After playing each ”Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots” boss battle, I could not help but feel dirty.

I’m told that this woman I am fighting has severe psychological problems.  And it seems like my only recourse is to beat the living daylights out of her.  Once her armor is shed, I am greeting with a ”more-than-skin-tight” latex costume that leaves less to the imagination than a birthday suit.  And after successfully beating her into submission, she writhes in semi-ecstasy as I free her from the ”beast” she once was.  The camera doesn’t fail to fully display every part of body dripping with…lubricant.  And, after being physically abused, she throws herself on me in an embrace – which drains my life.  Apparently, she still needs a beating.

I think Hideo Kojima needs help.

The great irony of the encounter follows the battle.  After completely abusing this woman, and watching her body writh in classic pornographic camera shots, I get a call from Drebin, the arms dealer.  He proceeds to explain to me this woman’s skewed psychological profile and he explains to me this woman’s sad tale.  It is as if the game designers guiltily wanted to humanize the sexual object they have created and displayed even though they proudly publicize that the motion capture for these scenes were done with nude women and were originally inteded to be nude scenes.

The only thing the MGS4 shows you of Laughing Octopus's personhood.

But even the attempt to humanize the Beauty and the Beast Corps was a failure at storytelling.  “Show, Don’t Tell” is the staple of every good storyteller and Hideo Kojima violates that in almost every cutscene.  There are lots of movies that show the psychological profile of the villain and can humanize their struggle.  Many fighting-genre anime are known for showing the psychological reasoning of each villain and the reason they fight – only to be crushed and redeemed by losing to the main protagonist.  Yet, even in this sense, Hideo Kojima fails to imitate.  The best he can do is a series of lubricant fetish ass-shots followed by a sad monologue.

Even as a red-blooded male, practically every woman in the game cheapened the experience for me.  Even EVA, a woman who is probably in her 70s sports the cleavage of a perky 20 year old porn star with breast implants.  I don’t know about the rest of you, but I had a difficult time stomaching “Big Momma”‘’s mammaries.  Maybe it is something about the Japanese and their strange oedipus complexes – and I’m not just talking about Otacon and his step mother (sorry, that was a spoiler from MGS 2).

Mei-Ling was one of the biggest disappointments in my mind.  This is a commander of a U.S. Naval Vessel.  She should exemplify respectability and authority.  Yet in her briefing, she can’t help but be cute, clumsy and camera fodder for an ass-shot.

The only woman who really made me happy was Meryl.  Even in MGS1, the camera shot from behind was justifiable, cute and funny.  The game teased you with a hint of sexuality that was respectful and humorous – something long lost to Hideo Kojima.