Metal Gear
Bored of gaming's all-too itchy trigger finger, game designer Hideo Kojima's first released title introduced the idea of avoiding bullet-based altercations, instead encouraging an altogether more stealthy approach. The game was, of course, Metal Gear and it made its debut on the MSX2 home computer way back in 1987. The story gave birth to one of gaming's most famous characters - special forces operative, Solid Snake - as he embarked on a covert mission to destroy the nuclear missile launching mech, Metal Gear. This important piece of gaming heritage most recently popped up in Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence, where the full game was included as a nice extra.
When did the series goice cold?
The sequel - Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake - was released exclusively in Japan for the MSX2 in 1990. The story goes that Kojima was never planning a follow-up, but changed his mind when he discovered that publisher Konami was creating a spin-off sequel, Snake's Revenge (which was released for NES in Europe and America). Kojima's true, second part of the Metal Gear series introduced a host of new features - Snake could now crawl and hide under objects, while enemies could detect noises, were given greater fields of view and a third state of alert (alert-evasion-infiltration).Metal Gear 2 also focused much more on the game's characters and storyline, introducing cut-scenes to develop the unfolding plot.
