FMV Overkill

The game starts with Snake in a 'room-for-one' torpedo being shot out of a submarine, accessing the facility through ice cold water into a small underground dock. All described in a beautiful FMV (full motion video) sequence with some of the best in-game music ever heard. The whole thing plays like a film and oozes atmosphere. Right from the start, with Snake emerging from the rippling water you will begin to realise what all the fuss has been about. This is perhaps THE definitive interactive movie and as you progress the majority of the game's story line is played through numerous cut scenes like this. They are filled with dialogue, radio chatter through Snake's inbuilt radio system (codec), flashbacks, and real video clips of nuclear bomb blasts.

These integrated scenes may give some great information on the whole story line and history, but some of the sequences really drag on. Your senses and are finely tuned, you are ready to shoot the hell out of the next unsuspecting guard but are suddenly forced to listen for minutes on end to some scientist or whoever. ZZZZzzzz. The voice acting and direction may be superb with some great camera placements and slow motion effects but sometimes you just desperately want to rejoin the fray. Also occasionally the script falls to the depths of a porn film (not, you understand, that I know much about this area) with Snake chatting-up all his female radio operators and even complimenting the main female character on her butt. This may be a clue for finding her later in the game but is still pretty cheesy.

Snake Fighting

You start the game armed only with a pair of binoculars and your trusty smokes so mission one is getting your hands on some decent hardware. This is not found in the first area, so you have to run, sneak and crawl your way around a few grunt guards (or if you are in the mood, breaking their necks in some hand to hand fighting) to the lift exit and the main part of the base. Luckily enough Snake is equipped with a personal radar system, visible in the top left corner of the screen, on which all guards, cameras, gun placements and important characters are plotted as well as their current range and field of sight. Keep out of their sight and hearing range and they will be oblivious to you. However get seen, make a load noise or start shooting widely and your radar will be jammed and all the guards will home in on your position.

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