[187ontheVHS]

I found that with the earlier ones there were just sooooo many long conversations that were conducted over the codec, and it drove me nuts just how long-winded these conversation conducted via a black screen with a few small sparsely animated blocks were. That has been almost entirely dropped from MGS4, pretty much everything plot-wise is done with (gorgeous) real-time graphics, rather than constantly reverting to the other screen. And when you do speak using the codec often you don't even leave the action, rather, conversation are held while something of interest is happening onscreen.
Basically, I found that MGS4 kept my interest way more than the other ones, there were few moments were I was thinking "Get on with it already!" like I did with MGS2. I had written the series off because I just couldn't stand the plodding moments of dull, meandering dialogue, but I was really blown away by this one. And the production values are second to none!
Give at a rent at the very least, but go in knowing the backstory fairly well, or your experience could very well differ.