Metal Gear

[Milwaukee Macho Man]

Christ, Kojima truly was writing this all on the fly, wasnt he? Introduce something only to change your mind and retcon it asap next entry.

This is giving him too much credit. Kojima never gave a shit about MGS lore/canon/history/whatever anyone wants to call it. It wasn't like he "changed his mind", he just didn't give a shit. The only way he could make more games was by making Metal Gear Solid games because those were the only games that sold decently. So he just did whatever the fuck he wanted, and gave it the old Metal Gear paint job to get it to sell/get it okayed by Konami.

He wanted to make a 60's Bond style cold war spy story, so he literally shit all over the established canon to make it work for MGS3. Despite what Kojima fanboys will tell you, there *was* a history of Big Boss before MGS3. He not only shit over official written material, but he flat out went against shit said in the games themselves.

He wanted to make a movie, so he made the most convoluted bullshit plot imaginable to force as many cutscenes as he could for MGS4.

Etc. Etc.

It wasn't him "changing his mind" so much as Metal Gear was the only way for him to get any idea he had out there so he just forced it.

Narrative-wise, MGSV was a mistake. Big Boss somehow surviving Outer Heaven was one of the least stupid things in the overarching plot and didn't really need an explanation.

This is something that Kojima fanboys honestly use as cope, or just give him too much credit.

MGS V's twist was never meant to fix a plot hole of Big Boss survival. Depending on who you want to believe, it was either just an idea he had to make the player "into" Big Boss, or it was some grand story about the effects of trauma on the psyche. While I personally like the theory that Big Boss is disassociating in MGS V, it's hard for me to believe that was Kojimas intention simply because there's a subtlety about it that he isn't known for at all. At the same time, MGS V is such a mix match of ideas and concepts he had that it could also have been intentional and ended up being subtle simply because it got drowned in all the bullshit about language and everything else. Kojima clearly had the whole psychological trauma thing in mind with the whole Paz subplot as well as the idea of the Phantom Pain itself so who knows?

Either way, Big Boss survival was once again a thing that was already explained in Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake (he was literally turned a cyborg, which was a reference to Snatcher but funny enough was also an element of Snakes Revenge), and is just another part of the history that he repeatedly shits over to make whatever idea he has at the moment work. You would think Kojima fanboys would know this, but then again most of them only got on board with MGS4 and can't be arsed to try and play MGS let alone MG and MG2 so they probably had no idea their weird explanation/cope for Kojima pulling shit out of his ass was already a thing.

Edit: This is something you would have seen with Silent Hills as well, I'd wager. The game itself didn't look like it'd feel like a Silent Hill game to me. But because Silent Hill was a name Konami knew sold, it was probably the only way he could make a horror game that *he* wanted to make.

 

[The handsome tard]

However, make no mistake, 3 was a story worth telling, it was worthwhile to flesh out Big Boss and that does make the saga overall richer, Big Boss saluting The Boss's grave would have been a powerful image to end the series on, if only...

Well, we tecnically end on that image. Say whatever you want about 4, its ending sequence is absolutely amazing and it was a satisfying way to cap off the saga in my eyes (which is one of the reasons I have a love/hate relationship with MGR...sure, its fun and meme worthy but damn it, this story should be over!). I legit get teary eyed when that cigar drops from John's hand...

Besides, I do enjoy the symbolism with Snake comitting suicide...because in a way, Solid Snake did die in that graveyard. David, however, was able to live on for a while longer at least.

For me, MGS 4 is a game that has some of the worst and best of the whole series to me, its kind of a rollercoaster of quality for me. Some parts drag, some parts make me tune out while other parts leave me on the edge of my seat everytime. I usually describe MGS 4 as having a great beginning and ending...but a rather meh ish middle.

I also enjoy the theory that says that Kojima made sure this was the final chapter (again, MGR not counting in this case) so nobody can take away what's his and ruin it. A sentiment that has aged sadly very well nowadays with all these reboots, sequels and remakes nowadays that are subpar at best or woke non sense at worst.

Nowadays the best that can happen to your series is for you to pull the trigger on it so it can rest in peace instead of living into becoming a joke of its former self. The more and more I get the line "best to die young instead of living old"...its not meant to be taken literally most of the times, it just means its best to end it at its peak than letting end in a whimper and forgotten. Just look at how many IPs nowadays are going to the shitter, Star Wars , Star Trek, Dr Who and we are going to add Lord of The Rings there VERY soon, mind you (thanks Amazon...). So Kojima had the unique opportunity to end the series on his own terms and make sure no one can force a bastard "subversive" sequel out of it (AGAIN...not counting MGR).

 

[Dom Cruise]

Well, we tecnically end on that image. Say whatever you want about 4, its ending sequence is absolutely amazing and it was a satisfying way to cap off the saga in my eyes (which is one of the reasons I have a love/hate relationship with MGR...sure, its fun and meme worthy but damn it, this story should be over!). I legit get teary eyed when that cigar drops from John's hand...

Besides, I do enjoy the symbolism with Snake comitting suicide...because in a way, Solid Snake did die in that graveyard. David, however, was able to live on for a while longer at least.

For me, MGS 4 is a game that has some of the worst and best of the whole series to me, its kind of a rollercoaster of quality for me. Some parts drag, some parts make me tune out while other parts leave me on the edge of my seat everytime. I usually describe MGS 4 as having a great beginning and ending...but a rather meh ish middle.

I also enjoy the theory that says that Kojima made sure this was the final chapter (again, MGR not counting in this case) so nobody can take away what's his and ruin it. A sentiment that has aged sadly very well nowadays with all these reboots, sequels and remakes nowadays that are subpar at best or woke non sense at worst.

Nowadays the best that can happen to your series is for you to pull the trigger on it so it can rest in peace instead of living into becoming a joke of its former self. The more and more I get the line "best to die young instead of living old"...its not meant to be taken literally most of the times, it just means its best to end it at its peak than letting end in a whimper and forgotten. Just look at how many IPs nowadays are going to the shitter, Star Wars , Star Trek, Dr Who and we are going to add Lord of The Rings there VERY soon, mind you (thanks Amazon...). So Kojima had the unique opportunity to end the series on his own terms and make sure no one can force a bastard "subversive" sequel out of it (AGAIN...not counting MGR).

The ending with Big Boss is 4 in a nutshell, emotionally it works, but logically it really strains plausibility to say that Big Boss is still alive, although it helps that the idea is teased as far back as Metal Gear Solid 1.

That's not really what bothers me though, what bothers me is other stuff like explaining away Vamp, who in 2 is so clearly supposed to be something supernatural, away with nanomachines, that's simply a big pile of bullshit and taking away any mystery about The Patriots by just saying "yeah, they're just big machine AI computers" instead of the more ambiguous and more creepier vibe to them in 2.

Every time I feel like I'm being too hard on 4 I'm reminded of stuff that really does rub me the wrong way, sometimes the point of a mystery is that it's a mystery, which is what the point of 2 was.

 

[Snekposter]

The ending with Big Boss is 4 in a nutshell, emotionally it works, but logically it really strains plausibility to say that Big Boss is still alive, although it helps that the idea is teased as far back as Metal Gear Solid 1.

That's not really what bothers me though, what bothers me is other stuff like explaining away Vamp, who in 2 is so clearly supposed to be something supernatural, away with nanomachines, that's simply a big pile of bullshit and taking away any mystery about The Patriots by just saying "yeah, they're just big machine AI computers" instead of the more ambiguous and more creepier vibe to them in 2.

Every time I feel like I'm being too hard on 4 I'm reminded of stuff that really does rub me the wrong way, sometimes the point of a mystery is that it's a mystery, which is what the point of 2 was.

Honestly a literal Romanian vampire fits in just fine with Metal Gear Solid considering there's a Fourth Wall breaking psychic in MGS1. Going "muh nanomachines" just takes away some of the creepy charm a guy like him has. I don't know what happened to Kojima or his handlers but that weird-ass charm got lost later on.

 

[Dom Cruise]

Honestly a literal Romanian vampire fits in just fine with Metal Gear Solid considering there's a Fourth Wall breaking psychic in MGS1. Going "muh nanomachines" just takes away some of the creepy charm a guy like him has. I don't know what happened to Kojima or his handlers but that weird-ass charm got lost later on.

Originally the supernatural was just something that simply existed in the Metal Gear universe and there was nothing wrong with that, it was one of the things that made the series stand out from most military fiction.

Vamp was a really good depiction of the supernatural as well, he was something inexplicable, bizarre, unknowable, the way the supernatural probably really is, it also made sense in the context of Metal Gear dealing with the realm of really high level top secret stuff, so things like psychics and the supernatural fit in with that, the bizarre stuff going on behind the scenes that the general public has no idea about.

But somewhere along the way Kojima got cold feet about that and tried to retcon away or at least greatly diminish the supernatural aspects, Ocelot literally being possessed by Liquid's soul became "lol just hypnosis" because hypnosis can definitely make your arm grow in size and have you speak in an entirely different voice.

In The Phantom Pain there was the presence of kid Psycho Mantis so there was still at least a nominal level of the paranormal but from what I remember there's also a lot of overcomplicated explanations of his ESP abilities.

But what about encountering The Sorrow in Snake Eater? What about Vamp being able to LITERALLY SIT ON WATER and pin Raiden's shadow to the ground with his knives? The series doesn't make much sense after Snake Eater.

Ironically though I do have to give Kojima credit for the explanations for The Cobra Unit (save for The Sorrow) he came up with in Phantom Pain, that made decent sense, but I wonder if that was the deal all along or just something he thought up after years of thinking about it.

 

[Aunt Carol]

But what about encountering The Sorrow in Snake Eater? What about Vamp being able to LITERALLY SIT ON WATER and pin Raiden's shadow to the ground with his knives? The series doesn't make much sense after Snake Eater.

Listen, some bisexuals have lightning powers, some bisexuals can walk on water and are immune to bullets. That's just diversity and we should celebrate it.

 

[DMX DA GOAT]

MGS3 should have been the only Big Boss game.

Dude was 100x cooler before Kojima felt the need to keep showing him off. The vagueness of his exploits and the contradictons made him a mythical figure. There is a way to make inconsistencies work and Kojima trying to explain them wasn't it, especially when the explanation was "lol patriots made it up he was really an incel who couldn't get over his mommy dying and brainwashed a dude to make his military nation while he hid like a bitch."

MGS3 was enough. We saw him get the code name Big Boss. We saw the Philosophers/Patriots (who would end up controlling the world) use and throw away his mentor like she was nothing. Literally his motivation for soldiers being "free" and wanting to go to war with the world. If you needed more than that to understand Big Boss you're honestly a fucking retard.

 

[X Pac Heat]

I wonder if that was the deal all along or just something he thought up after years of thinking about it.

Nah, it was something he realized could work so he went with it. Kojima doesn't plan things out and I doubt he was thinking about where The Cobras powers came from for a decade.

lol patriots made it up

The idea that Big Boss legend was made up to make him the Patriots "icon" or whatever completely destroys the greater narrative of MGS.

MGS 4 establishes the legend of Big Boss was a patriot scheme to make him their "icon". This begs the question why the United States ever wanted to clone him in the first place or why exactly he was chosen as the template for the Genome Army.

"But the Patriots cloned him, not the United States." the fanboy will say.

To that I say Jim Houseman in MGS clearly states it was the United States that did the cloning, and Peace Walker firmly establishes that Cypher has not yet gotten the control over the government like they have by the time of MGS2. Clearly the greater United States had to have seen a vested interest in cloning Big Boss, and as far as we can tell, Big Boss didn't do shit after MGS3 until he decided to start MSF so once again why? And why wait nearly a decade? On top of this, Peace Walker establishes that Big Boss left the Patriots in the early 70's which begs the question why they would do a propaganda campaign to make him their "icon" if he was their active enemy.

"Because Zero had hoped he would come back to the fold." the fanboy will say.

Then you get MGS V that establishes that Big Boss was in a coma for a decade. Not only was he in a coma though, but the world at large THOUGHT HE WAS DEAD. So now we have to ask when the hell this propaganda campaign even happened? It isn't like you hear stories about exploits you did while you were asleep? Guards in the game actively discuss how Big Boss has "come back" so it isn't like they were pretending you were out doing shit the whole time. Was Venom Snake supposed to be this propaganda? If so I have to go back to "why the fuck do you make your enemy out to be an icon?"

Like if you put any thought into it it becomes ridiculously idiotic and really shows just how little actual thought Kojima put into any of these explanations and rationalizations.

The worst part? The simplest explanations would have been the best.

MGS 3 is the ending to the series. Or at best MGS 4 is never made. The Philosophers become the Patriots just as the ending timeline said. Big Boss goes on to become the legendary mercenary he is known as, the whole time slowly planting the seeds for his revenge. It was all laid out for us and didn't need any further elaboration. "What about the Patriots though?" Who knows? They're an illuminati group. They probably keep on keeping on. Just assume Snake saves Olgas SON, probably keeps doing Philanthropy shit, maybe kills Ocelot at some point, maybe not. Raiden becomes a family man. Meryl doesn't marry that pants shitter.

But even if you HAVE to have MGS4 and Peace Walker...it would have made a lot more sense for Big Boss to just agree to work with Cypher while planning on betraying them the whole time. Wouldn't it have made a lot more sense if Outer Heaven was the army Zero wanted him to lead for the Patriots? And then he ended up taking their army and turning it against them due to his charisma and legend? And with their army taken right from under them, their last ace up their sleeve is to send the unproven Solid Snake to take him down? Like that answers WAY more questions that mattered such as...how did Big Boss build a fortress nation without *anyone* noticing? How did he get the financing for it? Why was he even bothering with FOXHOUND while he had this thing going on behind the scenes? The only thing you'd have to retcon is that Big Boss wasn't actually Snakes handler during Operation Intrude N313, which isn't that unbelievable considering the Colonel in MGS2. Or hell, you could also make it that by sending Gray Fox and Snake he was trying to blow the whole lid wide open and actually expose the Patriots, and instead Snake went and destroyed the whole damn thing instead of aborting the mission when he told him to.

Like, anything would have been better than brainwashed medics and propaganda campaigns.

If you needed more than that to understand Big Boss you're honestly a fucking retard.

Remember that people complained that MGS V still didn't show us "Big Boss becoming the villain" despite the fact that this entire fucking speech was the ending to Peace Walker.

Yeah, people are fucking retarded.

 

[Dom Cruise]

MGS3 should have been the only Big Boss game.

Dude was 100x cooler before Kojima felt the need to keep showing him off. The vagueness of his exploits and the contradictons made him a mythical figure. There is a way to make inconsistencies work and Kojima trying to explain them wasn't it, especially when the explanation was "lol patriots made it up he was really an incel who couldn't get over his mommy dying and brainwashed a dude to make his military nation while he hid like a bitch."

MGS3 was enough. We saw him get the code name Big Boss. We saw the Philosophers/Patriots (who would end up controlling the world) use and throw away his mentor like she was nothing. Literally his motivation for soldiers being "free" and wanting to go to war with the world. If you needed more than that to understand Big Boss you're honestly a fucking retard.

I agree, but at the very least they should have waited until V before we played as Big Boss again (and it should have actually been Big Boss)

Imagine how epic it would have been to play as him again after over a decade, instead they blew their load with two different PSP games.

But yeah, 3 told us all we really needed to know about him.

Nah, it was something he realized could work so he went with it. Kojima doesn't plan things out and I doubt he was thinking about where The Cobras powers came from for a decade.

I'm not saying he thought about it constantly, just that he might have chewed it over every so often over the years before coming up with something.

Or it really was the backstory he always had in mind when creating those characters but just didn't think of a way or care enough to convey it in the game, but stuff like The End engaging in photosynthesis really does seem like what Snake Eater is implying looking back, so you wonder when exactly he came up with those ideas, it's an interesting mystery.

The idea that Big Boss legend was made up to make him the Patriots "icon" or whatever completely destroys the greater narrative of MGS.

MGS 4 establishes the legend of Big Boss was a patriot scheme to make him their "icon". This begs the question why the United States ever wanted to clone him in the first place or why exactly he was chosen as the template for the Genome Army.

"But the Patriots cloned him, not the United States." the fanboy will say.

To that I say Jim Houseman in MGS clearly states it was the United States that did the cloning, and Peace Walker firmly establishes that Cypher has not yet gotten the control over the government like they have by the time of MGS2. Clearly the greater United States had to have seen a vested interest in cloning Big Boss, and as far as we can tell, Big Boss didn't do shit after MGS3 until he decided to start MSF so once again why? And why wait nearly a decade? On top of this, Peace Walker establishes that Big Boss left the Patriots in the early 70's which begs the question why they would do a propaganda campaign to make him their "icon" if he was their active enemy.

"Because Zero had hoped he would come back to the fold." the fanboy will say.

Then you get MGS V that establishes that Big Boss was in a coma for a decade. Not only was he in a coma though, but the world at large THOUGHT HE WAS DEAD. So now we have to ask when the hell this propaganda campaign even happened? It isn't like you hear stories about exploits you did while you were asleep? Guards in the game actively discuss how Big Boss has "come back" so it isn't like they were pretending you were out doing shit the whole time. Was Venom Snake supposed to be this propaganda? If so I have to go back to "why the fuck do you make your enemy out to be an icon?"

Like if you put any thought into it it becomes ridiculously idiotic and really shows just how little actual thought Kojima put into any of these explanations and rationalizations.

The worst part? The simplest explanations would have been the best.

MGS 3 is the ending to the series. Or at best MGS 4 is never made. The Philosophers become the Patriots just as the ending timeline said. Big Boss goes on to become the legendary mercenary he is known as, the whole time slowly planting the seeds for his revenge. It was all laid out for us and didn't need any further elaboration. "What about the Patriots though?" Who knows? They're an illuminati group. They probably keep on keeping on. Just assume Snake saves Olgas SON, probably keeps doing Philanthropy shit, maybe kills Ocelot at some point, maybe not. Raiden becomes a family man. Meryl doesn't marry that pants shitter.

But even if you HAVE to have MGS4 and Peace Walker...it would have made a lot more sense for Big Boss to just agree to work with Cypher while planning on betraying them the whole time. Wouldn't it have made a lot more sense if Outer Heaven was the army Zero wanted him to lead for the Patriots? And then he ended up taking their army and turning it against them due to his charisma and legend? And with their army taken right from under them, their last ace up their sleeve is to send the unproven Solid Snake to take him down? Like that answers WAY more questions that mattered such as...how did Big Boss build a fortress nation without *anyone* noticing? How did he get the financing for it? Why was he even bothering with FOXHOUND while he had this thing going on behind the scenes? The only thing you'd have to retcon is that Big Boss wasn't actually Snakes handler during Operation Intrude N313, which isn't that unbelievable considering the Colonel in MGS2. Or hell, you could also make it that by sending Gray Fox and Snake he was trying to blow the whole lid wide open and actually expose the Patriots, and instead Snake went and destroyed the whole damn thing instead of aborting the mission when he told him to.

Like, anything would have been better than brainwashed medics and propaganda campaigns.



Remember that people complained that MGS V still didn't show us "Big Boss becoming the villain" despite the fact that this entire fucking speech was the ending to Peace Walker.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=eMilA34KGXw
Yeah, people are fucking retarded.

The series after 3 really doesn't make much sense and everything is just much cleaner and neater when you consider 3 the end.

 

[Friendly Primarina]

Am I the only one who felt bad for the RAY at the start of Rising? He was trying so hard

On an unrelated note, someone uploaded the entire Marine Commandant speech from MGS2, so if you ever wanted to hear the whole thing without contending with time limits/door transitions, now you can:

 

[Captain Syrup]

For me, MGS 4 is a game that has some of the worst and best of the whole series to me, its kind of a rollercoaster of quality for me.

I really disliked MGS4.

Am I the only one who felt bad for the RAY at the start of Rising?

Not after fighting 20 RAYs at once on Euro Extreme.

You forced my hand, now taste the consequences!

 

[Snekposter]

But yeah, 3 told us all we really needed to know about him.

Not sure those were entirely necessary things to know, or even desirable. Humorous, enjoyable, and campy, and entirely in line with the weird Cold Wars pulp theme the game has, but really, that's the infamous Big Boss, evil genius and mercenary mastermind?

 

[Captain Syrup]

but really, that's the infamous Big Boss, evil genius and mercenary mastermind?

It's the Jake Lloyd problem. It's difficult to angle a character that way.

 

[Bastard_Call]

What does this thread think of Futurasound Productions? Personally I think he epitomises the battered housewife all Kojima fans truly are and even in the most dogshit parts of V he'll find some way to justify why it's secretly genius. Kojima is without flaw. Even against an obviously strained development, everything Kojima does is calculated toward furthering his artistic vision.

V is lax on story because it's actually a ludo-narrative-harmonic-orgasmic injunction on the part of Kojima, don't you see? It's a story about Venom being withheld information. Incidentally, its much less expensive to record Sutherland's lines this way.

 

[Milwaukee Macho Man]

What does this thread think of Futurasound Productions? Personally I think he epitomises the battered housewife all Kojima fans truly are and even in the most dogshit parts of V he'll find some way to justify why it's secretly genius.

Nail on the head. I can't stand it when I'm recommended his videos tbh.

 

[draggs]

Stans cant acknowledge that MG and MG2 were not games made with deep lore in mind and MGS did okay creating a deep lore that meshed with them but then you get to MGS2 and it goes all the way off the rails and never gets back on.

 

[Captain Syrup]

and it goes all the way off the rails and never gets back on.

So young, so naive. I thought 4 would follow up on that "crucible of the White House" nonsense.

(Paul Eiding is worth his weight in gold. He really made you believe it.)

 

[Dom Cruise]

What does this thread think of Futurasound Productions? Personally I think he epitomises the battered housewife all Kojima fans truly are and even in the most dogshit parts of V he'll find some way to justify why it's secretly genius. Kojima is without flaw. Even against an obviously strained development, everything Kojima does is calculated toward furthering his artistic vision.

V is lax on story because it's actually a ludo-narrative-harmonic-orgasmic injunction on the part of Kojima, don't you see? It's a story about Venom being withheld information. Incidentally, its much less expensive to record Sutherland's lines this way.

He's interesting, but I also take him with a big grain of salt.

 

[Captain Syrup]

Incidentally, its much less expensive to record Sutherland's lines this way.

What a waste of everyone's time. Keifer's and mine.

They missed a trick with Venom. Have the player-created medic be the star of Ground Zeroes. Then we pick up with "Venom" in the mideast. Like a switcharoo of the Tanker and Plant missions.

 

[Dom Cruise]

For how much Kojima fanboys seem to despise Portable Ops, it was far less damaging to the greater lore and made much more sense than Peace Walker or MGS V IMO.

You have him actually working with Campbell, you have him as having somewhat of a history before MGS3 with Python. You see the seeds of what would become Foxhound and Outer Heaven. The game actually sets up the plot point of the MGS3 team being the Patriots.

Their autistic hatred of it because "it wasn't Kojima" is honestly baffling to me. Maybe I'm forgetting shit because I haven't played it since it released but yeah Kojima fanboys are dumb. I'd understand if they took each game as it's own thing or something, but all they do is talk about the lore and story of the overarching series.

Portable Ops is the only "canon" entry I haven't played at all, I remain curious about it due to the return of characters like Paramedic as well as a young Campbell.

It'd be cool if they remade Portable Ops and Peace Walker in the FOX engine.