman, and a particularly complex and conflicted one.
I'm kind of rambling now but I mean that as an example of how making a character an ordinary guy doesn't have to be the only way of making him believable. And, more importantly, making said character an everyman is only a way of creative him complex and interesting.
I don't really agree with the mention of Deus Ex in this: both the original and Human Revolution (Invisble War was a mistake I for one would rather pretend never happened) went to great pains to distinguish their character's difference as a pillar of the game in its own right. This is particularly evident in HR, where all the anti-aug/pro-aug politics come together to really add a sense of realism and depth to the gameworld - with Adam 'I never asked for this' Jensen caught in the middle of it all.
Those themes are still there in the original Deus Ex though. Denton's interactions with the more ordinary humans are at the heart of his moral journey, and the endings (particulary the one in which he merges with Helios) are all about using powers beyond the grasp of 'ordinary' people for the player's interpretation of the greater good.
Surely that kind of moral scope ought to be encouraged, rather than put down.
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