Snake's Revenge
by decoy octopus



If one could make a list of "Impossible to beat" games, at the top of that list would almost assuredly be Snake's Revenge. Snake's Revenge is a touchy subject for anyone who considers themself a Metal Gear fan. Non-Canon in the Metal Gear timeline, it's not as silly or farfetched as Metal Gear (RADIOACTIVE HAMSTERS) but due to Ultra/Konami's tact with manuals at the time, they didn't take it all that serious, and as a result reading the manual will provide you with a few laughs or cause you to roll your eyes.

"It has been a short time since Solid Snake defeated Big Boss at Outer Haven and destroyed the original Metal Gear. Foxhound continues to operate in a still dangerous world. American development of more Metal Gears continues. A number of mass-produced units have been created and were in transit in a Navy carrier. It was this carrier that was attacked by the forces of Ishkabibil, a Middle Eastern nation under the rule of Higharolla Kockamamie.

Higharolla Kockamamie has seized both the Metal Gear units and the nuclear payload they are designed to utilize. He has brought them to his headquarters, Fortress Fanatic, and is threatening to use them if a series of demands he will issue are not met. This information was obtained by Foxhound through one of their operatives working within the defense forces of Ishkabibil. In response, Foxhound had dropped three of their operatives into the outskirts of Fortress Fanatic. Their mission is to destroy the Metal Gear units and their nuclear weapons and to eliminate Higharolla Kockamamie himself."


Higharolla Kockamamie. I wonder why Kojima kind of shits on this game when the names he's come up with aren't that much better. Marionette owl anyone? OH WAIT HE SAID THAT WAS NON-CANON TOO.

Kojima really comes off to me like a fanfic writer who has a huge self-hatred complex. He either changes his opinions way too fast or retcons or ignores things. BUT I DIGRESS FROM MY POINT.

Metal Gear 1 sold huge in America on NES and Kojima was more interested in making something else at the time, so Konami decided to make a sequel themselves. And if you peel away the veneer of the side scrolling levels, it's not a really bad game.

Good Points:
          - No backtracking
          - No codec frequencies to remember
          - They add a radar that is useful two times in the game
          - Cool weapons (Shotgun motherfucker)
          - No 10 minute codec conversations.

Bad Points:
          - Sidescrolling levels will fuck you in the ass later in the game.
          - When you're spotted, you're screwed until you either duck in an elevator or kill all enemies.
          - Higharolla cockamamie


You start out by being dropped in the jungle along with two (!!) other Fox Hound operatives. John Turner and Nick Meyers are your support. They talk to you about 4 times in the game, and you have an operative named Jennifer (No relation to Jennifer from Outer heaven) on the inside, she talks to you about 3-5 times as well. Holy shit no game loaded with inane codec conversations? SIGN ME UP
The basic gameplay when you're in normal mode (Non-side scrolly) is actually tried and true metal gear gameplay. You can and will get fucked by not being prepared for certain things. Like running out of Truth Gas when you need to interrogate an officer, not enough rations/oxygen/bullets. The programmers and designers didn't do a good job of making shit real accessible till the last part of the game. I got fucked rotten by the first boss until I found a little friend I like to call "Game Genie Codes".

There is no possible way to beat this game in a tidy amount of time without cheating. And cheating hard. I froze my life and items to never deplete. The amount of damage I took had I not had those codes in place would make a cheerleader blush. The side scrolling parts later in the game I cannot fathom how to defeat.



Another thing is that this game is really linear. Like once you get past a certain point you cannot go back. But the game doesn't let you progress without getting all the items requried to proceed. And why in the unholy fuck did they put card 6 before card 5 in discovery progression? I found 6 and went "Oh fuck I missed a card" and spent the next 45 minutes hopping trolleys looking for a card that was past where I originally was. BUT I GUESS IT'S NOT A METAL GEAR GAME WITHOUT BACKTRACKING IS IT?

It would be a misstep to not explain in detail what the side scrolling parts are in Snake's Revengs. Remember when you'd use an elevator in Metal Gear? Kinda like that but longer with enemies and mines and fucking things that electrocute the water oh god make it stop. And towards the end of the game to do anything you go through a door then into a side scrolling portion for a cache of mines. Or a ration or something else stupid. Now I'm not sure, because I had cheats on, but I'm pretty sure pits still instantly kill you and the radio trick from MG1 (Pit opens, you open radio quickly, pit goes pouf) doesn't work. Lots of things instantly kill you, like walking off the bridge into water (With a nice sploosh effect), walking off the new bridges (Actually inbetween train cars) or just whenever you run out of oxygen in the side scrolling parts. See in the original Metal Gear there was one underwater sequence, you got an Oxygen tank for and it never ran out. In Snake's Revenge you get a bar for your oxygen and when you run out (Quite possible) your life quickly drains.



Nothing is really ever explained plotwise in Snake's Revenge besides the "Something happened go here" type of codec communication. Your two support members in the field are easily dispatched (John gets captured and killed in the first jungle and Nick dies before the last battle) and you meet jennifer one time and she's some sort of Neo-Nazi.



The end game is pretty good compared to Metal gear 2 to be honest. You fight Big Boss as a human, he hulks up and becomes Termin--err Cyber Boss and you have to lure him out and destroy him. Then you have to destroy the Metal Gear in what is the most ludicrous last boss ever:



Also, the above took me about 20 minutes to actually do legit, I guess when you record in NEStopia, it disables all cheat codes and I had to hit 14 out of 15 missles to actually destroy that bitch. You even get to see the ending without having to suffer like I did. :D

As a straight up Metal Gear game, I'd give this honestly 4 socks because it is a good game, but the drawback of the impossible difficulty, along with side scrolling and HIGHAROLLA COCKAMAMIE makes me give this title:


Overall:






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