Snake! What happened? Snake! Snaaaaake! (Sorry, low hanging fruit!)
The Metal Gear Solid board game, produced by publisher IDW Games, has been delayed from 2019 to Summer 2020. Created by Emerson Matsuuchi (Century, Crossfire), the game is a 1-4 player cooperative game set during the events of Metal Gear Solid. Playing collaboratively to attempt to bypass guards, disable security systems, and collect ammo and weapons, players will progress through a series of high-stakes covert missions, boss fights, and non-canon VR missions. Playable characters include Solid Snake, Meryl Silverburgh, Otacon, and Gray Fox, who each have a highly specific skillset that will be put to the test by a dynamic enemy AI card-based system.
Though originally slated to release this year, IDW just released a statement explaining that the game won't come out until midway through next year, citing heavy rounds of feedback and revisions from multiple sources (including Konami). As they state in their press release:
Game design and development is an iterative process, and involves feedback from play-testers, graphic designers, the factory that will be producing the game, and our licensing partners in North America and Japan. As development progresses changes come in that range from things that affect quality of life aspects, things like the size of the spaces on the map tiles, to redesigning and developing scenarios for better balance.
Apparently these changes and tweaks that need to be made are sizable enough to delay the game by at least six months, which leads one to believe these lengthy revisions are likely mostly from "our licensing partners in North America and Japan." Either way, the team at IDW says they had two options: just fix as much as they could to get it out the door in time, or delay and do it right. They chose to delay, so it looks like you'll have to wait a bit to peek under the cardboard box.
The game is currently available for preorder, with plenty of day one exclusive miniatures to pad out what already seems to be a pretty hefty game.
Are you interested in the Metal Gear Solid board game? Do you think the franchise's mechanics will transfer well to a tabletop medium? Let us know in the comments below.
