More Metal Gear Coming?

For months now, everyone has been told that Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots would be the final chapter in the Metal Gear Saga. Wrapping up more than twenty years of the Metal Gear mythology, MGS4 is the culmination of the franchise. Or is it? According to an interview with Associate Producer Ryan Payton on MTV's Multiplayer blog, there will be more for fans to get into in the future.

According to Payton, "I think there's been some misconceptions that this is the last 'Metal Gear.' This is really just the last chapter of the saga of the Solid Snake Story." While Payton doesn't mention what direction the series could take without its iconic character, it does add some additional validity to an interview we did with Hideo Kojima where he mentioned having different ideas related to the Metal Gear universe that may or may not include Snake.

The MTV interview goes on to speak about the inclusion of Altair's Assassin's Creed garb within the game and how unusual its inclusion was within the title. "The 'Assassin's Creed' costume was one of the last things we put in the game," Payton said. "It was kind of a last minute thing [and] we were really lucky enough to have Ubisoft be so enthusiastic about this kind of cooperation. They worked overtime to get that costume into the game."

As for wondering about the overall vision of the series and where Kojima goes from here, Payton brings up a familiar statement for those players that have been following the title, which is that it brings the entire series to a close. "[Solid Snake] was a burden [for Kojima] because of all those loose ends," said Payton. "So when you play 'Metal Gear Solid 4' and when you get to the end, I think you're going to feel that 'wow, this is a nice closure.' All of the weird stuff that's gone on in the past, it's all coming to an end. All those weird questions — everything is answered."