SONS OF LIBERTY
In what is often described as one of the most iconic moments ever at E3, Hideo Kojima debuted a eight minute long cinematic trailer for Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. Snake sneaking aboard a storm-lashed cargo ship, while Russian ultra-nationalists marched down the corridors.
People could hardly believe their eyes. The fact that the trailer today, twelve years later, still feels majestic speaks of its huge impact. The level of hype the game had reached somewhat unrealistic levels. Many even believed that Kojima's "interlude" mecha-adventure Zone of the Enders, sold so well only because it is also released along with a demo of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. When the hype was at its peak, a Konami press release stated that no further details about the game would be released until the game was in stores.
The events of September 11th turned the world upside down, the impact of the US attacks rushing in changes across multiple mediums. Metal Gear Solid 2 was only months away from release. Originally the huge mobile fortress Arsenal Gear was to tear down the Statue of Liberty and then crash throughout southern Manhattan. That was drastically altered, and all American flags were removed, including the one that would actually covered the final boss's body at the steps of Federal Hall. Changes were made and Konami kept to its deadline.
Konami had managed to hide the game's biggest twist. The majority of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty was told not from the perspective of Solid Snake, but newcomer Raiden. Snake was supposed to have been killed after the game's opening hour which served as prologue to the main game, and ended with Revolver Ocelot stealing a new version of Metal Gear from the U.S. military.
The game flashes forward two years and into the start of Raiden's mission. A terrorist group calling itself the Dead Cell had kidnapped U.S. President James Johnson and holds him hostage in the massive oil platform Big Shell.
When the Sons of Liberty was released in November 2001 it was in every way a success. As time's passed though criticism has grown, to the point its seen as the weakest entry in the series. The adventure was text heavy, with long cutscenes and even longer radio calls.
Critics argued that Hideo Kojima's auteur status - imprinting his definitive vision on the game - had attracted a hubris around the game creator. There was even "A Hideo Kojima Game" on the cover. Many did not know what to think with the game's theme around "memetic engineering", taken from Richard Dawkins' theory of memes as the cultural genes. The secret power behind the events of Sons of Liberty were The Patriots, an omnipotent group of people who filtered and controlled the world's information in order to tilt it according to their own desires.
In retrospect, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty was clearly ahead of its time when it came to narrative and the subjects it touched on. However, it is hard to argue that the script was anything but poor, and was in need of a trimming.
SNAKE EATER
For the next part of the series Kojima would go back to the beginning of the Metal Gear saga. It was time to tell the story of the first Snake, who is also the best soldier that ever lived, the man who would become Big Boss. During the development of what would become Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater Kojima announced that the game would be the last Metal Gear game that he directed.
Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater released in late 2004. The game explored the history of Fox agent (not to be confused with the Foxhound) Jack aka Naked Snake, who would one day become the legendary Big Boss. The year was 1964, and at the height of the Cold War Naked Snake was on a mission to kill his former mentor The Boss, after she set the whole world on the threshold of a third world war.
Snake Eater's mechanics demanded much more of the player, who had to constantly keep track of several different factors. Besides stealth taking place in jungle and new outdoor terrain, you had to determine which camouflage was best used with which environment. Any damage Snake incurred had to be treated correctly.
The game also had a brand new system for close combat called CQC (Close Quarters Combat) and the faithful Soliton radar system had been replaced with a much more primitive option. Snake was even forced to eat local wildlife to keep fresh and alert during the mission. This origin story was so immersed in history that a novice to the series had best come equipped with notebooks, markers and Wikipedia in order to keep up with the story.
Thematically, Snake Eater asked questions about relativism, patriotism and what it really meant by national boundaries. This conflict was also depicted in the relationship between Naked Snake and The Boss, soldiers who once stood together but beliefs had made them enemies in the current political climate.
Snake Eater was to be Hideo Kojima's last Metal Gear game. For the next part of the series, a new director was to shoulder the burden. Fans reactions were somewhat skeptical, so much so that several serious threats, including several death threats, were sent to both Konami and Kojima Productions.
What effect, if any, they had, is not known, but Hideo Kojima was once again was back in the directing chair. This time he shared it with Shuyo Murata, who'd previously directed Zone of the Enders: The 2nd Runner and worked on Snake Eater together with Kojima.
During the development of the fourth game, the PSP game Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops was also released, which begins immediately after the events of Snake Eater. Portable Ops was the first game in the official series not directed by Kojima, but counted by most fans as another appetiser before Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. After three years of development, the game released worldwide on 12 June 2008, exactly ten years after Metal Gear Solid, and twenty years after Metal Gear.
GUNS OF THE PATRIOTS
The Guns of the Patriots visited several of the Metal Gear franchise's old themes. Alienation as a result of technological development, war effects in the form of post-traumatic stress and how we understand our world only at its end. In many ways the game mechanics became more Western with a greater focus on action, a free camera to control, and the ability to play the adventure from first person mode.
The tactical stealth took place this time in various war zones, which meant that you could also play the various warring factions off against each other. In The Guns of the Patriots, Konami also put a new focus on psychological warfare. You could scare and confuse the soldiers on the battlefield in various ways, but mainly it was seen in the personal development of the franchise's various characters.
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots became the swan song for the story of Solid Snake. It would take countless hours of cutscenes, huge amounts of text, as well as a full downloadable encyclopedia called Metal Gear Solid 4 Database, for Kojima to unravel all the threads that he'd laid out throughout the series.
The result was a game so bombastic and hyperbolic that it had to be chained to the ground in order not to fly away. It fluctuated constantly between serious topics such as romance and generational shifts to the next moment focusing on a monkey in underwear. Kojima broke the fourth wall so many times that he could just as well install a revolving door.
But in the end, believe it or not, Kojima unravelled all the threads. The fans were happy. All the pieces were in place, even if the script was as before overcooked and messy. Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots also proved that Kojima, whether he wanted it or not, would forever be imprisoned by his own creation. Much like the accomplished musician, who's convinced by fans to forever play different versions of the same song over and over again.
Prior to the next instalment, it was Kojima's plan to let a younger production team develop and realise new ideas. One was an idea to make a game about The Boss and her Cobra Unit during the invasion of Normandy. The proposal met with strong opposition. Kojima's lengthy time as creator, director and producer meant no one dared replace him.
"How does a typical day look like in my life? Most of who work in Kojima Productions its ordinary nine to five. In my case it's different., I must take care of the business side of game development, producer side as well as the creative work. So I have three jobs that I run at the same time. I get up at five o'clock in the morning and looks to be in the office at about half seven. then I have a meeting with Konami, and then a meeting with the team at Kojima Productions.
After I meet new staff and talk to them about their future work. It's my morning. In the afternoon, I get time to take care of my own work. I check email, approve designs, review payment costs, design new game scenarios, write scripts and take a tour around the studio to check that everyone is doing what they should. Late in the evening I go out and maybe meet with some industry people. Brainstorm, watch a movie, play a game. I get home at about midnight. Then I go through Twitter, take a shower and try to be in bed at about one o'clock, but usually it is two o'clock. "
There are few people who can handle that kind of pace. Kojima also has a wife and kids at home and the balance between family life and working life has often been difficult. Hideo has in his spare time often played with LEGO with his son because it gave him the opportunity to simultaneously work on new designs for future games. Looking at the rest of the gaming industry Kojima role is unique. He really does everything himself. He approves every detail in the games, which is very different in game development where people often work in teams.
"I'm probably very individual. I have to do everything myself. I'm one of those people that most designers really hate to work with."
For the transition to be as smooth as possible for both the fans and Kojima Productions, the next installments were split in two: Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker for PSP which focused on Big Boss and directed by Hideo Kojima, and a new series by a new team and revolve around the character Raiden, in Metal Gear Solid: Rising. Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker came and went. The game was yet another success for Kojima where he and his team worked brilliantly with the portable format limitations. Peace Walker contains probably the most complete and in-depth game system the series has seen so far.
What happened with Metal Gear Solid: Rising? It disappeared. Kojima's nightmares had once again come true. The new team could not handle the task which led to Hideo, at the end of 2010, to cancel the whole project. The game is now in the hands of Platinum Games and a very different beast.
There's a question as to whether Hideo Kojima will ever be able to hand over, or leave the Metal Gear series. Its an absurd situation.
War is certainly a popular theme for TV and computer games. The game world has countless skilful war games that has given us everything from photo-realistic graphics to the addictive digital paintball games.
However, there are exceedingly few games that dare to take that extra step - that dare to try something different. That's why we love Metal Gear. A series that is not afraid to sway between serious discussions about the terribleness of war, big robot battles, rampant conspiracy theories and toilet humour.
What is so fascinating about the Metal Gear series is that its still as relevant today as it ever was. Its ambitions dwarf many other game series. Its walked its own path the past twenty-five years. Here's to it continuing to do so.