By Elias Dounis on March 17th, 2004

Genre: Action/Adventure
Developer: Silicon Knights
Publisher: Konami
# of Players: 1
Memory: 3 blocks
ERSB: Mature
Released On: March 10, 2004
Supports: Progressive Scan, Dolby Pro Logic II
MSRP: $49.99
Also On: None
Website: http://www.konamijpn.com/products/mgs_tts/index.html

Once Green
In 1998, two games were released that were immediately dubbed two of the greatest games in gaming history (at the time). These two games were The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Hideo Kojima’s Metal Gear Solid. Unfortunately, since each one of these games were found on opposite sides of the PlayStation and Nintendo 64 “console war,” few had the chance to experience both titles. Due to this, many gamers held an unfair bias towards either one of these revolutionary titles, in addition to missing out on one of the greatest gaming experiences one could possibly imagine. Unfortunately, I was one of those fools; a fool who shunned Metal Gear Solid with a blurred Lens of Truth, a fool who dismissed future installments in the series as garbage, without even giving the titles fair judgment. Luckily, for those in my position, and for those who love the original Metal Gear Solid more than anything on this earth, Nintendo, Konami, and Silicon Knights have come together to resurrect the original Metal Gear Solid exclusively for the Nintendo GameCube in a full blown remake that no one can help but take notice of with Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes.

Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes is Solid Snake’s first appearance on a Nintendo console since the days of the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) and much like another remake of a PlayStation classic for the GameCube, Resident Evil, The Twin Snakes comes to the GameCube featuring all new gameplay elements, in addition to overhauled visuals and audio.

Shadows of the Past
Without any prior experience with Hideo Kojima’s Metal Gear Solid, I dove into The Twin Snakes with no intention of judging the game as a credible remake as many have done, but instead for how it matches up against today’s best titles, including others in the same genre which it arguably gave birth to, such as Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell. In that respect, Metal Gear Solid doesn’t hold up as strong as I once liked to have thought. Simply put, the gameplay featured in The Twin Snakes has been put to shame by Splinter Cell.

The amount of control you have over your character and over your camera’s positioning in Splinter Cell undeniably surpasses that of The Twin Snakes. Disturbingly, The Twin Snakes shares many qualities with Capcom’s Resident Evil titles when it comes to control and frustratingly positioned and fixed perspectives. However, I’ve personally never had any difficulty or quarrels with the control in a Resident Evil title, the same goes for The Twin Snakes, but the similarities cannot be mistaken. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the game’s camera, since at times you are restricted to an over the top viewpoint which often results in the shooting of enemies blindly, with your only assistant being the game’s Enemy Radar. Although, more intelligent players will utilize the game’s newly implemented First Person perspective from Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty to tranquilize or kill enemies from a distance.

As for actual gameplay situations, The Twin Snakes does provide some interesting stealth-related objectives, which are given to Snake as the game progresses through the use of a communication device called a Codec. Most of the time, the game requires for you to sneak by enemy Genome Soldiers (genetically enhanced tools of war), whether it’s quietly tip-toeing to your destination, crawling through air duct vents, hiding in a cardboard box, or placing yourself into a nearby locker (also borrowed from Metal Gear Solid 2). As already mentioned, this manages to provide for some interesting and (of course) entertaining gameplay. However, this is mostly in thanks to the game’s superb enemy AI. While more interesting AI can be found in a game (once again) such as Splinter Cell, that which is found in The Twin Snakes is still clever enough to keep gamers on their toes, knowing that if they make the wrong move, they will be detected, shot at, and be in even greater danger since reinforcements are immediately called for upon Snake’s discovery. Thus playing through certain scenarios many times over until the player has planned out an intelligent way to accomplish things.

I specifically used the word “intelligent” in order to get another point across. In The Twin Snakes you often have the choice of running into situations with guns blazing, leaving trails of blood everywhere you look, or you can make things easier for yourself and play the game as the stealth operative Snake is meant to be in The Twin Snakes, by using tranquilizers to put the enemy Genome Soldiers to sleep, or render them unconscious with a stealth attack from behind. Either way, there’s plenty of strategy to be utilized in The Twin Snakes, but it all depends on your own approach. (Don’t we all love open ended gameplay?)

Sadly, the game’s boss battles often seem a bit anti-climactic, and in reality are pretty dull and uninspired. Most bosses are easily bested with the player hiding behind a wall of sorts, while switched into First-Person, and peeking out whenever there’s an open shot, and shooting the target. Two other battles require hand-to-hand combat, and while these battles tend to be more entertaining than the aforementioned, they still seem jaded due to the fact that Snake only has three attacks in his arsenal: Punch, Punch, and Roundhouse Kick. However, the battle with Psycho Mantis and your second encounter with Raven truly deliver a challenge, and specifically for your battle with Psycho Mantis, a few Sanity Effects from Silicon Knight’s Psychological Thriller Eternal Darkness have been implemented to make things more unusual than they had already been.

A Game for the Ages
Now, chances are you’ve already given a peek to the score I given The Twin Snakes, and from what you’ve hopefully read so far, it may not seem as if it deserves the score given, but in fact a lower one. Well, let me clear things up a bit… Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes isn’t just a game. So, in truth it cannot be judged simply for the gameplay it delivers. Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes is an experience; an experience that few games rival, an experience that pulls gamers in so tight that they become emotionally attached to its story, characters, and atmosphere. With that said, I will not divulge too many details about the game’s plot, since it is arguably one of the greatest in gaming history; a story of war, vengeance, betrayal, love, and even fate. The deeper gamers dive into the game’s story, the more you want to continue playing, with little urge to ever let go of your controller.

The cinemas found in The Twin Snakes, choreographed by Japanese action film director Ryuhei Kitamura, are some of the most action packed found in any form of entertainment. Clearly they draw inspiration from such films as The Matrix, featuring slow motion “Bullet Time” effects and insane acrobatics that easily overshadow anything seen in actual gameplay. In addition, these cinemas exist in abundance, consuming the majority of time players will place into the game, and unfortunately its length isn’t of RPG proportions. Rookies can easily complete The Twin Snakes within a ten hour limit, with roughly five of these hours being made up of in-game cinemas and Codec discussions. However, the sheer enjoyment received from the story of Hideo Kojima’s masterpiece is enough to keep players coming back for more and more, eventually even learning to appreciate gameplay subtleties, and all other sorts of trivial extras. Just as each and everyone one of us enjoys watching our favorite movies and reading our favorite novels, we will each enjoy playing The Twin Snakes to the extent where it seems as if no other care in the world exists in our daily lives other than Metal Gear Solid.

A New Look
With The Twin Snakes, Konami and Silicon Knights set out to develop a title on par if not better looking than any version of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. In that respect they succeeded. The Twin Snakes shares an incredible resemblance to Sons of Liberty, however thanks to the GameCube’s prowess at applying textures to game characters and environments, it can be seen that The Twin Snakes is even better looking than its sequel in the Metal Gear Solid timeline. However, this does not mean that the game is as stunning as games like Metroid Prime or the Xbox version of Splinter Cell, because that would be a total lie. Indeed, the game is great looking, thanks to excellent character/facial animations, and particle effects, but some the character models could definitely use some more work, more textures could have been applied to give the game a more realistic look, and the framerate could have been locked at a solid sixty frames per second for the common graphics whore (because there a handful of instances where the framerate may drop for a split second or two). Overall though, The Twin Snakes is visually pleasing game.

A Heavenly Aural Experience
One of The Twin Snakes’ best characteristics is without question the game’s excellent audio qualities. Thanks to talented voice actors such as David Hayter (Solid Snake), The Twin Snakes presents gamers with some best voice acting on the GameCube, filled with plenty of emotion at the right moments. Seeing how the game features more dialogue than any other GameCube game on the market, this sure is a welcomed trait. In addition, all sound effects are superb in their own right. However, everything pales in comparison to the game’s soundtrack. Every piece of music in The Twin Snakes helps present the game’s amazing atmosphere. The most notable of them all being the game’s end theme, titled “The Best is yet to Come;” a beautiful composition so amazing that deservingly leaves you in awe upon completion of the game.

Out of the Fox Hole
I began playing Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes with the thoughts flowing through my head saying that all I ever heard about the PlayStation original, all I had ever read, had been hype that it couldn’t possibly live up to. I was definitely wrong.

Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes is without question one of the greatest gaming experiences of our time. While it can be said that games such as Splinter Cell outclass The Twin Snakes in terms of gameplay, words saying that Splinter Cell delivers a better experience than Hideo Kojima’s Metal Gear Solid shouldn’t even be whispered. Games like Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes are in a league of their own.