MGS Retrospective: Part 3
As has been pointed out to me, there are several main characters in the Metal Gear saga that are pretty damn important that I haven’t discussed yet, and since next week has the plot as the focus, it would appear that they would fall by the wayside.... Right up to launching Sons of Liberty in North America, Solid Snake was billed as the star once more, with Konami even going so far as to air commercials with Snake in scenes that would ultimately star Raiden in the game itself.... A friend who is very much into anime mentioned something interesting to me some time ago: a lot of male lead characters in anime titles have an extremely effeminate appearance, to the point of looking almost androgynous.... Also not helping Raiden’s case was the fact that his love interest, Rose (Jack and Rose, by the way, reference the Leonardo di Caprio and Kate Winslet characters from Titanic) was very much an ‘in-your-face’ kind of character, continuously contacting Raiden to discuss mundane things like him forgetting the mission is taking place on the day of their anniversary. When his seemingly cowed attitude towards Rose and meek response to his enemies are combined with his androgynous looks and the fact that he is essentially an unannounced replacement for the hugely popular character of Solid Snake, it is no surprise that he was almost immediately disliked by the fanbase of the series.... It is during this time that he meets and falls in love with Rose, whom he impregnates and is reunited with at the end of Metal Gear Solid 2. In Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, Raiden is initially introduced in the Big Shell chapter as ‘Snake’, serving as a member of what appears this new unit – another huge cop-out that had a negative fan reaction, to say the least.... In one of the trailers, he vows that it is his ‘turn to protect Snake’ this time around, so Kojima is probably aiming to finally give him some gravitas and let him appear as a wiser and battle hardened version of his naive Sons of Liberty-self.... He makes his first appearance in Metal Gear 2 as the new CO of FOXHOUND, although chronologically, his first appearance is in Portable Ops as a Green Beret, where Big Boss (the player character in MPO) meets him when both are imprisoned.... In Guns of the Patriots, he appears to be a private citizen, although he is concerned enough about the current state of the world to ask Snake to come out of retirement one last time to help him defeat the Patriots once and for all.... Of course, their initial mission to gather evidence of a new model designed for the US Marines (Metal Gear RAY) is a huge disaster but he resurfaces again during the incident at the Big Shell to provide on-site tech support for Snake.... He is first mentioned by name in the original Metal Gear Solid, where he is revealed in the game's cliffhanger ending to be the President of the United States at the time (George Sears) and the mastermind behind the Shadow Moses island incident.... Anyway, in Sons of Liberty, Ocelot is under the employ of his old friend Sergei Gurlukovich during the introductory Tanker chapter, but ends up betraying him and his mercenaries when he hijacks Metal Gear RAY. He then forms part of the terrorist group "Sons of Liberty" during the Plant chapter with Solidus Snake, but ends up betraying him as well, revealing his true allegiance with the Patriots.... In our next edition of the Metal Gear retrospective, we’ll take a closer look at the plot of the series, and in the week before launch, we take out the tinfoil hats to discuss some conspiracy theories regarding the ultimate fate of Snake and the Patriots (thanks to JP for the idea.)
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