Snake has gone "platinum", too.

There might be six or seven Playstation 3 owners in the world who haven't yet experienced Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. There can't be many more though; the tactical espionage action title performed exactly as expected, selling gazillions of copies and winning near-universal critical acclaim. If you are one of the unfortunates who does not yet have a copy of the MGS4 BluRay snuggled cosily into your PS3 collection, wave goodbye to one of your best excuses, because Metal Gear Solid 4 has just entered Sony's cut price Platinum range.

The discounted Platinum version has been shipped to retailers around Australia, so if you do pick up a copy, make sure you don't pay the previous full retail price! If you're not sure whether you're ready to shell out for Old Snake even at a heavy discount, you can log into the Playstation Network and check out two demos, one for the core game and the other for the multiplayer component, Metal Gear Online, that comes bundled with Guns of the Patriots.

It might be worthwhile holding off though - previous entries in the series have followed up their platinum releases with special editions containing many new features and gameplay modes. Whether Guns of the Patriots continues this tradition is debatable; it's possible that Konami's ongoing support of Metal Gear Online, which includes premium downloadable packs, will take the place of the previous special editions like Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance and Metal Gear Solid: Subsistence, both in providing new content to extend the game's lifetime and, of course, to generate further revenue.