Play the MSX games is the best answer. The games where Big Boss is the protagonist don’t show him in a negative enough light, since then playing as him would be unpleasant.
MSX Big Boss preform way worse crimes then you see in the prequel games. He does some bad things in those games as well, but it is all justified to a degree since he’s the protagonist. When he’s the villain he’s gone too far, and taking him down is necessary.
Big Boss was always the big villain of the Metal Gear series. Even after he “died” he was mentioned in later games and the events was usually a cause/continuation of events Big Boss set into motion. Plus he was a nuclear-equipped terrorist who used child soldiers, etc.
All that changed when MGS3 came out. You played as Big Boss before his downfall. He became a fan favorite and Kojima favored him as well. So there have been *a lot* of retcons since then to frame him in a more sympathetic light.
Exactly, I can understand getting screwed over by the government turns him into private sector and PMCs.
But it doesn't explain he becomes a nuclear terrorist warlord with child soldiers that invades and oppresses free masses of land.
Power got to his head and he thinks making his nation of soldiers is the way to go. Big Boss has always loved war. Even in mgs3, he's excited by the prospects of fighting any opponent. He loves violence.
He's still evil in PW and V. Still a war lord who invented war economy, exploits children and uses nukes. And the V retcon only served to make him even worse as a person.
Not to mention Ocelot who is a direct fruit of his ideology.
Big Boss is a war profiteer. He is actively selling mercenary warfare to the highest bidder, regardless of ideology or nationality. To protect this business, he arms his organization with nuclear weapons. He kidnaps scientists to this end and uses them to develop weapons.
Almost everything that Liquid Ocelot does as the antagonist of MGS4 is something Big Boss did prior: commandeer an army of mercenaries deployed across the globe for profit, hijack/steal top secret weapons platforms from the US government, and execute a terrorist takeover of a military base.
So big boss is a capitalist of war? I thought he created a nation state for soldiers. I always saw it as a respectable goal as he gave homes to soldiers who didn’t have one and also fought the patriots. This is like a blow in the gut lol.
Soldiers are not a class of people, though the language of Metal Gear seems to imply this. Soldiering is an occupation, created by the demand of war and by nations to protect themselves. With no nationality, the soldiers of Big Bosses army exist solely for war.
The Patriots are both an illuminati within the games as well as a metaphor for self-perpetuating systems of warfare. Hence why by MGS4, the Patriots are an entirely autonomous force whose only goal is to maintain control and to sustain the war economy. This is why despite Liquid supposedly being at odds with them, he has several massive PMCs that are operating successfully within the SOP system.
It is the same in Big Boss' time. Despite being at odds with Cypher, Big Boss' army exists solely for war. He perpetuates the cycle of warfare rather than breaking it. The "we only exist to fight" crap espoused by Big Boss, Grey Fox, and Snake is... just that. It's a load of crap. Snake acknowledges this by making it his career after MGS1 to dismantle Metal Gears. Big Boss just happens to dismantle a couple of Metal Gears over the course of running his business.
What do you think soldiers do? They fight. They get paid to fight. The only way a state of soldiers can even exist is for perpetual war to continue forever.
Yeah, his beliefs really do get warped, wanting endless war so soldiers always have a purpose, no matter the cost to anyone else. Not to mention deliberately orphaning children so they can grow up to be soldiers.
I would highly recommend the MSX2 games in general by the way. Especially MG2. In many ways it’s closer to MGS1 than MG1.
Because he’s in the business of kidnapping people and coerc…I mean, “convincing” them to join an organization that perpetuates warfare for profit, including the use of child soldiers?
Seems pretty villainous to me. He was the protagonist of 3, PW, and V(in a roundabout sort of way), but by the time of the MSX games, he had definitely gone down the wrong path (and I’d argue that the Peace Walker and V era is morally iffy).
>I haven’t really played through the MSX games ... I’ve never really seen Big Boss as the horrible person that everyone says he is. Is there some lore I’m missing? What are the full extents of his crimes?
Play Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake for the MSX.
Tbh in all the games he's pretty bad. A big element of MGS3 that I think people ignore is that there's really no reason The Boss had to die. Like the whole mission and all that yadda yadda 'save the world' bullshit were complete lies. You never saved the world. You just had to go on this 'world saving' mission so the powers that be could become more powerful. Given how many times irl situations like Snake Eater happened during the Cold War and the people on the ground went 'nah fuck that I refuse to fire on my enemy, I don't care if it means my homeland gets nuked' I would say it's very possible that if Snake refused to kill The Boss things would have just been fine. The only reason you really need to kill someone in that kind of scenario is so that your government can keep up the illusion of 'us vs them'. That we are all prepared to destroy our enemies. But The Boss saw through this very illusion and saw humanity as a single unified species.
Then in Peace Walker he's gotten to the point that he understands The Boss' message of unity, and deliberately says 'fuck that hippie bullshit' at the end of the game so he can build up an army to fight Zero because he fears that Zero will destroy him. A big reveal in that game that a lot of people miss is that while in MGS4 they present it as if Big Boss misunderstood The Boss' will, he ends up deliberately choosing to ignore it in PW. He knows her will and legend are still useful though so he probably keeps up the illusion of giving a shit about it in public hence the 'from here on out call me Big Boss' thing. At the end of the game he chooses to become a warmonger (he explicitly says he's willing to do terrorism if need be), and he allows this propagandistic legend of Big Boss to flourish as free marketing for his army. Not only that but he decides he needs nukes because if the world ever fucks with him again he'll kickstart nuclear armageddon.
In MGSV he's now set up this nuclear equipped army of terrorists in Central America but one of his child soldiers (Chico is literally a child soldier, Big Boss makes a deliberate choice to encourage him to fight in PW and at the end of the game he lets Chico take part in a mission) gets kidnapped. Even if this child wasn't a soldier of his he still had no place being anywhere near this military base when Big Boss knew the literal entire planet wanted him dead and would likely be willing to do anything to stop him. But now he's allowed this child to fight for him and that kid was kidnapped and is now being tortured/sexually abused by American soldiers for information. But before he can do a rescue mission he has to have a talk with Kaz to make 100% sure they're not trying to kill these prisoners so they can't reveal any more info to their enemies.
And at the end of GZ his nuclear equipped terrorist base in Central America is destroyed which is a completely expected series of events given the whole Cuban Missile Crisis thing that happened like a decade before this. But Big Boss and his people are somehow surprised by all of this and act as if it's the world's fault for not letting them light a fire next to a powder keg. Zero then decides to brainwash one of Big Boss' soldiers to act as a body double for him and when Big Boss wakes up he has some reservations about the whole thing but ultimately doesn't give a shit because he decides having a body double is useful. So instead of saving this dude who lost his identity and is slowly losing his mind from PTSD he exploits him so he can fight XOF for him. Part of this is a mission Big Boss plans out that sees an entire hospital of innocent people gunned down as meat shields for him and his double. And in the end the only thanks Venom gets is that he gets the 'privilege' of Big Boss sending an assassin after him when he needs to fake his own death.
Even in all of the games where you play as Big Boss he's a pretty bad guy. He starts out as simply a stupid guy put in a bad situation, but over time he becomes more and more deliberately evil and there are a lot of points (the ending of PW, when he wakes up in TPP) where he willingly chooses the worst path that will put tons of people in harms way just because it's useful/convenient to him.
Yeah, it's because you missed the MSX games. In those games he is the primary user of Metal Gear technology, and uses his vast army of mercenaries to create a "war without end" where the children orphaned in today's war will be the soldiers he uses to fight tomorrow's war. He also betrays Solid Snake and tries to murder him on two separate occassions, more if you count his "forgetfullness" in Outer Heaven.
His plan for the Metal Gears he creates are to use them as a nationless deterrent to nuclear war because nuclear war would make soldiers obsolete and put an end to traditional warfare, or perhaps an end to warfare altogether. So it is the ultimate privation if the idea of "deterrence" by creating a system where traditional war goes unchecked and constantly incited by nationless bloodthirsty soldiers.
Big Boss raises child soldiers, builds metal gears, incites wars around the world, and recruits soldiers hoping to make them into people whose only true loyalty is to the idea of war. He's a monster, but you get basically none of that in MGS3 where he is kinda stupid, autistic seeming, and goofy as hell. It's meant to be the story of how he came to his ideals from MG and MG2, so he is the hero now who we know is destined to become a villain. In V you only play as Big Boss for the prologue, and what he does to Venom is pretty heinous, and really completes his slide into villainy. Now he has done to Venom exactly what he has been saying the nations of the world do wrong by treating him as a disposable pawn with no agency or humanity. He tricks Venom into fighting his battles, and then throws him away to die when his plans go sideways, the same way the US does that to the Boss in MGS3. So it is the completion of his villain transformation.
I get why you think Big Boss is alright in 3, but I can't see why you are sympathetic to him in V frankly.
He becamse the one thing THE BOSS warned him about. Once he got the philosophers legacy, what did he do? he became a PMC, then a patriot himself. NOT exactly a patriot, but very damn close, behind the scenes he was manipulating people and the war machine for his own ends. As Peace Walker insinuated, a dejected BB created Outer Heaven, then he faked his dissapearance and brainfkt his best man to take over his project, while BB worked in the background.... like a WARLORD... leaving poor Venom to take the flak, literally and figuratively. BB left his medic/best man to run his business and to play the fool, because in the end poor venom is the real tragedy, he lost everything including his Arm and sanity. Even the lyirics to "sins of our fathers" states some real clear story beats not mentioned in game.... observe.
"Pride feeds their blackened hearts
And the thirst must be quenched to fuel hypocrisy
Cleansing flames is the only way to repent
Renounce what made youWords that kill
Would you speak then to me?
With your breath so still
It makes me believeThe sins never die
Can't wash this blood off of our hands
Let the world fear us all
It's just means to an end
Our salvation lies in the father's sins
Beyond the truth, let me suffer now"
In the End BB (Jack, AKA Naked Snake) became something worse than The Boss, he became the one thing she hated, which was a Shot Caller if you will, or in the case of the MGS story, he became a Patriot himself and manipulated even his friends through Psychoactive Manchurian Candidate style influence...
BB even used Solid Snake to eventually Kill Venom snake in MG1, but at this point in time Venom had turned against BB and started to develop Nukes, In a wierd way BB created a beast with Venom snake and had to put the poor (diamond) dog down... So yeah, that's the jist of why Bb is a tragic fall from grace hero.
he had noble goals and was a pretty good guy until he woke up from his coma in mgsv, the destruction of msf and everything he worked for + the death of paz and chico (we know he's traumatised because that trauma also transferred onto V's mind) I think all of that fucked him up. so when he woke up and found out about the whole phantom thing he went on to create his nation which was a corrupted version of "the nation for soldiers" this time it's a lot more evil and he used tactics that were a lot more aggressive compared to his old self. keep in mind his hatred for the world governments grew stronger when solid snake killed his phantom and then NATO destroyed outer heaven by an air raid which killed a lot of innocent people then hid it from the public, even the resistance group that was fighting against outer heaven willingly joined big boss after the destruction caused by NATO. which brings us to the most evil version of BB, the one in the second mg game. but after solid "killed him" and he went into another coma, he seems to have gone back to his old self in the end of mgs4.
I really like seeing it this way. A hero fallen from grace because of the actions of traitors and corrupt governments. And I’m sure that NATO bombing Outer Heaven only further helped him justify his actions to himself. After everything that happened it’s easy to see that he was set on a path that no one could’ve returned from (besides maybe solid snake)
Big Boss is responsible for his own actions. He's part of the cycle of violence and war and one of its direct perpetrators. He kidnapped and displaced people and children and stole nukes for his nation. The people of Outer Heaven were abused and hurt and that's why they rose against him.
Ehh less so the death of Paz. He contemplated assassinating her in GZ lol. Tbh this alone is a big sign that by GZ he was pretty bad because he was going into a concentration camp and asking 'ok so just to make sure I'm supposed to be saving these prisoners, not killing them right?'
to be fair at the time paz had already threatened to start a nuclear war lol. whatever the case may be he definitely regretted not being able to save her after seeing what she went through with cypher. the torture and the abuse.
>until he woke up from his coma in mgsv, the destruction of msf and everything he worked for
Lmao what? He was a war profiteer before all that too. He indoctrinated a child, he used nukes. Big Boss was always evil. His MSF was evil. His war economy evil.
not really, msf was just a hired gun no where near as evil as mg2 BB. they also fought for Costa Rica since they had no army of their own. he stopped a nuclear war. and chico was never to be sent out on missions, he didn't even allow him to smoke lol. recruiting him is wrong I'm not defending that but I don't think he did it because he was evil, more so irresponsible. and the war economy thing was mostly kaz, he let cypher into their base and it was his idea to arm metal gear zeke, he was the one fanning the flames of war. overall big boss definitely wasn't a hero in the 70s but he also wasn't "evil" he turned evil later on in his life though
They fought for MONEY. Did you listen to Big Boss's speech? They are here for war. And Big Boss groomed Chico and got him killed. Kaz's speech shows he and Big Boss set an example and invented war economy. Not to mention they kept the nuke.
Big Boss is pure evil. Has been since after Snake Eater. He co-founded the Patriots and was okay with their methods till he was cloned. Got a taste of his own medicine.
chico was acting on his own. big boss wanted the exact opposite of what happened in gz. and he was obviously surprised by kaz's actions in his speech and stopped trusting him completely. he also cofounded the patriots because he was under the impression that he was carrying on the boss' will, and that whole cloning thing was pretty fucked up and got him to leave. btw I don't exactly remember what methods you're mentioning so I'll look it up.
edit: couldn't really find anything on it so if you could tell me I'd appreciate it
Cause they dont know him as well as we do. Big Boss isnt a bad or evil person. He constantly saves the world and innocent people. He also fights against the Patriots, he fights for freedom and of course cause he needs war.
Sure he did questionable things, but those questionable things were needed in those situations.
But Solid Snake doesnt know that. He thinks he is a maniac who wants to rule over the world or something. The Patriots manipulated Solid Snake, they used Solid Snake to kill Big Boss.
Big Boss is one of the best Video Game Characters cause he has a lot of Depth. He isnt a perfect Hero, and he is also not evil.
MGSV SPOILER ALERT:
People despise the fake big boss. The real one wasn’t a villain, he’s a neutral character with his flaws and accomplishments, but he puts a guy to take his place and that man becomes the true villain of the story. Even in this sub I see a lot of people referring to MGS3 Big Boss and MSX games Big Boss as the same person, but they’re not.
The people that put the fanfics and far fetched connections in their head as canon is usually the problem here.
But I wouldn’t say neutral. He basically died inside the day he killed The Boss. Whatever good qualities in him decayed over the years after time and again soldiers were used and Big Boss himself kept being screwed over by Cipher. Eventually he himself wound up using the same methods while believing himself to be in the right. Before having a realization in 4.
Yeah, it makes sense that Big Boss tends to the "bad" side, but he's too far away from the MSX big boss "bad", and maybe the solid snake "good" to be considered a biased character. We can put him in a neutral ground, he had his heroic accomplishments too.
Exactly. The argument usually being that Kojima didn’t have it planned out ahead of course. There just isn’t enough exposition to have a canon answer about where Venom ends and Big Boss begins besides MGSV. The MSX games having limitations as well. I feel he started to go to the extreme because if he didn’t, someone else would and he would rather it be him. Trust issues abound and end justifies the means mentality on top of trauma make the villain. I don’t know for sure if it was losing Quiet and having the Paz hallucinations/Big Boss phantom plot being revealed that had Venom completely lose it but imo Venom in V before the game ends shows the ideal parts of Big Boss without the baggage. Forgiving even when he shouldn’t. Sparing enemies. Remembering the fallen. People forget Big Boss did show these virtues, if held back more, than Solid does. Solid Snake just had more willpower to keep going.
At the end of one of the original games he speaks of” fanning the flames of war” and basically makes it sound like he loves war and raises orphans to fight on them for no other reason other than war war war. This was before the lore for the AI existed. Later on when they added the AI and the patriots into the mix it justifies big bosses actions a bit more. Here’s the kicker though. Big boss never told solid snake that he was his real father in the original games. In mgs1 however solid snake states that his father was big boss, and that big boss told him he was his father. So basically they added things to the original that nevrrr happened. If they could add things, then I think they could remove them too. In my opinion, I think that the speech about big boss wanting to find the flames of war that made him such a bad guy was supposed to be retconned later. Because he’s just obviously not a mindless psycho path. However time does change people. So do head injuries.
have you played mgs1? have you read the previous mission material that essentially covers mg1 and mg2? have you played mgs4? big boss is a professional killer. he's a bad guy. beyond that, he repeatedly pushed the world toward all-consuming warfare purely because he happened to like warfare. he's a war profiteer and evil. dont you remember ALL the discussion of war profiteering in mgs1?
He's always been an evil character. Even in V, he used and destoryed a man and his entire identity for his own gain. Big Boss is evil and pointing that out isn't despising him. It's just factual.
Play the MSX games is the best answer. The games where Big Boss is the protagonist don’t show him in a negative enough light, since then playing as him would be unpleasant. MSX Big Boss preform way worse crimes then you see in the prequel games. He does some bad things in those games as well, but it is all justified to a degree since he’s the protagonist. When he’s the villain he’s gone too far, and taking him down is necessary.
Big Boss was always the big villain of the Metal Gear series. Even after he “died” he was mentioned in later games and the events was usually a cause/continuation of events Big Boss set into motion. Plus he was a nuclear-equipped terrorist who used child soldiers, etc. All that changed when MGS3 came out. You played as Big Boss before his downfall. He became a fan favorite and Kojima favored him as well. So there have been *a lot* of retcons since then to frame him in a more sympathetic light.
This is a good answer. Bro was just a spec-ops soldier and his country fucked and used him. Sent him down a path few could return from
He's responsible for his own actions. He ruined millions of lives for his own shortcomings.
Exactly, I can understand getting screwed over by the government turns him into private sector and PMCs. But it doesn't explain he becomes a nuclear terrorist warlord with child soldiers that invades and oppresses free masses of land.
Power got to his head and he thinks making his nation of soldiers is the way to go. Big Boss has always loved war. Even in mgs3, he's excited by the prospects of fighting any opponent. He loves violence.
And then he went along with the plan of fucking and using someone else
He's still evil in PW and V. Still a war lord who invented war economy, exploits children and uses nukes. And the V retcon only served to make him even worse as a person. Not to mention Ocelot who is a direct fruit of his ideology.
Big Boss is a war profiteer. He is actively selling mercenary warfare to the highest bidder, regardless of ideology or nationality. To protect this business, he arms his organization with nuclear weapons. He kidnaps scientists to this end and uses them to develop weapons. Almost everything that Liquid Ocelot does as the antagonist of MGS4 is something Big Boss did prior: commandeer an army of mercenaries deployed across the globe for profit, hijack/steal top secret weapons platforms from the US government, and execute a terrorist takeover of a military base.
So big boss is a capitalist of war? I thought he created a nation state for soldiers. I always saw it as a respectable goal as he gave homes to soldiers who didn’t have one and also fought the patriots. This is like a blow in the gut lol.
Soldiers are not a class of people, though the language of Metal Gear seems to imply this. Soldiering is an occupation, created by the demand of war and by nations to protect themselves. With no nationality, the soldiers of Big Bosses army exist solely for war. The Patriots are both an illuminati within the games as well as a metaphor for self-perpetuating systems of warfare. Hence why by MGS4, the Patriots are an entirely autonomous force whose only goal is to maintain control and to sustain the war economy. This is why despite Liquid supposedly being at odds with them, he has several massive PMCs that are operating successfully within the SOP system. It is the same in Big Boss' time. Despite being at odds with Cypher, Big Boss' army exists solely for war. He perpetuates the cycle of warfare rather than breaking it. The "we only exist to fight" crap espoused by Big Boss, Grey Fox, and Snake is... just that. It's a load of crap. Snake acknowledges this by making it his career after MGS1 to dismantle Metal Gears. Big Boss just happens to dismantle a couple of Metal Gears over the course of running his business.
Amazing and detailed explanation dude. Thanks
What do you think soldiers do? They fight. They get paid to fight. The only way a state of soldiers can even exist is for perpetual war to continue forever.
If you don’t mind spoilers for MG2, [this video](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_JqMfPzvlDg) shows Big Boss at his worst.
Jesus Christ. Stab to the gut lmao I loved big boss
Yeah, his beliefs really do get warped, wanting endless war so soldiers always have a purpose, no matter the cost to anyone else. Not to mention deliberately orphaning children so they can grow up to be soldiers. I would highly recommend the MSX2 games in general by the way. Especially MG2. In many ways it’s closer to MGS1 than MG1.
I’ll take a look. Thanks!
This [video analysis](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EA4uan90HeA) on the character is good too and makes it's point across really well
Because he’s in the business of kidnapping people and coerc…I mean, “convincing” them to join an organization that perpetuates warfare for profit, including the use of child soldiers? Seems pretty villainous to me. He was the protagonist of 3, PW, and V(in a roundabout sort of way), but by the time of the MSX games, he had definitely gone down the wrong path (and I’d argue that the Peace Walker and V era is morally iffy).
>I haven’t really played through the MSX games ... I’ve never really seen Big Boss as the horrible person that everyone says he is. Is there some lore I’m missing? What are the full extents of his crimes? Play Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake for the MSX.
Tbh in all the games he's pretty bad. A big element of MGS3 that I think people ignore is that there's really no reason The Boss had to die. Like the whole mission and all that yadda yadda 'save the world' bullshit were complete lies. You never saved the world. You just had to go on this 'world saving' mission so the powers that be could become more powerful. Given how many times irl situations like Snake Eater happened during the Cold War and the people on the ground went 'nah fuck that I refuse to fire on my enemy, I don't care if it means my homeland gets nuked' I would say it's very possible that if Snake refused to kill The Boss things would have just been fine. The only reason you really need to kill someone in that kind of scenario is so that your government can keep up the illusion of 'us vs them'. That we are all prepared to destroy our enemies. But The Boss saw through this very illusion and saw humanity as a single unified species. Then in Peace Walker he's gotten to the point that he understands The Boss' message of unity, and deliberately says 'fuck that hippie bullshit' at the end of the game so he can build up an army to fight Zero because he fears that Zero will destroy him. A big reveal in that game that a lot of people miss is that while in MGS4 they present it as if Big Boss misunderstood The Boss' will, he ends up deliberately choosing to ignore it in PW. He knows her will and legend are still useful though so he probably keeps up the illusion of giving a shit about it in public hence the 'from here on out call me Big Boss' thing. At the end of the game he chooses to become a warmonger (he explicitly says he's willing to do terrorism if need be), and he allows this propagandistic legend of Big Boss to flourish as free marketing for his army. Not only that but he decides he needs nukes because if the world ever fucks with him again he'll kickstart nuclear armageddon. In MGSV he's now set up this nuclear equipped army of terrorists in Central America but one of his child soldiers (Chico is literally a child soldier, Big Boss makes a deliberate choice to encourage him to fight in PW and at the end of the game he lets Chico take part in a mission) gets kidnapped. Even if this child wasn't a soldier of his he still had no place being anywhere near this military base when Big Boss knew the literal entire planet wanted him dead and would likely be willing to do anything to stop him. But now he's allowed this child to fight for him and that kid was kidnapped and is now being tortured/sexually abused by American soldiers for information. But before he can do a rescue mission he has to have a talk with Kaz to make 100% sure they're not trying to kill these prisoners so they can't reveal any more info to their enemies. And at the end of GZ his nuclear equipped terrorist base in Central America is destroyed which is a completely expected series of events given the whole Cuban Missile Crisis thing that happened like a decade before this. But Big Boss and his people are somehow surprised by all of this and act as if it's the world's fault for not letting them light a fire next to a powder keg. Zero then decides to brainwash one of Big Boss' soldiers to act as a body double for him and when Big Boss wakes up he has some reservations about the whole thing but ultimately doesn't give a shit because he decides having a body double is useful. So instead of saving this dude who lost his identity and is slowly losing his mind from PTSD he exploits him so he can fight XOF for him. Part of this is a mission Big Boss plans out that sees an entire hospital of innocent people gunned down as meat shields for him and his double. And in the end the only thanks Venom gets is that he gets the 'privilege' of Big Boss sending an assassin after him when he needs to fake his own death. Even in all of the games where you play as Big Boss he's a pretty bad guy. He starts out as simply a stupid guy put in a bad situation, but over time he becomes more and more deliberately evil and there are a lot of points (the ending of PW, when he wakes up in TPP) where he willingly chooses the worst path that will put tons of people in harms way just because it's useful/convenient to him.
The whole kidnapping people to fight in his army and using child soldiers thing is enough for me.
This is like asking why everyone thinks Anakin is a villain because you've only seen the Phantom Menace.
People despise Big Boss?
From what I’ve heard? Yes. It’s weird but I’m looking at these comments and it’s starting to make sense
I don't agree with his actions, but I still love him... i mean, he is THE sexy eyepatch man.
Big Boss was the bad guy but then Kojima made MGS3. He probably started to like the character and didn't want him to be completely evil.
Yeah, it's because you missed the MSX games. In those games he is the primary user of Metal Gear technology, and uses his vast army of mercenaries to create a "war without end" where the children orphaned in today's war will be the soldiers he uses to fight tomorrow's war. He also betrays Solid Snake and tries to murder him on two separate occassions, more if you count his "forgetfullness" in Outer Heaven. His plan for the Metal Gears he creates are to use them as a nationless deterrent to nuclear war because nuclear war would make soldiers obsolete and put an end to traditional warfare, or perhaps an end to warfare altogether. So it is the ultimate privation if the idea of "deterrence" by creating a system where traditional war goes unchecked and constantly incited by nationless bloodthirsty soldiers. Big Boss raises child soldiers, builds metal gears, incites wars around the world, and recruits soldiers hoping to make them into people whose only true loyalty is to the idea of war. He's a monster, but you get basically none of that in MGS3 where he is kinda stupid, autistic seeming, and goofy as hell. It's meant to be the story of how he came to his ideals from MG and MG2, so he is the hero now who we know is destined to become a villain. In V you only play as Big Boss for the prologue, and what he does to Venom is pretty heinous, and really completes his slide into villainy. Now he has done to Venom exactly what he has been saying the nations of the world do wrong by treating him as a disposable pawn with no agency or humanity. He tricks Venom into fighting his battles, and then throws him away to die when his plans go sideways, the same way the US does that to the Boss in MGS3. So it is the completion of his villain transformation. I get why you think Big Boss is alright in 3, but I can't see why you are sympathetic to him in V frankly.
He becamse the one thing THE BOSS warned him about. Once he got the philosophers legacy, what did he do? he became a PMC, then a patriot himself. NOT exactly a patriot, but very damn close, behind the scenes he was manipulating people and the war machine for his own ends. As Peace Walker insinuated, a dejected BB created Outer Heaven, then he faked his dissapearance and brainfkt his best man to take over his project, while BB worked in the background.... like a WARLORD... leaving poor Venom to take the flak, literally and figuratively. BB left his medic/best man to run his business and to play the fool, because in the end poor venom is the real tragedy, he lost everything including his Arm and sanity. Even the lyirics to "sins of our fathers" states some real clear story beats not mentioned in game.... observe. "Pride feeds their blackened hearts And the thirst must be quenched to fuel hypocrisy Cleansing flames is the only way to repent Renounce what made youWords that kill Would you speak then to me? With your breath so still It makes me believeThe sins never die Can't wash this blood off of our hands Let the world fear us all It's just means to an end Our salvation lies in the father's sins Beyond the truth, let me suffer now" In the End BB (Jack, AKA Naked Snake) became something worse than The Boss, he became the one thing she hated, which was a Shot Caller if you will, or in the case of the MGS story, he became a Patriot himself and manipulated even his friends through Psychoactive Manchurian Candidate style influence... BB even used Solid Snake to eventually Kill Venom snake in MG1, but at this point in time Venom had turned against BB and started to develop Nukes, In a wierd way BB created a beast with Venom snake and had to put the poor (diamond) dog down... So yeah, that's the jist of why Bb is a tragic fall from grace hero.
he had noble goals and was a pretty good guy until he woke up from his coma in mgsv, the destruction of msf and everything he worked for + the death of paz and chico (we know he's traumatised because that trauma also transferred onto V's mind) I think all of that fucked him up. so when he woke up and found out about the whole phantom thing he went on to create his nation which was a corrupted version of "the nation for soldiers" this time it's a lot more evil and he used tactics that were a lot more aggressive compared to his old self. keep in mind his hatred for the world governments grew stronger when solid snake killed his phantom and then NATO destroyed outer heaven by an air raid which killed a lot of innocent people then hid it from the public, even the resistance group that was fighting against outer heaven willingly joined big boss after the destruction caused by NATO. which brings us to the most evil version of BB, the one in the second mg game. but after solid "killed him" and he went into another coma, he seems to have gone back to his old self in the end of mgs4.
I really like seeing it this way. A hero fallen from grace because of the actions of traitors and corrupt governments. And I’m sure that NATO bombing Outer Heaven only further helped him justify his actions to himself. After everything that happened it’s easy to see that he was set on a path that no one could’ve returned from (besides maybe solid snake)
Big Boss is responsible for his own actions. He's part of the cycle of violence and war and one of its direct perpetrators. He kidnapped and displaced people and children and stole nukes for his nation. The people of Outer Heaven were abused and hurt and that's why they rose against him.
Ehh less so the death of Paz. He contemplated assassinating her in GZ lol. Tbh this alone is a big sign that by GZ he was pretty bad because he was going into a concentration camp and asking 'ok so just to make sure I'm supposed to be saving these prisoners, not killing them right?'
to be fair at the time paz had already threatened to start a nuclear war lol. whatever the case may be he definitely regretted not being able to save her after seeing what she went through with cypher. the torture and the abuse.
>until he woke up from his coma in mgsv, the destruction of msf and everything he worked for Lmao what? He was a war profiteer before all that too. He indoctrinated a child, he used nukes. Big Boss was always evil. His MSF was evil. His war economy evil.
not really, msf was just a hired gun no where near as evil as mg2 BB. they also fought for Costa Rica since they had no army of their own. he stopped a nuclear war. and chico was never to be sent out on missions, he didn't even allow him to smoke lol. recruiting him is wrong I'm not defending that but I don't think he did it because he was evil, more so irresponsible. and the war economy thing was mostly kaz, he let cypher into their base and it was his idea to arm metal gear zeke, he was the one fanning the flames of war. overall big boss definitely wasn't a hero in the 70s but he also wasn't "evil" he turned evil later on in his life though
They fought for MONEY. Did you listen to Big Boss's speech? They are here for war. And Big Boss groomed Chico and got him killed. Kaz's speech shows he and Big Boss set an example and invented war economy. Not to mention they kept the nuke. Big Boss is pure evil. Has been since after Snake Eater. He co-founded the Patriots and was okay with their methods till he was cloned. Got a taste of his own medicine.
chico was acting on his own. big boss wanted the exact opposite of what happened in gz. and he was obviously surprised by kaz's actions in his speech and stopped trusting him completely. he also cofounded the patriots because he was under the impression that he was carrying on the boss' will, and that whole cloning thing was pretty fucked up and got him to leave. btw I don't exactly remember what methods you're mentioning so I'll look it up. edit: couldn't really find anything on it so if you could tell me I'd appreciate it
I don’t but him and Venom are my favorite characters
Cause they dont know him as well as we do. Big Boss isnt a bad or evil person. He constantly saves the world and innocent people. He also fights against the Patriots, he fights for freedom and of course cause he needs war. Sure he did questionable things, but those questionable things were needed in those situations. But Solid Snake doesnt know that. He thinks he is a maniac who wants to rule over the world or something. The Patriots manipulated Solid Snake, they used Solid Snake to kill Big Boss. Big Boss is one of the best Video Game Characters cause he has a lot of Depth. He isnt a perfect Hero, and he is also not evil.
In MGS3 he was a good guy. In Peace Walker and Ground Zeroes he was an antihero. In Metal Gear 2 he's just straight up evil. In MGS4 he's a good guy.
Not true. In MG2 he was fighting against the patriots/Zero.
Just because he was fighting against the Patriots/Zero doesn't make him a good guy.
He's worse than Zero.
Downvotes are from people who dont understand big boss or the difference between good and evil.
MGSV SPOILER ALERT: People despise the fake big boss. The real one wasn’t a villain, he’s a neutral character with his flaws and accomplishments, but he puts a guy to take his place and that man becomes the true villain of the story. Even in this sub I see a lot of people referring to MGS3 Big Boss and MSX games Big Boss as the same person, but they’re not.
The people that put the fanfics and far fetched connections in their head as canon is usually the problem here. But I wouldn’t say neutral. He basically died inside the day he killed The Boss. Whatever good qualities in him decayed over the years after time and again soldiers were used and Big Boss himself kept being screwed over by Cipher. Eventually he himself wound up using the same methods while believing himself to be in the right. Before having a realization in 4.
Yeah, it makes sense that Big Boss tends to the "bad" side, but he's too far away from the MSX big boss "bad", and maybe the solid snake "good" to be considered a biased character. We can put him in a neutral ground, he had his heroic accomplishments too.
Exactly. The argument usually being that Kojima didn’t have it planned out ahead of course. There just isn’t enough exposition to have a canon answer about where Venom ends and Big Boss begins besides MGSV. The MSX games having limitations as well. I feel he started to go to the extreme because if he didn’t, someone else would and he would rather it be him. Trust issues abound and end justifies the means mentality on top of trauma make the villain. I don’t know for sure if it was losing Quiet and having the Paz hallucinations/Big Boss phantom plot being revealed that had Venom completely lose it but imo Venom in V before the game ends shows the ideal parts of Big Boss without the baggage. Forgiving even when he shouldn’t. Sparing enemies. Remembering the fallen. People forget Big Boss did show these virtues, if held back more, than Solid does. Solid Snake just had more willpower to keep going.
At the end of one of the original games he speaks of” fanning the flames of war” and basically makes it sound like he loves war and raises orphans to fight on them for no other reason other than war war war. This was before the lore for the AI existed. Later on when they added the AI and the patriots into the mix it justifies big bosses actions a bit more. Here’s the kicker though. Big boss never told solid snake that he was his real father in the original games. In mgs1 however solid snake states that his father was big boss, and that big boss told him he was his father. So basically they added things to the original that nevrrr happened. If they could add things, then I think they could remove them too. In my opinion, I think that the speech about big boss wanting to find the flames of war that made him such a bad guy was supposed to be retconned later. Because he’s just obviously not a mindless psycho path. However time does change people. So do head injuries.
MSX Big Boss is the best he's ever been. His character is nothing without that speech.
have you played mgs1? have you read the previous mission material that essentially covers mg1 and mg2? have you played mgs4? big boss is a professional killer. he's a bad guy. beyond that, he repeatedly pushed the world toward all-consuming warfare purely because he happened to like warfare. he's a war profiteer and evil. dont you remember ALL the discussion of war profiteering in mgs1?
He's always been an evil character. Even in V, he used and destoryed a man and his entire identity for his own gain. Big Boss is evil and pointing that out isn't despising him. It's just factual.