Metal Gear Online review: a balloon party that needs more air

What this online update adds after Konami's superb Phantom Pain is negligible, leaving you with a multiplayer that lacks depth

Inside big-budget games development, multiplayer is one of the first and most important decisions. Activision's all-conquering Call of Duty series looms large over the landscape, and competitors for the top spot offer similarly comprehensive multiplayer modes - most of which will be supported for regular content releases and updates. For a primarily singleplayer game like Metal Gear Solid, an online mode is an enormous creative and financial gamble in 2015.

Metal Gear Online's biggest problem might be this context, because it has resulted in tunnel vision: this is the series' third attempt at crossing over to online, across three generations of hardware, and the narrowest yet. Available as a download for all owners of MGSV: The Phantom Pain, MGO's first impression is that it's a bit of a penny-pincher. There are only three modes, for example, alongside a simple hub level and five maps.

The foundations, however, are solid. Metal Gear Solid V's singleplayer movement and aiming controls are superb, and carry over into MGO with minor tweaks - online, characters are weighed down by their kit much more, can't sprint endlessly and their aiming in general has a little more sway. The refined core moveset allows players to easily shoulder-aim, take cover, switch to a first-person view, all at varying heights and speeds. So even before MGO starts adding mechanics and rules, the basic movement and shooting is precise and feels fantastic.