Remote Ops: April Fools 2007
Editorial by Ravi Singh, Posted on June 11, 2007
On April 1, 2007, The Snake Soup posted a breaking news story with leaked information about the sequel to Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops. This sequel was to be developed for the Wii under the name Metal Gear Solid: Remote Ops. To add more “OH FUCKYEA” points, it was to take place during the events of Sons of Liberty entirely in Snake’s point of view. Remote Ops doubles as the announced Digital Graphic Novel for the Sons of Liberty comics–with full voiceovers! Oh shi–ok, yeah it’s an April Fools joke. I thought it up and then put it up, had Metal Gear Solid: The Unofficial Site (TUS) post it, and Cord added fuel to the fire by posting a hoax that Josh posted, to which we claimed was THE joke whereas the real joke was actually true.
Approximately five people actually thought this screenshot was 100% legit. No joke.
While the fact is this was indeed just an April Fools joke that I thought of and managed to get TUS involved in, The Snake Soup’s April Fools joke was not just for some laugh-out-louds. It was an experiment. Cliche? Yes. But it’s true. I didn’t just make up the concept for Remote Ops just to trick people. I wanted to see the reactions. You guys delivered.
While some people totally fell for it, the most common response from people was something along the lines of “OMG PLZ SO OBVIOUSKLY APRIL FOOLS.” Really? Well, of course it’s obvious. It’s new information delivered by us on April 1st. I doubt the word “fake” would be uttered by these same people if the story was published on any other day. Maybe on March 31st people would still be suspicious, but I doubt that would be the case on any other day.
Some internet intellectuals decided to use their glorious logic to prove how, besides it being April 1st, this was “obviously” fake:
Well, let’s see here. The story says that the sequel is called Metal Gear Solid: REMOTE Ops. REMOTE as in “The Wii uses a remote as a controller” or REMOTE as in “stationary.” Maybe you need to try harder when it comes to reading?
Um, ok? I thought putting 2007 would totally make the April Fools joke an obvious septic tank, but 2008 makes a lot of sense considering how quickly Kojima Productions shat out Portable Ops (at least in Japan and North America). Unless DieH@rd was trying to make a point nobody else got.
Another common one I got was about Ashley Wood. “Why would Ashley Woods’ work be needed for a Wii game?” The point is usually made from the assumption that the PSP can’t handle real-time cutscenes, which is bullshit. Besides that, Kojima Productions has proven themselves to be lazy when it comes to filler games. Look at the Snake Tales for Substance. It’s just text. At least the Ashley Wood artwork can have them evade a lot of “hay i dont wanna read!” criticism from the illiterates that get paid by IGN.
One point made by many, that I actually considered before planning the April Fools joke was this one: “Why would a team even be used on Big Shell when we know Snake was alone?” Here’s what I thought–Do we really know if Snake did everything alone (or with Otacon and Olga, at most)? Indeed, even if, I was wondering how fans would feel if Kojima Productions were to retcon Sons of Liberty to cater to the majority of fans. Unfortunately, I didn’t get much response in that nature. However, the response does hint that fans DO NOT expect any of the ‘Solid games to be retconned.
“Why would they even consider doing Sons of Liberty on Wii when Snake’s story on Big Shell could easily be added onto Digital Graphic Novel 2” some would ask. I would ask them “Why did they consider making The Twin Snakes?” Similarly:
Well, um, I dunno, money?
If you’re confused, he’s talking about this image somebody at TUS made:
At least these people gave reasons to their disbelief. Most people just went “this april fool joke sucks” without any basis besides “yeah i toptally did not fall for it yup im so smart.”
Big fucking deal
So yeah, the hype is definitely still kicking it.
Then there’s the fanboyism. Which I expected. Seeing as how Portable Ops became the killer app for PSP, people who bought a PSP just for it would get pissed if it’s sequel went to another console. I would be. But that’s different from this shit:
Um wow. Just read my article about why The Twin Snakes will never be ported to a non-Nintendo console as to why “Sony buying rights to Metal Gear” is bullshit.
Now instead of concluding that this was an April Fools joke, hotgasmask proves his stupidity:
You want to know my thoughts about Portable Ops 2?
THERE SHOULD HAVE NEVER BEEN A FUCKING PORTABLE OPS TO BEGIN WITH!
The game was being developed, originally, as a non-Metal Gear title. The developers claimed that in order to understand Guns of the Patriots, one needed to play this. They also said that it was the “missing link” between Snake Eater and the first Metal Gear. All of this is bullshit. The story can be understood within five minutes of searching YouTube and watching a few videos. It’s a filler game made from the game engine of a PlayStation 2 game.
I don’t want there to be Portable Ops 2 in general. I own a Wii and a PSP but I would be more glad if the project got cancelled in favor of original games with quality.
And why the fuck would Portable Ops 2 for the PSP be called REMOTE Ops?! Is that what I THINK it should be called too? Maybe I THINK Digital Graphic Novel 2 should be integrated with a game? Maybe I THINK Konami should leak me such information?
Doesn’t matter. Nintendo fanboy jumps into the conversation:
According to this guy, Nintendo owns Resident Evil, but they’re pussies who can’t bitchslap Sony with a lawsuit when they illegally port Nintendo’s property for their hardware.
Nintendo fanboy #2 walked in and said:
Awwww shit now it’s fucking on!
Yeah. It would be, wouldn’t it? Too bad Remote Ops would indeed be a completly (sic) different Metal Gear Solid game as we’re not talking about Guns of the Patriots here, huh? (I’m ignoring the “buying rights” bullshit because this poor kid has no fucking clue as to how the real world works).
Oh, he finally got that it was a joke.
Oh wow. Amazing, huh? That fucking thing where you walk around avoiding cars and bears so you can try to access wireless points and recruit shitty soldiers. I’m sure the Wii has nothing unique like that. A game on the Wii would be some boring console game. Ironically, didn’t this guy also mention something about games coming out for more powerful consoles? The Wii is more powerful than the PSP, last time I checked the specs.
Um… the PSP couldn’t handle Portable Op’s controls. I’m not the only one who shares this belief either. And lastly, it isn’t a FPS. It tries to be, but it isn’t. And even if it did, didn’t Call of Duty 3 come out for Wii?
Oh dayum, it’s all Microsoft Wordy and shit! (Click to enlarge)Anyone who said that the Remote Ops story was “obviously a fake” (not as in “oh, haha, April Fools” but in “OMFG TRY BETTER LAMES FAIL!”) but believed that the cease & desist letter Konami apparently sent me as a PDF file was real… it took me less than five minutes to type it up, print preview, and press the PRINT SCREEN button.
Of course, I guess it is believable — Konami did give me one of these when I, among other fansites, put up leaked Snake Eater screenshots. When I took them down, IGN had them up within a couple of days. Fuckers.
Going back to the fact that the date killed the joke, I must point out something. While all of these guys tried (and mostly failed) and disproving the joke, where the fuck were you when a lot of fucking gaming sites backed the spineless rumor of Guns of the Patriots randomly losing PlayStation 3 exclusivity? It’s disgusting how much shit I got for posting a fake news story on a Metal Gear fansite that’s not serious 75% of the time on April Fools day, yet, these gaming news websites that would be considered a reliable source on Wikipedia can flood RSS feeds with more bullshit than, I dunno, a bull pen? All I’m saying is why is it that only the Italians and Finnish seemed to have enjoyed the April Fools joke for what it was and didn’t try to prove anything?