Jonah
XBOT Suicide Prevention Squad
Many of those things originated with 2 except maybe the CQC & Food related stuff.I haven't played 4 or 5 since I don't own a next-gen console. The OG MGS has the goat bosses, story, and atmosphere, bu I think 2 and 3 have it beat if we're going PURELY on gameplay and nothing else. Yeah, Snake >>>>>> Raiden, but the improvements with the overall gameplay and the guard AI in those 2nd and 3rd games are just
* You could hang off of ledges and shimmy across walkways.
* You could roll into enemies or into a crawling position.
* You could hide in lockers to avoid detection.
* You could stuff your enemies into the lockers after knocking them out or killing them.
* You could aim in first person
* You could hold up guards and take their stuff.
* 2 and 3 gave us nonlethal weapons like tranquilizer guns, etc.
* Choking guards out was actually a viable tactic.
* 3 also gave us CQC, including the ability to slam enemies and interrogate them for info.
* MGS3 gave us the ability to poison guards with rotten food.
* In MGS3, you can also distract enemies with dirty magazines and empty ammo clips.
You could distract guards in MGS 2 with magazines & throw ammo as well.

3's Story was just very shallowAs a lifelong fan of the series I never really understood why 3 got the level of praise it does. It’s a fantastic game...but....I don’t put it above 1,4, or 5. Yeah...I said it. F-O-U-R.![]()


Kojima wasn't beating the player over the head with Anti-War themes as much in MGS 3, and everything else was played for laughs...

[The conversation between Raiden & Snake after He reveals that "Iriquois Plissken was an alias" and that He is not a hero, just a killer]
There is even the lack of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder plot points that MGS 1 & 2 brought up on occasion... It became part of MGS2's subplot involving Raiden's "Jack the Ripper" persona.
