TheMetal Gearfranchise is beefy enough when just talking about the mainline titles. It gets significantly juicier when bringing spin-offs into the mix. Some of them consist of the classic stealth-action game play everybody loves, while a few go off the deep end, to mixed results.
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To celebrate both the good and the bad, the following list will rank all the spin-offs based by their Metacritic score. A couple of vital ones don’t have a number on the site, but they will still get honorable mentions before getting down to business. Additionally, a few of these are canon, but aren’t numbered and came out on portable consoles.
11Snake’s Revenge (No Score)
This unofficial sequel was the second game to come out under theMetal Gearbanner and had no involvement from series creator,Hideo Kojima. In fact, he didn’t even know of its existence until after its release.
The idea of such an egregious continuation bothered him so much, it prompted the designer to start work on a true sequel. It isn’t seen as one of the high points of the franchise, though many who played it back in the day swear by its quality.
10Ghost Babel (No Score)
ThisGameboyColor game hearkens back to the first two titles, bringing a trueMetal Gearexperience to the primitive handheld. Like the originals, some of the puzzles are too obtuse for their own good, causing some to quit in frustration.
Those who stick through it all are treated to one of the finest games on the console. It is not canon, though, so don’t feel too bad for missing out.
9Metal Gear Survive (60)
After Kojima left Konami, the series' future was uncertain. UponMetal Gear Survive’srelease, most had wished the legendary franchise stopped afterThe Phantom Pain. The story follows MSF troops transported to a different dimension after Skull Face’s attack on the private army.
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In this new environment the soldiers must find a way home while fending off brutal hordes of zombies. The concept is insultingly ridiculous to the series' lore and the game play is a significant downgrade from everything that came before. One wonders if Konami purposely made the most flippant game possible to rub salt in fans' wounds.
8Portable Ops Plus (65)
Staying true to the tradition of re-releases with additional content,Portable Ops Plusexpands upon the multiplayer of the base game,Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops. This one eschews the original’s single-player campaign, however, and focuses on the multiplayer offerings.
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The game play does its best to translate the game play to thePSP, but doing so was no easy task without two analog sticks. Still, the game’s multiplayer was one of the finest on the handheld.
7Metal Gear Solid Touch (72)
This 2009 game retells the story ofMetal Gear Solid 4in the mobile form. Instead of the intense, meticulously detailed stealth sequences of thePS3game,Metal Gear Solid Touchis a shooting gallery where Snake ducks in and out of cover to hit enemies.
Despite this comparatively primitive genre, it still manages to retell the title’s story in an abridged manner. Not enough reviews are on the site to have a Metacritic score, but we averaged the two that were on there at the time to give it its score.
6Metal Gear Acid (75)
The franchise’s debut on the PSP mixed things up significantly by turning the series into a turn-based strategy game using cards. As odd an idea as this sounds, the developer managed to make a compelling battle system.
It takes many liberties with the characters and lore, immediately establishing itself in a different timeline, giving it the opportunity to tell its own story. Snake barely seems like Snake here, but that is alright as long as one knows what they are in for.
5Metal Gear Acid 2 (80)
A sequel to the role-playing game was announced and released in the blink of an eye, coming just a year after the first entry. It also improved upon it in every way and embraced a cel shaded art style. The game also came with 3D capabilities.
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Using the Solid Eye peripheral, one can play the game in 3D and view several special videos. Some of these are cutscenes fromMetal Gear Solid 3, while others are steamy videos of Japanese models.
4Metal Gear Online (81)
Metal Gear Onlineis simply the multiplayer offerings fromMetal Gear Solid 4. The competitive play was never a huge draw for the series, but some fell in love with the first online multiplayer suite fromMetal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence.Metal Gear Onlinenever quite reached the same level of affection among gamers, however, though it was still a solid component of the 2008 title.
As a standalone game, however, it wasn’t enough to justify a purchase. Still, the core game play is so good, having it out with friends over the internet is a worthwhile diversion.
3The Twin Snakes (85)
The remake ofMetal Gear Solidfor theGameCubetakes no liberties with the actual story, instead making drastic changes to the cutscenes. While the original’s weren’t grounded,The Twin Snakesturns all the characters into super-powered action stars capable of truly impossible feats.
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The level design remains the same, but the gameplay takes all the advancements fromMGS 2and lets players run around Shadow Moses with the ability to aim in first-person, hold up guards at gun point, and hang over railings.
2Portable Ops (87)
Big Boss’s first journey afterMetal Gear Solid 3isn’t as necessary to the lore asPeace Walker, but it is still an important piece of the puzzle and worth playing for any fan of the series.
Some of the gameplay decisions are questionable and the levels are sometimes too big for the admittedly wonky controls, but the narrative is enough to push fans to the finish. And as stated before, its multiplayer was surprisingly addictive, but the servers have long since shutdown.
