MGS 5’s terrifying first mission points to the lost Kojima Silent Hill

It’s been just over nine years since the release of Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Painthe final game in the venerable stealth-action series directed by its creator Hideo Kojima. A lot happened for Kojima during this time: he founded his own independent studio, which was released in 2019 Death StrandingHe watched a lot of movies and basically did whatever he wanted, not to mention all the celebrities he befriended and digitally scanned into his fictional worlds along the way.

But there’s something else Kojima hasn’t quite gotten around to yet: making a true horror game. His upcoming game FROMannounced last year, appears to be just that: a psychological horror game starring Hunter Schafer, with writing input from Hollywood horror writer Jordan Peele, no less! However, it doesn’t look like we’ll be seeing much of this game in the near future, or at least not sooner Death Stranding 2: On the Beach will be released sometime next year. However, in the meantime, have you ever wondered what it would be like if Kojima Really Since he’s applied his game designer sensibilities to the horror genre, I would highly recommend you replay the opening mission of The phantom pain“Prologue: Awakening.”

If you’re reading this, you probably already know the opening moments of Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain. It’s also likely that you haven’t played the game in a while, given the aforementioned amount of time since release. So here’s a little background on the level’s premise before I get into the reasons why I think you should play it.

The phantom pain takes place after the events of 2014 Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes. Players take on the role of Snake, a former CIA agent turned mercenary who wakes up in a hospital bed in Cyprus nine years after a near-fatal helicopter crash. He’s lost his left arm and his body is littered with fragments of human bones and shrapnel, so he’s understandably a bit worn out, not to mention the fact that he suffers from mild amnesia and his muscles have atrophied after nearly a decade of involuntary Bed rest.

Things get even worse when the hospital is attacked by an army of soldiers who are indiscriminately mowing down staff and civilian patients, presumably as part of a mission to destroy their ultimate target: you. After being saved from death by Ishmael, a mysterious patient with a heavily bandaged face, the two of you must work together to find a way to escape the hospital alive.

If you’re a hardcore Metal Gear fan, you know that it actually is Away There is more to this whole situation than what meets the eye. As interesting – and frankly confusing – as all of these details are and how they fit into the larger Metal Gear universe as a whole, they are completely beside the point of why I think you should play this particular mission The phantom pain this Halloween. And that’s simply because it’s a bloody horrific experience that blurs the line between implicitly psychological and outright supernatural horror.

First, you begin the mission with extremely limited mobility, crawling on your stomach and dragging your limp right arm behind you as you brace yourself against walls and objects, slipping off surfaces and hitting the ground as your body betrays you. It’s a frustrating and demoralizing experience, deliberately designed to put the player in the role of a man practically fighting for survival against the inertia of his own body. This is not the legendary soldier that fans of the series have come to know and love over the years. Or at least not yet.

As the mission progresses, Snake gradually regains control of his motor skills. As a result, the player slowly learns the basic mechanics of walking, running, crouching, and stealthily sneaking past roving squads of heavily armed wet workers. As if that weren’t enough, you’re also being stalked by what appears to be a red-headed psychic child wearing a straitjacket and gas mask, as well as a terrifying man in flames who is hell-bent on finding and killing you, à la Resident Evil 3‘s nemesis.

When you play it for the first time, it feels impossible to understand what is real and what is not in this situation. Did Snake really survive that helicopter crash, or is this hell? Is Ishmael really helping you escape, or is he just an invention conjured from Snake’s fractured psyche? Then there’s the climactic horseback sequence in which Snake and a mustachioed cowboy named Ocelot are chased by the Man in Flames on a burning horse. This may not be hell, but it sure feels like it.

Oh, and did I mention the scene where a gunship gets swallowed by a whale thrown by that psychic kid? Again, it’s best not to worry too much about what this all means in the broader sense of the Metal Gear universe. Just enjoy the experience for what it is: a confusing, frightening and exhilarating fight for survival in a world that is both fantastical and macabre.

Even after describing what happens in the game’s opening mission, I still wholeheartedly recommend you play it firsthand yourself, if only to experience what, in my opinion, is still one of the most memorable and terrifying Levels that Hideo Kojima created in a game dating. As someone who loves the Metal Gear franchise, who loves survival horror games, and who loves Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom PainI wish there were more moments The phantom pain this was similar to the tense survival horror atmosphere of its opening mission.

It’s important to mention this in 2014, right in the middle of it all The phantom painDuring production, Kojima revealed that his next project would be a Silent Hill game. Silent hillswith Norman Reedus as the game’s protagonist and Kojima’s friend, director Guillermo del Toro, who will co-direct alongside him. As part of this game, Kojima Productions released a widely well-received, aptly named “Playable Teaser” game PTwhich was delisted almost immediately next to it Silent hills‘ Cancellation in the wake of Kojima’s bitter year-long departure from Konami following the release of The phantom pain.

Repeating the first mission of Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain In 2024, it almost feels like looking into another dimension, one in which Kojima’s career went in a completely different direction Death Stranding never happened. Would Bloober Team’s Silent Hill 2 Does the remake still exist in a world where Kojima had the chance to try his hand at the series? Would Kojima have accomplished even a fraction of what he has done since the release of? The phantom pain if he hadn’t left Konami? The answer, of course, is: who knows? Silent hills never happened, and as a result, the trajectory of the Silent Hill franchise and Kojima’s career went in completely different directions.

The opening moments of The phantom pain I feel like Kojima is trying out ideas that he might have later refined in a horror game like this Silent hillsif he had had the opportunity to make this game a success. As bittersweet as that may sound, the fact remains Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Painhis first mission, in particular, is a lasting testament to what Kojima can achieve when he truly applies his wits and talents to the challenge of creating an interactive experience that values ​​psychological tension and horror over mere action spectacle. For all these reasons and more, I think it’s the perfect game for this year’s scariest season.