I recently began two game review features: one on a series I’ve always wanted to play, Kingdom Hearts, and the other on a series I’ve played a lot, the Metal Gear series. After series like Resident Evil and Sonic, this is probably the series I’ve played the most throughout my life, and I’ve played almost every entry in it. Regarding that, I debated whether or not to begin with Snake Eater because I’ve already reviewed the first Solid game. However, since Snake Eater will soon receive a complete remake, I figured I’d give it as much time as possible before starting, and it also makes sense chronologically as it’s the first game in the series. Regretfully, many people believe that this is the series’ high point, particularly in terms of plot, but does it truly get any worse from here? Is it even stable anymore? Come with me while we examine!
Context:
The End is only the Start! Regarding this review. In fact, he’s approximately halfway through the game (PS2).
Ironically, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater was first released as a PS2 exclusive on November 17th, 2004 in the US. The Japanese version of the game was released on December 16th, 2004. March 4th, 2005 was the release date for those of us who were stranded in the PAL territories. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater Subsistence, an extended edition, was released in late 2005 in Japan and in 2006 elsewhere.
Since then, it has been reissued numerous times. The Metal Gear Solid HD Collection for PlayStation 3 and XBOX 360 included it combined with MGS2 and MGS: Peace Walker. This game mirrored the original’s release schedule, which saw its release in November 2011 in Japan and the US but not in my home country of the UK until February 2012. This compilation was simultaneously released in all three territories for the PlayStation Vita in June 2012. Although I do own the 360 version, I felt that two consoles would be sufficient for this evaluation! The game was first released in early 2012 on the 3DS under the name Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater 3D, and it was eventually added to the Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection Vol. 1 for the PC, Nintendo Switch, PS5, PS4, and XBOX Series, and it was released globally on October 24, 2023.
Finally, let me note that there is the remake of “Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater,” which will soon be available for the PS5, XBOX Series, and PC. However, I will be doing a separate review of it when it is released.
Gameplay
I appreciate that, since it’s the 1960s, radars with hostile cones of view are prohibited, but flying moving platforms? Not a problem! (PS5)
It should come as no surprise that a game with the number “3” in the title plays similarly to earlier Snake games in the series. You take control of Snake in third person and must, if at all possible, go from place to place without getting seen. While you can still crouch, crawl on your stomach, choke people out quietly, kill individuals with silenced weapons, and do other standard moves, there are some differences because Snake Eater is mostly set in a 1960s jungle. Firstly, the useful radar that provided you with opponent positions and cones of vision has been removed and replaced with an actual sonar gadget that you must equip in your item slot. Second, dressing appropriately for the area you’re hiding in is essential to avoiding detection because there is now a camo index meter and a wide variety of camo outfits available. While the latter is a great system to experiment with, the former makes things much more difficult. In addition, there is an injury system that is quite annoying—if you get shot, explode, etc., you have to go into a menu, select the appropriate piece of equipment to treat it, and press each piece of equipment one after the other to heal yourself. Your stamina will also naturally deplete over time and you will have to replenish it by eating food found around the area or by capturing and eating local animals (perhaps by eating a snake). Even though it can be amusing to see where you’ve been struck by accident, it removes you from the action far too much. During an entertaining boss battle? It’s a good motivator to stay hidden and not get hit, so let’s just say I’m not surprised it never returned to the series. Well, hold on for five minutes, I need to press start, go into this menu, and press all these buttons to heal myself before continuing. The boss is presumably just waiting in-universe.
First-person panic attack while being alert? Yes, that certainly sounds like me. (PS2)
If you’re anything like me, you will, of course, be aware that there are lots of non-stealthy weaponry available to you and a new CQC fighting system that allows you to either take down opponents head-on or seize them and slit their throats (or question them before doing so). A ton of fun is in store! There are boss fights that require you to use stealth at all, such as a great sniper duel with “The End,” a 100+ year old sniper who you must out-snipe in several patches of jungle, or move your internal clock forward enough that he dies of natural causes, which is a classic bit of Hideo Kojima humor. You can use a handgun or rifle in first person mode to aim and fire accurately. This feature was introduced in MGS2, but it’s still worth mentioning here, as I discovered during my replay of the original MGS, which lacked it. Another famous scene features Snake climbing a ladder. While it may seem like a harmless and unremarkable scene, the ladder climb actually takes two or three minutes, during which time a mellower version of the Snake Eater theme plays. I’m not sure what Kojima was aiming for, but whatever The last boss battle is another, but I’ll save that for the tale portion. Still, it’s one of my favorite gaming memories, so I had to include it here as well!
The PS2 version included with an extra game called “Snake vs. Monkey,” in which the main character must catch Ape Escape monkeys that are hidden throughout multiple maps. It’s a shame it was never transferred because of copyright issues because it’s a lot of fun. The “Subsistence” version adds an online mode and playable versions of Metal Gear 1 and 2 (presumably because at the time those were the only other games that took place in between this game and MGS1—boy, did that ever change!). Oh well, it sounds like it was just some basic death matchy stuff, so I’m not heartbroken that it too has never left the Sixth Generation.
Sound and Visuals:
Well done, PS2 version! I’ve had a few second looks to make sure I’m labeling the correct console in the brackets on these photos! (PS2, huh…)
The visuals were superb at the time; in fact, I recall the jungle settings and the numerous adversaries and animals that were displayed at once as being truly amazing, and Snake’s model and movement were excellent as well. It looks fine as long as you go in knowing that it’s an up-rezzed version of a twenty-year-old game. The 360 port made the game widescreen and polished up the models and environments a bit, and the PS5 version I played here took the 360 version and added a little bit more polish (like better lighting).
Though I wouldn’t say the voice acting is as good as some of the more recent efforts, it’s still excellent, especially David Hayter’s Snake and Lori Alan’s The Boss. The music is used to heighten the tension and sense of action, with a few vocal tunes thrown in for the intro and credits.
Narrative
He’s so young, ocelot, I don’t really care about Sokolov in the big picture! (PS5)
In order to provide the government with deniability, a CIA agent going by the codename “Naked Snake” is dispatched into Soviet Russia alone in order to collect a scientist named Sokolov who had defected to the US but had lately returned to his native country in a business deal. Worse even, Sokolov is rumored to be developing a brand-new, unique kind of nuclear-armed tank that might tip the scales in Russia’s favor. With the help of Major Zero, Para-Medic, and his former mentor The Boss through radio communication, Snake finds Sokolov and even defeats a highly skilled Soviet GRU Major named Ocelot. However, the mission is abruptly ended when The Boss shows up in person and declares she is defecting to the Soviet Union, primarily to work with Colonel Volgin, who wants to unseat Khrushchev. With the help of her former COBRA Unit allies from World War II, The Boss eliminates Snake, retakes Sokolov, and gives Volgin a nuclear missile launcher known as the “Davey Crockett.” Volgin makes the spontaneous decision to launch the nuclear missile against Sokolov’s research center as they take off, upsetting Ocelot and obviously confusing The Boss.
After surviving a beating, a protracted fall, and a nearby nuclear explosion, Snake is sent back to Tselinoyarsk a week later under the combined orders of US President Johnson and US President Khruschev, the former seeking to establish the US’s innocence in the nuclear bombing and the latter seeking to eliminate Volgin and his group. Three objectives are set for Snake: first, to eliminate Volgin and foil his faction’s plans; second, to destroy Sokolov’s nuclear-armed tank, the “Shagohod”; and third, to eliminate the Boss to demonstrate that she was operating independently and not in accordance with US directives. Even though he was expecting to meet a male spy named Adam, Snake meets an inside man, or rather, a woman, named EVA. He then makes his way through the area, defeating Major Ocelot once more (though he seems to be enjoying his confrontations, especially after Snake persuaded him to try shooting with a revolver in a classic prequel “that’s the origin of that” fashion!). Additionally, Snake makes his way through the COBRA unit, taking out odd living beehive man The Pain, equally odd double-jointed insect man The Fear, ancient photosynthetic sniper The End, insane former astronaut The Fury, and strange former astronaut The Pain. Finally, he has a hallucinatory near-death experience where he meets the already-dead COBRA member The Sorrow.
It’s okay, he’s simply practicing pull-ups to get more endurance!
Additionally, he encounters a scientist named Granin, who confesses that he despises Sokolov for selecting his Shagohod design over his concept for a bipedal tank that he referred to as a Metal Gear in the cog of something else. Don’t worry, this is only another prequel. He also learns that Volgin has a massive fortune because his father inherited the “Philosopher’s Legacy.” Essentially, in the early 1900s, China, Russia, and America banded together and used their combined resources to form a covert organization known as The Philosophers. When the group disbanded, the fortune was divided, but Volgin’s father kept the majority. Now, Volgin (having killed his father) not only has the Soviet portion of the legacy, but also a microfilm that contains all of the legacy’s locations. A convoluted family tree, to say the least! The Boss later reveals that she worked for The Philosophers and that her son, who was born in the midst of the Normandy landings, was taken from her to ensure she continued to do so. For the record, the child’s father is The Sorrow, and the child is named Ocelot.
Warning: there are spoilers ahead in the bolded sentence!
Eventually, Volgin captures Snake and uses his electric powers to torture him (giving Ocelot the idea that electro-torture is a great thing, so that’s the origin of that again!). All the while, our protagonist loses an eye trying to protect EVA and make sure she doesn’t reveal her identity. In order to complete his objective, he ultimately makes his way out of the base and engages in a nearly amorous chat with an EVA before returning to the base and detonating bombs on the Shagohod. Although The Boss takes her away to be killed off-screen, he installs the bombs and eventually finds himself having a hand-to-hand fight with Volgin after he and Ocelot actually scent out EVA. After Volgin is defeated by Snake, he reunites with EVA, whom The Boss released. The two escape on a bike and sidecar, but Volgin’s Shagohod is pursuing them. A few missile rounds and a “lucky” lightning strike (which might or might not have anything to do with the Sorrow’s otherworldly abilities) kill Volgin, sort of (wait for a retcon in MGS V!). Snake and EVA then flee to a plane, where EVA is mortally wounded but ignores it and it’s soon forgotten. But before that, Snake confronts The Boss. He learns from EVA that the plan was for her to fail in her defection, but after Volgin detonated the nuclear bomb, she had no choice but to be called a traitor to her nation and killed in order to clear America’s reputation. In doing so, she became a historical figure of hatred and a true patriot. In one of the most powerful boss fights and cutscenes in game history, Snake reluctantly takes on the woman and ultimately kills her in a flowery field.
Certain situations are self-explanatory (PS5)
After that, Snake and EVA board their plane, but before it can take off, Ocelot shows up and gives Snake another chance at dueling, but this time he loses. He then declares how much he admires Snake and departs. Snake spends another night with EVA, during which she takes the Philosopher’s Legacy film from him. She then reveals that Snake has kept the real film for himself, but that she was actually a Chinese agent posing as a US agent and being sent to Russia as a spy. This is the incident that leads to Snake becoming Big Boss and creating Outer Heaven; later games set after this but before MG1 would retcon this, though this incident is still a major factor in what ends up happening. Still, it’s obvious why this game was made, but whatever. Later, Snake receives a medal and the title of “Big Boss” from the US President. However, after the country treats The Boss, Snake wants nothing to do with the title or the country. Instead, Snake salutes The Boss’s nameless grave and opens up plans for a utopia where soldiers can be themselves without interference from politicians.
The spoilers are over!
With some iconic Hideo Kojima craziness in the form of character designs and abilities, it’s an incredibly entertaining Cold War drama. I’ve always found Snake and The Boss’ connection to be so special and well-realized that it serves as a wonderful illustration of a complex, deep relationship that has nothing to do with romance or love. Storywise, it’s unquestionably Kojima’s best work.
Ideas then
In 1960s Russia, a snake pulls an unconscious Raiden up a flight of stairs. Bewildered? If this screenshot had been displayed in the lead-up, I’m sure a lot more would have been at the time! (PS5, I apologize; I ran out of PS2 screenshots.)
Ironically, even though I liked Snake Eater, I didn’t really get into it at first. I believe that at the time it came out, every buddy I would ordinarily talk to about the game or the tale was attending a different university across the nation, and since the internet had just recently begun to take off, I wasn’t able to talk to them about it online either—at least not very frequently. As a result, I played it twice, loved the story, but, to be honest, I was terrible at the stealth part (like all my Metal Gear playthroughs). I didn’t play it again until the 360 re-release, which is when I really realized how fantastic the game was overall. I awarded the 360 version a five back in the day(s), but because this is a PS2 / PS4 review, I’ll have to go with my original PS2 rating.
Ideas Right Now
Or not. “What a thriilllll.”
Right now? Although I still struggle with stealth areas, the gameplay is still a lot of fun and the plot is amazing. The higher resolution texturing and increased screen real estate help strengthen the already solid base. Although this is entirely subjective, I believe that the game’s plot alone merits a 5, even in 2024. In terms of playability, I’d still give it a 4. Anticipating the same thing again, but with graphics from the more recent Unreal Engine 5…