There are actually a few communists among the creative team behind the last few Metal Gear entries. Though the main brand guy Hideo Kojima is a baizuo.
It doesn’t really do a good job with leftist commentary, mostly just using the aesthetics of marxist criticism without teaching liberals anything. It touches on capitalism and hegemony at a very surface level but doesn’t engage with the topics in meaningful ways.
That being said, there are some hype scenarios, like having a sword fight with the president of the USA after a giant NSA boat crashes into Manhattan, knocking over skyscrapers (off-screen).
If anything, honestly, I’d say Metal Gear as a series mostly glorifies war and nationalism, and kinda whitewashes a lot of atrocities committed by empire as clearly fictional (since in the setting, they are reliant on magic), or as probably fictional (since they happen in a computer game with magic).
The best Metal Gear games are Peace Walker and Rising. They’re the two games where Hideo Kojima had less input. Both from a anti-imperialist, pro-communist, anti-war perspective and from a gameplay perspective. I like them all. Hideo Kojima is a wanker. I like Death Stranding too, but there too, he is a wanker.
Solid 1 is smaller in scope. NATO is clearly the ‘bad guys’, but it doesn’t feel too far removed from a 90s Hollywood action film trying to insert some intrigue and edge.
In 3, you are explicitly sent into Soviet territory, working for the CIA. By the end of it, it’s clear the USA are the bad guys overall, but there’s still heavy both-siding in the form of the Soviet commander being a cartoon villain with a million scars on his face who gets off on torturing people. The original contradiction in having your mentor who you respect defect to the soviet union turns out to be her on an undercover mission. The main MacGuffin has the function of downplaying global south exploitation and colonialism’s role in the imperial core’s wealth. It is not anti-imperialist despite taking place during the cold war. It does show Soviet technology as far superior to CIA technology, but I don’t think you should read too much into that.
2 though, I have to praise. Snake (series protagonist) is an eco terrorist who’s enemy is the regime in the USA, and the plot is about propaganda and censorship. Your objective at the end of the game is to sink the NSA’s server farm giant robot boat nuke platform. I think it was ahead of it’s time in predicting where mass surveillance and internet propaganda was heading. The game is from late 2001.
In terms of gameplay. Solid 1 is Pac Man. Solid 2 3 are transformative evolutions of Pac Man, but will likely feel stiff and clunky to a modern player. I enjoy all three.
The Boss’s mission wasn’t really a contradiction though as she was forced to carry it out or the Philosophers would kill her, Snake, and Ocelot. They even kill her husband the Sorrow for collateral, so we know that wasn’t a bluff. Her hand was kind of forced as the ending narration puts it. She despised herself for it, hence why she kept letting Snake go, and was hoping he would kill her in the end (or kill herself and die either way as she would also be killed by the MiG air strike she called).
Also isn’t the Philosophers legacy a literal representation of Western Imperialism and the exploitation of the global South? It was a combination of America’s, the Russian Empire’s, Nationalist China’s, and other imperial countries exorbitant wealth that was under the control of capitalists who de facto ruled the world (Wiseman’s Committee).
While it is comically evil, wouldn’t Volgin’s ideals and actions make sense in the fact that he was meant to be a representation of the Brezhnev faction that would replace Khrushchev? With Brezhnev’s heavy militarization and focus on the arms race above all else?
I guess I would also excuse the no anti-imperialism a little bit as it wasn’t really relevant to the plot for it to show up, though there are little things here and there like China getting a one up on the CIA by using CIA secrets to develop their own hydrogen bomb.
Sure, but we didn’t see her ideologically attracted to communism. When I say contradiction, I mean from Snake’s (or the liberal player’s) POV at the off-set. Because she never defected. Her arc tells us her mission is evil, but capitalism isn’t. And what does her mission entail? What are the major bad consequences? It’s the Soviets choosing to nuke their own people as a false flag. That’s the part we’re supposed to pity her over primarily, not having to further Empire.
Also isn’t the Philosophers legacy a literal representation of Western Imperialism and the exploitation of the global South? It was a combination of America’s, the Russian Empire’s, Nationalist China’s, and other imperial countries exorbitant wealth that was under the control of capitalists who de facto ruled the world (Wiseman’s Committee).
Yes but it’s not concrete. It’s nebulous conspiracy theory stuff, presented more along the lines of stock market manipulation than clearly transparent exploitation happening through the currently operating above-board channels.
Instead of saying the west stole humanity’s progress, it feels like the game is saying China stole the west’s legitimately earned progress. Perhaps it’s just been too long since I played it. I’ve only played through it twice, once when it was new, and once when the 360 port was new.
While it is comically evil, wouldn’t Volgin’s ideals and actions make sense in the fact that he was meant to be a representation of the Brezhnev faction that would replace Khrushchev? With Brezhnev’s heavy militarization and focus on the arms race above all else?
Well maybe, but it’s still what they choose to show us of the Soviet Union. There’s no other Soviet faction or Soviet story. They’re not portrayed especially positively in V.
I agree with your first point insolation, but when the game is factored into the larger Metal Gear Canon and other games, we can clearly see the impact and overreaching effects of the Philosophers and their influence through capitalist systems. Plus while the Boss never actually aligns herself with communism (she is extremely reactionary as she was a devoted CIA agent and probably the best spy to ever live, and assisted in many American operations like the Bay of Pigs) but through her character we see the true reward that being a devoted capitalist and CIA agent get you. It gets you tossed aside and thrown in the trash once you no longer have any value. This acts as a sort of cautionary tale for Snake, as he would have ended up the same way as the Boss if he did not abandon the US and the CIA.
The part on the Philosophers is a bit off though, and I think you’re mixing up the ending of the game with the backstory. The Philosophers came to be after the end of WW1 to attempt to create a world peace though mutual back channel communication, as they were already the wealthiest and most powerful people in their respective Imperialist countries. However because of capitalism their goals quickly became corrupted to the point that they simple exist to increase their own power though forceful of subversive action in other countries (We see the effects of this this happening firsthand in Latin America and the Middle East in other games). This is done through pure exploitation of countries, the military industrial complex, and capitalist manipulation. Plus the Philosopher’s legacy of 100 Billion is basically what was left of the original Philosophers funds as they were splitting and going “bankrupt”, an amount of money that would still be worth over 1 trillion dollars today, so we can imagine that they were incredibly more wealthy at their peak, and even then it would probably be nothing compared to the future Patriots led by Cipher.
But the legacy was stolen from Snake by Eva the Chinese agent, however thats never stated to be a negative, as if Snake managed to hold onto it, it would just fall into the hands of the remnant American Philosophers. So China gaining the legacy is shown as a positive thing as it allowed them to stave off American imperialism and develop China into a modern power.
her character we see the true reward that being a devoted capitalist and CIA agent get you. It gets you tossed aside and thrown in the trash once you no longer have any value.
And the communist scientists get nuked by their own. Perhaps a nihilist reading is more fitting then? The series has never steered away from being performatively edgy.
This acts as a sort of cautionary tale for Snake, as he would have ended up the same way as the Boss if he did not abandon the US and the CIA.
Yeah, and I appreciate some of where Naked went from there. But he does very explicitly come out of it an enlightened centrist. For every scene he gushes over Che or resists empire, there’s one where romanticises war, stresses that they’re not politically driven, or happily sides with anyone that will pay him.
The Philosophers came to be after the end of WW1
By making the money so old, they’re whitewashing it. Was it earned through slavery? Who knows, it’s so old! But you can’t expect us to give it up now?! But this isn’t how liberalism works. All their money is still coming from slavery. I don’t respect this MacGuffin at all.
to attempt to create a world peace though mutual back channel communication, as they were already the wealthiest and most powerful people
Look, they inherently want to do good…
It feels like the game is saying “Even when you have the best of intentions, you have to do it the right way”, as opposed to the imperialists, death squads, coup regimes, did not have the best of intentions.
We see the effects of this this happening firsthand in Latin America and the Middle East in other games
Solid 4 beats you over the head with everything else it wants to communicate. But it doesn’t communicate why Latin America is poor.
So China gaining the legacy is shown as a positive thing as it allowed them to stave off American imperialism and develop China into a modern power.
But in reality it was socialism that allowed them to stave off imperialism and develop China into a modern power! Metal Gear attributes all crimes of empire onto magical super villains and all triumphs of democracy and socialism to benevolent benefactors and luck.
I don’t really understand your first point, as the Boss didn’t fire the nuke, that’s was Volgin’s work. The Boss’s job was to bring Volgin the missile. As to why Volgin did it? That’s one of the comically evil things I mentioned before. There was no reason for it.
Second, yes Snake is very much an “enlightened centrist” and I won’t push back on that. I’ll mostly tack that up too Kojima being a “western leftist”.
I will push back on the Philosophers line through. Even though they say they “want to do the right thing”, they were never painted in a positive light. They were corrupted by capital, evil, and completely forgot about their goals only 2 decades after starting. They are undisputed villains that act as the precursor to similarly evil organizations like the Patriots.
For the Socialism on China line, I agree! For real life you are entirely correct. I’m simply talking about the in game universe, as that’s even a plot point focused only in the game. Socialism was the reason why China was able to develop, however similar to a “Deng moment” the 1 trillion dollars and CIA secrets allowed China to invest in themselves and build themselves back faster. The game doesn’t really forget socialism, they simply say the money was useful in preventing China from falling behind. (In game of course, not in real life)
I don’t really understand your first point, as the Boss didn’t fire the nuke, that’s was Volgin’s work. The Boss’s job was to bring Volgin the missile.
I’m saying that yes, the CIA will betray you, but the Soviet Union will also betray you. The Boss was betrayed by the CIA. The scientists were betrayed by Volgin. The CIA is not portrayed as uniquely evil, and their evil isn’t tied to empire or capitalism. There are bad people here, and there are bad people there. In both cases they can get away with anything.
On the other two points, your readings aren’t at odds with the text, but the text isn’t damning condemnations of capitalism or liberalism either. The game can slot onto your world view or a liberal world view without challenging either. Since your world view is so far from a liberal world view, that can only be the case if it’s weak critique. If socialism isn’t forgotten, then the powers should compound and China should be a bigger player in the world of Metal Gear than the real world. But we never hear about China.
The MGS series has a theme of “gene, meme, scene, sense, peace, revenge, race”. I did not know that I missed out all these years on this game series, due to a bad assumption I made about Metal Gear being just an insignificant game, because Metal Slug took over my childhood.
If you’re gonna play Peace Walker, try to have a friend to play it with. It supports up to three friends. I’m not sure if the servers are still up, but the PSP version is local coop so would always work.
People will tell you to start with 3. I don’t personally think 3 is a good starting point. I think all other entry points are better. (Solid 1, Solid 2, Solid 4, Solid V, Ground Zeroes, Peace Walker. There is also Rising Revengence which I mentioned earlier, but it’s a different genre and type of game. The “Metal Gear” games and the games I haven’t listed are poor entry points and poor games).
😢 I no longer have friends who would play or cherish old times. I am a grown up, everybody is a grown up. And in India, people did not play as much of these titles, most of the games they have played are either the very popular flashy AAA garbage titles, or old school NES games. I am one of the fewer Indians who chased this stuff.
You’ll be able to have fun with it on your own too. Many of the larger side-missions benefit greatly from playing it with someone else, but for the main story it’s not as crucial, just because of the types of missions there are. Feel free to share your journey with us if you choose to get started on the series.
I will take a little while, since I am a bit busy now, with studying for job and all. The game grind needs to wait, but yesterday I downloaded MGS 1-4.
There are actually a few communists among the creative team behind the last few Metal Gear entries. Though the main brand guy Hideo Kojima is a baizuo.
It doesn’t really do a good job with leftist commentary, mostly just using the aesthetics of marxist criticism without teaching liberals anything. It touches on capitalism and hegemony at a very surface level but doesn’t engage with the topics in meaningful ways.
That being said, there are some hype scenarios, like having a sword fight with the president of the USA after a giant NSA boat crashes into Manhattan, knocking over skyscrapers (off-screen).
If anything, honestly, I’d say Metal Gear as a series mostly glorifies war and nationalism, and kinda whitewashes a lot of atrocities committed by empire as clearly fictional (since in the setting, they are reliant on magic), or as probably fictional (since they happen in a computer game with magic).
The best Metal Gear games are Peace Walker and Rising. They’re the two games where Hideo Kojima had less input. Both from a anti-imperialist, pro-communist, anti-war perspective and from a gameplay perspective. I like them all. Hideo Kojima is a wanker. I like Death Stranding too, but there too, he is a wanker.
I looked at the titles the past few days and generally 1, 2 Sons of Liberty and 3 Snake Eater are most favoured. What is your perception of those?
Solid 1 is smaller in scope. NATO is clearly the ‘bad guys’, but it doesn’t feel too far removed from a 90s Hollywood action film trying to insert some intrigue and edge.
In 3, you are explicitly sent into Soviet territory, working for the CIA. By the end of it, it’s clear the USA are the bad guys overall, but there’s still heavy both-siding in the form of the Soviet commander being a cartoon villain with a million scars on his face who gets off on torturing people. The original contradiction in having your mentor who you respect defect to the soviet union turns out to be her on an undercover mission. The main MacGuffin has the function of downplaying global south exploitation and colonialism’s role in the imperial core’s wealth. It is not anti-imperialist despite taking place during the cold war. It does show Soviet technology as far superior to CIA technology, but I don’t think you should read too much into that.
2 though, I have to praise. Snake (series protagonist) is an eco terrorist who’s enemy is the regime in the USA, and the plot is about propaganda and censorship. Your objective at the end of the game is to sink the NSA’s server farm giant robot boat nuke platform. I think it was ahead of it’s time in predicting where mass surveillance and internet propaganda was heading. The game is from late 2001.
In terms of gameplay. Solid 1 is Pac Man. Solid 2 3 are transformative evolutions of Pac Man, but will likely feel stiff and clunky to a modern player. I enjoy all three.
The Boss’s mission wasn’t really a contradiction though as she was forced to carry it out or the Philosophers would kill her, Snake, and Ocelot. They even kill her husband the Sorrow for collateral, so we know that wasn’t a bluff. Her hand was kind of forced as the ending narration puts it. She despised herself for it, hence why she kept letting Snake go, and was hoping he would kill her in the end (or kill herself and die either way as she would also be killed by the MiG air strike she called).
Also isn’t the Philosophers legacy a literal representation of Western Imperialism and the exploitation of the global South? It was a combination of America’s, the Russian Empire’s, Nationalist China’s, and other imperial countries exorbitant wealth that was under the control of capitalists who de facto ruled the world (Wiseman’s Committee).
While it is comically evil, wouldn’t Volgin’s ideals and actions make sense in the fact that he was meant to be a representation of the Brezhnev faction that would replace Khrushchev? With Brezhnev’s heavy militarization and focus on the arms race above all else?
I guess I would also excuse the no anti-imperialism a little bit as it wasn’t really relevant to the plot for it to show up, though there are little things here and there like China getting a one up on the CIA by using CIA secrets to develop their own hydrogen bomb.
Sure, but we didn’t see her ideologically attracted to communism. When I say contradiction, I mean from Snake’s (or the liberal player’s) POV at the off-set. Because she never defected. Her arc tells us her mission is evil, but capitalism isn’t. And what does her mission entail? What are the major bad consequences? It’s the Soviets choosing to nuke their own people as a false flag. That’s the part we’re supposed to pity her over primarily, not having to further Empire.
Yes but it’s not concrete. It’s nebulous conspiracy theory stuff, presented more along the lines of stock market manipulation than clearly transparent exploitation happening through the currently operating above-board channels. Instead of saying the west stole humanity’s progress, it feels like the game is saying China stole the west’s legitimately earned progress. Perhaps it’s just been too long since I played it. I’ve only played through it twice, once when it was new, and once when the 360 port was new.
Well maybe, but it’s still what they choose to show us of the Soviet Union. There’s no other Soviet faction or Soviet story. They’re not portrayed especially positively in V.
I agree with your first point insolation, but when the game is factored into the larger Metal Gear Canon and other games, we can clearly see the impact and overreaching effects of the Philosophers and their influence through capitalist systems. Plus while the Boss never actually aligns herself with communism (she is extremely reactionary as she was a devoted CIA agent and probably the best spy to ever live, and assisted in many American operations like the Bay of Pigs) but through her character we see the true reward that being a devoted capitalist and CIA agent get you. It gets you tossed aside and thrown in the trash once you no longer have any value. This acts as a sort of cautionary tale for Snake, as he would have ended up the same way as the Boss if he did not abandon the US and the CIA.
The part on the Philosophers is a bit off though, and I think you’re mixing up the ending of the game with the backstory. The Philosophers came to be after the end of WW1 to attempt to create a world peace though mutual back channel communication, as they were already the wealthiest and most powerful people in their respective Imperialist countries. However because of capitalism their goals quickly became corrupted to the point that they simple exist to increase their own power though forceful of subversive action in other countries (We see the effects of this this happening firsthand in Latin America and the Middle East in other games). This is done through pure exploitation of countries, the military industrial complex, and capitalist manipulation. Plus the Philosopher’s legacy of 100 Billion is basically what was left of the original Philosophers funds as they were splitting and going “bankrupt”, an amount of money that would still be worth over 1 trillion dollars today, so we can imagine that they were incredibly more wealthy at their peak, and even then it would probably be nothing compared to the future Patriots led by Cipher.
But the legacy was stolen from Snake by Eva the Chinese agent, however thats never stated to be a negative, as if Snake managed to hold onto it, it would just fall into the hands of the remnant American Philosophers. So China gaining the legacy is shown as a positive thing as it allowed them to stave off American imperialism and develop China into a modern power.
And the communist scientists get nuked by their own. Perhaps a nihilist reading is more fitting then? The series has never steered away from being performatively edgy.
Yeah, and I appreciate some of where Naked went from there. But he does very explicitly come out of it an enlightened centrist. For every scene he gushes over Che or resists empire, there’s one where romanticises war, stresses that they’re not politically driven, or happily sides with anyone that will pay him.
By making the money so old, they’re whitewashing it. Was it earned through slavery? Who knows, it’s so old! But you can’t expect us to give it up now?! But this isn’t how liberalism works. All their money is still coming from slavery. I don’t respect this MacGuffin at all.
Look, they inherently want to do good… It feels like the game is saying “Even when you have the best of intentions, you have to do it the right way”, as opposed to the imperialists, death squads, coup regimes, did not have the best of intentions.
Solid 4 beats you over the head with everything else it wants to communicate. But it doesn’t communicate why Latin America is poor.
But in reality it was socialism that allowed them to stave off imperialism and develop China into a modern power! Metal Gear attributes all crimes of empire onto magical super villains and all triumphs of democracy and socialism to benevolent benefactors and luck.
I don’t really understand your first point, as the Boss didn’t fire the nuke, that’s was Volgin’s work. The Boss’s job was to bring Volgin the missile. As to why Volgin did it? That’s one of the comically evil things I mentioned before. There was no reason for it.
Second, yes Snake is very much an “enlightened centrist” and I won’t push back on that. I’ll mostly tack that up too Kojima being a “western leftist”.
I will push back on the Philosophers line through. Even though they say they “want to do the right thing”, they were never painted in a positive light. They were corrupted by capital, evil, and completely forgot about their goals only 2 decades after starting. They are undisputed villains that act as the precursor to similarly evil organizations like the Patriots.
For the Socialism on China line, I agree! For real life you are entirely correct. I’m simply talking about the in game universe, as that’s even a plot point focused only in the game. Socialism was the reason why China was able to develop, however similar to a “Deng moment” the 1 trillion dollars and CIA secrets allowed China to invest in themselves and build themselves back faster. The game doesn’t really forget socialism, they simply say the money was useful in preventing China from falling behind. (In game of course, not in real life)
I’m saying that yes, the CIA will betray you, but the Soviet Union will also betray you. The Boss was betrayed by the CIA. The scientists were betrayed by Volgin. The CIA is not portrayed as uniquely evil, and their evil isn’t tied to empire or capitalism. There are bad people here, and there are bad people there. In both cases they can get away with anything.
On the other two points, your readings aren’t at odds with the text, but the text isn’t damning condemnations of capitalism or liberalism either. The game can slot onto your world view or a liberal world view without challenging either. Since your world view is so far from a liberal world view, that can only be the case if it’s weak critique. If socialism isn’t forgotten, then the powers should compound and China should be a bigger player in the world of Metal Gear than the real world. But we never hear about China.
The MGS series has a theme of “gene, meme, scene, sense, peace, revenge, race”. I did not know that I missed out all these years on this game series, due to a bad assumption I made about Metal Gear being just an insignificant game, because Metal Slug took over my childhood.
If you’re gonna play Peace Walker, try to have a friend to play it with. It supports up to three friends. I’m not sure if the servers are still up, but the PSP version is local coop so would always work.
People will tell you to start with 3. I don’t personally think 3 is a good starting point. I think all other entry points are better. (Solid 1, Solid 2, Solid 4, Solid V, Ground Zeroes, Peace Walker. There is also Rising Revengence which I mentioned earlier, but it’s a different genre and type of game. The “Metal Gear” games and the games I haven’t listed are poor entry points and poor games).
😢 I no longer have friends who would play or cherish old times. I am a grown up, everybody is a grown up. And in India, people did not play as much of these titles, most of the games they have played are either the very popular flashy AAA garbage titles, or old school NES games. I am one of the fewer Indians who chased this stuff.
You’ll be able to have fun with it on your own too. Many of the larger side-missions benefit greatly from playing it with someone else, but for the main story it’s not as crucial, just because of the types of missions there are. Feel free to share your journey with us if you choose to get started on the series.
I will take a little while, since I am a bit busy now, with studying for job and all. The game grind needs to wait, but yesterday I downloaded MGS 1-4.