Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty

• Explore. Explore everywhere. There are a lot of items you can miss that are really handy.

• First (plant) boss soilers: No, you can't beat Fortune. You just need to wait for the elevator.

• Avoid calling rose unless absolutely necessary. Not because saving is bad, but because she's so fucking annoying. You will like the game a lot more if you avoid her whenever possible.

• You can hit the choke button once when holding a guard when they start to wiggle to keep control over them.

• Magazines are broken as shit. Use them, love them.

• You should codec everyone after every major event because it puts the story into perspective. Rose talking about fucking movies isn't wholly out of place when you take in the ending and neither is Campbell and his "REMEMBER YOUR VR TRAINING." Pliskin is the most important because he knows the back story for every boss which actually highlights their insane motivations.

• You'll be asked a question when you start a new game. Say that you played MGS1 and loved it.

• You can hold L1 to auto-aim in first person view and to run and gun in third person.

• In first person view, press L2 and R2 to inch to the sides. If you hold both at the same time, you can stand on your tiptoes.

• Tapping R2 twice will reload your weapon instantly.

• If you call an elevator twice, it will come quicker. This works in all MGS games.

• Use the M9 from a distance and you can clear a section of guards really easily.

• Some guards constantly radio back to base reporting their progress, so if you get rid of them the game sends out a search party to your location. Either hide the body quickly in a locker before they find him or shoot his radio with your SOCOM.

• There is a lot of cutscenes in this game, so be aware that you might spend a long time not actually playing the game.

• Always log into nodes your first time through the area, it really helps for later on.

• You can also use chaff grenades to disrupt radio communications.

• The angle can be finicky sometimes, but you can knock guards out, even on extreme, with one punch to the balls if aimed properly. It helps to hold them up to get a feel for this.

• If you are quick enough to shoot the ! above a guards head in first person mode, it will cancel his alert and put him into a dazed state.

• The cooling spray can be used to wake sleeping guards quickly or to put active guards into a momentary recovery animation preventing them from shooting, running or calling in an alert.

• If Snake calls Otacon enough times to save, a special guest from MGS1 will appear via codec.

• If you're struggling with the sniper section near the endgame, call Pliskin to give you a hand.

• You can only get the USP suppressor in the tanker on subsequent replays, but strut F contains the somewhat hidden SOCOM suppressor, even in your first game.

• There are a bunch of fun easter eggs. Some include conversations between Snake & Otacon based on what pictures were taken in the tanker. Call Otacon while in a locker looking at a model poster in 1PV. You can hear Johnny (the guard from MGS1) twice in the game. The first time is during a cutscene in the Shell 1 core, and the second is while on the oil fence when Emma walks behind one of the supports .