TWENTY-FIVE years ago, Metal Gear Solid was released on the first PlayStation.
Though the events in the game are set after Metal Gear in 1987 and Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake in 1990, Metal Gear Solid (MGS) is the first in the “Solid” era of franchise, which spanned from 1998 to 2015. “Solid” denoted how MGS used 3D computer polygon graphics, unlike its predecessors.
Though the first two Metal Gear games are important, this article will forgo those games to instead focus on MGS, a game that was important in setting up the blueprint for subsequent games in the franchise and for other games in the same genre/subgenre to emulate.
Birth of a new subgenre
From the mind of video game auteur Hideo Kojima, MGS was an important game in the action-stealth subgenre and while it played an important role in developing the subgenre, it technically wasn’t the first 3D stealth game.
About six months before the release of MGS, the ninja game Tenchu: Stealth Assassins was (also) released on the PlayStation. Much of the gameplay and mechanics were similar, but the former diverged by taking the action-stealth route, whereas Tenchu was almost entirely stealth.
What made the game stand out, from Tenchu and the other games at the tail end of the last millennium, was its military action, the melding of political and historical intrigue, and emphasis on cinematic sequences.
For instance, compare the story cutscenes of 1997’s Final Fantasy VII and MGS; the latter blows the former completely out of the water.
