Metal Gear?!

Hi there. My name is Caleb. If you happen to know me, then it probably comes as no surprise to find that I'm writing a blog about the Metal Gear series of videogames. Simply put, I love Metal Gear--its characters, its plot, its gameplay, the themes it deals with, and the level of sheer off-the-wall insanity the series' mastermind, Hideo Kojima, always manages to whip up. This blog will contain all kinds of information on, and analysis of, the series. I plan to write entries focusing on major themes, characters, plot points, running gags, influences from outside media, instances where the history of the series coincides with actual 20th century history (or interestingly contradicts it), and whatever else I feel like yammering about.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the series, Metal Gear is a series of "tactical espionage action" videogames that began in 1987. The first installment, Metal Gear, was originally published by Konami for the MSX personal computer, which was only sold in Japan and Europe. In 1988, Metal Gear was remade for the American Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), where it gained much wider exposure and quickly gathered a surprisingly huge fan following. In the third-ever issue of Nintendo Power, November/December 1988, Metal Gear appeared out of nowhere at #3 on the magazine's "Top 30" list (as determined by responses mailed in by readers). It beat out immensely popular titles like Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!, Super Mario Bros. 2, and Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link, and stayed in the top 5 for quite some time. A decade later, in October of 1998, Metal Gear Solid was released for the Sony Playstation. It sold almost seven million copies worldwide, and is still widely regarded as one of the best Playstation games ever made. The success of the original Metal Gear Solid established the series as one of the most popular videogame franchises of the last ten years, and cemented Hideo Kojima as an industry celebrity (and one of my personal heroes :) ).

I'll go into more detail about the history behind each game in the series later, though. As anyone who follows videogames likely knows by now, the final game in the series--Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots--will soon be released. June 12, 2008, is the day when the saga of the Snakes will finally see its conclusion, and needless to say, I'm extremely excited. So excited, in fact, that I've decided to prepare by playing through every game that takes place in the main story arc of the series in chronological story order. Which breaks down like so:

Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater -- 1964
Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops -- 1970 (December)
Metal Gear -- 1995
Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake -- 1999 (December)
Metal Gear Solid -- 2005 (March)
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
Tanker chapter -- 2007
Big Shell chapter -- 2009 (April 29-30)
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots -- 2014

This approach may seem a little awkward at times--the order in which the games take place within the series' timeline is much different than the order in which they were released. But since I'm mostly going to be focusing on the narrative and thematic elements of the series, I think going through the games in story order ultimately makes the most sense. One warning, though: there will be a huge amount of spoilers found in these entries. Proceed at your own risk if you want to play through the series on your own. Finally, if you have any comments or feedback, please feel free to post here or e-mail me directly.

Now that introductions are aside, let's get started!