Early in the upcoming year gamers will have an unprecedented amount of solid titles on which to spend their Christmas cash. There hasn’t been a year in recent memory that has been so front-loaded with quality games. Bayonetta, Mass Effect 2, God of War III and Final Fantasy XIII are only a few examples of AAA releases that are coming out before April. To play them all will be next to impossible for most of us. Konami and Kojima Productions seem to understand our quandary, at least, and have announced that Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker won’t be hitting shelves until late May.
In fact, it almost seems that in order to stand out from the pack next year Peace Walker will be employing some of the tactics that its main protagonist, Big Boss, might use on the battlefield. Rather than take on all of those heavily armed, first quarter AAA titles directly, Peace Walker will quietly tip-toe right past them and sneak into the much less crowded second quarter, where it will hide in the shadows of your local GameStop (or, I suppose, in some dark corner of the PlayStation Store for those of you who have already thrown off the shackles of physical media), cleverly disguised as just another unassuming PSP game. And then, just as those slow summer months are coming up and gamers start to let their guard down - BAM! ; there it is. And it’s already got you in its inescapable grasp!
Okay, I might have taken that questionable metaphor a little too far, but the point is that when all those quality console titles hit in early 2010 Metal Gear fans will want to remember to save some time and money in their gaming budget for Peace Walker.
Set in Costa Rica in 1974, the new game is a direct sequel to Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater which placed the player in the role of Big Boss and dropped them into the middle of Cold War-era Russia. Peace Walker looks to bring the series’ plot full circle by bridging the gap between Snake Eater and the original Metal Gear which released on NES in 1988.
Peace Walker will be available on PSP and hits shelves in North America on May 25th.
