The Metal Gear Solid Collection is so true to Hideo Kojima's "original vision" that it needed a new content warning

Metal Gear Solid 3 — (Image credit: Konami)

Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection Volume 1 apparently makes no alterations to the themes and content of the original games, though it does open every game with a warning that some of that content "may be considered outdated."

"This game contains expressions and themes which may be considered outdated. However, these elements have been included without alteration to preserve the historical context in which the game was made and the creator's original vision. Player discretion is advised," the warning reads. The game doesn't specifically reference series lead Hideo Kojima here, but the singular "the creator" here leaves little room for doubt on who we're talking about.

These are the kinds of warnings you typically see before Bugs Bunny cartoons with extremely racist caricatures, and I'm struggling to think of what in the original Metal Gear Solid trilogy could qualify for that treatment. Like, even as a Metal Gear Solid superfan who's played through each of these games at least a half-dozen times, I can admit that unfiltered #KojimaContent has some substantial excesses, but I'm not sure there's much that's downright offensive enough to go beyond the collection's ESRB rating.

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Well, I mean, there are Snake's extremely questionable attempts to flirt with Mei Ling in MGS1. And those first-person 'check out Eva's breasts' sections of MGS3. And the somewhat homophobic jokes around Raiden throughout the series. And that one really weird stepfamily incest subplot… Okay, look, any game would sound that bad if you just listed the objectionable content out like that, right? …Right?

At least there's a small mercy in that we won't be getting Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes in this collection. I don't think any of us are prepared for the waves of discourse that are gonna hit the internet when everybody remembers what happens at the end of that game.

'Volume 1' certainly implies there are more of these packages to come, but nobody's sure if the Metal Gear Solid Master Collection can save MGS4.

Dustin Bailey joined the GamesRadar team as a Staff Writer in May 2022, and is currently based in Missouri. He's been covering games (with occasional dalliances in the worlds of anime and pro wrestling) since 2015, first as a freelancer, then as a news writer at PCGamesN for nearly five years. His love for games was sparked somewhere between Metal Gear Solid 2 and Knights of the Old Republic, and these days you can usually find him splitting his entertainment time between retro gaming, the latest big action-adventure title, or a long haul in American Truck Simulator.