Board Thread:Metal Gear Solid V/@comment-98.234.99.168-20150703054955/@comment-1504072-20150723110435

64.33.250.214 wrote: I wouldn't say the eye color issue is completely moot, when Kojima retconned the canon to make Big Boss's eyes blue. In MGS2, Solid appeared to have green eyes like Liquid. Which further validated Campbell's original statements in MGS1 that Solid and Liquid were exact duplicates aside from skin tone, as he didn't bring up the differences between eyes or hair. This was canon until Twin Snakes came along and changed a number of things. Twin Snakes made Solid's eyes blue, and I heard because of that Kojima made Boss's eyes blue in Snake Eater to match Solid. I thought that Solid Snake's eyes were green in The Twin Snakes, or at least grey in all the screenshots I've seen. Can you provide any screenshots that prove otherwise? Also, do you have evidence that shows Kojima basing his design choices on those of The Twin Snakes? That really doesn't sound like something he'd feel beholden to, IMO. It would make more sense to base Big Boss's appearance on Solidus from MGS2, being the visually identical clone and all.

64.33.250.214 wrote: When Kojima made Big Boss's eyes blue, he pretty much established that as one of the character's recessive traits. Blue eyes are recessive, so it would only make sense for the clone with recessive genes to have those features. It has also been established in MGS1 and later games that Solid and Boss have Japanese genes. Blue eyes are extremely uncommon for Japanese people. Yet both Boss and Solid did not inherit darker eyes from their Asian side. Which implies canonically and story-wise that these are recessive traits. I don't believe that Big Boss's eyes were made blue simply to imply a recessive genetic trait, rather than a design choice for aesthetic reasons. Also, the color choice should be equally credited to character designer Yoji Shinkawa, rather than just Kojima alone.

The only Japanese genes inherited by Les Enfants Terribles were from the egg donor's mitochondrial DNA, as established in MGS4. Only Big Boss's nuclear DNA (i.e. that located in his cell's nucleus) was inherited, which contains the eye colour genes. Since Big Boss is no longer of Japanese descent in canon (if he ever was), the above point about Japanese eye color inheritance is invalid.

If you wanna get technical, eye color is actually determined by many genes. If Big Boss really had blue eyes due to a single gene, then ALL his clones would have blue eyes, as no dominant version of that gene (allele) even exists in Big Boss's DNA. Therefore, trying to determine the "recessive" clone on that basis would be meaningless. The various other genes coding for eye color (whose dominant/recessive allele pair is unknown) may account for any difference in eye color between the clones, even if the extent of their influence is not as strong as the commonly known blue/brown eye gene.

LONG STORY SHORT: Considering all of the above, and all the evidence available, using eye/hair colour from these games to determine the clones' identities is a fairly weak argument, IMHO. Regardless of whether it was Solid or Liquid who was always blond (dyed brown) or always brunet (dyed blond), there'll always be a combination to fit Campbell's "completely identical" line in the MGS1 briefing.

64.33.250.214 wrote: I'm sure there are ways to make a character stand out in a dark environment without making their hair look blonde. Several spots in the game don't have good lighting, yet it doesn't drastically change Solid's character model. You could dismiss the briefing as stylistic if it wasn't for Campbell's dialogue. Why mention that Solid and Liquid look like exact duplicates except for skin? The briefing is largely static, with limited animation. Snake's polygon model during gameplay is in a completely different context, being much more dynamic. Also, as mentioned above, if either clone's hair is dyed/bleached, rather than natural color, then Cambpell's line can still be valid.