People who grew up in the 1990s, particularly those who played video games, will be excited to learn that after about 12 years of speculation, we are finally closer to seeing the feature film version of Metal Gear Solid.

Way back in 2006 the creator of the seminal stealth game, Hideo Kojima, said that there would be a movie coming out, and over a decade later we are starting to finally see some movement on that promise.

Basically, they've hired a producer. Not just any producer either, it's Derek Connolly, who wrote the screenplay for Jurassic World and is working on the latest instalment in the Star Wars saga at the moment.

Advert

The Metal Gear franchise began back in the 1980s, but really hit the mainstream with Metal Gear Solid, a 1998 PlayStation game that followed the adventures of Snake, a stealth soldier who infiltrated a nuclear facility to try to neutralise the threat posed by the special forces group Foxhound.

Oh, and he has to somehow expose a giant world conspiracy that involves all sorts of mad stuff in 'unauthorised' combat zones. They're bad, basically, and the game's great.

We don't know whether the film will start there or take a completely different direction, but we do know that Gray Fox - a Foxhound super soldier who features throughout the video game series - will be a heavily featured character.

A scene from Metal Gear Solid 5. Credit: Konami

Advert

We know this because Jordan Vogt-Roberts - who has signed on to direct the film - said so.

Vogt-Roberts has previously worked on Kong: Skull Island, and The Kings of Summer. Perhaps most important of all is that he is a huge MGS fan.

In an interview with Collider, he said: "Metal Gear Solid is probably the most important franchise to me on the planet. It is such a genius, idiosyncratic work and being able to spend time with [Hideo] Kojima recently has been like a dream.

"That is a property that I will fight tooth and nail to make sure is done properly because it's so easy to screw it up and so easy for a studio to try and make it into G.I. Joe or try and make it into Mission: Impossible or try and make it into something that it's not.

Advert

The 1998 original version of the game. Credit: Konami

"Metal Gear Solid needs to be exactly what it needs to be, which is Metal Gear Solid."