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Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty

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Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
Logo.
Logo.
Developer(s)Konami Computer Entertainment Japan (West)
Publisher(s)Konami
Designer(s)Hideo Kojima (producer, writer, director)
Platform(s)PlayStation 2
ReleaseNovember 14, 2001 (NA)
November 29, 2001 (JP)
March 8, 2002 (EU)
May 30, 2002 (KR)
Genre(s)Stealth action
Mode(s)Single player

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (commonly abbreviated MGS2) is a stealth-based game that was developed and published by Konami for the PlayStation 2 in 2001. Directed by Hideo Kojima, it is the fourth game in the Metal Gear series and the sequel to the critical and consumer success Metal Gear Solid. Its release was followed by Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater.

Following a strategy used to promote the original Metal Gear Solid in 1998, a movie-like trailer for the game was shown at E3, in 2000. Critics praised the game's level of graphical detail, in particular the use of in-game graphics to render plot-driving cut scenes. The gameplay is similar to that of Metal Gear Solid. New features, however, allow players to use first-person view to aim weapons, and to tranquilize enemies instead of killing them.

As a result of the promising trailer, and because the original MGS was so highly regarded, there was a high level of anticipation surrounding MGS2's release.

Plot synopsis

Template:Spoiler

Tanker Chapter

The story opens in late 2007 (presumably sometime during or after August 8), two years after the events of Metal Gear Solid, on the George Washington Bridge in New York City. Solid Snake and Otacon now belong to Philanthropy, a UN-recognized fringe organization formed in order to eliminate the various Metal Gears constructed due to Revolver Ocelot's distribution of the Metal Gear REX blueprints on the black market. Snake, aided by Otacon via codec, is investigating the new Metal Gear RAY being developed by the Marines to guard against the proliferation of REXes. While the Marines transport RAY offshore aboard the oil tanker U.S.S. Discovery for testing, soldiers invade the ship by helicopter and dispose of all the Marines on duty above decks.

The mission turns bad rapidly as these troops, formerly of the Russian military and led by the disgraced Colonel Sergei Gurlukovich, seize the tanker and plant explosives aboard it. Snake personally runs into Gurlukovich's daughter Olga, and disables her with a tranquiliser gun, before proceeding into the ship's hold. A large unit of Marines is recieving a briefing from Scott Dolph, their commander, on the new RAY and its role, at the conclusion of which Ocelot strides on stage, applauding. Gurlukovich and his troops descend, taking Dolph hostage, leading to a Mexican standoff between the forces. The tension is broken as Ocelot betrays Gurlukovich, kills Dolph, and detonates the explosives, advising the remaining US and Russian soldiers to swim for shore if they value their lives.

During the ensuing carnage, as Ocelot prepares to board RAY, Liquid's personality reasserts itself through the arm which had been taken to replace Ocelot's own. He takes a moment to mock his rapidly aging brother before boarding RAY, carving the ship in two, and escaping. Ocelot's personality reasserts itself as he advises Solidus Snake (he calls Solidus "Mr. President", though he is no longer the president of the United States anymore at the time. The script provided in The Document of Metal Gear Solid 2 says that he is talking to Solidus) that their mission has been successful.

Plant Chapter

This chapter begins two more years after the Tanker incident on April 29, 2009, as video game players assume the role of Raiden/Jack/Snake. Snake is a FOXHOUND operative whose mission is to rescue the President and other hostages being held captive by a terrorist group aided by former Soviet soldiers in the Big Shell, a decontamination facility erected at sea to clean up the oil spill which resulted from the sinking of the Discovery. He is aided by his girlfriend Rosemary as data manager, and Colonel Roy Campbell as the mission commander.

Raiden discovers that the Big Shell is nothing but elaborate camoflage for the development of an advanced mobile fortress dubbed Arsenal Gear. Solidus Snake, with the assistance of the remnants of Gurlukovich's private army (led by Olga) and Ocelot (who has claimed that Snake was responsible for the sinking of Discovery) has seized the facility and is attempting to use it to fight the enigmatic Patriots responsible for the theft of RAY. Following an elaborate sequence of double-crosses it is revealed that Raiden and Olga have each been coerced - directly or indirectly - into assisting the Patriots in eliminating Solidus. Meanwhile, Snake is aboard, battling both sides in an attempt to destroy Arsenal. To this goal he is assisted by Otacon, and his sister Emma, who designs a computer virus which should disable Arsenal.

Once again, Ocelot reveals himself to be a double-agent, trying to kill his allies on behalf of the Patriots. Liquid resufacing himself through declares his intention to use RAY to take on the Patriots, and goads Snake into following him while setting Arsenal Gear on a collision coarse with New York City. After it comes to rest, the Patriots, and their goal - control of the dissemination of information, in order to ensure an Orwellian peace - are revealed. Raiden eliminates Solidus, who hoped to use Raiden's implants to identify the Patriots, atop Federal Hall.

After the final credits roll, it is shown that Otacon is able to decode the virus disc and uncover its information. The information on the disc revealed the identities of all twelve members of the Wisemen's Committee-- one name belonging to one of Snake and Otacon's contributors; and that The Patriots did reside in Manhattan, but have been dead for about a century.

Excised Plot Details

Solid Snake inside the tanker.

The game plan and script reveal some aspects of the plot which are left unclear or confusing during the game itself, or are just interesting to know. Both are available on The Document of Metal Gear Solid 2 disc, though the game plan is only in Japanese:

  • Raiden's field commander was named Daniel Quinn ("Colonel"). His support team consisted of Maxine "Max" Wark, an Asian woman who saves game data and quotes Shakespeare, and William "Doc" Wilson, the creator of GW. All three would turn out to be AIs.
  • There were two additional members of Dead Cell: Old Boy and Chinaman. Old Boy was Dead Cell's strategist and a former Nazi general, and was over 100 years old. Chinaman was an expert in martial arts, and has used most of Vamp's bullet parrying moves. Both were cut from game appearances -- Old Boy being first (who later was used as The End), and Chinaman next. The only place to see them is the animated footage of "The Liquidation Of Dead Cell."
  • Liquid Snake, controlling Revolver Ocelot, activates Arsenal Gear's navigation system and sets the target as Federal Hall. This detail is never explained in the game, possibly for the same reason that the following scenes were removed.
  • A scene depicting Arsenal Gear's displacement of the Statue of Liberty and half of Manhattan was removed following the events of the September 11, 2001 attacks.
  • A short coda was to appear after the credits, a breaking newscast showing the Statue of Liberty's new resting place, Ellis Island (see above). The anchorwoman in this piece would've been Karen Hôjô, the heroine from Hideo Kojima's Policenauts.
  • Solidus Snake was the 43rd President, and James Johnson is the 44th.
  • Early concept art shows that Vamp was initially conceived as a woman, while Peter Stillman was originally planned to be a younger version of Ed Brown, also from Policenauts.
  • The AI speaking to Raiden during the final codec conversation is not GW, but another AI named JFK.
  • Both Ames and President Johnson initially thought Raiden was an assassin sent in by the Patriots to dispose of the President.
  • All three Snakes are (or were) undergoing advanced aging as a result of the cloning process.
  • Iroquois Pliskin and Rose were supposed to have blond hair -- Pliskin's dyed to cover his identity, and Rose's as her natural color.
  • As a child, Raiden took part in the Liberian Civil War.
  • Three additional game modes were planned that didn't make it to the final game: a Bomb Disposal mode (side-missions set in the Tanker and Plant stages where the player must locate and defuse Fatman's bombs), a Mantis Mask mode (where the player can read other characters' thoughts and detect their lies) and a two-player versus mode. The Bomb Disposal missions were later integrated into Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance.
  • The Arsenal Gear stage was designed to be much longer than it was in the finished game. One of the proposed areas was a temple wherein the player fought against Vamp (in the original plan, Chinaman appears in the Shell 2 Core filtration chamber instead of Vamp).
  • At the point where Solidus dies, Raiden was supposed to have cut the rope on Federal Hall's flagpole where an American flag was supposed to fall onto Solidus' body (albeit the reason for the patriotic music).
  • At the ending scene, American flags were supposed to be on all the flagpoles in New York.
  • Jack and Rose, were modeled after the protagonists of the film Titanic, just as the names Hal and Dave appeared in the first MGS title.

Template:Endspoiler

Weapons

Pistols:

  • M9 Tranquilizer (Beretta 9mm modified to fire tranquilizer darts, used by Snake and Raiden)
  • USP (Heckler & Koch USP, German 9mm Auto loader, used by Olga, later by Snake)
  • SOCOM (Heckler & Koch Mark 23 Mod 0, German .45 cal pistol, given to Raiden by Plisken)
  • Makarov PM (Russian 9mm semi-automatic pistol, used by some Russian guards and later by Olga) *
  • Colt Single Action Army (.45 Long Colt revolver, used by Ocelot) *
  • GLOCK 18C (Austrian 9mm machine pistol, used by Fat Man) *
  • Beretta M92F (Italian 9mm semi-automatic pistol, used by some Marines) *

Sub-Machine Guns:

  • FN Herstal P90 (Belgian 5.7mm Personal Defense Weapon, used by Arsenal Tengu Commandos and Solidus) *

Assault Rifles:

  • Kalashnikov AKS-74U (Russian 5.45mm Compact Assault Rifle, used by most Russian soliders and Raiden)
  • Colt M4 (US 5.56mm Assault Rifle, used by Marines, Navy SEALs, Plisken, Snake, Raiden and Presidential Security teams)
  • Nikonov AN-94 (Russian 5.45mm Assault Rifle, used by Big Shell Russian guards) *

Sniper Rifles:

  • PSG-1 (Heckler & Koch PSG-1, German 7.62mm semi-automatic rifle used by Plisken and Raiden)
  • PSG-1T (A PSG-1 modified to fire tranquilizer rounds)

Shotguns:

  • Franchi SPAS-12 (Italian 12-gauge dual action shotgun, used by Big Shell attack teams) *

Explosives:

  • Grenade (Frag Grenade)
  • Stun Grenade (Stun G.)
  • Chaff Grenade (Chaff G.)
  • C4 (Plastic Explosive)
  • Claymore (Claymore Anti-Personnel Mine)

Heavy Artillery:

  • M203 Grenade Launcher (used by Marines, Navy SEALs, and Plisken/Snake and Presidential Security teams) *
  • RGB6 Multi-Grenade Launcher (used by Raiden)
  • Nikita Remote Control Rocket Launcher (used by Raiden)
  • Stinger (FIM-92A Stinger, man portable Surface-to-Air Missile (SAM), used by Raiden)

(weapon is unavailable to te player) *

Characters

Revolver Ocelot, aka Shalashaska - (Age 63 at tanker, 64-not-yet-65 at plant) A former FOXHOUND member whose motive apparently is to capture Metal Gear Ray and sell it on the Black Market. He is an expert, and is armed with his favorite weapon, the Colt Single Action Army pistol. In Sons of Liberty, he works with Solidus Snake at Big Shell, though his true loyalty lies with the Patriots.

Liquid Snake - When he died, his arm was grafted onto Ocelot's body and awakens when Solid Snake is near. To get Solid onto the Big Shell, he gave them (Otacon, Solid) a tip; that a new Metal Gear was being built and that terrorists were looking seize it. He still thinks that "there is only room for one Snake and one Big Boss." His only goal now is to eliminate the Patriots.

Col. Roy Campbell - The commander of FOXHOUND, who commands the mission to infiltrate Big Shell, and supports Raiden via codec. Retired after the events of Shadow Moses (Metal Gear Solid), he turns out to be Artificial Intelligence (a computer was guiding Raiden all through out the mission). This first became apparent while Raiden was inside Arsenal Gear when his codec communications with the Colonel went haywire, with the Colonel becoming immensely strange and nonsensical.

See List of Metal Gear Solid 2 characters

Fan reaction

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty extended the series' plot line and introduced a major new main character. The established hero, Solid Snake, was for most of the game not a playable character. Instead, players controlled Raiden, a new member of FOX-HOUND, fresh from VR training. Many fans and critics reacted negatively to this new twist in the gameplay. Areas of contention included Raiden's androgynous appearance, a sentimental and somewhat whiny personality, obvious naivety and inexperience, and vulnerable position throughout the game. Added to the fact that Raiden's character was a secret until the game's release; people just assumed that they would be playing their favorite hero. However, Hideo Kojima has stated that Raiden's character and its perception by the audience were important for the overall feel of the story (i.e, they contribute to a sense of lack of control, being subjected to major manipulation by unknown, deceptive and/or mysterious persons, and a general lack of knowledge about the conditions and motives of several characters as well as the turns and twists of the plot). Furthermore, it was felt that the game was overly self-indulgent, with excessively long sequences of plot-driving dialogue.

Supporters argued that the above criticisms stemmed from the inappropriate expectation that Metal Gear Solid 2 would be a simple, action-oriented sequel. The ideas and themes which Hideo Kojima tried to express, such as the nature of reality and how information defines humanity (meme theory), were components of a highly intellectual and deeply philosophical work of software art. Some commentators have tied the game in with other cyberpunk works such as the anime/manga Ghost in the Shell, William Ford Gibson's Neuromancer and the contemporary PC game Deus Ex, while others [1] have analyzed the game as a postmodern artifact. It has also been linked to the meme theory proposed by Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene. On the note of Raiden, it should be acknowledged that both he and the general scenario given to him during the game is nearly identical to that of Snake's in the original Metal Gear, an issue which is pointed out (in game) by Revolver Ocelot in explaining the "Solid Snake Simulation" scenario.

The game had a particular focus on conspiracy theories, with the main villain being a mysterious organization known only as the Patriots, headed by twelve men who control a type of shadow government which includes the President of the United States as their puppet. The origins of the Patriots are explored in greater detail in Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater.

European fans, who recieved the game 3 months after America & Asia, essentially had the game's big twist (That you controlled Raiden & not Snake) ruined for them, as many magazines had cover stories regarding this issue. In fact, Computer & Video Games magazine actually had "Solid Snake is dead" on the front cover, along with an accompnying picture of Raiden.

Music

Hideo Kojima's choice of composer for Metal Gear Solid 2 was highly publicized in the follow-up to the game's release. Kojima decided upon Harry Gregson-Williams, a Hollywood film composer from Hans Zimmer's studio, after watching The Replacement Killers with sound director Kazuki Muraoka. A mix CD containing 18 tracks of Gregson-Williams' work was sent to his office. Flattered by the research put into creating the CD (as some of the tracks were unreleased, and that what tracks he'd worked on for some films were undocumented), he joined the project soon after.

In order to bypass the language barrier and allow the score to be developed before the cut-scenes were finalized, Gregson-Williams was sent short phrases or descriptions of the intended action. The resultant themes then shaped the action sequences in return. Gregson-Williams also remixed the original "Metal Gear Solid Main Theme" for use in the game's opening title sequence.

Norihiko Hibino, who had worked on previous Konami games such as Metal Gear: Ghost Babel, was responsible for all of the in-game music. He also worked on the majority of the game's cut scenes, re-orchestrating Gregson-Williams' "Main Theme" remix for use in several sequences.

As with Metal Gear Solid, the cut scene music includes orchestral and choir pieces, while the in-game soundtrack is scored with ambient electronic music. However, the score as a whole incorporates more electronic elements (particularly breakbeat) than its predecessor, in order to reflect the plot's thematic thrust of a machine-dominated society. Rika Muranaka again provided a vocal ending theme, a jazz track entitled "Can't Say Goodbye to Yesterday," sung by Carla White.

Voice actors

English version

Japanese version

Packaging artwork

  • Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty Sony PlayStation 2 North America, 2001
    Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
    Sony PlayStation 2
    North America, 2001

Release information

File:MGS2 Premium Package.jpg
Premium Package box and contents

The Japanese release was held back two weeks following the initial North American release. As a result, the developers added new features and cut scenes, including two new modes: Boss Survival and Casting Theatre (the latter allowed players to select cut scenes and change the character models used). Like the original Metal Gear Solid, a Premium Package of the game was issued in addition to the stand-alone version. The box came with the reversible cover art on the DVD case, a DVD video, an A4-sized pamphlet and a metallic-colored Solid Snake figurine.

The game's original European release date of February 22, 2002, nearly three months after the other releases, was delayed another two weeks. As compensation, Konami included, free of charge, a bonus DVD called The Making of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, containing an hour-long documentary on all aspects of the game's production, a comprehensive archive of trailers, a lengthy text article from GameSpot, concept sketches, and other familiar DVD "added value". The added features from the Japanese release were carried over to the game itself along with a new difficulty setting (European Extreme).

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