It's . . . OK? I don't think it's nearly as terrible as the crew makes it out to be and I feel like a lot of their complaints are kind of overblown. Like, sure, your equipment degrades, but it does so pretty slowly and you can always make more. While I agree that the combat is pretty terrible, you can for the most part avoid it without a huge amount of effort.

Now, that doesn't mean I think it's perfect. I think there is a much better game hidden in here than the one that actually shipped. A lot of my complaints carry over from MGSV: I don't think the open world adds anything, I think the writing is downright terrible, and there's just too damn much of it. I'd really like to see a version of this game that was much more puzzle focused rather than this weird, grand social experiment it has going on.

Like, you get a certain amount of set cargo to deliver across a much smaller area of the map and then you have to figure out how to do that based on the weight, route, and any conditions like time limit or cargo damage. Remove the auto-loading option and make players pack their cargo themselves so that balance and protecting the most valuable/fragile cargo becomes a big part of it.

Overall, I'm mostly enjoying my time with it. A solid 7/10 for me.

I'm genuinely having fun with it.

Stuff like balancing, stamina, item management, package degradation, battery management, etc. rather than feeling annoying, I found them to actually be the fun challenge of the game.

The game has the usual kojima style over-exposition, which I personally don't mind. The atmosphere is top notch and the world is a very unique interpretation of a post-apocalypse.

The game is incredibly fun when things go wrong. trying to scale down a mountain and being too stubborn to waste the climbing ropes, falling over, twice then free-falling 50 meters down a ravine into the water, scrambling to get your cargo, while you try to stay afloat, washing up ashore, you realise that your mission critical package is hanging off a ledge halfway up the mountain, so you try skyrim your way up mountain and while looking for the perfect place to use the one ladder. just when you think you're stuck, you see another player's climbing rope and finally get back to your package. and go FUCK YES

disorientated, you open your map and realise you've been heading the wrong way the entire time.

true story.

This will either make you go "fuck this game" or "this game is amazing".

It's tranquil, intense, mundane, punishing, and rewarding all at the same time.

45 hours in an i'm loving it.

I think it's pretty neat so far (chapter 6). The script is whack, but I can get past that. The gameplay loop is extremely refreshing if you ask me.