On the one hand, the Metal Gear storyline can get quite intellectual in places, like Metal Gear Solid 2’s somewhat prophetic view of the internet. On the other, it has a vampire-like man who’s called Vamp because he’s bisexual and a cowboy possessed by his transplanted arm.
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Series creator Hideo Kojima also liked to mess with his fans’ expectations, like pretending ' The Phantom Pain' wasn't MGS5 and was being made by 'Moby Dick Studios'. So, it’s no surprise that the fans have tried to get one step ahead of him by analyzing his work, finding stray story threads, and coming up with these popular Metal Gear theories.
9 Quiet is Sniper Wolf’s Mother
The Two Snipers are Related
- The two are similarly skilled at sniping.
- Sniper Wolf comes from the same continent as Quiet's last known whereabouts.
In Metal Gear Solid, one of the FOXHOUND members that went rogue was Sniper Wolf. As her codename suggests, she’s an expert sniper. Before then, she was a young Kurdish girl from Iraq who was adopted off of the battlefield by ‘Saladin’, aka Big Boss, and raised within his outposts as a child soldier. But what if her sniping skills came from nature rather than nurture?
MGS5 had its own expert sniper in Quiet. Maybe before she’d become part of Diamond Dogs and XOF, she was the mother of Sniper Wolf. It would have to be before the events of the game, as Sniper Wolf was born in 1976, and Quiet disappeared in Afghanistan in 1984. Why she’d have a child in Iraq, and whether she was old enough to have one at the time, haven’t been figured out yet.
8 Chico is Quiet
Chico Survived and Transitioned to Get Revenge
- They have vaguely similar facial features.
- Kojima Productions previously planned to bring Chico back in a role similar to that of Quiet's.
It’d be easier to join the dots for Sniper Wolf’s parentage than for this curious theory. Introduced in MGS: Peace Walker, Chico was a child soldier in the Sandinistas. He’d largely talk to Big Boss about cryptids and other mysterious monsters, tying into the Monster Hunter boss fights. Ground Zeroes took him in a darker direction where, after being tortured, he died during the bombing of Mother Base.
Kojima Productions did consider bringing him back as a male, melee-based equivalent to Quiet. He ultimately didn’t make it in, but it got fans thinking. Perhaps KojiPro combined Chico’s design into Quiet by making her trans? Chico transitioned into Quiet and sought revenge against Big Boss. This got quashed pretty quickly by Quiet’s VA and model Stefanie Joosten. Interesting as it is, the series is still waiting for its first trans character.
7 The Twins Snakes is Otacon’s Recollection of Events
The Gamecube Remake is How Otacon Remembers MGS1
- There are different items in the Remake compared to the original, and later games include both.
- Otacon's excitement at Snake's recollection of his stunts.
With MGS3 currently being remade as Metal Gear Solid Δ, fans are wondering if more games will be remade, or re-remade in the case of MGS1. It was previously remade as Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes for the Gamecube, which had new cutscenes that cranked the action up to 11. For example, Solid Snake backflips off of a missile to fire a Stinger at a helicopter. But it led to a question: how did MGS1 actually happen?
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Did it follow the PS1 game’s events? Or was the remake canon? MGS4’s return to Shadow Moses played it coy by hiding MGS1’s Policenauts poster under Twin Snakes’ Zone of the Enders: The 2nd Runner poster. Fans have settled the difference by saying Twin Snakes is Otacon’s interpretation of the game’s events, as he reacted to Snake’s memories of MGS1 rather excitedly. He imagined the events in a more dramatic way than Snake did.
6 Solidus Snake and Senator Armstrong Knew Each Other
Armstrong May Have Been Solidus' Protégé
- The two served as politicians with similar goals.
- Armstrong's plan involves child soldiers trained with Solidus Snake's methods.
Metal Gear Rising saw Raiden discover the private military company, World Marshal, was planning to start a fresh war on terror. But it was being done so that World Marshal’s primary shareholder, Senator Armstrong, could get into power and “end war as a business”. But he’d still need soldiers, and these would come via cyborgs powered by brains taken from impoverished children.
They’d be raised in a virtual environment based on the training George Sears, aka Solidus Snake, provided for his child troops in the Liberian Civil War. Why would he make that specific choice? Perhaps because Armstrong knew Solidus? Solidus could’ve known Armstrong back when he was President and thus passed on what he knew to the then-upcoming politician. It’s possible, maybe even plausible. Though it’s unlikely to become canon.
5 Raiden Never Escaped the Patriots
The Patriots Kept Controlling Raiden's Life
- The Patriots followed the other protagonists and NPCs.
- They had previously succeeded at capturing him, turning him into a cyborg before his 'escape'.
Raiden’s attempts to ignore his time as a child soldier under Solidus made him easier to manipulate by the Patriots. He eventually accepted his past and took what he learned from Solidus to (literally) cut his ties with him. Then he took control of his own life and moved on. Or did he? The Patriots were still controlling things behind the scenes in MGS4, working through Drebin and the Rat Patrol without their knowledge.
They could’ve been controlling Raiden too. Rose did keep her and their son at a distance due to Raiden being a security risk and for his own erratic behavior. His personal downward spiral could’ve also been engineered to make him easier to capture when he rescued Sunny from their clutches. They’d lose her as a bargaining chip but gain him as an unwitting mole into Big Mama’s operations. He wasn’t free until the Patriots were gone for good.
4 Otacon is The Hero
The Nerdy Hacker Played The Biggest Role in Defeating the Patriots
- His computing hacking abilities and technical know-how have made him an important character in the plot.
- He's also saved multiple lives, including Solid Snake's, and was the one who ultimately destroyed the Patriots.
Big Boss, Solid Snake, and Raiden may be the characters that save the day, yet the most important character to the Solid games is arguably Hal ‘Otacon’ Emmerich. He started off as an engineer manipulated into making a “nuclear-equipped, walking deathmobile”. The “Emmerich Curse” meant he’d be as doomed to help make machines of misery as his father (Sahelanthropus) and grandfather (the atom bomb) were.
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But by the end of MGS1, he saved Snake’s life numerous times and told him how to destroy REX. Then, grieving the death of his foster sister, he still managed to save 30+ hostages from the Big Shell in MGS2. Then he completed the FOXALIVE virus (co-written by Sunny and his late sister Emma) that ended the Patriots once and for all as well. Without Otacon, the world might have remained in the Patriots’ thrall, making him a true hero.
3 Solid Snake is The Villain
The Protagonist Isn't Strictly a Good Guy
- He's reluctant to receive praise for his actions as he knows they've hurt others in the process.
- He was also used largely as a tool by higher powers before breaking out on his own.
Conversely, Snake avoids describing himself as a hero. He flat-out denies the title in MGS4 (“I’m no hero. Never was”), scoffed at the idea in MGS1 (“I’m just a man who’s good at what he does: killing”), and even admitted his efforts in MGS2 were no different to terrorism. These could be written off as him being morose about his legacy or knowing it all too well.
He saved the world from nuclear threats and an oil crisis. But he was being used as a tool, either by Big Boss against the Patriots (Metal Gear) or vice versa (MG2). His actions also cost people their lives and livelihoods, like Kyle Schneider, Grey Fox, and Naomi Hunter. So, no matter how much they were for the best, he could never honestly call himself a “hero”. But Snake is more of an anti-hero than an outright villain.
2 The Games Are Simulations
MGS1, 2, 3, and GBC are VR Missions
- The series incorporated its VR Missions into the plot, and constantly breaks the 4th wall.
- MGS1 and MGS2's Tanker Chapter have canonically been turned into VR Mission in-lore.
The series has been breaking the 4th wall since MG1, where a rumbled Big Boss orders Snake to “turn off the console!”. The series has since used nearly every part of its device’s hardware to mess with players in one way or another. So, it’s no wonder that fans may also think the games are VR simulations, which is actually partially canon. If players play the Tanker-Plant campaign, Raiden will reveal he went through a VR simulation of the Tanker incident.
But he won’t mention it if players only play the Plant chapter. He also went through VR missions based on MGS1, and possibly the Game Boy Color MGS game (the end of the Special Missions mentions ‘Jack’, aka Raiden). MGS3 may also be a simulation, as the modern-day Colonel Campbell turns up in a game set in the 1960s and chastises the player if they cause any ‘Time Paradoxes’. So, whatever the player does may just be emulations of canon events.
1 Never Be Game Over!
Kojima Never Left Konami
- MGS5 has incomplete sections ('Kingdom of the Flies' finale) and unused assets ('Chapter 3: Peace' title card).
- Kojima had previously hidden cryptic clues in his work or tried to pull the wool over fans' eyes.
MGS5 was left with a bunch of unfinished content due to its chaotic development, which eventually saw Kojima and much of his team ousted from Konami. They would eventually find a new home in the new Kojima Productions, where they’d make Death Stranding. But like ‘Moby Dick Studios’, his departure had to be another publicity stunt. He hadn’t really left Konami. Death Stranding was just a spin-off in between finishing up MGS5.
They formed a subreddit, ‘Never Be Game Over’, and pored over details from MGS5, Death Stranding, their trailer footage, and even from Kojima’s Twitter for clues. But this wasn't the case. Kojima and co had left, and MGS5's story content would be left unfinished in favor of microtransactions and online updates. 'Never Be Game Over' was ultimately a phantom pain in itself, as fans were left hurting over MGS5's missing features.