Was scrolling though David Hayters Twitter feed and came across this tweet:

Picture of a reserved parking spot at a place called Formosa Group. I went to their website and looked them up. They do a wide variety of audio related stuff including Video Game VO. Their credits include MGS4, MG Rising Revengence and Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes.

http://www.formosainteractive.com/credits-video-games/

^that page doesn't list Revengence but on another page there is the cover of Revengence in a collage of games they worked on.

I'm sure this is something picked apart by NeoGAF or Reddit a long time ago but I don't really frequent those sites so I figured I would just wildly speculate here.

I don't think he's in it but I predict a twist to this game like mgs2. I'm holding out hope for the gray fox therory.

At most I would expect 1-2 lines at the end but still don't see it happening.

The ending of this game will be like the ending of Scooby-Doo where Big Boss and his crew finally capture Skull Face and realise his face is a mask.
Then they will pull it off and it is Big Boss underneath.
Then they pull off another mask and it's Frank Jaeger.
Then they pull off yet another and it's Decoy Octopus.
However, that's also a mask, and they pull it off, and it's David Hayter.

Then Big Boss pulls off his face to reveal himself as being Kojima the entire time.

I remember this from a few months ago. My understanding is that Hayter was at Formosa doing voiceover for Republique, and his presence there had nothing to do with Metal Gear.

Here's a Tweet from one of the Formosa people who was overseeing both MGS5 and Republique at the same time, in the same building:

https://twitter.com/thabtoUK/status/591578278139400192

@Mike: I figured as much. THOUGH Republique is listed as being released in 2013 on hayters IMDB page and the Remastered steam version came out in February and that picture was from April of this year. Again, I'm still in denial until I know for sure hes not in the game. Man him not being in the game may end up ruining it for me.

My hope is you start out with Keifer as big boss and then half way you switch to Solid Snake in metal gear 1 as Hayter

@devil240z: There is no context for the picture Hayter tweeted, though. We don't even know when it was taken, or why he was at Formosa at the time. It wasn't necessarily even taken in April when he shared it.

You're not wrong. But also who takes a picture and then waits however long to tweet it. Usually you take the picture within the twitter app for the express purpose of tweeting it. Or at least thats how I do it.

@Mike: Hayter has been off and on teasing stuff very subtly for awhile now. Him voicing Big Boss I think is probably out of the question no doubt. Solid Snake was born along with Liquid in 1972 timeline wise the Outer Haven uprising takes place in 1995 he'd be 23 and I could see Hayter voicing a Young Solid Snake in some sort of Epilogue chapter that leads right up to the doorstep of the original Metal Gear even if its not playable and just a cut-scene.

also Cam Clarke is listed on IMDB as voicing Liquid Snake in Ground Zeroes. Anyone know where in the game his voice shows up? I think he came up on one of the TPP trailers drew and dan watched. So if Cam is voicing Liquid then...

I strongly feel like Hayter will be in MGSV. It just doesn't make any sense that he woudln't be, and all of his public vitriol toward Kojima was a little hammy in my estimation. I feel like he will be in MGSV SOMEhow. Maybe even if it's just a stinger at the end that sets up MGS1, or a MGS1 DLC or something.

@devil240z: Might have been a voice clip from the Deja Vu mission in GZ, but I don't know.

I feel like there's at least going to be some reference to MG in there since this game is supposedly the missing link between the two stories. My dream scenario would be PP ending with Big Boss watching as an adult Solid Snake begins his first mission to thwart Big Boss. It's not that far fetched that they would be kids in PP and full grown adults by the end since they could explain it away with the accelerated aging.

Since Kojima and Konami had apparently been fussing during the games production so much, I wonder just how much of a 'Kojima twist' the game will actually have.

im surprised with all the spoilers leaking out that no one asked any of those people to confirm this theory

I think it's also important to remember that Kiefer Sutherland probably wouldn't be involved unless he was able to play Big Boss. The idea of a big name like him getting pushed aside so the cult favorite can play the main character doesn't gel with me. More likely is that if Hayter is in at all, he'll be in an epilogue or something.

The Deja vu mission in Ground Zeroes is basically one big fanservice mission for MGS 1. Lot of audio clips and call backs from the first game. They used a few Liquid Snake audio clips.

People hoping for Hayter will be disappointed, I think. They didn't hire Sutherland just to troll fans, and Solid Snake will be just a kid if he is even in this game period.

I assume Hayter wanted a ton of money for one last hurrah, and Kojima wanted to pay him but Konami said "No, here's Keifer for cheaper."

And then Kojima secretly hired Hayter anyway for a post-credits scene. Which then led to PT being delisted, among other things.

I've been suspecting he'll be in the game basically since it was said that he won't be. Kojima.

Which means, since people are suspecting that Kojima is splitting up with Konami then that is also a swerve as well. Oh the layers this onion will go.

Maybe it's because I don't want to accept it, but I refuse to believe that he's not in the game somewhere. That being said, I do think Kiefer is a perfect fit and I absolutely love what little I have heard of his performance.

If Hayter does show up, I do think it will be just VO for the end of the credits. Repeating the opening of the original Metal Gear as a way of showing the timeline is complete. Even that, IMO is a big if.

I think people are really setting themselves up for disapointment with this DH stuff.

I was totally surprised to find that I had never found my way to Kiefer's wikipedia page and learned his full name is Kiefer William Frederick Dempsey George Rufus Sutherland! Ridiculous!

The end of Phantom Pain is you being killed in a fist fight in a minefield.

hayter will voice the character you create at the start of the game

that's my prediction

@bradbrains: I've been disappointed since gz. So it can't get much worse.

My admittedly more crazy theory is that Kojima and Konami are in Kahoots!

@brodehouse said:

A turret sequence in which you shoot a giant computer as a young Solid Snake.

Maybe 12 year old Solid Snake will just sound like snake and hes just always had that voice. Hit puberty at 4.

But really though. With Kojima saying the whole "full circle thing". maybe there is another several year jump. Snake fought in the gulf war when he was 19 years old in 1991. He was recruited into Fox Hound by Big Boss shortly after. And it would all just seem really odd for the game to just roll into Metal Gear(as in if the game ends and just tells you to go play the original Metal Gear to continue the story.)

@devil240z: My personal theory is that the post-Kojima Metal Gear Solids (i.e. MGS6, which Konami supposedly has started hiring for) will just be rehashes of the first two Metal Gear games, which will lead into another MGS1 remake, and then remakes of MGS2-4, which will finish up just in time for a MGSV remake, and we'll have some real ouroboros shit going.

That or MGS6 will be a pachi slot machine.

Yup. He made such a big deal out of it, it seemed like an obvious ruse. Ever since then I've been holding onto a theory that the last segment of the game is, if not a full combined remake of MG1/2, to make them fully fit within franchise canon, at least a scene of Solid showing up at Outer Heaven.

After all, there isn't much that's relevant to the overall story within MG1. He could easily "kill" Boss pretty quickly before he then retreats to Zanzibarland, Snake follows him, he fights Grey Fox, etc. Makes sense that it might be the last third of the game. But then, it has broken street date and I haven't seen any spoilers, which is very alarming. Maybe MGSV is just what it appears to be... Which would be very disappointing given Kojima's track record of batshit surprises.

Also maybe Hayter voices your multiplayer character.

David Hayter is the voice actor equivalent of "No, really, Valve is teasing EP3 in the game files of their latest patch! NO FOR REAL GUYS... guuuyysssss" At this point.

More power to everyone if they are right though, but it seems... unlikely.

Personally, the second they had a different voice actor for Big Boss at the end of MGS4 I found Hayter's casting as Big Boss weird. I do think Snake and Liquid are in the game...I mean, one of the trailers points that out. I also think we're gonna see a lot of time jumping (hell, we see Big Boss' Metal Gear in the game...), hallucinations, and more. I think its possible we even switch from Big Boss to someone elsein the last 1/4 of the game. Either way, we aren't gonna get David Hayter even if Snake is in the game. Snake would be what...18-20 years old? Hayter would sound a little old for that, not to mention I see nothing wrong with different voice actors for each character. I mean hell...Solidus, Solid, and Liquid all sounded completely different so its weird that Solid Snake and Big Boss sounded exactly the same until Big Boss was like 70 or something :|

@ford_dent said:

I hate you and I love you and I hate you.....and I love you.

My prediction - a young Naomi injects you with David Hayter's voice at the end!

You think David Hayter is more expensive than Kiefer Sutherland? That seems unlikely.

No way Hayter is more expensive than Kiefer.

There's also no telling how much Hayter was asking for to do the part, or what Konami was offering. It's always possible that Hayter negotiated himself out of a job by thinking he was irreplaceable, that type of situation isn't exactly unheard of. Maybe he just wanted more than Konami was willing to pay and neither side would budge, so they went with someone else.

Or it's likely for The Long Dark (which also happens to cast Jennifer Hal aka Naomi Hunter).

I think his performance in Peace Walker probably had a lot to do with getting Kiefer for MGSV. His VO in PW was laughably bad. But in all seriousness, I think that what Kojima has been telling us as to why he went with Kiefer is the whole truth. While the guy loves to troll, he also never straight up lies. If this was all some elaborate ruse, I also don't think Hayter would have done the whining he has about it.

I found Kiefer as Snake jarring at first, but once I got used to it, I've come to like it better than Hayter's work. While I do not at all think Hayter will be in TPP, at this point I'd be bummed out if he was, unless it was an end of credit clip doing his first few lines from the very first Metal Gear as Solid Snake. I strongly believe those holding out hope that this game time jumps and turns into a Metal Gear remake are gonna be the most disappointed.

Hayter is in it. I know it. He really just has to be in it some how. I bet that there will be something.

POSSIBLE SPOILERS: Skullface uses a vocal cord parasite. Maybe BB will get it and then he sounds like Hayter until he coughs it out as a gag?

I really have come to believe people have Stockholm syndrome with Kojima. There's nothing wrong with Hayter's VO in Peace Walker that can't be blamed on the migraine-inducing script, and none of the (admittedly comically limited) work turned in by Sutherland in Ground Zeroes is particularly impressive. It's...Fine, I guess. But nothing to write home about. There also seems to be a lack of commitment to the cornier lines - and like it or not, that's what Kojima writes. Sutherland's delivery of the iconic "kept you waiting" line is terrible.

I like Kiefer, and I can put up with his VO in TPP (much more so than GZ, where it's the guy from Peace Walker speaking with a totally different voice after virtually no time has passed), but this retroactive denigrating of Hayter's work to shill for the new guy is beyond annoying. And besides, people who turned in some truly abysmal performances in MGS have returned. Chris Randolph got brought in for a previously unseen character with an identical voice (with poorer justification than Solid and Naked Snake having identical voices) for Peace Walker despite his woefully inept performance in 4. And he continued to be pretty bad for mostly the same reasons in Peace Walker. But there he is again, in Five.

And he would have gotten away with it too, if it wasn't for that meddling Konami yakuza.

I've listened to all the cassette tapes in ground zeroes, and have heard Kiefer as snake enough times to realize I'm fine with him replacing David Hayter. Honestly, Snake has never been that important of a talking character in this series. A large percentage of his dialogue is him, inquisitively, repeating things that were just said to him. There are a few moments where he gives his own insane rants, but that's pretty much only in MGS2 (where snake isn't the main protagonist).

So, I don't care as much about this as I initially did. Kiefer seems to do a fine job, and I don't care that he doesn't talk a lot, because he doesn't need to. I'm mostly excited for TPP because of the gameplay, because they fucking nailed it. It's, probably, the best playing stealth game ever. At this point, the insane shit that's likely to happen in TPP is just icing on the cake for, what seems to be, a really well designed/wellplaying game.

So is Hayter in the game after all?

Couldn't Solid Snake be a bit older during this game's time span? I mean, with the accelerated aging and all. But I don't actually know when that process started. I know his actual number age in MGS4 was in his 40's or something - totally not what he physically became. If Liquid is voiced in it too then Solid HAS to be. If he's old enough then Snake must be right? Regardless, the move to Sutherland voicing Boss would've made more sense if they started it in MGS3, had Hayter for 4, and had both for 5.

@darson: timeline wise solid & liquid would both be about 12 in 1984