Network now...BLOG
What MGS4 Taught Me About War
I am tired of war. The relentless crump and shudder of explosions, and the whineskip- puff of bullets that miss me by inches; my aching lower back; the cynical global machinations of the military-industrial complex. Sometimes I have to find a quiet place to sit and rest just to calm my shaken mind. War is hell.
On the other hand, I’m really stoked about increasing my tally so far of 162 headshots, and I’ve just acquired a new bolt-on gadget for my beloved M4 custom. Plus, for all the ‘war economy’ talk (a lurid sci-fi version of Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine), there’s nothing more relaxing than going shopping between missions. For guns, I’m as happy and docile a consumer as anyone else. And I can’t help but look forward to trying out my new toys on the next unsuspecting mercenary. War is great!
Cut to another story of ageing muscle: John Rambo’s body, in Stallone’s most recent film, is eerily similar to that of Old Snake: decades of violence become inscribed into the parchment skin, a palimpsest of creases, veins and tendons. Rambo IV contains perhaps the most viscerally naturalistic depictions yet accomplished in cinema of what happens when human beings are shot with rifles or ripped apart by grenades. It reminds us that a dedication to unsparingly exact representations of violence can have a serious moral purpose. Look, it says: this is what war, that thing that politicians talk about so easily, really involves.
But the same tension is at work here as in Metal Gear Solid 4: the director is telling us that war is hell, but he is also showing us how exciting it is. In MGS4, war is the toy itself, by design. And when Rambo transforms from sulky boat-punter into the implacable killing machine of old, the audience shivers in pleasure even as it winces at the close-ups of bullets ripping flesh.
The problem is as old as Homer, who thrills us with the beauty of his battle scenes even as he laments the waste of life. Perhaps only visual art can avoid it: a single shocking image, like Picasso’s Guernica, does not titillate. But art with a temporal dimension – literature, movies, videogames – implies continuity. In films and books you need heroes, or at least witnesses who survive to tell the tale. So the depicted war can’t be so bad that everyone just dies for no reason. (If all of Saving Private Ryan were like the first 20 minutes, with no one surviving all the way through, it would be unwatchable.) And even if a videogame abjured character continuity, it would still, by its very structure in time, inculcate notions of progression and the satisfaction of victory. It would still have to be, in this sense, fun.
Perhaps Clint Eastwood’s diptych, Flags Of Our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima, has come closest among recent war movies in avoiding the satisfactions of combat. But I doubt that a videogame in which you spent most of your time cowering in tunnels and finally committed seppuku by grenade would trouble the charts. And even in Eastwood’s films, there is glamour and beauty: for one thing, the actors are all really really goodlooking (as Derek Zoolander would say).
Do contemporary media ‘glamorise’ violence? Well, they can’t help it. You cannot make an artificial mimesis of violence without aestheticising it. Could we even suppose that taking something revolting like violence and transforming it into something glamorous, something beautiful and amusing, constitutes a kind of triumph? Hideo Kojima’s games are, in a sense, all about this question, pummelling it with scattershot Verhoevenesque satire, arch reminders to the player that videogames are essentially a waste of time, and the rather lovely absurdity that you can win a campaign using only anaesthetic bullets.
A more troubling approach, for me, came a couple of years ago in Shadow Of The Colossus. My enchantment at the kinetic challenge and haunting beauty of the game was quickly replaced by a sense of waste and guilt at my serial murdering of these dumb giants. I suspected that this was perhaps going to turn out to be the point, but I couldn’t bear to carry on. For me, the aesthetic pleasures weren’t enough to outweigh the powerful regret the game so astonishingly succeeded in engendering. If a game of violence is so effective in its message of anti-violence that you actually stop playing, does that mean it was a success or a failure?
Compared to that, MGS4, with its cramming of the issue of post-traumatic stress disorder into a segmented psyche-bar (arguably a far more damning frivolity than its diarrhoea, porn mags and monkeys), is just a cartoon. Perhaps a wargame can never really be anti-war. In a way that’s a relief, I think, as I smoke thoughtfully along with Snake, waiting for the next act.
On the other hand, I’m really stoked about increasing my tally so far of 162 headshots, and I’ve just acquired a new bolt-on gadget for my beloved M4 custom. Plus, for all the ‘war economy’ talk (a lurid sci-fi version of Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine), there’s nothing more relaxing than going shopping between missions. For guns, I’m as happy and docile a consumer as anyone else. And I can’t help but look forward to trying out my new toys on the next unsuspecting mercenary. War is great!
Cut to another story of ageing muscle: John Rambo’s body, in Stallone’s most recent film, is eerily similar to that of Old Snake: decades of violence become inscribed into the parchment skin, a palimpsest of creases, veins and tendons. Rambo IV contains perhaps the most viscerally naturalistic depictions yet accomplished in cinema of what happens when human beings are shot with rifles or ripped apart by grenades. It reminds us that a dedication to unsparingly exact representations of violence can have a serious moral purpose. Look, it says: this is what war, that thing that politicians talk about so easily, really involves.
But the same tension is at work here as in Metal Gear Solid 4: the director is telling us that war is hell, but he is also showing us how exciting it is. In MGS4, war is the toy itself, by design. And when Rambo transforms from sulky boat-punter into the implacable killing machine of old, the audience shivers in pleasure even as it winces at the close-ups of bullets ripping flesh.
The problem is as old as Homer, who thrills us with the beauty of his battle scenes even as he laments the waste of life. Perhaps only visual art can avoid it: a single shocking image, like Picasso’s Guernica, does not titillate. But art with a temporal dimension – literature, movies, videogames – implies continuity. In films and books you need heroes, or at least witnesses who survive to tell the tale. So the depicted war can’t be so bad that everyone just dies for no reason. (If all of Saving Private Ryan were like the first 20 minutes, with no one surviving all the way through, it would be unwatchable.) And even if a videogame abjured character continuity, it would still, by its very structure in time, inculcate notions of progression and the satisfaction of victory. It would still have to be, in this sense, fun.
Perhaps Clint Eastwood’s diptych, Flags Of Our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima, has come closest among recent war movies in avoiding the satisfactions of combat. But I doubt that a videogame in which you spent most of your time cowering in tunnels and finally committed seppuku by grenade would trouble the charts. And even in Eastwood’s films, there is glamour and beauty: for one thing, the actors are all really really goodlooking (as Derek Zoolander would say).
Do contemporary media ‘glamorise’ violence? Well, they can’t help it. You cannot make an artificial mimesis of violence without aestheticising it. Could we even suppose that taking something revolting like violence and transforming it into something glamorous, something beautiful and amusing, constitutes a kind of triumph? Hideo Kojima’s games are, in a sense, all about this question, pummelling it with scattershot Verhoevenesque satire, arch reminders to the player that videogames are essentially a waste of time, and the rather lovely absurdity that you can win a campaign using only anaesthetic bullets.
A more troubling approach, for me, came a couple of years ago in Shadow Of The Colossus. My enchantment at the kinetic challenge and haunting beauty of the game was quickly replaced by a sense of waste and guilt at my serial murdering of these dumb giants. I suspected that this was perhaps going to turn out to be the point, but I couldn’t bear to carry on. For me, the aesthetic pleasures weren’t enough to outweigh the powerful regret the game so astonishingly succeeded in engendering. If a game of violence is so effective in its message of anti-violence that you actually stop playing, does that mean it was a success or a failure?
Compared to that, MGS4, with its cramming of the issue of post-traumatic stress disorder into a segmented psyche-bar (arguably a far more damning frivolity than its diarrhoea, porn mags and monkeys), is just a cartoon. Perhaps a wargame can never really be anti-war. In a way that’s a relief, I think, as I smoke thoughtfully along with Snake, waiting for the next act.
Going here from another one of your articles, I just read it all over again and enjoyed it all over again.
On SotC. I would say it's a love story.
The boy loves that girl. He will destroy ancient, beautiful things for her.
You should finish that game, even if it's painful. Think of it as enjoying an unfamiliar, smelly or gross looking delicacy, please bear through the discomfort to find it's flavor.
Great article. Very thoughtful, especially that bit about how even the most gritty war movies still employ really really really, ridiculously good looking people.
I'd just like to share my thoughts on Metal Gear.
I admire the Metal Gear series because I think it goes further than the simple message that "war/violence is bad" message. I think the most interesting thing about Metal Gear is that it puts forth the idea that a fight without ideals is empty and meaningless. The real tragedy presented in Metal Gear isn't the presence of War, it's the absence of meaningful ideology in war. In the grand scheme of things, economic profit ends up outweighing age old concepts such as race, religion, ethnicity, culture, the things that people have historically deemed worth fighting for. In such a world it becomes difficult to believe your personal opinion and beliefs are of any value, and yet, it also makes those things all the more precious.
I think Metal Gear does a great job of telling the player that it's very important to be able to question your own beliefs and to come to your own conclusion of what is true and what is valuable vs the conclusions that are handed down to you by others. Alot of media has the message that you should "be yourself", but this is usually depicted as following your emotions. Metal Gear prompts the player to evolve and be an even truer version of themselves, which often means questioning your beliefs and making uncomfortable choices.
One way this is reflected in the gameplay mechanic is the constant and unforced opportunity to avoid inflicting fatalities in all the Metal Gear Solid games. I chose to not kill people in Metal Gear. It makes the game harder at times, but it reflects my personality. It is a choice I make based on my emotional investment earned by the game, unlike many other games that boil morality down to literally binary prompts.
Snake is admirable because he's able to actually question his own judgment and instincts. He's incredibly observant, but also incredibly unjudgmental and he's one of the few heroes that can change his mind, even if it leaves him lonely and miserable.
Playing through the Metal Gear series helped me come to the belief that freedom is about more than rights and rules (which can be taken away), it's about being able to assess things from your own unclouded point of view (which can be oppressed, but can't be taken away). Other media have attempted this message, but I just connected to it much stronger through the interactive experience (and weird ass personalities) present in Metal Gear.
Mad World also had a similar message about how violence becomes empty when nothing substantial is on the line.
I hope what i have to say will reach someone else out there. I'm often filled with the sense that people care more about how an opinion affects their social standing, rather than how much it reflects their true feelings (that is my way of saying that people jump on the hate wagon too soon when it comes to popular entertainment).
I appreciate that you were able to write about Metal Gear without any snide remarks implying you are too intelligent to enjoy it.
I hope you continue to write many more articles for Next Gen and even if you become jaded, you never become snarky and spiteful.
SotC for me was very reminiscent of hunting, without the wetness of leaves, uncomfortable clothes and the actual killing of creatures that I really do not like. Although they do make good meals.
Anyway, my two cents: confusing war in games / books / movies / pictures with the real thing is something that can happen only when you lived in peace and never experienced anything else. In that way it is easy to confuse Spore with evolution (if you have no education on the subject) or Civilization with research of space-travel (if you are an economy or law major). A game is a game, nothing else. It may be art, but it is not the real thing and anybody confusing it with the real thing should take note of "over 18" sign on the box.
>>the actors are all really really goodlooking (as Derek Zoolander would say).
you forgot "ridiculously"
Metal Gear series, I always liked that you had the option not to kill.
When given that option, I just don't kill.
It seems that SotC wasn't able to provide a great desire to kill those monsters. At least for Steven. After all, hero(you) was killing them to save the loved one. Perhaps, by having some kind of flashbacks(dreams) where she's still alive, would have changed that for Steven and he'll be eager to continue this killing.
I knew I was going further into darkness by killing them, but I didn't care - I was saving my love from death.
Pretty cool feature, very thought-provoking. I will say that, even though I had to check a dictionary every few sentences to see what certain words meant, I really enjoyed this article. Thumbs up, my friend:)
SotC defiantly produced a feeling of guilt very early on. It seems many games provide an opportunity to gauge a personality. I’m sure there were many out there who loved taking down the placid giants. GTA for example, I avoid running over pedestrians while i watched a friend run into a hospital and mow down nurses. Another thumbs up for the article its got me thinking about these ideas all over again.