Hideo Kojima is one of the most prolific and recognizable game designers, responsible for some of the most iconic and important games that shaped a generation of fans and the industry as a whole. Whether it be his Death Stranding series or his upcoming horror game, OD, he is a revolutionary mind and cinematic genius who has pioneered many mechanics and aspects. However, his magnum opus is undoubtedly the Metal Gear Solid franchise, which initially started as just Metal Gear, but evolved into the 3D realm, and with it, a handful of gaming masterpieces.
There are no bad Metal Gear Solid games, but there are surprisingly more than fans would have expected, totalling around 20 video games if fans include ports, remakes, expansions, and collections. With so many magnificent games, deciding the best can be tricky, which is why this list will rank the eight best Metal Gear Solid games. No Metal Gear games will be featured. Based on aspects such as gameplay, design, visuals, narrative, influence, originality, fan opinion, critical acclaim, and overall quality, these eight games in particular are a must-play for every die-hard fan or casual enjoyer.
Image via KonamiFans mostly only think about the main Metal Gear Solid titles, but there are a bunch of side games that fans wouldn't expect to be as good as they are, such as this PSP title, Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops. Taking place in 1970, Naked Snake is captured, but the player must now work to clear his name and then recruit members of the enemy faction in order to stop the launch of a ballistic missile prototype.
Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops is a very missable game since it is only on the PSP, but for those who still have it, it is a worthwhile game to sink their teeth into. This game has a unique narrative connection to the main titles, which bridges a gap between the third game and the Big Boss' dream. Not only that, but Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops established the recruit-and-command mechanic that became a staple of the series later on.
7 'Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater' (2025)
Image via KonamiThe Metal Gear Solid franchise has been porting over the old games in the form of a collection, but the newest game is still Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater. This game is a remake of the third title, being a 1-to-1 recreation of the classic title but with revamped graphics and modern design techniques, making it a much more streamlined experience compared to the original.
Technically, Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater should be above the original game since it improves on everything, but it is only a modern remake, and nothing can beat the originality and freshness of the original. Still, this is the definitive way to experience this story for many fans, as the improved controls and updated graphics got it up to date with modern standards. Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater is one of the greatest video game remakes since it keeps what was good and improves what was needed.
Image via KonamiMost fans could probably predict that the top five Metal Gear Solid games were the mainline games, but before that list gets to those, it has to feature Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker first. Taking place in Costa Rica in 1974, the Big Boss and his mercenary group investigate claims that there are signs of an armed military force in a nation without an army. But what they discover is an AI-driven machine whose only purpose is to ensure mutually assured destruction.
Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker took what Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops built and polished it to create a better experience overall. The revamped structure introduced short-form missions, each with its own purpose, level, and design, which spiced up the gameplay. From the base building system to the recruitment mechanics to the multiplayer boss raids, Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker was a phenomenal PSP game that was arguably the best title on the console.
5 'Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots' (2008)
Image via KonamiEvery single Metal Gear Solid mainline game is a masterpiece, but there has to be a worst, and while it may be controversial, it is Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots on this list. Taking place in 2014, the most modern for the franchise, the world economy relies on proxy wars fought by military companies. Now in his late years due to cloning, Old Snake must undergo one final mission: assassinate Liquid Ocelot before he takes control over a powerful AI system and thrusts the world into war.
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is an excellent send-off to the character and the franchise, but it is undermined by its unexpected sequel. Full of fan-service, this game has plenty of beloved moments that wrap up unresolved plot points, character development, lore, and narrative threads. It is a visually stunning video game for its time and features a resurgence of the stealth mechanics that made the franchise so beloved, specifically with the Octacamo suit.
Collider Exclusive · Action Hero Quiz
Which Action Hero Would Be
Your Perfect Partner?
Rambo · James Bond · Indiana Jones · John McClane · Ethan Hunt
Five legends. Five completely different ways of getting out alive — with style, with muscle, with charm, with luck, or with a plan so intricate it probably shouldn't work. Ten questions will reveal which action hero was built to have your back.
🎖️Rambo
🍸James Bond
🏺Indiana Jones
🔧John McClane
🎭Ethan Hunt
FIND YOUR PARTNER →
01
You're dropped into a dangerous situation with no warning. What do you need most from a partner? The first few seconds tell you everything about who belongs beside you.
ASomeone who already has three contingency plans running and is calmly working through all of them. BSomeone who reads the terrain instinctively and knows exactly how to use it against the enemy. CSomeone who keeps their nerve and their sense of humour when everything is falling apart. DSomeone who knows the history of wherever we are and what we're walking into. ESomeone with the right contact, the right cover identity, and the right exit already arranged.
NEXT QUESTION →
02
You have to get somewhere dangerous, fast. How do you travel? How you get there is half the mission.
AOn foot through terrain no one else would attempt — I move where vehicles can't follow. BOn a motorcycle, a cargo plane, or anything else that gets me there before I think too hard about it. CIn something that belongs to someone else — borrowed, stolen, or improvised under fire. DFirst class, with a cover identity and a gadget that does something I won't explain until it's needed. EBy whatever means are available — I've driven, flown, and once arrived by camel. The destination matters, not the method.
NEXT QUESTION →
03
You're pinned down and outnumbered. What does your ideal partner do? This is when you find out what someone is really made of.
ADisappears into the environment, flanks them silently, and ends it before I've reloaded. BCracks a one-liner, grabs a fire extinguisher or a chair, and improvises something that somehow works. CProduces a gadget specifically designed for this exact scenario and uses it with infuriating precision. DPulls out a whip, a pistol, and an archaeological insight that somehow gets us out alive. ENeutralises the threat with maximum efficiency and minimum words — they were already three moves ahead.
NEXT QUESTION →
04
The mission is paused. You have one evening to decompress. What does your partner suggest? Who someone is when the pressure drops is who they actually are.
AA bar with terrible lighting, cold beer, and absolutely no questions about feelings. BThe finest restaurant in the city, a bottle of something expensive, and a conversation that is equal parts brilliant and exhausting. CA local dig site, a museum after hours, or a long story about why that particular artefact matters to human civilisation. DPizza. Bad TV. Falling asleep halfway through a movie neither of you were watching anyway. EA debrief that turns into three hours of contingency planning that somehow becomes the most fun you've had all week.
NEXT QUESTION →
05
How do you prefer your partner to communicate mid-mission? Good communication is the difference between partners and a liability.
APrecise and minimal — tell me what I need to know and nothing else. Every word has a cost. BDeadpan and dry — keeping it light keeps me sharp, even when everything is on fire. CEnthusiastic and slightly chaotic — but always with useful information buried somewhere in the noise. DCalm and controlled through an earpiece, with a plan that covers every variable I haven't thought of yet. EBarely at all — silence is a language and they speak it fluently.
NEXT QUESTION →
06
Your enemy is powerful, well-resourced, and has the upper hand. How should your partner approach them? The approach to the enemy defines the partnership.
AInfiltrate their inner circle, learn everything, and dismantle them from inside out before they know we're there. BStudy the historical pattern — every villain of this type has a weakness written somewhere in the past. CGet them talking. The more they monologue, the more time I have to figure out how to beat them. DGo through them. Directly. With as much force as the terrain allows. EFind the one thing they haven't accounted for — there's always one thing — and make sure we're holding it.
NEXT QUESTION →
07
Things go badly wrong and you're captured. What do you trust your partner to do? Who someone is when you need them most is the only thing that matters.
ACome in alone, quietly, and get me out before anyone knows they were there. BHave already been working on the extraction since the moment I disappeared — the plan is already running. CCome in loud, come in fast, and worry about the collateral damage later — I'd do the same for them. DUse every resource, every contact, and bend every rule until I'm out — they don't leave people behind. ECharm their way in somehow, bluff through the hard part, and still manage to look good doing it.
NEXT QUESTION →
08
What does your ideal partner bring to the table that you couldn't replace? A great partner fills the gap you didn't know you had.
ATechnology that shouldn't exist yet and the training to use it under any conditions. BSurvival instinct so refined it borders on supernatural — and the scars to prove it's been tested. CKnowledge of history, language, and culture that makes them invaluable in places where force is useless. DThe ability to walk into any room in the world and immediately become the most trusted person in it. EStubbornness that refuses to accept a situation is hopeless — and the improvisational skill to back it up.
NEXT QUESTION →
09
Every partnership has a cost. Which of these can you live with? No one comes without baggage. The question is whether you can carry it together.
AA partner who never fully switches off — always watching exits, always calculating threats, even at dinner. BA partner who gets the job done brilliantly but has the emotional availability of a locked filing cabinet. CA partner who makes everything ten times more complicated than it needs to be — but who always comes through. DA partner who gets personally attached to every relic, ruin, and artefact we encounter, which slows everything down. EA partner who was not built for this and knows it — but shows up anyway, every time, without being asked.
NEXT QUESTION →
10
It's the final moment. Everything is on the line. What do you need from your partner right now? The last question is the most honest one.
AOne line. Absolutely dry. Delivered like the world isn't ending. Then we move. BNothing said at all — just a look that means we both already know what has to happen. CA plan I don't fully understand that somehow accounts for everything, delivered in thirty seconds flat. DA piece of historical context that reframes the entire situation and tells us exactly what to do next. ESomeone who steps forward instead of back — because that's who they've always been.
REVEAL MY PARTNER →
Your Partner Has Been Assigned Your Perfect Partner Is…
Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.
Rambo
Your partner doesn't talk much, doesn't need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you've finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You'll never need to ask if he has your back. You'll just know.
James Bond
Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it'll take you a moment to remember what's actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You'll never be bored. You'll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.
Indiana Jones
Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar's eye and a brawler's instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn't matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you'll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.
John McClane
Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren't so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.
Ethan Hunt
Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you've finished reading the briefing, and the plan he's settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn't exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.
↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ
While there are remakes, remasters, and collection ports, the last actual Metal Gear Solid game to be released was Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. After the fourth game, this brings Snake back into the past, 1984 to be specific, where he wakes up after a nine-year coma. Establishing a new mercenary army, Snake seeks revenge against a mysterious covert unit and its boss, Skull Face. Revenge turns to duty when he learns this unit is developing a parasite that can be targeted at anyone using specific codewords.
Fans would love a new Metal Gear Solid game, but it is likely that this is the final one, and that wouldn't be too bad considering it is a masterpiece. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain takes a different approach to its narrative, breaking it into parts which weren't universally beloved, but added a unique framing to the story. However, this game became such an instant classic because of its technical mastery, including the mission-based gameplay which offered freedom in the sandbox world to handle missions in any way possible.
3 'Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater' (2004)
Image via KonamiThere are only a few actual remakes of the Metal Gear Solid franchise, including two of Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, but none have managed to reach the same heights as the original. Taking place during the Cold War, Naked Snake is sent into the Soviet jungles in order to rescue a defecting rocket scientist from the Soviet Union. The country is preparing a super weapon known as Shagohod, and to make matters worse, his former boss and mother figure, The Boss, has defected to the Soviet Union, and he is the only one able to defeat her.
The Metal Gear Solid series is known for having some of the best worldbuilding in video games, and this game uses that political intrigue and emotional complexity to create the most compelling narrative yet. It is deeply personal, intimate, and tragic, using the dynamic between Snake and The Boss to create a cinematic masterpiece. The final boss fight is arguably the best in gaming history, ending one of the best character arcs. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater also takes away the high-tech gadgets in favor of gritty survival gameplay that makes the experience ten times better.
Image via KonamiSome games are so legendary that no sequel can live up to the original, and while that is mostly true for the Metal Gear Solid franchise, it has one game better than the first, but this list will get to that later. The first Metal Gear Solid game has players controlling Solid Snake, a once-retired special ops soldier who comes back into the line of duty to take on a dire mission. A rogue special forces unit captures some hostages in a nuclear facility and threatens to release a deadly weapon into the world. Meanwhile, Snake encounters his brother and learns a shocking truth.
Metal Gear Solid is naturally the most influential game of this franchise, defining many stealth mechanics as well as its cinematic framing, which placed the camera at movie-like angles. This video game blueprint was the complete package, transitioning to 3D perfectly while making the stealth tense and suspenseful and the combat compelling. Psycho Mantis is an incredible boss fight that breaks the fourth wall in the most memorable way, making it the cherry on top of a flawless experience.
1 'Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty' (2001)
Image via KonamiThe first Metal Gear Solid game is a masterpiece, but its sequel, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, just edges it out to become the greatest game in the franchise. After a failed mission, Solid Snake is presumed dead. Years later, an agent known as Raiden infiltrates a facility to save the President of the United States of America from the titular terrorist organization. However, he learns that this is a staged mission, and all part of a test for a device that can control human behavior.
For its time, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty was one of the most ambitious narratives in the gaming scene, using its bait-and-switch protagonist to deconstruct player expectations. In the modern age, this game is still relevant through its thought-provoking themes of AI that drove the story forward. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty has aged like fine wine, becoming a defining video game of this century through its postmodern narrative and innovative gameplay.
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