Metal Gear Solid: Rising

This article is about the cancelled game that was announced in 2009. You may be looking for Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, the game that Rising was revamped into by PlatinumGames.

Metal Gear Solid: Rising is a cancelled game that was intended to be the next console installment in the Metal Gear series following Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots. Originally announced at E3 2009,^[1] the game went through a long development process at Kojima Productions, who struggled to fully develop the game.^[2] At the beginning of 2011, Hideo Kojima decided to hand the development of the game over to PlatinumGames, who revamped the project into Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance.^[2]

The game was to star Raiden and was to be set before the events of Metal Gear Solid 4.^[3] Kojima was the executive producer, while Shigenobu Matsuyama was the original producer.^[3]^[4] However, Matsuyama was replaced by Yuji Korekado prior to the game's cancellation.^[5]

Gameplay[]

Metal Gear Solid: Rising was based on a concept known as "zan-datsu", literally "cut and take."^[3] The game's original producer, Shigenobu Matsuyama, explained in a Konami press conference that the "take" part revolved around Raiden literally taking power from enemies, a concept shown in the trailer as Raiden absorbed the power from a robotic soldier's intestinal battery. This concept of "taking" was not limited to power; intelligence essential for a mission objective might also be taken from enemies, as well as other components.^[3]

The game's original director, Mineshi Kimura, explained the zan-datsu concept even further, saying, "You can cut anywhere you want and destroy it, but you can actually aim where as well and that leaves you the freedom of killing your opponent, or you could cut without killing your opponent. It's really up to the player how you cut."^[3]

Producer Shingenobu Matsuyama expressed publicly that the game would definitely have a online component, and very likely have functionality with Xbox Kinect and PlayStation Move.^[6]

Plot[]

Set between the events of Metal Gear Solid 2 and Metal Gear Solid 4, Rising was going to explain how Raiden became the character that he did in Metal Gear Solid 4.^[3] The story was said to be darker than Metal Gear Rising and would depict Raiden rescuing Sunny from the Patriots. Several of the Unmanned Gear enemies seen in Metal Gear Rising, most notably the Mastiff enemy, as well as Boris Vyacheslavovich Popov were to be included in the game.^[7]

Plot Revealed[]

On March 30th, 2024, a popular gaming youtuber DidYouKnowGaming got in contact with developers on the project for their "Every Cancelled Metal Gear Solid Game" video. The developers did disclose information on the game, but they adviced not to divulge into the details, keeping their identities anonymous. What you are about to read is the plot synopsis provided by the devs.

The Plot^[8][]

Metal Gear Solid: Rising was set to be a "three act tale of revenge and rescue" taking place over two to three years. At the outset of the game, In 2011^[9], Raiden is not a cyborg yet, and his mission is to save Olga Gurlukovich's child, who is held captive by a wealthy American financier named Wexler. Wexler is keeping the child at Area 51, the very secret American military facility. Raiden manages to break Sunny free, but Wexler captures him, and forces Raiden's partner named Vespa to pull out his intestines, afterwards Wexler would crush Raiden's jaw with his own bare hands, leaving his tongue hanging down his chest, fade to black. More than a year later, in 2012, Raiden has a new, black cybernetic body and is being force-fed memory suppressants. He is now known as "Black Raiden", barely-human cyborg ninja. This was set to be a dark part of the game, as Black Raiden now working for Wexler. With the player now in control, the game was going to constantly remind the player of the fact that the people they kill in the game as Black Raiden are "the good guys". Eventually, the player would get into a boss fight, where a "psychic japanese guy" would appear to Black Raiden as Solid Snake, Snake's only appearance in the game. After the boss fight, Raiden would gradually recover his memories. Raiden manages to locate Vespa and together they break out of Wexler's compound. Raiden's new cybernetic black suit gets damaged in the process, leading to him meeting up with Dr. Pettrovich Madnar, who builds him a new suit. It's a white suit, to reflect Raiden now fighting for the side of justice, the very same cybernetic suit he wore in Metal Gear Solid 4. "White Raiden" and Vespa then set out for revenge on Wexler.

Sadly, DidYouKnowGaming couldn't get exact details on the ending of the game, although they mention at the end of the story synopsis section that the viewer "can probably piece it together roughly if they're familiar with Metal Gear Lore."

Development[]

Pre-announcement[]

Prior to Metal Gear Solid: Rising's announcement in 2009, the concept of Raiden getting a starring role in Metal Gear Solid 5 was jokingly stated by Rosemary and Raiden in the Secret Theater film Metal Gear Raiden: Snake Eraser, which was included in Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence. At the time the film was released, Metal Gear Solid 4 was considered to be the last game in the Metal Gear franchise.

Original version and cancellation[]

MGS RISING 3 WBLUE — A promotional image released alongside the announcement of the game.

Hideo Kojima officially announced Metal Gear Solid: Rising at Microsoft's E3 2009 press conference, after running various countdowns for the announcement on a Konami website.^[1] Kojima stated that he became involved with Rising because "it's a completely different kind of action than what [had] appeared in the series so far" and also stated that he would be more involved in the development of the game than a normal video game producer would be.^[10] Kojima had specifically said that he would not be directing, as he wished to pursue other projects. Rising was actually not Kojima's idea. It was his staff. He said that if he were to choose between making a game with guns or katanas, he would probably choose guns.^[11]

Kojima affirmed that he would have preferred Gray Fox rather than Raiden as the main character during the pre-production of the game, but that the studio was more akin to Raiden. Kojima also said that he was looking for a production job, not a direction job, and that couldn't have been done if Gray Fox were the main character.^[12]

Mgsscreen — Raiden in the E3 2010 trailer.

Sean Eyestone, the host of Kojima Productions' podcast, stated that Rising would feature an entirely new game engine, which was later revealed as being Kojima Productions' own Fox Engine.^[2] At E3 2010, the debut trailer for the game was shown,^[13] featuring Raiden facing off against a robotic soldier bearing a similar appearance to members of the Beauty and the Beast Unit, based on an unused concept by Yoji Shinkawa for Metal Gear Solid 4, which appears in the Master Art Works book. The robot that Raiden killed at the beginning of the trailer had the same footwear as Vamp and the FROGS, which suggested that these robots might have utilized the same technology to traverse walls and roofs. The trailer also featured the first gameplay footage, and a Peace Walker poster could be seen when Raiden destroyed the building. An official site for the game was also unveiled, where the robot was later identified as a Mastiff, per recent blueprint artwork accessible via passcode.^[14] Kojima also stated that Rising would play like a mainstream European and North American-style game. As such, he felt that "it [didn't] matter if it [lacked] the message aspect of a MGS game [he'd made]."^[4] Sadly though, the game didn't really play that well behind the scenes, as sources say that 10 frames per second, as the developers didn't have tools and programming chops to turn their game into reality, causing the whole E3 2010 trailer to be completely pre-rendered.^[6]

During development, it was also considered that Raiden would have received different voice actors for the game. It was rumored that Raiden's Japanese voice actor would have been Toshiyuki Morikawa instead of his usual voice actor, Kenyu Horiuchi. Quinton Flynn, Raiden's English voice actor, mentioned that he wasn't asked to reprise his role, indicating that the same would have happened in the English version.^[15]

Rising5 — Raiden about to cut a watermelon in half in the 2010 demo.

A Dwarf Gekko made a brief appearance in the TGS 2010 tech demo, holding things for Raiden to slash, such as watermelons, bowling pins and even another Scarab. This particular droid was called "Kogekko."

In August 2011, it was revealed that Rising would be absent from the 2011 Tokyo Game Show. According to Eyestone, the reason for the game's absence was so that the development team could spend their time on the game itself rather than a trailer or creating a one-off for an event.^[16] Kojima reportedly became more involved, and replaced Shigenobu Matsuyama with veteran Kojima Productions staff member Yuji Korekado as the producer of the game.^[5]

However, believing the project would not get completed, Kojima secretly cancelled Rising. Prior to the cancellation, however, the boss concepts and the script was completed^[17]. Other reasons as to why Kojima cancelled the game may stem from the fact that in 2011 alone his studio began pre-production on two next-gen video game projects, Enders Project, which was set to be a reboot of Kojima Production's other IP titled Zone Of The Enders and Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, which also began production in 2011. And with Kojima needing working hands on his two other projects, especially Metal Gear Solid V, it's only logical from his perspective to cancel the game.

The project was then given to PlatinumGames, resulting in Metal Gear Rising.^[2] Some of the aspects that were to appear in this game, such as Zandatsu and the character of Boris, would be retained in Metal Gear Rising.^[7]

Etsu Tamari apparently loved the script of Metal Gear Solid: Rising. Yuji Korekado in a 2012 interview also admitted that the game would have "the best bosses in the franchise"^[18], he was really saddened at the cancellation of the project. In the same interview Korekado also admitted that the game already had motion capture and voicelines recorded before the cancellation, along with boss fight concepts, level design and the whole script^[19].

Based on concept arts alone, it's apparent that the game would feature a great amount of female characters. A cyborg robot with an "A" on it's head also carried a cyborg "child", and with the events such as Raiden becoming a cyborg rescuing Sunny in this game. one can assume from the concept art alone that the game would feature themes of parenthood, birth, rebirth and feminity, implying that Olga Gurlukovich's death would play a vital theme role in the game too. Although it should be noted that half of these concept arts also appear in The Art Of Yoji Shinkawa: Volume 3 "Sketch Book" in a much higher quality. Whenever or not these character and mecha designs were created for Metal Gear Solid: Rising or were just Shinkawa's personal drawing tests/recreational drawing that he created in the meantime is up to debate.

References in later games[]

In both the HD Edition of Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker and Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater 3D, released 2011 and 2012, respectively, the Weekly Shōnen Magazine cover featured in a small window coverage of Metal Gear Solid: Rising. At the time the games were made, Metal Gear Solid: Rising had not been formally announced to have been revamped into Metal Gear Rising.