Great moments in PC gaming It’s a bite-sized celebration of some of our favorite gaming memories.
Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance
Developer: Platinum Games
Year: 2014
I was still terrified when I first played Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance. I was just a guy with a sword, foolishly assuming I had to carefully dodge the giant Metal Gear and his Ray attacks thrown at him during his first ten minutes of the game. Once upon a time, I spent an entire game waiting for Metal Gear to appear, worrying about the threat of the ultimate weapon. But at that time I didn’t have a Japanese sword. I’ve found that makes a pretty big difference.
The second time I played Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, I actually laughed because I beat that 1,000-ton bastard so fast.
A gimmick for Metal Gear Rising, the brilliant action game innovation was Blade Mode, which let you slice watermelons, people, and concrete pillars into countless tiny slivers by holding down a button. And it was a good gimmick. In his second playthrough of Revengeance, I felt spikes of glee every time I triggered Blade Mode in the air, slicing a soldier in half and cybernetically automatically tearing his spine from his body. But the true art of Revenge that takes time to get the hang of is the parry system.
It’s as elegant as Metal Gear Rising is extreme. Just flick the joystick forward to hit an enemy the moment they attack, and you’ll have your blade to counter them. This is unlike counters in Sekiro, where you have to balance input between blocking and attacking. This is not patience. It’s not a calculated revenge for the last attack that hit you. It’s about revenge. All at once, unstoppable, unrepentant carnage.
Revengeance teaches you parry control, but it doesn’t tell you the essence of it. The correct way to parry is in the middle of a 27-hit combo, just one extra stick in the middle of the row of lights. and heavy attack. The last thing to do in Metal Gear Rising is stopthis is why a perfect kill completely replenishes your health and blade meters, and is why you can dodge 98% of incoming attacks.
By the time I got to New Game+, I needed a taunt button to push my enemies harder and faster. A perfectly timed parry struck them a fatal blow, and thanks to that, Metal Gear, which briefly caused shock and awe, became a child’s plaything. Then I let it fly like a mouse with a toothpick overpowering Andre the Giant.
In a game full of moments that feel ridiculously badass, Revengeance’s parry stands out as the ultimate tool. Somehow they really saw Raiden at that moment. Stop a nuclear submarine by sticking a sword into its leg (opens in new tab) And you think, ‘Oh, I could make a whole game out of that.
