This article is about the AI weapons specifically developed for the Peace Walker project. You may be looking for Unmanned weapons in general. |
The AI weapons were unmanned combat vehicles developed by the rogue CIA Peace Sentinel in the early 1970s, as part of the Peace Walker Project. The AI units had various tech abilities such as high speed, mobility, or destructive power.
History[]
Development[]
Under the directive of CIA Station Chief Hot Coldman, the Peace Sentinel successfully developed four types of AI weapon. Codenamed Pupa, Chrysalis, Cocoon, and Peace Walker, they reflected hovercraft, flying, treaded, and walking type vehicles, respectively. Each was equipped with at least one AI pod containing the artificial intelligence that operated the vehicle's frame. Each also had a speech synthesis system, for relaying verbal communication on the battlefield to surrounding forces. Although their development was largely unknown to the public, rumors nonetheless circulated.[1]
The AI weapons' main development was headed by Huey Emmerich, while Strangelove created Peace Walker's advanced decision-making AI system, known as the Mammal Pod. Peace Walker was the final culmination of AI research gathered during the development of Pupa, Chrysalis and Cocoon. As such, the names given to the three prototypes all referred to the transformation stage of a butterfly's life cycle, while Peace Walker itself was often referred to as "Butterfly," and its Mammal Pod, the "Imago." In addition, other than the AI pod(s), the heads of the AI weapons themselves also functioned as a core to their main weapons, which would result in usage on other unmanned weapons should they be salvaged.[2]
The AIs belonging to the AI weapons for the Peace Walker project's speech synthesis system repeated pre-set messages that would play depending on the situation. Peace Walker was the only one of the AI weapons from this project, as well as the AI weapons overall (counting ZEKE) that was capable of self-generated speech.
Peace Walker Incident[]
- Main article: Peace Walker Incident
In 1974, Big Boss (Naked Snake) and the Militaires Sans Frontières encountered each of these machines while attempting to investigate the Peace Sentinel's presence in Costa Rica, who were also transporting nuclear weapons into the country. Upon Huey's defection to the MSF, the MSF learned from Huey the methods of defeating the AI weapons, although they were forced to choose between the spare parts and the AI memory chips.[3] After dealing enough damage to each weapon, and gaining access to the interior of their respective AI pods, Big Boss and MSF ripped out the memory boards of the AI itself, in order to disable it. After being tampered with by the MSF, the AI pods of the Pupa, Chrysalis, and Cocoon, weapons detached themselves from the main frames, and launched themselves on an escape vector, using their built-in rocket boosters.
When infiltrating the Peace Sentinels' mine base, the MSF discovered various inactive Pupa frames, indicating that the other AI weapons were intended for mass production, in addition to Peace Walker.
After the events of the mission, the MSF used the parts and memory boards they had salvaged from the AI weapons to create Metal Gear ZEKE.
List of AI weapons[]
Behind the scenes[]
The AI weapons all bear similarities to several different incarnations of Metal Gear; for example, the Chrysalis is armed with a rail gun and radome similar to that used by Metal Gear REX.
The DLC included AI weapon voices for all four AI weapons. There were one or two sets depending on whether it was the international or Japanese version of the game. The first set, released both in Japan and internationally, were human voices that were voiced by Vanessa Marshall/Yumi Kikuchi(?) (Pupa, Chrysalis, Cocoon) and Lori Alan/Kikoku Inoue (Peace Walker), and were 476 KB, 568 KB, 372 KB, and 606 KB for Pupa, Chrysalis, Cocoon, and Peace Walker/Basilisk, respectively. The quotes otherwise are exactly the same for the Type II and Custom variants as their voices without the DLC. The second set, released in Japan only, supplied accented speech from Japanese regions to each of the AI weapons, and amounted to 450 KB, 580 KB, 342 KB, and 650 KB for the Pupa Niigata Dialect, the Chrysalis Kansai Dialect, the Cocoon Hiroshima Dialect, and the Peace Walker/Basilisk Nagoya Dialect, respectively. Unlike the first set, the second set came with their own quotes, and were said regardless of whether it was Type II or Custom. For unknown reasons, the International release version of the first set had a lower KB cost for download than the Japanese version. Specifically, the Human AI voices for Pupa, Chrysalis, Cocoon, and Peace Walker/Basilisk, in America, cost 474 KB, 562 KB, 344 KB, and 678 KB, while the Japanese equivalent KB cost was 476 KB, 562 KB, 372 KB, and 678 KB, respectively.
Play Arts Kai released several figurines promoting Peace Walker that were based on the AI weapons. They also came with a code which, when inputted, unlocked a new soldier as well as a FOX T-shirt.
According to the Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker Official Art Works book, there were either going to be four additional AI weapons or the current AI weapons originally had a different design. They were a tank-turret like weapon called "Belle", a submarine-esque AI weapon that upon surfacing shoots out various shells called Odette/Odile, an fixed-wing aircraft-based AI weapon named "Scarlet," and a tower/platform/core based AI weapon named Sleeping Beauty [P.W.]. Their names derive from the French word for Beauty (and also one of the names for the female protagonist in the fairy tale "Beauty and the Beast"), the name of the white swan from "Swan Lake," Erza Scarlet from "Fairy Tail", and the character from the fairy tale of the same name.
In one of the briefing tapes, Miller revealed that Chico leaked a photograph of Chrysalis to a tabloid magazine which resulted in Gairy requesting for the UN to investigate extraterrestrials, and implied that this would get him into trouble with the CIA due to their apparently being responsible for cattle mutilations and abductions. The tape's reference to Chrysalis made it ambiguous as to whether the CIA was targeting him for leaked info in general or whether the aforementioned involvement to mutilations and abductions were related to the Peace Walker project.
On October 25, 2011, two of the AI weapons, Chrysalis and Peace Walker, were utilized in a test regarding the Fox Engine.[4]
The AI weapons, including ZEKE, are unlockable in the Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes app's Mother Base Developer, both in their standard and custom forms. The former are unlocked by completing a level 1, 3, 5, 7, and 9 Hangar section for the Pupa, Chrysalis, Cocoon, Peace Walker, and ZEKE, and the latter are unlocked by:
- Pupa Custom - Obtain Score of 75k+ on Hard (Ground Zeroes)
- Chrysalis Custom - Score of 60k+ on Hard (Eliminate the Renegade Threat)
- Cocoon Custom - Obtain score 60k+ on Hard (Classified Intel Acquisition)
- Peacewalker Custom - Obtain 24k+ points on Hard (Intel Operative Rescue)
- MG ZEKE Custom - Score 55k+ Hard (Destroy the Anti-Air Emplacements)
In the radio drama "Snake & Kaz: Love Cardboard" included in the CD Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker - Heiwa to Kazuhira no Blues, an AI weapon was heard singing while Miller and Snake, with difficulty, were trying to sneak around in a cramped cardboard box. It was not clear whether the AI weapon was Pupa, Chrysalis, or Cocoon.
Type II and Custom AI weapons[]
After completing Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, Extra Ops allows the player to fight upgraded versions of the AI weapons.
The Type II AI weapons are not notably different to the base model AI weapons, though their voices feature a different tone. However, Custom AI weapons feature several notable differences to their original counterparts:
- Maroon color scheme
- Boosted firepower and defense
- Faster repair time from being downed
- Immunity to chaff grenades
- Taunts and threats by Paz in place of announced actions and events by the AI include but are not limited to:
- "Die!" in places of "Engaging shock units./Commencing Area Attack./Firing Drill Missiles."
- "Freeze!" in place of "Firing Boosters."
- "I'll crush you like an insect!" in place of "Commencing jump."
- "Time for you to DIE!" in place of "Shock output at maximum."
- "You think I'll let you get away?!" in place of "Target locked./Missile Target acquired."
- "I'll send you straight to hell!" in place of "Charging railgun."
- "Take this!!" in place of "Chaingun."
- "Fly! My Kidnappers!" in place of "Launching Kidnappers."
- "There you are!" in place of "Approaching Target."
- "Kidnappers, come back!" in place of "Recalling Kidnappers."
- "This one is going to hurt...!" in place of "Main cannon loaded."
- "See how you like THIS!" in place of "Commencing Sweep Attack."
- "Now I'm really pissed off..." in place of "Thermostat malfunction detected."
- "Bring it on." in place of "Face me!"
- "How do you like this?" in place of "Firing rocket launcher."
- "Flamethrower!" in place of "Flamethrower engaged."
- "Poison Beam!" in place of "Freeze!"
- "Try this on for size!" in place of "Launching S-mines."
Gallery[]
Notes and references[]
- ^ Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, Kojima Productions (2010).
Kazuhira Miller: Snake, what was that thing?! // Naked Snake (Big Boss): Whatever it was, it looked unmanned. // Miller: Unmanned? I'd heard rumors, but an operational unit...? - ^ Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, Kojima Productions (2010).
Huey Emmerich: Great. Also, each AI weapon has a “head part” that serves as the core of its armament. Recovering a head part will allow you to use the weapon associated with that part. …But those guys won’t go down without a fight. So don’t get preoccupied with this stuff. // Naked Snake (Big Boss): Don’t worry. I’m not about to risk my life for a bunch of scrap. - ^ Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, Kojima Productions (2010).
Kazuhira Miller: Apparently each part of an AI weapon is connected to a memory board inside the AI pod. Destroying a part will release the lock on the memory board. After that, climb in the pod and you'll be able to grab whichever boards you've unlocked. Only thing is, any parts you destroy can't be collected and reused, so you'll have to decide which is more important. - ^ http://andriasang.com/comyqm/
See also[]
Metal Gears |
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Walking vehicles (nuclear strategy) |
Metal Gear RAXA — Intercontinental Ballistic Metal Gear Peace Walker (Basilisk) — Metal Gear ZEKE Metal Gear Sahelanthropus TX-55 Metal Gear — Metal Gear D — Metal Gear REX |
Related weapons |
Shagohod — AI weapons (Pupa, Chrysalis, Cocoon) Walker Gear — Battle Gear — Metal Gear G (Gustav) Arsenal Gear — Outer Haven — Gekko — Metal Gear Mk. II / III Metal Gear EXCELSUS |
Non-canon Metal Gears |
Metal Gear 1 / VRC-4 (Supercomputer) — Metal Gear 2 — Metal Gear GANDER Metal Gear (Eldera) — Metal Gear KODOQUE — Metal Gear Chaioth Ha Qadesh |