Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty

"There's room for only one Snake, and One Big Boss!"

- Revolver Ocelot under control by Liquid Snake

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons Of Liberty was the fourth game in the Metal Gear series. The game was split into two main sections (Tanker and Plant chapters) and two playable characters: Solid Snake and Raiden. The music was conducted by Harry Gregson-Williams.

Story Overview
Two years after Shadow Moses, Solid Snake and Otacon, working as Philanthropy receive intelligence of a new type of Metal Gear being transported through the Hudson River. As Snake boards the tanker, it's seized by a rouge group of Russian Mercenaries, intent on stealing the new Metal Gear. Eventually, the Tanker is sunk and Solid Snake is presumed dead and the Hudson is polluted with mass amounts of Oil.

Another two years later and the Big Shell, a gigantic off shore clean up facility is taken over by a terrorist faction calling themselves the Sons Of Liberty. New FOXHOUND operative Raiden is sent in to neutralize the threat.

A more detailed Story Overview can be seen here

Reception
Fans were taken by suprise that they took the role of Raiden during the entirety of the Big Shell chapter. Overall reaction in North America and Europe were negative towards the introduction of Raiden, and was neutral in Japan. Another dispute was the cutscenes which were considerably longer than the cutscenes in Metal Gear Solid, leading to complaints that Metal Gear Solid 2 was more like a movie with interactive sequences rather than a Tactical Espionage game.

However, despite such negative commentaries, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty received high scores from critics (95% critical average) and sold over 7 million copies worldwide, and has also been featured on numerous "Greatest Games of All-Time" lists.

Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance
Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance went multi-platform in spring 2003, hitting Xbox and PC. The new version included several new gameplay modes (boss survival, the return of VR training) and some minor graphical enhancements. The PC version required an upgrade due to its high graphic content in which the user would need a DVD drive to play the game. "Substance" appeared on the Playstation 2 several months later, releasing at the same time that the original version was added to Sony's Greatest Hits lineup. The Playstation 2 version included skateboarding mini-game not found in the Xbox and PC versions.

Additions and Changes in Substance include:
 * Addition of a Boss-Survival mode
 * Addition of Skateboarding mini-game (PS2 only)
 * Addition of 5 "Snake Tales", feature sized games
 * Addition of over 500 VR and Alternative missions
 * Addition of Casting Theater
 * Alterations of Dog Tags
 * Alterations of Thermal Goggles graphics

The Document of Metal Gear Solid 2
In the month of September 2002, a "Making of" interactive disc was released in Japan and North America. The disc contained VR Missions, built in soundtrack, the mechanics and areas of the game as well as the ability to look at player polygons. It wasn't literally a "Documentry" in a sense as it was more interactive to a degree as it served it's purpose to show the entire game of Metal Gear Solid 2.

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty Digital Graphic Novel
A Digital Graphic Novel was announced at Metal Gear 20th Anniversary Party, according to sources from the Live Blogging brought by IGN.com and 1UP.com the DGN will contain full voice overs and more features than the prievous digital graphic novel.

Theme
Memetic engineering (the theory that ideas, beliefs and thoughts can be isolated and controlled) is the theme of this game. The aim of The Patriots is to control the flow of information through society, censoring the public from the things they don't want shared. Solid Snake's philosophy is that humanity needs to find something worth believing in and pass it onto future generations.

Substance is also a theme within the game, as Raiden is essentially a blank character, as he is essentially controlled and used his entire life. In the beginning, he fully believes himself to be Solid Snake, until the notion of meeting the "Real" Solid Snake shows up. When Rose tells him about his room, its an all white room, with nothing but a bed within it. When he finally meets with Solidus, who had been the first to bring Raiden into war, he ends up having his own substance and personality, as taking down his "father" so to speak, and proclaiming his love to Rose, although she herself was also part of the "Meme" theme up there. The Patriots made the two meet, but there was a false relationship up there, and at the end, it was a true, just love between the two. Raiden was full. '''