So I was thinking...

Kojima always seems to get off by tricking people or giving misinformation. I recall during an interview (pre e3) he said that they had removed the Cardboard box because it would conflict with the realistic tone that they were going go (I'll try to find the src and post). Now of course here we are, and there's the cardboard box in MGSV.

With that said, lets consider the following:

There was the whole debacle with David Hayter no longer voicing "SNAKE". Combine that with the fact that we've heard very very little of actual Keifer in Ground Zeroes or any trailers thus far. There is zero logic to this considering the entire MGS series is very much driven by story and voice acting; I'd say the pillars of the franchise.

What if, somehow.. David Hayter is still involved along side of Keifer. Solid Snake / Big Boss respectively? I highly doubt you somehow dont hire the beloved Hayter to voice Snake, replace him with Keifer, but somehow he's too busy to allow for multiple V.O. Sessions. I know its dumb... but I cant help but wonder...

There's a ton of evidence pointing to there being at least two "Big Boss" figures in the game, in the sense that Punished Snake and Venom Snake are actually different characters, with only one (or even neither) being THE Big Boss we played as in 3 and PW. If if that isn't the case, there's still the distinct possibility of a Hayder-voiced Solid Snake being in the game somewhere, if only in a quick after-credits scene.

Any other developer and this would all be crazy conspiracy shit, but with Kojima, who knows.

Any theory about Hayter still being Snake went out the window when Ground Zeroes came out and Big Boss was in-fact voiced by Keifer. Additionally there was no voice actor change in Japan, and it makes no sense that Kojima would trick only the international audience and not his native one.

I think the most likely case is there just wasn't much dialogue from him in there. I don't see why it would be weird for them to take story out of there or keep it minimal just to show gameplay.

And anyways, Kojima has been saying he is changing the Metal Gear storytelling to be more concise, allow more freedom during it, and in general have less cutscenes. Maybe he's really telling the truth? It seems that way. I could see Big Boss being a man of few words type in this game. Or I could see him talking more at other moments. Seems like jumping to a conclusion to base so much off this demo. It looks like there will be a lot of story in there throughout the game, from the trailer.

They are just cherry picking what they show, I bet there will be a ton of him in the final game.

Kojima has already said that Big Boss won't say as much in this game. He will communicate more through facial animation, which is why he wanted to get a more prominent actor like Sutherland. On top of that, there's supposed to be less cutscenes. I don't think there's anything crazy at work(though I'm not ruling out a Hayter cameo at the end), I think it's just a new style. Finally, I'm sure they're being selective as well with what they show.

There was was actually quite a lot of Kiefer dialog on the audio logs in Ground Zereos.

Indeed.

But I gotta say, most prerelease Metal Gear stuff rarely gives you a solid picture of what to expect.

Well, except for when the MGS4 launch trailer showed way too much stuff from deep in the game.

i think that bit at the end of the trailer where big boss is with goddamm skullface overlooking the creation of metal gear like their buddies means something is definitely up.

not to mention in one of the interviews, Keifer did say there's a "Secret" in regards to snake in this game.

Kiefer will still be Boss. Having David Hayter voice Boss for The Phantom Pain would be silly, even by Kojima-san's standards.

@mrfluke said:

Both Skullface and Boss seem to have some connection since they are against Cipher. The GDC trailer mentions "FOX vs XOF" so maybe the relationship between both characters might be a reluctant one. We will just have to wait and find out.

I want to believe that you'll actually play as Ocelot.

I want to believe.

@vocalcannibal: I just hope you get his revolver like you did in MGS3 and can twirl it around.

hmmmmm maybe, but also Kojima said he was removing the exclamation marks atop of guards before MGS4 was released in 2006. In that "You could read the emotions of the characters" idea, but that wasn't misinformation. That was testing out an idea and learning it doesn't work and then falling back to what works well instead, although unlocking emotion bullets is amusing but not revolutionary gameplay even in MGS series. So maybe at some point the cardboard boxes in MGS5 were removed and tested poorly in alpha playthroughs so they were brought back in.

Kojima will do crazy things, but if something doesn't work he might change it, the best example is Raiden. He still wants people to play his games. But I don't believe he's gonna scrap Kiefer's work, even if I don't think he's as good as Hayter.

@corruptedevil: God, me too. Big Boss could use a little joy in this life at this point.

Keifer only read the first page of his script then said "What is this shit? This doesn't make any goddamn sense, I'm not reading this!" and stormed out of the booth. So they had to work around that.

I'm pretty sure there is SOMETHIING up. I mean look at all the trailers we've only seen the Afghanistan so far. Everything we've seen is FROM that area. I hardly believe that even if that map is huge that the entire game takes place in that one location. Like I've said a dozen times already I refuse to believe that game is what it is until I'm actually playing it. Once that games launch window approaches I'm going on full media blackout. I'm not usually sensitive about spoilers but if something crazy happens in that game I want to discover it myself.

Right now my impression is the worst case scenario. Kojima got too big for his britches and wanted to feel like a big hollywood director with this game, so he used his contact (friend?) Avi Arad (big hollywood producer) to set him up with a hollywood actor. Said huge actor has a really tight schedule, too tight to record the crazy amount of V.O. for a video game of the phantom pains size, and that's why there is so little big boss dialogue.

BUT... I would love to be proven wrong. I would love if the theories are true and he'll pull the carpet out from under us ala MGS2 with Raiden. I'm just not gonna get my hopes up. That kind of bait and switch is too obvious at this point, which is why I'm going with the worst case scenario. Either my low expectations will be met and I'll get a decent amount of enjoyment from the game, or they will be exceeded and I will be get more enjoyment from it.

Man, that would be the greatest trick ever if Hayter is actually in the game and his vocal discontent was all an act. I have no love for Hayter's Solid Snake, but it would still just be a great trick to pull on people. I really doubt that's the case, though.

yea we'ill see what happens, but i mean, the whole theme of this game is "revenge" and skullface did kill a lot of his soldiers and blew up his old base, that has to be some sort of last minute allegiance if they are teaming up

then again, i believe that trailer has big boss killing diamond dogs soliders in the end as well.....

That's a pretty good theory the only thing I'd say that probably debunk this myth is Kojima's usage of Japanese VA Akio Otsuka the original voice of Solid Snake / Big Boss in the Japanese version of the MGS series is voicing Big Boss in Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain. In an interview he mentioned I belive that the change to Sutherland was primarily due to the motion capturing for the game.

I'm of a mindset like others in which we have both Big Boss and Solid Snake in this game. This is probably just wishful thinking however.

well, even looking back to ads for MGS1 and 2, the trailers seem to just showcase the first sections. MGS1 in paticular went only as far as showing off the cyborg ninja which is still really into the game and less then 5 rooms in. Some of the trailers for MGS5 are already showcasing at least 4 other locations that are not Afghanistan. At least now it's crazy gameplay, like fulton recovery silliness.

But even if you do do a black out, you might be surprised just what what be spoiled.... Like for me, before MGS3 I saw a TGS motion capture sequence of Ocelot fighting Snake in the plane. That was something that always stayed in my mind "when are they going to fight in the plane?"

Theres too many Troy Baker lead games these days..so I don't want that to happen.

Guys, I love MGS, and I obsess over it all the time.

I think theories like that are completely insane and wrong.

Kojima's said that MGSV has less of a focus on cutscenes, and that with the new facial capture tech, he wants characters to talk less through words, and more through their faces, especially in the case of Big Boss.

@demoskinos: The game play we've seen is all Afghanistan, but some of the stuff in the trailers is definitely Africa. Hell, Ocelot even refers to Africa by name at the end of the E3 2013 (extended cut) trailer.

Just posted my own thread on this but here seems a better place so I will just repost it.

Granted the demo was in Japanese but I still feel this is relevant. Do you think that having Sutherland doing the voice of Big Boss will hurt the game. Even in the recent TGS demo Boss never really opened his mouth. Obviously the voice work has to be more or less identical no matter what region the game is. Was paying a well known actor too much and voice work for boss was cut back in all areas. If I'm honest given the amount we have heard snake speak I wouldn't be surprised at all if in the final release David Hayter will be the voice of snake / big boss. Another kojima joke.

@vaad616: No, it's not going to be Hayter voicing Big Boss in MGSV. First off, it doesn't make much sense to hire Kiefer at all for a stupid joke, and second, this isn't the first time Big Boss was voiced by someone else. In MGS2 Solidus Snake (the "perfect clone" of Big Boss) was voiced by someone else, and in MGS4 Big Boss had a different voice actor. And then there's the facial animations thing, which if you'll notice, Kiefer's face looks a hell of a lot more like Big Boss's than Hayter's does.

Now, if you want to talk about some crazy theory where Kiefer is actually playing a different character and Big Boss Hayter will return in a plot twist later in the game...I'm listening.

@mooseymcman: The Grey Fox theory is insanely dumb. Way dumber than anything Kojima has ever done.

@corruptedevil: THAT SHADOW THOUGH. And the Grey Fox bust appears behind Kojima in his Japanese live stream videos! It all makes sense, MAN.

Actually, I really hope that isn't what the big plot twist in the game is. I wouldn't be surprised though, because Grey Fox does have so many fans, and it seems like something Kojima would do to me. But I hope that's not the case, I'm not a huge Grey Fox fan.

@mooseymcman: I kinda hope there is no twist. Just a well told, coherent story that goes directly from the end of Ground Zeroes to the beginning of MG1 with a bunch of cool set pieces and character moments throughout.

If there is a twist it should be Ocelot being a sextuple agent or whatever he's at now.

@corruptedevil: Me too, but given all the deception around the marketing for the game (the whole Moby Dick Studio thing), I'm thinking there will be some sort of twist. I'd rather it be something like, I dunno, Ocelot turning heel for the 40th time but then was really not a heel. Know what I mean? Something less drastic than, "You were really this other guy this whole time!"

It's even more obvious when they start using face scanning more often for the ingame character. I mean, now Ocelot looks a bit like Delsin..

Team Hayter