Rumor 101: How Metal Gear Solid Rising came to Xbox 360
Kojima’s Metal Gear franchise has been a coveted object in the world of video games since the PlayStation era where the game delivered a level of immersion that rivaled a Hollywood movie. Sons of Liberty matched all expectations from a sequel barring the fact that the protagonist was no longer Solid Snake, the hero of the series. When Metal Gear Solid 4 was announced for the PlayStation 3, it became a must have title for the console which was still early in its development stages and as time went by this exclusivity would be threatened continuously with numerous other coveted PlayStation franchises hopping onto the Xbox 360.
So why did the game never make an appearance onto the Xbox 360, though Final Fantasy XIII an equally big franchise did ultimately land up on the platform? Was it the development for the Xbox 360 (the running joke of it coming onto multiple discs)? Or was it the money that was put in development for the game, since it was rumored that Microsoft did not want to fund a game that had already started out on the PlayStation. This question has remained an unsolved mystery and then suddenly when PlayStation 3 loyalists were confident that the franchise would remain exclusive to their platform, it jumped ship.
Here is a possible reason why MGS4 never made it to Microsoft’s console. As the urban legend goes, it was as simple as not being able to achieve a release date that was in line with the PlayStation 3 version of the game. Apparently, Metal Gear Solid 4 was going to be a multiplatform game at one point in time. It was well into development when Microsoft’s 2006 business strategy of buying out third party titles had approached Konami. They wanted the game on their platform and were willing to put their money behind it with the clause of releasing the game either simultaneously with the PS3 version or have bare minimum lag for its release. The development team, however, could only port the game almost a year past its PS3 release date due to legal contractual obligations with Sony. This was something Square Enix could deliver on for FFXIII for the North American version of the game. Hence the idea was dropped.
So Microsoft went in another direction, they wanted another game to be developed for the franchise which was more in line with western audiences. The game, which ultimately turned out to be Metal Gear Solid: Rising, had been a side project within the original MGS4 development team. Microsoft decided to pick it up after what they saw from the prototype of the game and bring it onto their platform as well. Hence we got to see the focus of the game on Microsoft’s platform as opposed to the Sony. Metal Gear Solid: Rising is now rumoured to have a late 2011 release date on their platform.
Was that the reason why MGS4 never amde it to the XBox 360?! God, if they start working on it now I’ll still buy that game! Toss in some features like Substance and then you have a reason to re-release the game on both platforms!
Wrong,
it went like this;
Microsoft: Hey, Konami i want a MGS game for the xbox 360
Konami: well that isnt easy Kojima only wants to release for PS3
Microsoft: Here is $50 mil.(maybe more maybe less dont know the price of konami)
Konami: SOLD!
Konami: Kojima, you better start making a MGS for Xbox 360
Kojima: i dont feel like it.. luckly i got some ‘youngsters’ they are proberly able to make a MGS game for ya
as much as Xbox owners wis is was, “Metal Gear Solid: Rising” is not a proper MGS game, it’s a spin-off by a different team.
The real MGS is still Playsation only. Sorry….
It never jumped ship. Rising is hardly a MGS game, it a spinoff at best. Kojima has very limited involvement in it, the thing is just a MGS title by the title alone… which Microsoft paid heavily for.
Are you forgetting that MGS2 was on the xbox?
MGS4 wasn’t on the 360, because Kojima didn’t want to degrade the game to make it possible to run on such an outdated system. Look what happened to FF13 when it went to the 360. Play the PS3 demo and then the final product (after going multiplat) the difference is staggering. Why dumb down a game for a system like the 360 that is on the massive decline and has no future?
It was never a sideproject of the original team… stop making stuff up. Kojima has said repeatedly that a new team is developing it, he had nothing to do with Rising besides minor consultation. The whole original team was moved to the PSP title and are on a new unannounced project at the moment… absolutely no involvement with Rising. They are taking Microsofts money, and making a piss poor spinoff with it.
@Mark
Actually, although it’s a spinoff, the original team who worked on MGS4 & PW are at work on this title. So, yea… Listen to the Kojima Productions podcasts more often
Hah wanna bet a billion buck that MGS rising is going to sell more than MGS4 dude…
Ummmm… Kojima Productions Ken Imaizuni already debunked this when people spread rumors about MGS4′s budget saying that if the budget was really high it would’ve been developed as a multiplatform title, but in the end it was PS3 exclusive because the game would not fit on anything other than blu-ray. Rising is multiplatform due to requests to have MGS on other consoles as well as to spread the franchise out and make more money. When a proper MGS sequel dos come out, it’ll likely be PS3 exclusive because it’d seek to outdo the production values of MGS4 and that will require a blu-ray disc, and given how much more powerful the PS3 is when used properly, Kojima will likely want to take advantage of it again because MGS is a showcase piece!
Actually the official reason if you look it up is that the game is too technologically complicated for the 360 and too long. The game took up a entire Blu Ray disc, which no other game has done yet. Konami stated that this game is not possible on the 360.