Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty

A HIDEO KOJIMA GAME

Original Release Date: 2001

Publisher: Konami

Developer: Konami Entertainment Japan

Later released as: Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance

Games that inspired it: (see METAL GEAR SOLID)

Games it inspired: Mission Impossible: Operation Surma, Spy Fiction

Platform: Playstation 2, Xbox

Lead designer: Hideo Kojima

Written by: Hideo Kojima, Tomokazu Fukushima

If Metal Gear Solid 2 had been released without all of the new features it added to the Metal Gear Solid engine, it would have still squeaked through as a pretty good game with a story to rival the greatest Hollywood and its finest screenwriters have to offer.

But that didn't happen. Kojima spent many sleepless nights and a lot of time doing research to bring the follow up to the best stealth action game ever made up to that point. It would not simply be a sequel, it would take the basic controls established by the first game and add to them. Now, Snake can target more precisely from a first person mode and hang and shimmy from ledges.

Instead of calling in a new screenwriter and a new director after the success of the first game, Kojima decided to take the reins himself, he thought it was the only way he could ensure quality for the sequel. He was right.

Metal Gear Solid 2 without Hideo Kojima would probably not have turned out as well. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater will probably benefit from Kojima's continued tenure, but the future of the franchise after Snake Eater is questionable. Due to the tremendous success of the franchise, Konami will want to continue to release sequels, and Kojima has already said that he might not continue after 3, and he certainly will not be able to continue helming Metal Gear Solid sequels forever, but for now he has already cemented himself in history with the marvelous title that is Metal Gear Solid 2, even more complex and daring than the original (except without a villain as compelling as Metal Gear's Psycho Mantis) both in terms of story and gameplay.

The opening scene of the game takes place in New York on the Verezano Bridge, every square inch of it was painstakingly researched (the Metal Gear Solid team, including Hideo Kojima actually went to New York City and researched everything from the Verezano Bridge to Wall street) as shown in the Document of Metal Gear Solid 2 (an essential documentary for all Metal Gear Solid fans, it tells us how Metal Gear Solid 2 was created). As the game opens a figure is walking through the rain, which splashes off of him to create a realistic halo of water around him. The bridge is full of moving cars. All of a sudden the figure starts running and soon he disappears people who played Metal Gear Solid one will immediately be grateful of this fan service (this was the invisibility suit Snake had gotten in Metal Gear Solid's Alaska base) and newbies to the Metal Gear Solid universe will appreciate the coolness of it.

As the figure lands on the passing ship below, the invisibility turns off, and the figure appears to us for the first time. HE LOOKS SO COOL! He is Solid Snake. Your first mission: to take photographs of the new Metal Gear weapon. The significance, like the last one: Its nuclear capability. It is the ultimate doomsday weapon. The person or people who control it could hold entire world governments hostile with the threat of its horrible power. Because of this, this model is being guarded by the country's finest, a division of the Navy called the United States Marine corps.

As you land however, the ship is being taken over by a mysterious group. Unlike last time this time you are not working for the U.S. Government, you are a member of Philanthropy, a super secret division of the United Nations responsible for nuclear non proliferation.

The genius of the game extends to the details, the affiliation of a military man observed by binoculars is quickly ascertained by a detail observed by Snake "Russian. No marine barber touched that head of hair." he says. A woman has underarm hair. The first boss battle smacks you in the middle of a great interactive movie. Your enemy shines a spotlight in your eyes to mess up your aim, a blanket flies off a stack of supplies in the heavy winded rain. Sneak past hundreds of soldiers as they are being briefed about a top secret military weapon.

The opening cinema shows players that Revolver Ocelot, (A.K.A: The Perfect Shot) returns, twirling his gun as usual. The opening cinemas show us that he is observing Solid Snake but why? He lets him go twice. A public address system tells the enemies around you that the hallway you're in is going into lockdown and must be inspected immediately. The game cuts to a cinema, Snake's eyes move realistically in their sockets. His character model is much more convincing than Metal Gear Solid's model, he can emote with his face in many subtle ways to add to David Hayter's (the English translation's Solid Snake who as I mentioned before was also the screenwriter for X-Men and its sequel) raspy Clint-Eastwood-but-tougher voice.

Wrenches are thrown into the marvelous works to yield (if you could believe) even more marvels: soldiers who are broken from lecture for surprise exercises as you sneak by them "Now turn left, right". Your heart beating hard. Alerting a soldier, hiding in a bathroom, the soldier following you in. He tries to radio for backup, but you are so good that you shoot his radio so that it doesn't work, then you knock him down and shoot him in the head with a tranquilizer dart, then you drag his body and hide it in a hatch locker so that the patrolling guard won't see it. His talkie rings "Why haven't you reported in yet?" it says. More troops are sent in to investigate. You hide in the shadows and wait for them to leave. Taking an enemy hostage. Hitting one enemy standing in a crowd and hiding so that he blames his comrade for hitting him (reminiscent of the Stormtrooper distraction in Star Wars: A New Hope).

"Who Dares, Wins" a motto of the British Special Air Service used in the game is a perfect example of the motivations and work ethic of Solid Snake as it is of Hideo Kojima and his team of game developers. After the first half of the game many gamers got turned off because instead of controlling Solid Snake they had to control an entirely new character called Raiden, many gamers didn't like this new character, some even stopped playing because they felt that the game had lost its coolness.

I think these gamers are wrong, Raiden, if you go through the entire game and give him time to develop, is one of the Metal Gear Solid universe's best characters. He is a soldier, trained entirely in virtual reality (or maybe the truth is that he has an even stranger martial history) and so when he is first called into action and you start controlling him it is revealed that that is his first real mission ever. One of Hideo Kojima's brilliant characteristics as a story teller is how he fully fleshes out each character, from their past to their motivations, their loves, their hates, their fears, and their goals for the future.

You can go through the entire game without killing one person (you can use a dart gun which puts people to sleep), or by killing many. If you kill one person as Raiden the next time you call Rose on the Codec (a communications device in which you can chat with several characters by inputting their frequency), Raiden will grieve and talk about the gravity of having taken a life. This is unprecedented, there are countless games where a character can kill or maim hundreds of others and never once regrets his violent actions, let alone reflects on them. Like the death of Aeris is FINAL FANTASY VII this is a milestone because it is one of the only times when a videogame character has reflected emotions as real as those in the finest Hollywood pictures.

Once you get to the bridge which leads into Shell 2, you meet Solidus Snake (former President George Sears), a villain who can artificially increase his muscle size with a special armored suit. You fight him on a connecting bridge in quite an amazing battle, he is in a Harrier jet, you are on the bridge and Solid Snake is in a helicopter, throwing down items for you to use. When the battle is over the bridge is all messed up and you have to find a way to cross its burning flotsam remains to get to the other side. But like Miyamoto, Kojima urges you to proceed cautiously, if you walk too fast from one side to the other you can slip on bird poop and die (honestly!!!). But on the other hand, if you move too hesitantly where there is no real danger in moving quickly then your weight will buckle the panels below you and you will fall along with them. This keeps you constantly on your toes when playing the game, always keeping you thinking.

Raiden is an almost universally reviled character, but I like him, sure he is no angel (he has lifted his hand to his wife) and he might look like a woman (In a hilarious scene the President walks up to Raiden grabs his crotch area, and surprisedly states "You're a man!"). In a staggering move too bold to be a coincidence, Jack's (Raiden's real name is Jack) girlfriend is on the mission as an aide to him. But the reason why Raiden has been set up to be the player character is that in Metal Gear Solid 2, Solid Snake's role in the story is as a legend, and as a legend he has to be held somewhat in awe so therefore he is made aloof (read: beyond the player's control). The player is Raiden, the kid newbie (read: Luke Skywalker) and Solid Snake is the father figure (read: Obi Wan Kenobi) that must guide him through, after all players that play the game through its end will know that the Colonel is not who he seems.

Then there is a scene after Raiden is captured that he is stripped naked. Love it or hate it, this is a classic scene, and it is one of the images that define Metal Gear Solid 2. You never get to see his crotch (regardless what you make him do, cartwheels, punching) he always finds a way to cover his crotch), but many guys detest his scene. Many female videogame players I've talked to enjoy it, they get aroused by it. I just think it's a good scene, the image of Raiden naked isn't burned into my mind, I just view it in a sexually neutral sense.

What I don't like about that part of the game is that Raiden can't choke people or hang from ledges while he is naked, which leads us to believe he'd rather die to keep the game M rated than allow us to take a peek at his crotch (and why killing is more acceptable in entertainment than a simple penis is one of the flaws of our rating systems and the FCC).

"I see men die, I see men hit, but I don't feel a thing for them." Raiden says to Rose, this quote reflects are feelings as we shoot and kill characters not only in Metal Gear Solid 2, but in any other game. Have we ever stopped to consider anything about these characters we are killing in a game, no, but Hideo Kojima, through Raiden, inspires us to think about this.

One of the villains, Vamp is a bisexual he was a lover of Fortune's father. Now Vamp has a double meaning because it means he is a vampire as well as being bisexual. Fortune is a woman who cannot die. Bullets shot at her don't hit her but swerve around her. In a brilliant move at one point in the game Raiden shoots at Fortune so that the bullet swerves around her and hits another character who would have otherwise evaded the bullet if the gun was pointed directly at him.

There is even a confession of incest involved with another one of the hero characters and it is very shocking, revolting, and also touching at the same time.

There are so many things to do in Metal Gear Solid 2, you can even get peed on!

The game isn't perfect, the facial animations are stiff and robotic, especially in Codec conversations. Also, you will be holding your own urine during several portions of the game, some of the cutscenes can run over thirty minutes in length! That's a lot of time in which control is out of the players hands, but the excellent writing by Hideo Kojima and Tomokazu Fukujima which doles out not only first rate action sequences, but ideas! Suffice it to say that Metal Gear Solid 2 gets very heady near the end, especially more so than the "save the world" theme of the first Metal Gear Solid, and that is why, in my opinion Metal Gear Solid 2 is superior to its predecessor (although its predecessor is still a good enough game to be considered a classic).

"What you think you see is only as real as your brain tells you it is." "Its not whether you were right or wrong but how much faith you are willing to have, that decides the future."

And before Lost in Translation, Raiden beat Bill Murray to the punch with his "This is for your ears only." line to Rose.

Kris Zimmerman directed the U.S. dialogue and he did a stellar job, the voice acting is surprisingly first rate and very well performed.

In the credits there is also thanks given to Felix Dennis' FHM magazine "for supplying the posters." Throughout the game there are images of scantily clad women in the lockers and some of the walls, if you take pictures of all of them during the tanker stage and try to send him to Otacon when you get to the computer terminal he will respond appropriately ;-).

"Life isn't just about passing your genes, you can leave behind much more than DNA through art, movies games what we seen, felt, anger joy, sorrow, these are the things we will pass on, those are the things I live for.. building the future and keeping the past alive are one in the same thing" a beautiful quote from Solid Snake to end the game.

There is a bit of sadness when Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty ends, and this is because Kojima and Fukushima's writing, which fully rounds out each character, makes us form a powerful emotional connection to them. This game is a work of emotional and adrenaline art.

A GREAT MOMENT: Sniping the area with Snake of enemies to allow Emma to cross a narrow walkway, and hearing her die realizing that you did not shoot out a mine!