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The Official Playstation Magazine (OPM) in the UK recently did an interview with Hideo Kojima, head of Kojima Productions, creator of the PS3 exclusive stealth game Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. Prospecter at MSG.org typed it out. The game won’t just take place in the Middle East, but will travel the world. Also interesting is that the GEKKOs (yes the mechs that moo like cows) won’t always attack Old Snake…

OPM: We noticed in the new MGS4 trailer that Snake seems to be shooting soldiers from both sides of the conflict. With graphics getting more realistic do you feel that the moral aspect of gaming is going to become more important?

Kojima: Well, this time Snake has his own rivals and destiny so he’s in a battlefield but sometimes the people there don’t have anything to do with him. So yes, there’s a moral aspect to what Snake should or could do to others that are not really involved in his actions. It’s up to the player, and that’s a deliberate theme this time.



OPM: Does this freedom to make moral choices reflect how people approach Metal Gear games in different ways - with some people blasting through and some using stealth more - or is it just a reflection of the morally murky way wars are being fought now?

Kojima: There are three aspects to this. Firstly, there’s the real world changing as it is now with the Americans going everywhere and creating war. Secondly, there’s MGS4’s theme and plot, which has something to do with this. And the third aspect is that while MGS has always been a sneaking mission, FPS shooting is a trend and I really wanted to give players that freedom this time. I also want players to discover their emotions about how war changes life and people. You may decide to stick with nation ‘A’, or ‘B’ in the game’s war, or you could destroy both. You could also choose not to ally with either country. There are not political issues involved for Snake. You don’t have to kill the enemy, but you might decide to. I want people to understand that kind of feeling - killing someone you had no intention to kill. These days, with any FPS you’re either on side ‘A’ or side ‘B’ and you’re killing, killing, killing, but my games shouldn’t be like that, and that’s why I have this big theme. Of course, this is still a game and I don’t people to be sick every time they shoot an enemy.

OPM: The original tagline for MGS4 was ‘No place to hide’, and yet the more wee see OctoCam it seems that, now, potentially everywhere is a place to hide. To what extent will gamers be able to come up with creative places to stow away?

Kojima: In the MGS series there has always been some obstacle or other that you could hide behind and not show your body so you wouldn’t get spotted. This time it’s not like you hide somewhere - its more that you’re in sight but out of sight in the battlefield. You’re out of attention, so to say.

OPM: Can you expand on that?

Kojima: To use a funny analogy - in the past, the MGS series was like a bank robber trying to rob a bank at night; so there are guards, cameras etc. And when you get spotted you’re instantly known as the robber. But in this game, you’re going into the bank at midday. You might just be a customer going in to make a deposit, but you still have to sneak in to accomplish your mission. So you’re trying to deceive. You’re on camera, so if you do weird things you’ll be spotted as the robber, but if you don’t you won’t. Its more about deceiving the eye. I can’t really reveal the top secrets but we [the development team] did our training camp in the mountains as we always do, and this time we had that kind of training: deceiving the eye, or crawling unseen while you’re in view. That’s what we did for MGS4.

OPM: In the first MGS4 trailer (see the video at the start of the interview) we saw an ageing Snake inject himself with something. At the end of the trailer we see what look