Metal Gear Solid: 20 Things That Made You Love Hideo Kojima

Incase you didn't know, Metal Gear Solid creator - and all-round genius plot-wizard - Hideo Kojima looks to be having a troubled time with employer Konami, as essentially all mention of his relation to Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is being wiped from existence in the process. No longer is MGS V "A Hideo Kojima Game" like the previous few, now his Kojima Productions department has been renamed 'Konami L.A. Studio' - and most recently he didn't even attend the regular Famitsu Awards, with the spectacular Silent Hills reboot-teaser 'P.T.' getting pulled from Sony's PS Store as a potential sign of things to come. Whatever's happened it seems like he's gone for good after Phantom Pain, and that's a crying shame, because now more than ever we need crazy innovative personalities like Mr. Kojima in positions of power to remind everyone what pure artistic expression is. So, when you think of Metal Gear Solid you'll probably immediately think of the plot-mangled madness of the whole thing, before remembering all the little quirks that elevate its initially militaristic appeal into something far more enrapturing and rewarding. Over the years MGS has done everything from invent and perfect the stealth genre to providing thousands of lines of dialogue around various philosophic and political debates, garnering a diehard fanbase of tattooed-up Kojima-praisers in the process. With everything that's transpired it looks like it's truly the end for any future Hideo-backed Metal Gear experience (as Konami have rather coldly already started recruiting more people) but whilst everything is up in the air - and while we wait for MGS V to drop - why not celebrate everything that's made MGS the downright loveable explosion of East-meets-West perfection it was born to be?