So, upon reading this I think I speak for all of us anticipating this title when I say "SRSLY?!?" Blu-ray, the mighty 50 gigs of storage space, is too small? Even AFTER compression? I mean, we all knew this would happen eventually, but after less than 3 years (of a supposedly 10 year product lifespan), we're running out of room?
First and foremost, lets step back here for a second. Number one, this isn't just ANYONE filling up a blu-ray disc. We've heard this song and dance before. There was a flurry back when it looked like Insomniac was trying to pull a fast one. But this is Hideo Kojima. Anyone who's played one of the previous Metal Gear games, love them or hate them, has to admit he has style. He's the Quentin Tarantino of gaming; his directorial prowess is cult in status because he isn't QUITE mainstream, but you know every time you're going to get more of exactly what you love. Brilliant visuals, gameplay to match and over the top, beautifully executed action. In other words, if there was anyone that I'd think could really fill up over 50 gigs (and believe me, I'd have paid more if it meant Sony put this game on 2 discs and kept everything), then its gotta be Kojima. However, one way or the other, this is nothing but a bad thing.
We as gamers have become very familiar with the pattern that emerges from most, if not all, developers. They promise the moon and then usually deliver a large ball of cheese; albeit a very tasty ball of cheese that can kind of look like the moon, but it just isn't what we bargained for, by and large. This is the problem with so called 'innovation' nowadays. Mario is Mario; you know EXACTLY what you're in for. Assassin's Creed, on the other hand, was and continues to be a bit of an unknown. While the game did deliver on the idea of "You'll be running around the Crusades jabbing sharp pointy things into pink fleshy things and doing it with stealth and unbelieveable cool", the game failed to promise things like a sometimes awkward control scheme, a convoluted plot and...well, you get the idea. That sort of repeated experience leaves us in a kind of awkward fear of new ideas in our games. On the one hand, some of us are very tired of the same thing over and over again (though not all of us; see anyone who buys Madden or every FPS), and thus we'd like to see new things. This leads us to developers like Kojima and Suda 51. Sure, we can assume most of MGS4 will feel just like the conclusion of the series that its supposed to be, but on the other hand, there are some really solid ideas in place that could make MGS4 something vastly better than any of its predecessors. But, this is supposed to be a rant about space, so let me get back to that.
The point I'm trying to make is that this hardware generation is seemingly already falling flat. Sure, there have been some great games, but the real problem with having people that are actual visionaries make games is that unlike so many other mediums, these guys will be severely limited by their medium of choice with little to no chance of making improvements on their own. A TV director will always be limited by the budget and time constraints of a TV show, until he manages to convince a Hollywood Studio to give him a shot; then his limit will be nearly nothing. Game makers are severely limited; by the strength of their staff sure, but much more so by the hardware they are bound to. There is always only so much room on a disc and only so much raw power available for the system to play with; they have to take everything they are dreaming of for a game and make sure it fits. This is part of where the 'innovation' features end up biting us; features get cut or reduced for space and hardware limitations. But with this generation, just because of the raw storage and hardware made available, I had hoped that perhaps the developers would finally start to be limited by only their minds. It seems, perhaps, that I was wrong.
By the way, as someone who's really been excited for MGS4, having the game be close to 50 gigs absolutely blows my mind. My only concern is this: how long does it take to install 50 gigs of data onto a PS3 hard drive using the internal 2x blu-ray reader? Maybe, on second thought, its good Kojima doesn't have access to anything larger than 50 gigs.
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