cnx.cmd.push(function(){cnx({“playerId”:”995c4c7d-194f-4077-b0a0-7ad466eb737c”,”settings”:{“advertising”:{“macros”:{“AD_UNIT”:”/23178111854/od.kotaku.com/article”,”CHILD_UNIT”:”article”,”POST_ID”:”2000701073″,”POST_TYPE”:”post”,”CHANNEL”:”culture”,”SECTION”:”feature”,”SUBSECTION”:”preview”,”CATEGORIES”:”preview”,”TAGS”:”konami,metal-gear-solid,metal-gear-solid-4-guns-of-the-patriots,remaster,summer-preview-2026″,”NOP”:”0″},”timeBeforeFirstAd”:0}}}).render(“cnx-player-main”)}); 
Konami / Kotaku
Metal Gear is a fundamentally incomplete series without Guns of the Patriots. That might sound obvious to say! The story isn’t finished without the ending? Wow! But it’s important to stress the nature of what’s happening here. Modern games such as Resident Evil Requiem emulate the model set by Guns of the Patriots, summoning up old monsters for us to kill in the hopes of establishing a new series status quo; they perform similar rituals because that is the inevitable fate of franchises. The question is whether you will mash everything into a Ready Player One fan-service multiverse, or find the strength to end things. Guns of the Patriots is almost twenty years old but it foresaw the world of messy cinematic universes and chose the latter.
This is the line. This is where we take a bow. After this? It’s not my problem.
This isn’t always done cleanly. Some characters are turned into sacrificial lambs, dehumanized and flattened into raving beasts. A few others are forced into awkward final tableaus. Underneath that is the message: find the courage to end things. Do it messily if you must but stand firm and conclude. If you leave even a single thread hanging, your story might rise up again as an ugly monster. Let the world return to zero. Let it die. This is good, isn’t it?
A remaster of Guns of the Patriots will be included with Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection Vol. 2 when it launches on August 27.