Making of Metal Gear Solid 4 - 20 Years of Metal Gear 2/3

It was one of the first titles to use 3D polygons in a video game. Polygons were used, mostly, in racing or flight simulation games. It was rare to see polygon-based characters in action games, and it was challenging for us to use 3D polygons to create these characters. l remember it being very difficult. With MGS1, l personally liked the Cyborg Ninja. Originally, he was not in the script... But l approached Mr. Kojima to see if we could incorporate this character into the game. My personal favorite is Metal Gear Solid 2 on PS2. l loved the scene where Metal Gear RAY appears on the tanker and afterwards there's a battle scene with Solid Snake. It was one of the inspirations behind my game "Shadow." After MGS, Solid Snake's popularity grew. He became an icon for the game and l thought that would make it difficult for the players to relate to him. So, by creating a new main character, Raiden, players were able to let go of their attachment to Solid Snake and have him be just another soldier. l do understand why some fans rejected Raiden... But personally, l don't think it was a mistake to make him the main character... You will understand why once you play MGS4. We received a lot of positive feedback after MGS1 was released. People liked how we combined story with action gameplay. So when we started work on MGS2, l considered not creating much of a story. However, when l told that to people, they all told me that the greatest thing about MGS was its emphasis on storyline coupled with great action. So, l decided to develop a storyline... But because this was a sequel l thought l needed to make the story more complex. l guess l made it too complicated... That's one of my regrets with MGS2. For the story of MGS3, l decided to take a very simple, clean approach. l focused on the relationship between Snake and The Boss. The reaction to this approach was very positive, which I’m very happy about. In truth, my original plan was to release MGS3 on PLAYSTATlON 3. But no matter how long we waited, PS3 wasn't ready to launch. There came a time when we realized that we couldn't wait any longer, So we developed MGS3 for PlayStation 2 instead. Usually when you shift up to next generation hardware, the game benefits because it brings the gameplay up to the next level. However, this time, because we couldn't rely on the console, we decided to perfect the jungle and nature scenery -- this was said to be impossible to do on the PS2. And thus, the survival game concept was born.