Collection essentials #489: Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes (GC)

Metal Gear Solid had made a huge splash on the original PlayStation. Then, Metal Gear Solid 2 was a major early title for the PlayStation 2. And Xbox owners would receive a port of the game a year later. But aside from a spinoff Game Boy Color title, Nintendo was missing out on all this Metal Gear action. They wouldn’t be getting a port of 2 (the GameCube controller arguably doesn’t have enough buttons for it), but instead they wound up getting their own exclusive Metal Gear Solid game for the GameCube. The details don’t seem 100% clear on how this game was conceived and planned, but Nintendo helped make sure that Konami made a Metal Gear game for their GameCube. And since they were already busy working on the third Metal Gear Solid title, developer Silicon Knights would step in and do most of the work on this project. This turned out to be Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes, which is basically Metal Gear Solid 1 reimagined with the graphical quality and gameplay elements of Metal Gear Solid 2. And to this day, it remains a GameCube exclusive which has never been ported onto any other system.

For more details on Metal Gear Solid 1, including the story premise, please see my previous post about that game.

Twin Snakes is a fairly faithful remake and sticks to all the story beats of the original. However, the dialogue was rewritten and re-recorded. They did manage to get almost all of the original voice cast of the original game to reprise their roles, which is awesome. With the enhanced graphics in the style of MGS2, the characters now can actually emote during the cutscenes, and obviously everything looks a lot smoother too.

Gameplay-wise, this game does indeed play like MGS2 as well, with features such as the ability to shoot in first-person view added as well as controls designed for a joystick rather than d-pad to give greater freedom of movement. There are also a few weapons added in this version, such as the M9 tranquilizer gun. 

Since Nintendo had a hand in the creation of this game, there are a few Nintendo Easter eggs hidden in the game, such as figurines of a few Nintendo characters lying around in one room.

Reviews for Twin Snakes were almost all positive when it first released. However, its reputation among series fans is mixed to say the least. There’s always a risk of this whenever you’re remaking an iconic and beloved story-driven game like Metal Gear Solid. So what problems do people have with this game? First of all, many dislike choices made in the new cutscenes. They tend to be more drawn-out and over-the-top than the original. Some prefer the original music and voice acting. A gameplay criticism is that MGS1 was not designed with gameplay features of MGS2 in mind, so things like first-person shooting make segments of the game way too easy. 

In terms of my history and opinion, I remember when Twin Snakes first came out. I had been somewhat interested in Metal Gear for a while, and it seemed like a potentially good way to get started on the series. My friend Dan encouraged me to do so, as he told me “the combat sucked” in the original game and that it would be fixed for Twin Snakes. And so I did pick up Twin Snakes pretty soon after its release, and it was my first Metal Gear game. The copy in the photo is my original. I fell in love with it! The storyline was riveting, and I greatly enjoyed the stealth gameplay too. I replayed it three times, having fun with the super-powerful bonus items you get for beating the game. 

My opinion is that this is not a perfect remake by any means, but I think it’s a bit over-hated. I honestly don’t mind the new voice acting, and I just don’t see it as being a big drop-off in quality that others do. I don’t really mind the new cutscenes either. Now, granted, I played through this game before the original, so my own perspective is affected by that for sure. And at the end of the day some of this stuff is a bit subjective. I do agree that the new gameplay elements “don’t fit” right with the original Metal Gear Solid, but on the flip side, the gameplay here feels less dated than the original game in my opinion. Some may call this blasphemy, but I may recommend newcomers to the series to start with this remake because the gameplay of the original may be a little hard to swallow for some who are more used to contemporary game design. In summary, some criticism is fair, but I don’t think Twin Snakes should be written off or ignored by everybody.

You’ll notice my copy has an autograph, which is that of Cam Clarke, the voice actor who played the voice of the game’s main villain, Liquid Snake. I met him at ConnectiCon in 2021, doing my Solid Snake impression to him, and then he made me impersonate his own voice of Liquid Snake. It was fun!

I personally love Twin Snakes and it has a special place in my heart for being my own first Metal Gear title. It’s one I could see myself going back to in the future, too. It’s a no-doubt essential in my GameCube library!