is a 2004 action-adventure stealth game developed and published by Konami for the PlayStation 2. It was released in late 2004 in North America and Japan, and in early 2005 in Europe and Australia. Written, produced and directed by Hideo Kojima, the game is the fifth mainline installment in the Metal Gear series and the first chronologically, serving as a prequel to the entire series. Set in 1964, 31 years before the events of the original Metal Gear, the story centers on the FOX operative codenamed Naked Snake as he attempts to rescue Russian rocket scientist Nikolai Stepanovich Sokolov, sabotage an experimental superweapon, and assassinate his defected former boss.
While previous games were set in a primarily urban environment, Snake Eater adopts a 1960s Soviet jungle setting, with the high-tech, near-future trappings of previous Metal Gear Solid games replaced with wilderness. While the environment has changed, the game's focus remains on stealth and infiltration, while retaining the series' self-referential, fourth-wall-breaking sense of humor. The story of Snake Eater is told through numerous cutscenes and radio conversations.
Considered one of the greatest video games of all time, Metal Gear Solid 3 was met with critical acclaim, with many considering it an improvement over its predecessor, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. Critics praised the narrative, characters, and graphics, but the new gameplay mechanics and dated camera system were met with mixed reviews. The game was also a commercial success, selling more than four million copies worldwide, albeit less than Sons of Liberty.
An expanded edition, titled , was released in Japan in late 2005, then in North America, Europe and Australia in 2006. A remaster was included in the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection, which was rereleased in the Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection Vol. 1 compilation on October 2023. A remake, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater, was released in August 2025. A numbered sequel, Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, was released in 2008, while a narrative sequel, Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, was released in 2010.
Gameplay
The gameplay of Snake Eater is similar to that of previous games in the Metal Gear Solid series. Snake, controlled by the player, must move undetected through a hostile, enemy-filled environment. Although Snake acquires various weapons (ranging from handguns to rocket-propelled grenades), the emphasis is on using stealth to avoid confrontations. Many objects and gadgets can be found along the way to aid in this, including motion detectors to track hostile soldiers, and the Metal Gear series' trademark cardboard box, which Snake can hide under to avoid visual detection.
Despite the fundamental similarities, Snake Eater introduces many new aspects of gameplay not present in previous Metal Gear games, including camouflage, a new hand-to-hand combat system called "close quarters combat" or "CQC", a stamina gauge, and an injury-and-treatment system.
Two-thirds of the game is set outdoors in a Soviet tropical forest, To minimize visibility, the player must switch between different camouflage uniforms and face paints to blend in with the environment; for example, wearing a bark-patterned uniform while leaning against a tree, or wearing striped face paint while hiding in tall grass. Failure to restore the gauge by eating has detrimental effects on gameplay, such as decreasing Snake's ability to aim his weapon and being heard by the enemy due to Snake's loud stomach grumbles. bonus items usable in the main game can be unlocked by progressing through various stages. and The Boss (Lori Alan/Kikuko Inoue), former mentor to Naked Snake and co-founder of the FOX unit. The Fear (Michael Bell/Kazumi Tanaka), who has supernatural flexibility and agility; The Fury (Richard Doyle/Masato Hirano), a disfigured former cosmonaut armed with a flamethrower and a jetpack;
Other characters include Dr. Sokolov (Brian Cummings/Naoki Tatsuta), a rocket scientist whom Snake must rescue; rival scientist Aleksandr Granin (Jim Ward/Takeshi Aono); EVA (Jodi Benson/Misa Watanabe), Snake's love interest, American defector, and KGB agent sent to assist him, and a young Ocelot (Josh Keaton/Takumi Yamazaki), commander of the elite Ocelot Unit within Volgin's GRU.
Plot
In 1964, CIA agent Naked Snake is sent to Tselinoyarsk, USSR in an operation known as the "Virtuous Mission." Snake is tasked with rescuing Soviet scientist Dr. Nikolai Sokolov, a prominent weapons developer who defected two years earlier until the Russians forced the United States government to return him in order to end the Cuban Missile Crisis. Zero informs Snake that following his return, the CIA received intel that Sokolov is placed in charge of a secret military project to create a nuclear-equipped tank called the Shagohod, which could end the Cold War. The injured Snake is recovered via fulton extraction, moments after the nuclear blast.
In the aftermath of the destruction, the Soviet Union accuses the United States of the attack, after detecting their aircraft over Tselinoyarsk. To avoid a nuclear war, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, who suspects Volgin's involvement, agrees to let U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson prove the U.S.'s innocence. Snake, finding himself assigned by Zero to assist in this manner, is ordered to complete "Operation Snake Eater," which comprises three objectives: stop Volgin's faction; destroy the Shagohod; and eliminate The Boss. Redeployed into Tselinoyarsk to fulfil these demands, Snake is first sent to meet with NSA agent ADAM, who defected to the Soviet Union to infiltrate Volgin's ranks with fellow agent EVA; Snake is instead met and assisted by EVA, who directs him to a lab where Sokolov was taken. Snake survives encounters with Ocelot and eliminates The Pain, one of the Cobras. He reaches the lab and meets Soviet scientist Granin, whose conceptualization of a bipedal tank has been shunned in favour of the Shagohod. Dejected, Granin reveals that Sokolov and the Shagohod are located in Volgin's military fortress Groznyj Grad. Snake eliminates the remaining Cobra members: The Fear, The End, and The Fury. At Groznyj Grad, Snake finds Sokolov but is captured. Having killed Granin, a suspicious Volgin beats Sokolov to death and tortures Snake, who loses an eye while protecting a disguised EVA from Ocelot after suspecting her of being a spy. Snake is imprisoned but escapes.
Snake returns to Groznyj Grad to destroy the Shagohod, but is confronted by Volgin, The Boss, and Ocelot, having uncovered EVA as the spy. Volgin informs Snake of the Philosophers, a secret organization of the most powerful figures in the United States, the Soviet Union, and China, who formed a pact to win World War II and create a new world order. The group jointly amassed $100 billion, the Philosopher's Legacy, to finance their research and operations. However, after the war, the organization began to infight and disintegrated, with the Legacy divided and hidden in banks across the world. Volgin had illegally inherited this money, and Snake learns the U.S. is attempting to retrieve it.
Snake defeats Volgin and destroys the hangar, but Volgin pursues in the Shagohod. Snake disables the Shagohod and Volgin is seemingly killed by a bolt of lightning. Snake and EVA flee to a lake, where a WIG is hidden. Before they escape, Snake confronts The Boss She also reveals that The Boss did not defect, but was ordered to infiltrate Volgin's ranks and find the Legacy to bring back to America. However, because of Volgin's nuclear attack, The Boss had to be seen as a traitor and die at the hands of Snake to prove the U.S.'s innocence.
A demoralized Snake is awarded the title of Big Boss and given the Distinguished Service Cross by President Johnson. In Arlington National Cemetery, Snake adorns The Boss' unmarked gravestone and tearfully salutes her.
Ocelot telephones the KGB Chief Director to suggest that the KGB use the knowledge of the Virtuous and Operation Snake Eater missions to blackmail the United States during future negotiations. Ocelot then informs the director of the CIA that the microfilm stolen by EVA was a fake and that half of the Philosopher's Legacy is now in America's hands, with the other half held by the KGB, revealing himself as ADAM.
Themes
The overarching theme of Metal Gear Solid 3 is "Scene", which has to do with how politics changes with time and location. The narrative technique hyperreality is used, which involves blending fiction and history. The game does this by intermingling historical events and people, like the Cuban Missile Crisis, President Lyndon B. Johnson, and Nikita Khrushchev, with its own fictional elements.
Development
Initially, the game was supposed to be developed for the then-upcoming PlayStation 3, but due to the long wait for the console, the development was moved back for the PlayStation 2 instead. From the outset, the games director Hideo Kojima wished to drastically change the setting from previous games. He stated that the jungle setting is what both his development team, and the Metal Gear fans, wanted. The love scene between Naked Snake and EVA was inspired by the film The Pink Panther (1963). Kojima and Shinkawa watched the movie but the former stated it might have come out differently from the original version. Since the game's trailers did not state that Naked Snake was Big Boss, Kojima often gave vague answers regarding the character's true identity. Originally, Naked Snake was planned to have been voiced by Kurt Russell by Kojima's request, but the actor declined. Russell corroborated further in January 2024 saying that while he understood that Naked Snake was inspired by Snake Plissken, a character he portrayed in the 1981 film Escape from New York, he was not interested in reprising roles nor working on a project that did not involve movie director John Carpenter.
Kojima commented that the outside environment was challenging to create. He explained that the reason previous games were primarily set indoors is that the current consoles were not powerful enough to portray a true jungle environment. In contrast with urban environments, the jungle does not have a flat surface. The protagonist in Snake Eater has to cross uneven terrain, including rocks, dirt mounds, and tree stumps. As a result, the collision engine used in previous installments could not be used, and a new one had to be built from scratch.
Kojima designed the boss battles of Snake Eater to be totally different from those in previous Metal Gear games, or any other games. He said that the boss battle with sniper The End best represented free, open gameplay in the game. The battle takes place over a large area of dense jungle, and the player must search extensively for The End, who attacks over a long-range from an unknown position. This battle of attrition can last for hours but during the game's development that theme lost its significance. One of his colleagues then advised him to listen to Stellastarr, but Kojima misheard it as Starsailor. He liked the song "Way To Fall", and chose it as an ending theme.
Release
Snake Eater was first released in North America; the Japanese release was held back for almost a month after that. The Japanese version featured several additional downloadable camouflage patterns that were not available for the North American version, some which were only downloadable through data from Metal Gear Solid 3-related soundtrack CDs. A limited "premium package" edition of Snake Eater was released alongside the standard version in Japan. The premium package comes with a DVD featuring all the promotional trailers shown before the game's release (including a proof of concept video shown internally within Konami), two booklets and a painted 1/144-scale model of the Shagohod. A special limited edition CD was given away to those who pre-ordered the Japanese version of Snake Eater, which included several tracks from the game's soundtrack, as well as computer screensavers and additional camouflage for the main game. The pre-order package allowed cell phone users to access a special site featuring image and music downloads.
For the European release, Konami added several new features, including the "European Extreme" difficulty setting, a "demo theater" which allows players to view all cutscenes at any point after viewing them once during the main game, and a Duel Mode, where players can replay boss battles from the main game, in addition to extra facepaints based on European flags and two new "Snake vs. Monkey" levels. Most of the downloadable camo patterns that were available for the Japanese version were also released for the European version, with only a few exceptions.
In July 2007, Konami re-released all the mainline Metal Gear Solid games from the PlayStation and PlayStation 2, along with the PSP game Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops, individually and as part of a limited edition box set in Japan commemorating the 20th anniversary of the original Metal Gear. This edition of Metal Gear Solid 3 features the first disc from the Subsistence version and a new second disc containing ports of the MSX2 games Metal Gear and Solid Snake, lacking Metal Gear Online (due to the discontinuation of its servers), as well as all the other content that was present in Subsistences original second disc (Snake vs. Monkey, Duel Mode and Secret Theater). A similar box set was released for the North American market in March 2008, titled Metal Gear Solid: The Essential Collection, which includes the first disc of Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence along with the original Metal Gear Solid and Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance, but lacks the second disc with the MSX2 games from the Japanese 20th Anniversary edition.