10 Levels That Stopped Video Games Being Perfect
7. The PAL Card Backtracking - Metal Gear Solid
Hideo Kojima's original Metal Gear Solid is one of the most innovative and ambitious video games of all time - an endlessly creative, gorgeously cinematic stealth-actioner that's still a blast to play in its original form some 25 years later.
But for all of its many wonderful moments and incredible boss battles, there's one section which continues to haunt players all these years on - the Permissive Action Link (PAL) card nonsense near the end of the game.
The PAL card changes its shape depending on the temperature it's subjected to, and in order to use it to try and stop Liquid Snake from launching Metal Gear REX, you need to take it to a cold environment, return it to the computer, take it to a hot environment, and take it back to the computer once more.
This forces the player to listlessly backtrack to both the frosty warehouse where they previously fought Vulcan Raven and then the blast furnace, and if players don't return to the computer quickly enough each time, the alloy will lose its shape, forcing them to try again.
It's pure, aggravating busy-work, and while only a small portion of the game overall, by far the laziest and least-interesting part of Metal Gear Solid.
Mercifully Kojima took the vocal fan outcry onboard for his 2004 remake, Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes, which made it far more convenient for players to change the card's shape with nearby objects.