Metal Gear Solid. Innovation. Amazing. Rarely are these words not combinedin the same sentence. The Metal Gear series throws the vital ingredients ofa classic title and throws them in a cauldron of imagination, and theproduct is nothing short of brilliant. However the constantly innovatingseries never made it onto our beloved N64, its success story developed onthe Psone, Metal Gear Solid was released on the Sony machine as theflagship title, and cultivated so many sales it was dubbed by many industrypundits as one of the best titles ever. The series stepped up another gearwhen it spawned a new incarnation on the PlayStation 2, Metal Gear Solid 2: The Sons of Liberty, the gameplay was simply immense, the title literallylittered with little innovations making the title incredibly enjoyable.However the series has not seen the light of day on the mighty GameCube, until now that is. Konami, Nintendo and Silicon Knights, three of the mostrespected developers in our industry, are putting their minds together toproduce Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes, essentially a remake of thePsone title Metal Gear Solid, but with gameplay additions reminiscent ofSons of Liberty. This is no simple remake, this game is going to set newrecords of innovation, and it will be a milestone in gaming history.

The Metal Gear Solid series, subtitled Tactical Espionage, is aboutstealth, pure stealth. This is not your ordinary all-out-guns title. Youhave to slide, sneak and creep your way around terrorist facilities inorder to achieve your goal. You must work out quick and effective methodsof neutralising your enemies. Metal Gear Solid is a mixture of elegant, delicate maneuvers with top quality cinematic action. The player takescontrol of Solid Snake, a rough, mysterious character with guts. And lotsof them. The series emphasises precision, the title encourages you toquietly pump a silenced bullet into an unsuspecting guards head. Itencourages you to infiltrate a guard filled room, before snapping each andevery guard's neck, before changing into their clothes. Sold Snake isprolific. He is not your average hero. Luckily, the rugged hero has a hugearsenal at his disposable, as well as the latest in hi-tech gadgetryavailable for use. Snake is a dignified, clever killing machine. This makeshim perfect for the challenges he faces in the Metal Gear Series.

Enough about the past, let's look forward to the future. Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes is going to be a phenomenal experience. An experiencewhich every single GameCube owner deserves. And boy is Konami, Nintendoand Silicon Knights going to deliver. With the recently announced inclusionof a GBA/GCN link-up feature, innovation is clearly at the top of theteam's list. The head of the team compromises of Hideo Kojima, the creatorof the Metal Gear series, Dennis Dyuck, from Silicon Knights and RyuheiKitamura, from Napalm Films. The latter's inclusion emphasises the projectsfocus on cinematics. The whole project is based on a Konami/Nintendocollaboration with Shigeru Miyamoto helping and overseeing the project.Once again, another reason why this title is going to make every singleNintendo fan in the world feel all tingly inside. The main focus behind thetitle is to essentially merge Metal Gear Solid on the Psone with Metal GearSolid 2: Sons of Liberty on PlayStation 2, into one massive orgy ofinnovation on Nintendo GameCube. As I mentioned before, Metal GearSolid: The Twin Snakes is going to feature the same plot and gameplaypresent in the highly successful earlier title Metal Gear Solid, but isgoing to feature additions and bits of gameplay featured in Metal GearSolid 2.

The kind of extra innovations we can expect to be included in the new titlevary from the ability to go into first-person mode, which we have seendemonstrated in screens, to the same advanced AI, which was featured nMetal Gear Solid 2. This is not to say that the original was not full ofinnovation. For Instance, the Codec system demonstrated Kojima's leniencytowards innovation, the communication advice was put to great use in thefirst title. Little additions made you smile, such as knocking on a wall toget the attention of a guard, whose neck would snap with a satisfyingcrunch as you maimed him. Another one of Hideo Kojima's great influenceswas film. The title is very cinematic, from the long narrative cut scenesto the revolutionary viscous plot to the credits, the influence is clear.And this is in no way a bad thing, it only adds atmosphere to the title.Having played the original, I'm not going to the spoil the plot for you,but I guarantee you, it is a beauty.

From what I've seen of the title, I can only describe this game as oncewhich makes you gobble your dinner down to play, once which makes you dropeverything in your life to play, once which will have you staring at yourTV for weeks on end. The sheer level of innovation is groundbreaking, andthe highly qualified team has done the best job possible in merging the twoclassic titles together. This is going to be a must-buy. No doubt.