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OK, so I’ve finished watching through the Metal Gear Saga Vol. 2 DVD in its entirety, and as promised last night I’m back to share my impressions.

There’s roughly an hour’s worth of video content on the MGS Vol. 2 disc split between trailers and various series retrospective content. On the trailer front, every single Metal Gear Solid 4 trailer from the big game events over the past two years is here. The 15-minute epic from E3 ‘06, the first gameplay trailer from TGS ‘06, the classic Raiden vs. Vamp trailer from E3 ‘07, the Beauty and the Beast trailer from the ‘07 Leipzig Games Convention, and the odd TGS ‘07 trailer remembered largely for its drinking monkey and soldier taking a dump inside a barrel (though sadly the whole shitting in a barrel part has been clipped out from the DVD version for some reason). They’re all on the disc and as impressive as always. No matter how many times I watch it, that Raiden and Vamp battle never ceases to blow me away.

Trailers aside, the remaining content basically serves as a MGS refresher course. Whereas Metal Gear Saga Vol. 1 was more like a behind-the-scenes documentary, Vol. 2’s lone purpose is to bring you up to speed on the series’ storyline up to now and set the stage for MGS4, and it does so very well. After a brief Prologue piece and 20th Anniversary retrospective trailer, there are four chapters of story background to catch up on, each chapter serving as a character bio and a game recap. Big Boss - The Origin of Snake recaps the events of MGS3, Liquid - The Second Snake recaps the original MGS, Solidus - The Third Snake recaps MGS2 and Solid - The First Snake previews what’s to come in Old Snake’s final mission in MGS4, followed by an awesome credits sequence that rolls a historical timeline alongside scenes from every previous Metal Gear game (except for the two PSP Acid titles since they don’t fit into the main story arc).

All in all, it’s an excellent collectible item for the diehard Metal Gear fan and a pre-order bonus that, you know, actually has a purpose and won’t eventually find its way into a junk draw in your room or office. Unless, of course, you’re one of those gamers pre-ordering just to get the Metal Gear Online beta code. I’m sure there’s a bunch of you planning to do just that…

If you’d like to see some of what the Metal Gear Saga Vol. 2 content looks like before deciding whether or not to make your own pre-order, I’ve captured some screenshots and posted them in the gallery below. Feel free to thumb through.

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