Platinum Games, known for its cult hit Bayonetta, is making another splash with its unexpected Metal Gear tie-in, Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance. We spent some time with Revengeance today on the E3 show floor, and it’s definitely slashing its way to the top ranks for our Best of E3.
If you’ve spent any time at all with Bayonetta, you’ll start out feeling at home with Revengeance, but before long new features will find their way to the fore. Dashing now also blocks bullets as long as you dash, and pulling the left trigger puts you into Blade Mode, giving you the ability to instantly slice anything in your path with precise aim.
The result is finely orchestrated chaos unleashed by you, the player. Gameplay is tight and responsive, letting you dart from enemy to enemy effortlessly and aim your strokes accordingly. At a certain point, you can do insane finishing moves on any enemy you damage enough, either wrenching their cybernetic organs from their body to heal yourself, or chopping the enemy into tiny pieces. The game even rates you based on criteria such as how many bits you slice your enemies into.
Though the game is still replete with the trademark Metal Gear story-filled ambiguity (or is it the other way around…), it is through-and-through an action game. Die-hard Metal Gear fans should not expect the stealthiness normally found therein. The good news, however, is that this opens up the Metal Gear universe to a new demographic of fans: those that enjoy action, and not stealth (like myself!), and the even better news is that it’s an amazingly-done way to break that barrier.
