Hideo Kojima’s iconic stealth game Metal Gear Solid is celebrated in the latest issue of Retro Gamer. Developers of rival stealth titles look at the impact of Konami’s game and explain how it influenced their own titles; from the debut of its monumental trailer at E3, to creating games in its wake.
“One thing you have to remember is that the first time the world saw this trailer, it was not just on some little TVs at the Konami booth,” recalls Richard Ham, who was the design lead on the PlayStation’s Syphon Filter. “This was on a gigantic jumbotron screen that towered over everything, I think it was the first time anything like that had ever happened at E3.”
One person who recalls Metal Gear Solid well is Jeremy Blaustein who worked closely with Kojima when he translated the game for Konami. “I always viewed Solid Snake as an antihero,” says Jeremy. “That’s why in my mind the choice to make him sound like Clint Eastwood was obvious. I wanted him raspy and tired of war, and someone burned out. In my mind, the Clint Eastwood character fit the bill exactly.”
- 26 years on, developers discuss the massive impact Metal Gear Solid had on the industry: "This was going much further than all previous action games. And that was totally inspiring"
- Over 20 years of muscle memory made Metal Gear Solid Delta feel like I was just playing the original – and MGS heads like me know that's truly special
Metal Gear Solid continues to influence games to this day with one of the latest examples being Antonio Freyre’s incoming release of As Time Surrenders. Antonio can still remember the first time he experienced Kojima’s game. “The first time I saw Metal Gear Solid was at a Blockbuster,” he explains. “They had the demo to play in the store. I didn’t understand English back then so I had no clue what to do. I was stuck and couldn’t get past the [starting] Cavern area. Every time we went to Blockbuster, I’d try it again. I was captivated by this strange game where I had to hide.”
If sneaky shenanigans aren’t your cup of tea, there’s plenty of other great articles in our new issue. We go behind the scenes of the 8-bit classic Booty and we speak to Mike Hally and John Romero about their involvement with the popular Gauntlet series. We speak to Two Point Studios Mark Webley about his interesting career at Bullfrog and discover how Antony Crowther made Captain Planet And The Planeteers for the 16-bit home computers.
Other highlights include Ultimate Guides on the arcade hits Dead Or Alive 2 and Star Wars: Return Of The Jedi, the origins of 221b Software Development, the making of the arcade classic Tron and the best PlayStation shmups to add to your collection.
