Metal Gear Solid is on the verge of making a comeback that many of us would have thought completely and utterly unlikely until not too long ago, with Konami and Virtuos working together on a remake of the masterpiece that is Metal Gear Solid 3, and naturally, excitement surrounding it is quite high. Following its official announcement earlier in the year, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater also offered a first look at in-engine gameplay footage at Microsoft’s recent third party showcase, and though it wasn’t a meaty gameplay blowout by any means, the trailer was certainly hiding plenty of smaller, more granular details that have caught the attention of many an eagle-eyed fan. Here, we’re going to talk about a few such details that you may have missed.
VISUAL FLOURISHES
Visual upgrades are obviously going to be one of the most significant changes we’ll witness in Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater as compared to the original, and though the seemingly complete removal of MGS3’s sepia tone has left some disappointed, MGS Delta’s recent in-engine trailer did show some impressive examples of its graphical and technical upgrades. At about sixteen seconds into the trailer, for instance, you can see the ground deforming in the background as ripples of water wash over it. Meanwhile, starting at the 55 second mark, there are also a couple of shots of a frog and a crab where the true highlight is just how good the water itself looks. The very final shot of the trailer also showcases the impressive density of vegetation that the environments will seemingly boast, while throughout the trailer, it’s hard not to be impressed by things like the textures of all the terrain.
CROUCH WALK
You’d assume that crouch walking would be a pretty fundamental feature to have in any stealth game, but that’s not necessarily always the case. For instance, other than the game’s 3DS version, crouch walking wasn’t possible in MGS3– you could either walk upright, or you could crawl while you were prone. In MGS Delta, however, it looks like crouch walking has been added in. Very briefly at around the 30 second mark in the recent trailer, we can see Naked Snake going prone, but before he does that, for a split-second, you can see him in moving forward while in the crouch position, as if the player is cycling from upright to crouch to prone. Concrete evidence that crouch walking has been added into the game? Perhaps not, but we’d be surprised to see it missing in a modern remake of the game. Because let’s face it, that’s a pretty basic feature.
MGS5 ANIMATIONS
It looks like Konami has totally moved on from the Fox Engine, with Metal Gear Solid Delta being developed on Unreal Engine 5 instead, though it does seem like the company is still using some of the work it did with Metal Gear Solid 5. In particular, we can see that in some of the animations in the remake’s recent trailer. The prone animation we just discussed looks like it’s been taken from The Phantom Pain, while at about the 25 second mark, Naked Snake taking cover behind the stump also looks reminiscent of MGS5’s cover animations. Of course, Konami has clearly labeled the recent trailer as pre-alpha footage, which means there are things that they have shown that probably aren’t final just yet, so there’s a possibility that some of these animations end up getting tweaked.
ZOOMING
Another small mechanic in Metal Gear Solid Delta that seems to be taken directly from Metal Gear Solid 5 in how it’s visually presented is zooming the camera. A minute into the trailer, we see Naked Snake slowly moved forward while crouched behind a wall, before he stops at a corner and the camera zooms in on him and the patrolling enemy ahead of him. This is, of course, also not something that the original Metal Gear Solid 3 allowed players to do, and though it’s obviously a pretty minor addition, we’re curious to see how it impacts the remake’s stealth gameplay.
ITEM BOXES
As Metal Gear Solid 3 fans will recall, the original stealth masterpiece frequently saw players collecting items by picking up boxes scattered throughout the environments, and it seems those are making a comeback in almost exactly their original form. Some eagle-eyed viewers may have noticed already, but at the 37 second point in the trailer, in the cave below the bridge’s left side end, you can spot what clearly looks like a couple of item boxes. Obviously, they’re too small and distant to see the exact model being used, but they do look strikingly similar to the original game’s item boxes.
KEROTAN FROG
If you’ve played the original MGS3, there’s a good chance that you spent an unhealthy amount of time scouring through its environments in search of hidden Kerotan frogs, toy-like collectibles that you were tasked with finding and shooting. Most would have expected that those (or something analogous to them, at least) would be returning in MGS Delta, and that does indeed seem to be the case. Starting at about the 49 second mark in the recent trailer, we’re shown the arena where the boss fight against The Pain takes place, and the Kerotan figure that could be found in the largest opening in that cave’s ceiling in the original game seems be to placed in the exact same spot in the remake as well.
VEGETATION
Given how densely packed Metal Gear Solid 3’s environments were with vegetation, you’d expect its remake to pay special attention in that area, and MGS Delta does seem to be doing that. We’ve already mentioned the dense vegetation showcased throughout the remake’s in-engine trailer, while in addition to that, there are also a few shots – like at the 30 second and 45 second marks – where we can see blades of grass moving and reacting to Naked Snake as he moves through grass patches.
CQC
Up-close combat (or CQC) is one of those aspects of MGS3 that definitely haven’t aged very gracefully, which means there’s plenty of fans who are hoping for some meaningful upgrades to be made with the remake. For now, however, we still don’t have any evidence that suggests that we will get those improvements. We see Snake using CQC only at one point in the recent trailer, and very briefly at that – at about the 45 second point – and it’s a move that was present in the original game as well. Of course, we’re hoping that MGS Delta does actually make improvements to CQC and that that’s something Konami is choosing not to show off just yet. After all, this wasn’t exactly a meaty gameplay reveal by any stretch of the imagination.
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