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alt title(s): Metal Gear Acid; Metal Gear Solid
The Metal Gear series was created by Hideo Kojima in 1987, and popularized the Stealth Based Game. The idea came when the creator realized that the hardware (the MSX) couldn't show more than a few enemies at a time without flashing epileptically and generally breaking - so why not make a game where avoiding your enemies is the theme? This concept received a lot of criticism - one famous quote from Kojima's boss is, "Hiding from your enemies? That's not a game!". But then they started playing it. And it became quite a hit, spawning a great many sequels (with countless ports and editions):
Plus a bunch of spin-offs:
- Snake's Revenge (1990, an NES sequel to the first Metal Gear that was "decanonized" by Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake)
- Metal Gear: Ghost Babel (released outside Japan as Metal Gear Solid for Game Boy Color, much to everybody's confusion) (2000)
- Metal Gear Acid (2004)
- Metal Gear Acid 2 (2005)
- Metal Gear Solid: Digital Graphic Novel (2006)
- Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops (2006) (Canon)
- Metal Gear Solid 2: Bande Dessinee (2008, Japan-only sequel to the Digital Graphic Novel)
- Metal Gear Online (2008. Included with Metal Gear Solid 4)
- Metal Gear Solid Mobile (2008)
- Metal Gear Solid Touch (2008-2009)
- Metal Gear Solid Rising (upcoming)
- Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker (upcoming)(Canon)
The chronological order of the series is:
The plot is far too complicated (and occasionally batshit crazy) to write here in any detail beyond the vaguest - besides, it would spoil it all - but the general plot centres around the main character, Solid Snake, his family and the titular Metal Gears - walking battle tanks capable of launching nuclear strikes from anywhere in the globe.
Metal Gear and Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake were the first two games in the series, and quite openly pastiches of action movies and spy movies. Tropes were gleefully obeyed, and the action hero archetype was responsible for defining the iconic main character - Solid Snake.
Upon the advent of the PlayStation, the series took a brand new turn - it decided to take itself seriously, to startlingly good results. Metal Gear Solid became a huge hit for both its melodramatic and somehow incredibly juicy plot, and its wonderfully satisfying gameplay.
The third game, Metal Gear Solid is a Deconstruction of the Cloning Blues plot. The oddly philosophical Solid Snake, a legendary soldier, is called out of retirement to prevent a group of terrorists launching a nuclear missile. The demand, though, is for the dead body of Big Boss, the greatest soldier ever, who Snake killed. Worse yet, the terrorist's leader is a dead ringer for Snake. Enlisting the help of an inexperienced young Faux Action Girl who is well aware of her own limitations, and a very kind Otakuish scientist, he proceeds in an attempt to save the world and get some answers from his doppelganger...
Metal Gear Solid 2 was not quite as popular, but was hugely anticipated. While the storyline was despised by the general population for its controversial, extremely complicated plot-twists and debilitating main character switcheroo (Solid Snake had become a true meme by then, with his shamelessly badass personality and distinctive, growling voice), it sold extremely well and became a cult success amongst the sort of people who enjoyed the ending of Neon Genesis Evangelion - and is even used to explain meme theory in some serious institutions. Despite the polarizing nature of the storyline, the game received critical acclaim for its groundbreaking gameplay and graphics which heavily utilized the then new Playstation 2's capabilities.
This one is a surreal No Fourth Wall postmodernist rampage through the relationship between game and player, which is, depending on who you ask, a landmark in gaming and hugely ahead of its time, or a self-absorbed rant which made no sense and cried for an editor. Perhaps both. On a more basic level, it centred around Raiden, a Deconstruction of the You Suck character type, as well as the Bishonen stereotype, and his attempt to prevent a group of terrorists from blowing up a cleaning plant on the ocean. But everything gets eerily similar to Raiden's VR training, based on Snake's previous missions, and increasingly surreal, until he's forced to question how much of what he's experiencing is real. And then it gets more complicated. Warning - it has such a doozy of a Gainax Ending, it needed its own page.
Snake Eater was considered a return to form - again, there was a main character switcheroo, but this time for Solid Snake's identical progenitor, Naked Snake, which helped ease the pain. Taking place in the defining years of the Cold War, it played out like a spy movie, and quite happily used every spy movie trope in the book - including a James Bond-esque musical intro sequence - without ending up feeling too campy or vapid, and had a gut-wrenchingly sad Twist Ending.
A prequel set in The Sixties, showing one of the most basic tropes, the Fake Defector, for the absolute maddening tragedy it would be in real life. Naked Snake, a very gifted soldier in the Cold War, is sent over the border to rescue a Soviet scientist who had attempted to defect to the West - but is prevented from doing so by his mentor, The Boss, who is quite easily the person he loves most in the world, and seems to be defecting to the Russians. With the help of a Bond Girl pastiche with a dark secret, and the (occasional) help of a young version of the most glorious villain of the Solid Snake timeline, he takes down her unit one by one, well aware of what he must do when he finally catches up to her...
MGS4 features a new camera and aiming system]] along with a high-tech camouflage suit for Snake and the ability to pick up enemies' weapons. The story, which takes place Twenty Minutes Into The Future (or rather, the only one in the series that is still set Twenty Minutes Into The Future,) follows a prematurely aging Snake on his final mission- he is hired to kill Liquid Ocelot, the resident Chessmaster now possessed by Snake's "brother", who owns the prominent Private Military Companies and is trying to take over the Sons of the Patriots system (essentially a form of nanotech-induced low-grade mind control that happens to make soldiers vastly more effective on the battlefield and- theoretically at least- minimizes civilian casualties) that regulates all soldiers. On his mission, Old Snake encounters a few surviving characters from the previous games, and a few of the dead ones. In the process, it RetCons much of the confusing ending from MGS2, and has a Tear Jerker of an ending.
Unusually for a Metal Gear game, MGS4 doesn't introduce a "true" Metal Gear at any point; the Gekkos are explicitly not called Metal Gears, and there's no nuclear threat against the United States for Snake to avert. The nuclear threat is against the Patriots. Like the genetics of MGS1 and memetics of MGS2, a major theme of MGS4 is the unique sense a given human being has about the world around them and how it's lost forever when they die, such as with the Boss and her ideas being grossly misinterpreted by several different groups without her around to set them right.
MGS4 is either considered an epic landmark in gaming and storytelling and that nothing comes close to it in those regards, or it is considered a camp game with a story that has been going downwards since MGS2 because of Author Filibuster. Both sides, however, agree on one thing: MGS4 absolutely ended the saga. Or did it?
The games love breaking the fourth wall and have a distinct quirky sense of humour - running jokes involve the iconic use of a cardboard box to sneak around a base (wait until he's not looking, run to a new location, and repeat). Hideo Kojima's irreverence is such that he's been trying to kill the series off since MGS2 made its protagonist switch, so he can get on with more interesting things, but a rabidly devoted fanbase simply won't let him.
One of the most engaging parts of the games is the huge focus on multiple uses for items, with the pictured pack of cigarettes a great example. While they seem like a pointless gag item, the player soon discovers that by equipping them they can see laser beams with the smoke, although they suffer a cost as the cigarettes sap your health little by little (they're bad for you, you know). They also calm the main character's nerves, making him aim straighter. And if that isn't enough, there's always at least one character who will give you a long lecture about the dangers of smoking if you contact them.
Each game is intended as a Deconstruction of action movies and video games, playing tropes so painfully straight they curve right back in on themselves. Very few tropes are invoked without logically following them through, especially those of spy movies - we see exactly what kind of mind and complete control of a situation would be needed to pull off the absurdly complex Xanatos Roulettes that happen once per game, exactly what happens to a Tykebomb forced to take up a normal life, and there's a female on male sexual abuse subplot which is not at all okay, to name just a handful.
They're hugely acclaimed for a lot of good reasons - stellar gameplay, very complex plots with pitch-perfect Deconstructions, excellent direction, intelligent character development and weird stylised dialogue. Just prepare for a lot of cutscenes. I mean, a lot of cutscenes. No, more than that. Honestly, you play the game for two-fifths of the time, watch a full-length movie the other three-fifths. If you like the plot, though, you'll probably love the cutscenes.
There is also The Last Days Of Foxhound, a webcomic based off Metal Gear Solid which parodies certain aspects of the games as well as discussing some questions that were unanswered before MGS4. As well as another webcomic titled The Cobra Days chronicling the World War II adventures of a similar Quirky Miniboss Squad from MGS3.
It is very awesome.
Oh, there's also HoYay . But no-one would play a game just for that, right?
...Right?
Come check the character sheet.
This franchise provides examples of:
- Absolute Cleavage: (EVA, even as a much older woman). Naomi in MGS4, where she leaves her labcoat unbuttoned and is obviously wearing no bra.
- Absurdly Spacious Sewer: The sewers under Groznyj Grad.
- Achievements In Ignorance: OK, so Snake collects various plants and animals, which he can call Para-Medic to identify. At the same time, he carries around night-vision goggles and other various things which require battery power. When he collects a species of bio-luminescent mushrooms, he assumes that because they glow, that eating them will "recharge [his] batteries." This works even though Para-Medic specifically told him it was impossible. Snake's ignorance is just that good.
- Action Girl: Meryl, EVA, Olga, The Boss, Sniper Wolf, The BNB Corps, the FRO Gs.
- Afraid Of Needles: The explanation Johnny gives when revealing why he doesn't have any nanomachines in his body.
- AI Is A Crapshoot: The reason why the Patriots are gunning for world domination
- Air Vent Escape: Handy to escape guards. At least half-invented this trope, at least in the world of video game publishing.
- All There In The Manual: Many of the characters' back-stories are only revealed in supplemental materials or in optional Codec within the game. The most notable is the true identity of The Boss and The Sorrow's son, who is only revealed if you trigger a radio call between Snake and EVA in Metal Gear Solid 3. It's Ocelot.
- Almost Dead Guy
- Alternate Continuity: Snake's Revenge and Ghost Babel are both alternate sequels to the original Metal Gear; the first AC!D game follows a different story (though Snake is still a legendary soldier) and the second goes further.
- Substance included "Snake Tales", a series of five missions that featured Snake going through stages from Sons of Liberty, but with different plot point (there's no mention of the Patriots, and Snake's backstory is subject to changes). Snake Tale A features Snake trying to save the President from Fatman, which turns out to be a plot by a third party. Tale B features Snake saving Emma Emmerich from Russian drug traffickers, while another third party is planning another plot. Tale C features Snake facing off against Sergei Gurlukovich and Meryl aboard the Tanker, and serves as a direct sequel to the first game. Tale D features Snake trying to save the Colonel Dolph from Vamp, with another conspiracy transpiring in the background. Tale E, the final mission, involves an alternate-universe Solidus planning on wrecking the multiverse by having Solid Snake destroy a fifty foot tall guard with death ray eyes.
- Alternate Universe: Cloning was perfected extremely early, and apparently, so were exo-skeletons and mecha and gigantic Big Brother ships. Oh, and batshit AI.
- The first game, made in 1987, takes place sometime in 1990's (later established to be in 1995 or 1996). The second game, made in 1990, takes place in 1999 and has the Soviet Union survive past 1991. Metal Gear Solid, made in 1998, takes place in 2005 and contains the line "The nuclear age ended with the turn of the millenium." Metal Gear Solid 2, released in 2001, took place in 2007 and 2009. So it takes place in the future, which is now the past, but the next game takes place in the future anyway, which won't happen because the past didn't happen because it was just a theory about what the future would be, This makes for one of the most confusing timelines in the history of fiction. Only the addition of time travel could it make it more confusing.
- Zeerust Canon at its finest.
- Not to mention their use of Ruritanian settings like Outer Heaven, Zanzibarland, and Snake Eater which takes place in "the jungles of the Soviet Union"
- There's a potential fanfic-salvation for Zanzibarland's name, despite Zanzibar being a small partly-island country off the coast of East Africa, and Zanzibarland being a place basically located right where Tselinoyarsk apparently was/is: something interesting happened with Big Boss in Zanzibar in the late '70s~'80s that somehow directly led to Outer Heaven's creation, and thus the second one was named after it for whatever assumed, possibly to someday be explained, reasons. Any other explanation would not be possible to make the remotest sense of.
- Amateur Photographer: Each Metal Gear Solid features a digital camera that allows the player to take screenshots of the game and save them to the memory card.
- Ancient Conspiracy: Subverted in Portable Ops and further in MGS4. The actual conspiracy, The Patriots, were formed fairly recently, in the 1970s, and only use the ancient conspiracy, The Philosophers, as a disguise to hide behind. The only link between the two is that the Patriots were founded with the money that the Philosophers left behind when they split.
- Anyone Can Die: In fact, 95% of the named all characters in any game, bar the Mission Control and the Player Character, WILL end up dead.
- Arrow Cam: Nikita Remote Controlled Missiles - First Person Mode.
- Arms Dealer: Four introduces the Drebin Network, who are you one stop shop for ammunition, unlocking weapons and porno mags. And its all 100% Patriot free. Not.
- Arthur Dent: Sigint in Snake Eater. He even lampshades it at one point.
- Audio Adaptation: There was a two-volume Metal Gear Solid Drama CD in Japan (titled Drama CD Metal Gear Solid) that basically served as a continuation to the PS game, while the fictional radio drama Idea Spy 2.5 in Metal Gear: Ghost Babel became an actual radio drama starring Hideo Kojima as the title character.
- Ax Crazy: Half the freaking cast.
- Baby Got Back: Solid Snake is one of the more notorious male examples, which the MGS 2 sneaking suit particularly emphasises. And then there's the "identify Meryl by staring at her butt" (technically, her distinctive walk in-story) business in Metal Gear Solid.
- Back Tracking: One of the more egregious examples occurs in MGS. Upon encountering Sniper Wolf, Snake is told to go find a sniper rifle, which is in a room fairly close to where you started the game. Snake even lampshades it.
- The Twin Snakes alleviates this by placing a non-lethal one much closer to where you actually need it.
- Badass: Well, yeah.
- Back To Back Badasses: MGS4 Johnny and Meryl get one of these during their Crowning Moment Of Awesome.
- Badass Bookworm: Otacon, eventually.
- Badass Grandpa: Several. There's Big Boss, Revolver Ocelot, and The End. Solid Snake becomes one in Guns of the Patriots, and EVA is a Badass Grandma in 4 as well.
- Snake's case is arguably that of a deconstruction, as Snake fighting in spite of his condition isn't solely treated as being heroic or inspiring. Rather, it's occasionally treated as being foolish and suicidal by the other characters at the minimum, and said characters aren't above patronizing and treating him like a burden.
- Badass Longcoat: Ocelot. Liquid would count except he only has the coat on for maybe two scenes maximum.
- Badass Mustache: Old Snake
- Badass Normal: Snake, at least when compared to the majority of his not so supernaturally-gifted or crazy-equipped foes. He does have enormous willpower and is Made Of Iron, but he can't carry an M61 vulcan cannon and doesn't usually have kickass battle armor to help him.
- Oddly enough, Johnny qualifies for this trope. He's patently useless in the majority of appearances, but his actions at the end of MGS4 cement his status (considering he was just a normal completely unmodified human soldier).
- Banana Republic: Outer Heaven and Zanzibarland in the original MSX2 games. Oddly enough, the MGS games mostly avert this, with the exception of "Army's Heaven" in MPO. The side-story installments also have Gindra in Metal Gear: Ghost Babel and the Moloni Republic in Metal Gear Acid.
- Battle Couple: Johnny and Meryl by the end of Metal Gear Solid 4.
- Beard Of Sorrow: Snake in the Briefing to Act 4, having had half his face toasted off.
- Beat Them At Their Own Game: Sniper Wolf and then Crying Wolf... the matching second names are not a coincidence, right down to a similar location for the boss fight, both in a Snowfield and Communications Tower on Shadow Moses Island.
- It's not impossible to take down Sniper Wolf with Nikita missiles at the final confrontation.
- Being Tortured Makes You Evil: The backstories of three of the B&B Corps involve torture in some form.
- BFG: Lots and lots of them, especially in Metal Gear Solid 4. Remember the railgun Snake takes from Crying Wolf?
- In Metal Gear Solid, Vulcan Raven uses a M61-A1 Vulcan 20mm gatling gun that he ripped out of an F-16.
- Fortune used the same railgun as Crying Wolf.
- Big Bad: One per game, and also one for the entire series. Until the plot goes into Gray And Grey Morality.
- Bishonen Line: With a twist, the person going through the line is Ocelot during the final battle on Outer Haven, and the changes are mental rather than physical due to Ocelot shifting personas.
- Bittersweet Ending: Every individual game, though the bitterness and sweetness varies with each one.
- The Blank: Decoy Octopus and Laughing Octopus.
- And, by extension, Old Snake, after he gets Laughing Octopus's mask
- Boss Rush: Very often a bonus mode, seen in MGS2 and individual boss battles of 3, and an extra treat in the AC!D series and Portable Ops Plus.
- Book Ends: Saluting the Boss at her grave.
- Bottled Heroic Resolve
- But Not Too Foreign: Pretty mild for most characters but up the ying-yang for the Snake "family." Although Western in origin and in spite of the fact that both Otacon (who's surname is Jewish-German!) and Mei Ling look much more Asian than any of the Snakes, the characters are told again and again how Asian they are. Says Vulcan Raven in MGS 1: "The blood of the East runs in your veins" and he then goes on to describe (how he knows this we have no idea) that Snake's ancestors were from Japan and before that the Mongolian plains. As it turns out, Snake and his brother Liquid were cloned using a donor egg from a Japanese woman (so their mitochondrial DNA is East Asian) and Big Boss himself is the grandson of a Japanese immigrant.
- Otacon himself is a pretty good example as, while (as far can be told) he's entirely European in origin, he is an emphatic Japanophile. Likewise, Raiden, while not a Japanophile, seems like he walked straight out of one of Otacon's Japanese animes.
- Butt Monkey - Johnny Sasaki, who gets knocked out a lot and keeps getting bad diarrhea problems, and is The Scrappy of Rat Patrol 01... up until he gets some badass points and steals Meryl from our lovable, crotchety old clone.
- Raiden has it pretty rough as well. In MGS2 he is nagged by his girlfriend, is urinated on, he gets beaten up and used as bait for certain people, it is revealed that his parents were murdered by Solidus, and that's just his first appearance. In MGS3 he was parodied by Volgin's gay lover Raikov, a usable face mask that Major Zero and Sokolov both apparently dislike, and Metal Gear Raiden: Snake Eraser where he travels back in time to kill Big Boss so that he could become the main character of MGS. To say he failed miserably there would be a understatement. In between MGS2 and MGS4 he is told by Rose that she suffered a miscarriage, don't worry Rose was lying after which he is tortured by the Patriots and used as a guinea pig for their experiments, his head is severed from his body at the jaw and transplanted to an entirely synthetic body, which is later upgraded to the exoskeleton we see him wearing in MGS4.
- By The Power Of Greyskull - The Solar Gun in ''MGS4. "Sunlight!!"
- This troper couldn't help but yell "TAIYOHHHH!" when he read this.
- Canon Discontinuity - Snake's Revenge, a sequel to the original NES version of Metal Gear which Konami produced for the international market. Although Kojima claimed that he thought Snake's Revenge was "faithful to the Metal Gear concept", he still went ahead and produce the real sequel, Metal Gear 2 for the MSX, which ignores Snake's Revenge.
- Captain Obvious - There are a whole lot of these. Some examples:
Otacon: "Snake, this a war zone, so you have to be on your toes."
- Caramelldansen Vid
- Cartwright Curse - Poor Otacon...
- Charm Person - Gene's ability in Portable Ops. So much that he convinces all his soldiers to commit suicide by telling them about an Enemy Within, and does the same to the scientists over their conscience of abusing Null.
- Child Soldiers - Null/Gray Fox, Raiden, Drebin.
- Cherry Tapping: The End actually does this to the player in MGS3. He only uses tranquilizer rounds, and if you lose to him you have to backtrack from the lab you visited earlier. You can pull the same thing on him, by using the tranquilizer pistol you've been carrying since the beginning of the game. In fact, you have to do this in order to get his rifle.
- Chronic Backstabbing Disorder - The name comes from The Last Days Of Foxhound, a webcomic based upon the game, which is used to describe Revolver Ocelot's habit of betraying anyone and everyone. Including his own soldiers.
- Code Name - Speaks for itself.
- Cold War - The background of MGS3, Peace Walker, and Portable Ops.
- Combat Sadomasochist: Vamp and Raiden seem to enjoy hurting each other a little too much.
- Comm Links - The codec.
- Companion Cube - The cardboard fricking box. Both Solid and Naked Snake apparently have some sort of sexual fetish with it, and the latter believes that not only is his being in the box his destiny, but it is also the true key to happiness. The former finds it relaxing to sit in the box - or, y'know, barrel.
- Solid Snake doesn't just find the box relaxing, to him, it's the most important thing he has on him. He even lectures Raiden about it, giving the famous "Take care of your cardboard box, and it'll take care of you" comment.
- Sigh... okay, for those of you who aren't familiar with the series, it goes like this: Solid and Naked Snake are both professional soldiers. Due to the gameplay mechanics, being inside the box renders them invisible to people trying to find them and kill them. The box is therefore their equivalent of a security blanket. NOW do you get it?
- Complete Monster - Col. Volgin and Vamp.
- Continuity Lockout - MGS4 absolutely.
- Conspicuously Selective Perception - AI can only see in front of them in the earlier games. Of course, an enemy spotting you right away would piss off many.
- Continuity Nod - The entire fourth act of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns Of The Patriots, including a playable flashback of an area from the first MGS game [with PS 1 graphics, no less] and too many callbacks to mention.
- The final battle deserves a mention, as the entire battle consists of a battle atop a wrecked Metal Gear of sorts — Outer Haven being a nuke delivery platform, if not quite wrecked — complete with flashback segments, background music and health meters that change as the fight changes which game it's referencing, and Liquid Ocelot's final line as a callback to Metal Gear Solid 3.
- "You're pretty good", which itself is a callback to Ocelot's immediate line to Solid Snake after their first boss battle in the original Metal Gear Solid.
- Contrived Coincidence - The Raikov mask in MGS3. Radio conversations reveal that it would have been destroyed had it not been for SIGINT insisting they keep it, and it served no real purpose for Snake when he first got it (the Virtuous Mission). Conveniently, Raikov was Colonel Volgin's lover and the mask allowed Snake access to the high security wing of Groznyj Grad.
- Copy Protection - Metal Gear Solid had an important character's Codec number on the back of the CD that you needed to call in order to advance. While it certainly stalled the game for anyone who didn't buy it new in its box, this probably wasn't intentional copy protection, more likely another example of what the series likes doing to the fourth wall.
- Metal Gear 2 had a radio frequency on the box, and a table to decipher TAP codes in the manual.
- Credits Gag - Hideo Kojima as Voice of God, Richard Doyle as Big Boss
- Being a Metal Gear game, neither of those are really gags...
- Crowning Moment Of Awesome - So very many; in MGS4 Metal Gear REX vs. Metal Gear RAY. And it's PLAYABLE.
- MGS4 actually had several, including the Raiden/Vamp battle, the aforementioned Humongous Mecha battle, and the final battle against Liquid, which devolves awesomely from two skilled and powerful fighters with incredibly fluid attacks to two old men slugging each other because that's all they have left. Oh, and the microwave hallway.
- And one can't forget Raiden fighting off a legion of Liquid Ocelot's elite troopers after he lost both his arms.
- And the one where Johnny and Meryl take turns proposing to each other and discuss their wedding plans. In the middle of a damn firefight.
- From the first game, Fox's fight with Rex, Snake rappelling down a tower to escape the Hind, Vulcan Raven, etc. Seriously, the series has a roughly one-to-one ratio between CMOAs and mindscrews.
- Crowning Moment Of Heartwarming: Big Boss's CQC hug with Snake towards the end of MGS4. The rest of the scene qualifies as both this and a decent Tear Jerker.
- Additionally, plays with Well Done Son Guy, by having Big Boss tell Snake point-blank that he never considered him his son, but held him in high regard as a soldier. In the context of the series, it is rather touching.
- Crowning Music Of Awesome: Sniper Wolf's theme in MGS. This led to a case of Too Much Of A Good Thing in The Twin Snakes however, as the porting team noticed the popularity of this song and so chopped out huge sections of the original soundtrack, plastering Sniper Wolf's theme over all the key events.
- Cuffs Off Rub Wrists - A minor gag in MGS2.
- Cut Scene - Let's just say there are two types of people in the Metal Gear fandom: those who hate Metal Gear because of the cutscenes, and people who don't.
- Cutscene Power To The Max - the remake of MGS1 is particularly bad at this, where Snake can Bullet Time.
- Cyber Cyclops - The Ninja in MGS1 and Metal Gear Ray are both cyclopes.
- Only the mass production models of Metal Gear RAY are Cyclopes. The prototype has two optical sensors.
- Also, although Gray Fox's mask affects the appearance of a cyclops, if you look closely the eye holes are actually two slits immediately next to the giant red scanner. However, the aesthetic remains similar.
- Dark Skinned Blond: Fortune, Drebin.
- Deathbringer The Adorable: The chickens on the Nomad, who do little besides hang out in their cages and lay eggs for Sunny to
try to cook, are named Solid, Liquid and Solidus. Possibly subverted; it's conceivable, maybe even likely, that Sunny named them after the states of matter, not after three of the most deadly men to ever walk the Earth.
- Death By Disfigurement: Gray Fox
- Death Glare: One word: Gene.
- Death Seeker: Metal Gear Solid had Gray Fox, who was looking for one last battle with Solid Snake. MGS2 introduced us to Fortune, whose father died in the tanker incident, followed by her husband's death and a miscarriage as a result of all the stress. She cannot be hit by bullets due to a top secret electromagnetic weapon that she unknowingly carries. Vamp doesn't really start playing this role until MGS4, and injects himself with nanomachine suppressants in order to cancel out his healing factor and finish himself once and for all. Snake himself arguably counts in MGS4, since his reasons for living are rapidly disappearing. He decides to see the world with Otacon during his last few months, however.
- Deconstruction: Lots of it.
- Deconstructor Fleet: Metal Gear Solid 2 is, amongst other things, one giant deconstruction of sequels and the expectations that fans (especially the Unpleasable Fanbase) will have of them.
- Decoy Protagonist: Snake in MGS2.
- Department Of Redundancy Department: This is just like one of my Japanese animes!
- If I may be a prick and attempt to justify this, this is probably a context based translation error. In Japan, anime is shorthand for any type of animation; give Otacon's status as a foreigner, they probably felt the need to establish a context so the Japanese audience wouldn't think he's talking about western animation in the original script. The translation didn't realize that the context required for the Japanese audience was implicitly shown by the use of the word 'anime'. This is just me theorizing, of course.
- Hey, it could have been French anime too, if they didn't explain it...
- Depraved Bisexual: Both Volgin from MGS3 and Vamp from MGS2 & 4.
- Did Not Get The Girl: Things don't work out for Snake and Meryl, what with Snake being an Ineffectual Loner and Meryl falling in love with, then marrying the series' "perennial loser." Although some would say it's for a very different reason altogether.
- Also same for Raiden and Rose in Metal Gear Solid 2, although they end up together in number 4, and Big Boss and EVA in #3 - though technically subverted as she got pregnant with Big Boss' "child" clones.
- And lest we forget that there were two full games before the Solid Series, Snake obviously does not end up with Ellen Madnar (MG1), nor does he end up with Holly White (MG2).
- Disney Death: Big Boss.
- Does This Remind You Of Anything:
Ocelot: "There's nothing like the feeling of slamming a long, silver bullet into a well greased chamber."
- Downer Ending: The last game subverts this (really), by playing the start of the credits before the final scene. Played heartbreakingly straight in MGS3, however.
- Down The Drain
- Dye Or Die: Inverted in MGS2; played straight in the first game.
- Dying As Yourself: Defeating the Beauty and Beast Corps members with nonlethal weapons allows them to overcome their madness, accept their sins, and die peacefully. Also, Ocelot.
Ocelot: You're pretty good....
- Dysfunction Junction: The games go to lengths to point out just how incredibly screwed up almost every single character is, and the tragic consequences of such.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: And how!
- Easter Egg: Tons of 'em.
- Edge Gravity
- Elite Mooks: The Hi-Tech Soldiers, Arsenal Tengu in MGS2, the Rocket-men and FROG units in MGS4.
- Enemy Chatter: Only during Alert, Evasion, and Caution phases. However, there is some chatter to be found in most games, if you look hard enough.
- Enemy Civil War: The first few chapters take place during an armed insurrection in unnamed countries, and you can use distractions to move unnoticed. However, PMCs are hostile at all times, but helping the
terrorists rebels nets you some items and ammo. And the original Patriots fighting among themselves is the real reason behind the events of the entire series.
- Enigmatic Minion: Revolver Ocelot.
- Equal Opportunity Evil: The ranks of the various Quirky Miniboss Squads tend to be quite diverse. And then there're The Patriots.
- Escort Mission: Raiden and Emma; Big Boss and EVA; Old Snake and Drebin's Stryker; Old Snake and the Van.
- Even The Guys Want Him: Big Boss.
- Everything Fades: Averted - except for the first MGS, dead bodies don't go and need to be hidden.
- However, enemies killed in alert mode or action sequences will disappear (flicker out more like it), and occasionally in normal status if one waits long enough.
- As a possible reference to this, Liquid Ocelot's elite FROG units immolate themselves once they're dead, and if Snake touches the bodies, they crumble to dust.
- Everythings Better With Monkeys: Drebin's pet, Little Gray.
- Evil Brit: Two of the most influential villains in the entire series are British: Zero, founder of the Patriots, and Liquid Snake, one of the only men in the world who can face Solid Snake in equal combat.
- Evil Is Dumb: Johnny Sasaki and, arguably, Fortune.
- Exploding Barrels: In MGS4, on the streets of a European city — and not five minutes after a character claimed that "oil and fuel are as precious as diamonds."
- The setting as it's been explored up to this point gives this a justification; it's not that oil and fuel have hit Hubbert's Peak, but that the world devolving into constant conflict in the name of the war economy has simply made it hard to get, along with anything else we take for granted. After all, there hardly seems to be an energy crisis, what with all the stuff requiring fuel working fine, and the PMCs holding down martial law in
Prague the Eastern European town would surely need to cart some fuel around for themselves to keep their APCs running.
- Exposition Break: Utterly infamous for these.
- Extreme Omnivore: Naked Snake wants to taste everything that moves.
- Eyepatch Of Power: Subverted slightly in that Big Boss' eyepatch really is an eyepatch, while Old Snake's Solid Eye simply provides optical enhancements... as well as 'radar,' of sorts. Well, then there's also Solidus.
- Fallen Hero: Big Boss, along with Major Zero, Para-Medic, and Sigint.
- Famous Last Words: see Final Speech below.
- Fan Disservice: See trope entry.
- Fan Nickname: Metal Gear Solid 4 gets "Movie Gear Solid", for its high Story To Gameplay Ratio.
- A Father To His Men: (Big Boss, Gene.)
- Arguably The Boss in reference to the Cobra Unit.
- Feelies
- Femme Fatale: Sniper Wolf, EVA, Naomi.
- Fetish Fuel: Starting with the fact that Snake's seaking suit laces up in the back like a corset and has straps around his thighs that look suspiciously like garters...
- In MGS3, Big Boss strips shirtless for a scene where he resets the bone in his arm with some very interesting grunts.
- Not to mention the very interesting torture scenes in MGS1 and MGS2, the latter where Raiden is naked.
- And several fans have admitted to a sudden attraction to older men after having played MGS4.
- Final First Hug: Big Boss hugs Snake like a father before his death.
- Final Speech: Every single character death includes one of these. No exceptions.
- Fission Mailed: Trope Namer.
- Fisticuffs Boss: At least twice.
- Five Bad Band: Several.
Metal Gear Solid 2's Sons Of Liberty:
Metal Gear Solid 4's B&B Corp A.K.A. Snakehound:
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