I never liked the Metal Gear games either, actually. I'm a bit too impatient to actually enjoy any of the Metal Gear games. On the older games, because it uses the bird's eye view, you're forced to use either the camera or set your back to literally every wall to make sure there are no enemies because you can't very well view them without doing that.
Metal Gear Solid 3 fixes the problem and actually gives you a rotating camera, but now that 90% of the game is open areas, you have to use paint and different uniforms to cover yourself in alot of parts, that and wait for god knows how long to actually get by a group of people because you can only move while they're turned around or you have to specifically wait and look for a bit to see what directions they're taking.
So what do I do in the Metal Gear games(other than the first MGS since that one is the easiest in the series?) I get seen and proceed to kill literally everyone. But on MGS3, for all those people I killed, it took me about 37 hours to walk through the river of sorrow, then use the one pill after I ended up getting to the end and dying(which you use to proceed.)
One good thing about the Metal Gear series though. The storyline kicks ass. MGS3 easily has the best storyline in the series, the first one is also okay, and part of the second is good. Raiden whining like a girl 90% of the game ruins the entire story though. I've only played a few hours of MGS4. Far harder than 3 and you're required to use stealth in order to not get raped in a few areas(respawning enemies are also bullshit.)
When I was a kid I thought Metal Gear NES was pretty pretty cool, but I never owned it and it was only a single day which I played it. I clearly remember that beginning though which you had to restart over and over. I had the roms on my PSP awhile ago, but I ended up playing them again and hating them.