Hideo Kojima's original idea for Metal Gear Solid 5 featured The Boss, Cobra unit
- Posted December 14th, 2011 at 11:22 EDT by Mike Harradence
- 8 Comments
Metal Gear mastermind Hideo Kojima has let slip that one of the original ideas floating around for a potential Metal Gear Solid 5 centred on The Boss and the legendary Cobra unit during the invasion of Normandy.
Speaking in the recent Metal Gear Rising vidoc, Kojima revealed that the idea was pitched to his development team after Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots shipped in summer 2008.
“Metal Gear Solid 4 wrapped up in 2008, and the dev team took post-project time off right after that. But, of course, we were in a situation where we had to start planning for MGS5. So I started coming up with several ideas,” he commented.
“I had several ideas for a game featuring The Boss and the Cobra Unit during the invasion of Normandy. I then handed these plans over to the team so they could take over and make the game. I presented my ideas to the team during the summer of 2008. However, simply dropping MGS5 on the younger staff members was a bit heavy and there was resistance to doing it without my involvement.”
The Boss and the Cobra unit featured in Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, with the latter serving as boss battles for Naked Snake. The unit was established in World War II by The Boss, and took part in a mission during the Normandy landings, as revealed during the climax of Snake Eater.
Kojima went on to reveal he was working on a new project while pitching his idea for MGS5, and was keen to have his staff take charge of the new title. However, this idea was met with some resistance from the team, and it was then that the idea of Metal Gear Rising was conceived.
“At the time, I was working on a new project. It was during the planning phase of that project and I wanted the staff to take charge of the new title,” Kojima explained.
“There was resistance to that idea, though. It was then that someone proposed the idea for what would become Rising. It was a game based on Raiden’s story, since MGS5 had too much weight to it. It would be a side story that the team felt more comfortable working with.”
Metal Gear Solid 5 has yet to be announced, though Kojima has said he is happy to continue to make new games in the series provided fans want them.
via VG247
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Syphon_Filter |
Syphon_Filter2- 7:43am EST - December 14th, 2011
- 1
Yeah, its great idea. MGS3 had the greatest charaters.
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Anim3Fr33K
- 8:17am EST - December 14th, 2011
- 2
Heck yes! I am 100% behind this idea, i really hope it comes to pass and dosent get shelfed for another Snake entry, i love snake but id love to see more of the boss and the cobras.
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Dantess
- 1:24pm EST - December 14th, 2011
- 4
This would be a great idea for MGS5, after all MGS3 was an uber-prequel and then we came back to the future with MGS4. Why not go even further back to the Bosses rise to fame? Imagine that- a stealth game set in World War II, with the Cobra Unit at your disposal!
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honomaru
- 2:12pm EST - December 14th, 2011
- 5
Um guys...I'm pretty sure that idea is dead. Watch the documentary on youtube. He dropped that idea before the team even started work on Rising. He was most likely implying that it was one of the ideas he pitched to the team but they were intimidated by doing a whole new MGS without him so he dropped it. That's why he's talking about it so freely. If MGS5 were going in that direction he'd probably be a little more tight lipped.
New Rising is horrible though...that's no lie. I watched the entire 25 minutes documentary and while im more impressed with the Platinum take on the game now than I was before, the animation still looks "stovepipe" stiff compared to the old look of the game. The story is lame too.
Oh Raiden...why do the good die so young? The PMCs best represent my interest in the game now...well the pmcs after Raiden is done with them that is. -
1solidsnake |
solid1snake67- 7:55pm EST - December 14th, 2011
- 6
as long as its not like that horrid raiden game, it's gonna be great. don't get me wrong it looks cool slashing but it's not metal gear, and im gonna like to have a new MGS game
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The GhosT
- 12:02am EST - February 2nd, 2012
- 8
I am completely with Dantess. Since I played PW, I've wanted more. Not of the same, but I've wanted more as in "we should have had more from the beginning". NOW PREPARE YOURSELF FOR THE MOST EPIC MGS ARTICLE/ESSAY YOU'VE EVER READ ABOUT WHAT ANNOYS ME MOST IN MGS RECENTLY BEFORE I GIVE MY INPUT TO MGS5. JUST SKIP IF YOU COULDN'T GIVE A S*** ABOUT MY OPINION RATHER THAN CRITICISE ME FOR THE ACTUAL OPINION AND SAY I'M BUTT-HURT. Unlike the author of this article, I AM an old fan since the beginning and have a lot to say due the change in my favourite game franchise.
Although PW game was good for a PSP game, it wasn't what I was expecting. It was redundant and really imparted nothing we didn't already know. I didn't really learn anything I couldn't have guessed myself. It didn't really answer anything about The Boss that wasn't obvious already and was a waste of a game. It should have been about the creation of Outer Heaven and Big Boss recruiting Grey Fox etc. rather than the MSF. When PW ended with "call me: Big Boss!", that's when the game we SHOULD have had should have actually started. Yeah, it was a great game and it had its emotional moments at parts, but I'm afraid MGS has been getting too anime-like in recent years and this is the reason I feel so detached: because of what Kojima has done to the series. It started with a very light introduction in MGS1 mentioning Japan and having a Japanese character and a few references to things the creator was involved in or whatever (Policenauts posters, Otacon's name standing for Otaku convention, etc.) but it was LIGHT. Primarily (as any old fan should know), and much to Kojima's original intentions, the game was an action game very much directed and crafted in the same fashion as a WESTERN thriller film. That was what Kojima said his main influences were and were his ORIGINAL INTENTIONS. Then MGS2 pulled in Mr. Androgynous and loads of people with white hair, along with pictures of Japanese people in lockers and Snake bashing the bishop like a creepy Japanese train passenger. Anyway, they were also references, and didn't overtake the game or anything, but it wasn't as good as MGS1, the classic, although don't get me wrong: it was AMAZING, still a 10/10. MGS3 now... Kerotans, watching women get changed, CONSTANT, INCESSANT gossip about Japan from Para-Medic, nut-grabbing, random inexplicable hand gestures from Ocelot that although are cool, are so anime-inspired and out of place through the eyes of an old fan; loads of poo like that. But the game was fantastic, full of raw-emotion and introduced one of the best characters: The Boss. But then Portable Ops was a failure, that should have been destroyed due to what it did to Grey Fox, making him look (ironically) exactly like Rikimaru in the avatar Dantess is using himself, yet made him a whiny, Dante-looking pansy. Last time I checked, he was half-Vietnamese (retconned thanks to PO), half-German, and looked like the South American bloke from Predator who cuts his chest with a knife, and had a black man's voice over (marvellously acted by Greg Eagles, I must say- also ruined in Twin Snakes along with the mess of Mei Ling and Naomi Hunter's voice in MGS4. OK, Mei Ling was never meant to sound Chinese in the first place, but if you make a mistake, at least consistently stick with it rather than correct a mistake four games down the line and make her American, insinuating she faked the accent to score guys. And Naomi... first you were English, reserved and had character and then you turned into a Final-Fantasy look-a-like s*** with an American accent in MGS4? No. Wow, longest amount of words in brackets ever). And they blatantly did this because they probably want him to allude to Raiden somewhere down the line, since Raiden suddenly became all obsessed with the "Ninja". Just no. Perhaps they will try to write off that Raiden is a clone of Grey Fox since Kojima has such a raging stick for making "everyone related" in the end and having someone somehow tie-in to someone else down the line (Huey looking and sounding EXACTLY like his grandson...). I could actually deal with that, since it's believable that if they would try to recreate the greatest soldier with Big Boss, they would attempt to clone the "perfect soldier" Grey Fox was. Anyway, I digress even further. So, then MGS4 was beginning to get ridiculous. The B&B Corp. Worst bosses ever. Just a complete rip-off (NOT METAPHORICAL AND DEEP ALLUSION) of Foxhound, with no character. Every one of them had the same boring backstory, they all died by turning to stone va*inas and were unoriginal. One of the chief aspects of what made MGS great over the years were the best bosses in gaming history (MGS1, again, getting it spot-on- you actually LIKED and sometimes ROOTED for the bad guys... what other game does that for you?), but MGS4 was terrible for bosses. It was a good game, but the wealth of guns was unnecessary, felt "un-stealthy" and I really don't want to start on the cringeworthiness of the MAJOR anime influences on this game. It was getting ridiculous by the end. There were typical "pervy Snake" moments, like dropping a pen and bending down to look down Naomi's top, but then there was Sunny. Please, never put that little s*** in another game. That cringe-worthy "animeness" works for Japan, Kojima, but you've lost all sense of what you set out to make since MGS1. It's a fantastic game, don't get me wrong, also worthy of 10/10, but it was straying so much from what Metal Gear Solid actually was it was beginning to get annoying. A bad plane-wedding scene at the end? COME ON, PLEASE!!!! PLEASE! WHY?! That was so cringe-worthy. Everyone laughs at the end at the dumb monkey (and oh Jeez, don't get me started on that monkey! It's an ugly, deformed mess! Again, why?!) like it's some cheesy 80s adventure movie?! So embarrassing. And I'm not even gonna go down the route of how he messed up Raiden's character so severely in MGS4. Wow. I don't care what little 14 year old who's only just started getting into MGS has to say, it was a ridiculous inclusion. Along with Johnny marrying Meryl. Wow. I somehow managed to get used to and actually COME TO LIKE Raiden in MGS2, because as I got a little wiser I realised that a younger, more naive and green inclusion was good for the plot. I actually liked Snake and Raiden as a team since they contrasted each other well and appreciated Raiden's back-story. Even his romance with Rose I came around to. But to turn him into a Grey Fox wannabe was an insult. And worse still, it resulted in a game that was once meant to be a bridge of a gap between MGS2 and 4 but then because they realised they had no premise on which to make it worth a whole game, they made it some ballistically pants hack 'n' slash like DMC where Raiden's character is even further demolished into someone he would never have been. I mean, he actually uses his Jack the Ripper persona in the new game and trailer? C'mon, please. He hated that nickname even when he was a child soldier, why would he embrace it after the events of MGS4, where Solid Snake did everything and risked EVERYTHING to ensure the world's safety, and Raiden gets his son and wife back, and decide to go out chopping away at things and pick up and throw MG:Rays around? Wow. Anyway, before I criticise that too, back to the anime stuff. It was embarrassing. Scenes with Sunny making weird moaning noises and "hmmm", "oh?" and "aaah" sounds just looked like I was looking at Final Fantasy, at that annoying pink-haired tart from FF13. THEY ALL LOOK THE SAME!
So, we then get Peace Walker. We have a little girl who, although she's meant to be from Costa Rica (which insinuates brown skin and hair), looks like a blonde-haired Japanese, teenage, schoolgirl-slave robot with starlit eyes... who we can take pictures of. And see in her underwear. And fondle. Seriously? We may as well have a mini-game where we hammer the X button to every thrust as Sonny gags on The End. And Kaz's name is Japanese. He lived in Japan. His mother was Japanese (even though he also looks FULLY white), and he turned androgynous wearing a feminine scarf. YES! WE GET IT THAT EVERYONE IS SOMEHOW CONNECTED TO JAPAN, KOJIMA! Way to destroy all mysticism. Oh, wait, we get to fondle him too. And then there's Strangelove (another unnecessary addition). Looks also like Rikimaru in that avatar but with glasses and a mouth. Yes, in Japan, it seems EVERYONE has white hair and looks the same, boy OR girl. Dante is Rikimaru: is Raiden: is Sonny: is Olga: is Storm (FF13): is Strangelove: is Grey Fox (according to PO and the revamped artwork of Grey Fox in Subsistence's MG2 port- covering your mistakes there, eh, Kojima?): is Nero (DMC 4) etc, etc. It's irritating and isn't what MGS started out to be. I like subtle references that pay homage to the brilliant creator and where he's from, what he's proud of, etc. NOT turning the game into some anime-wannabe. It doesn't work here in the west and that's why my favourites actually go down in order of when they were made: MGS1, 2, 3, 4, PW. The originals had spirit, and we need that back before MSG5 is made because I won't forgive Kojima if he messes it up, seriously.
SO... much to the reader's delight, I move onto the actual topic at hand: MGS5. MGS5 needs to be a remake of MG and then 6 needs to be a remake of MG2. And the reasons why are as follows:
* It will give Kojima a chance to mend the many retcons he had created, especially the issues with Grey Fox: DOES he look white or half-Vietnamese like he was meant to and suited more? Did Big Boss really meet him in Vietnam, when he was imprisoned for being half-white, AND was meant to be born in a different time period and all that other stuff? I personally prefer the Vietnamese thing, since it gives his character a bit of variety and means it's another character that doesn't have to look like Dante. But Kojima would never heed that opinion. I hate PO for what it did to my favourite character.
Also, Liquid said in MGS1 that Big Boss was in his late 50s when he went in for the Les Enfants Terrible Project, and we later find out that was an impossibility. How was Liquid misinformed, surely that doesn't make sense?
* It's a chance for Kojima to bring the greatness of the old games to a revived look and feel (much needed if you ask me and others) and to the new generation of gamers and new MG fans. He would tenfold his profit if he were to make these two games. But it has to be done in old-school MGS1 style (plotwise and character development wise) with the 3d camera of MGS4.
* It's a brilliant opportunity for some major fan-service. With MG1 and 2 remade, we can have THE BEST characters of all games in one WONDERFUL masterpiece. As long as it's not babied-up and filled with those moments where the characters gaze off with starry eyes like the annoying kids that have come to dominate the series lately. This needs to be dark, emotional and raw. Everything MGS1 was, with the nostalgic intensity of The Boss & Naked Snake in MGS3, as well as the power in relationships between Snake and Big Boss at the end of MGS4. Scenes like that are what we want. Also, it's fan-service in the sense that we haven't had a MGS game with a young Solid Snake since MGS2 and we played as him for only a small section of the game which angered many fans. But here, we can have a fully-playable, young and flexible (calm down, girls) Snake with Campbell- the best codec mission advisor ever- back as our mission support! Can you imagine that? How nostalgic would it be?! And our nemesis is BIG BOSS HIMSELF! And guess who's a side character to replace Otacon? Grey Fox! As a side-running narrative, Snake and Grey Fox's relationship could be explored and it would make for the most powerful scene of any MGS game: a fight in a minefield that would knock the pants off the Liquid Ocelot vs. Snake scene in MGS4. Imagine that? It's almost UNimaginable due to the epicness of that scene. Set in the thunder and rain (a good allusion to a later Raiden just for Kojima's sake because you know he'd want him in there somewhere), and with no other than Greg Eagles, the original voice actor to play as Frank Jaeger. I mean, you couldn't ask for more of a MGS game than that. Campbell, Big Boss, Solid Snake, Grey Fox. Best game ever. And not to mention perhaps a nod to Liquid or something. It's an opportunity for Kojima to really tie up the series and I would be happy for him to rewrite some of the story if it means he could make it the game it needs to be. I want grey corridors and metal warehouses. Noisy grates and trucks to hide under. Everything that made MG1, 2 and MGS1 what they were. It could be perfect. But it will probably include a Raiden-voiced Grey Fox, a young Snake with white hair (?- somehow he would include white hair), and something dumb like that.
Richard Doyle needs to reprise his role as Big Boss too. Please, Kojima, please.Oh, and the Cobra Unit thing sounds good, but we need remakes of Mg1 and 2 otherwise a new series of characters and plot completely.
If you got through this, wow. I commend you. I await the insults since I now realised I've written more than the article itself. Good article by the way, it was a good read.Man, I thought I'd shy'd away from MG lately but this article brought it back. Good to know someone else feels the same way.
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