The second installment of the Metal Gear Retrospective from the masters of recollection over at GameTrailers recently dropped, bringing with it a flood of joyous, espionage-flavored memories from our youth. The games featured in this edition are centered around Kojima's only exploit on Sony's seminal home console, Metal Gear Solid -- that includes the GameCube remake, and the bizarre VR Missions standalone game. Pull up a chair, plug the controller into the second port, and let the warm waves of nostalgia wash over you as you relive the events that transpired at Shadow Moses.

We're guessing that you missed your chance to grab an entry code for the Metal Gear Online beta, or you'd probably be too busy spending your Saturday afternoon brushing up on your CQC to read our humble gaming news site. Well, wipe away those tears of regret, little one, and we'll make you a deal -- check out this radical gameplay footage from the beta (including a very satisfying conclusion involving a dude launcher) to slake your thirst for Kojima's sneaky-creepy multiplayer outing, and we'll take you out for Chuck E. Cheese's. Sure, it won't do much to dull your regret, but you'll be too busy wondering why this restaurant elected to have a rat for a mascot to worry about all the online stealth action you're missing out on.

Fans of Kojima's genre-defining stealth action series only have to wait two more days until Konami flings wide the floodgates of the Metal Gear Online beta, giving North Americans with a pre-order bonus access code fourteen days to hide in cardboard boxes or perform questionable chiropractic procedures to their heart's content. Unfortunately, there are a number of Snakes-in-training who dropped a Lincoln to secure an incomplete beta code, due to a printing error at Konami HQ.

Konami Support requests that those that are missing digits shoot them an email with the partial code and a return email address so that they can respond with a functioning code. With less than 48 hours until the beta launch, we suggest they step on it -- with the rising costs of torches and pitchforks, we're not sure the gaming populous could afford another Halo 3 beta delay debacle.

[Via PS3F]

Those who are truly anticipating the further adventures of the now mustachioed, raisin-wrinkled Solid Snake have no doubt hesitantly slid a five-dollar bill across the counter of their nearest brick-and-mortar, trying not to meet the crisp, judgmental eyes of Abraham Lincoln as they fulfill the reservation fee for Metal Gear Solid 4. Well, at least your shame before The Great Emancipator wasn't endured in vain -- copies of Metal Gear Saga Vol. 2, complete with beta access keys for Metal Gear Online, are currently shipping to retailers to be distributed to loyal pre-orderers.

The DVD includes backstory on the major characters in the Metal Gear franchise, as well as a few trailers for MGS4, but the real treasure in this early bird bonus is the access code which will allow you to download the MGO beta on April 17, and play the fourquel's online counterpart from April 21 until May 5 -- at which point bleary-eyed FOXHOUND fanatics will emerge from their houses to an unfamiliar world; one where cowbots don't roam the streets, and neck-snapping is almost universally frowned upon.

Film adaptations of video games are fickle mistresses. You don't need us to tell you that most of the ones that make it into theatres are horrid, while the ones with some potential usually get canned before seeing the light of day. Most of us would probably fit the Metal Gear Solid movie into that latter category -- after all, it's been nearly two years since the initial announcement of the film, and details have been sparse at best. That is, until a recent red carpet interview with the film's producer, Michael De Luca, dropped a Metal Gear REX-sized bomb on the entertainment industry.

Okay, we're exaggerating bit -- all he did was state his interest in getting Kurt Wimmer to write and possibly direct the film. Wimmer's primary writing/directing credit is the 2002 quazi-cult classic "Equilibrium", whose 35% aggregate rating on Rotten Tomatoes doesn't exactly fill us with confidence -- unless compared to the works of a particularly infamous game-to-movie adapter, whose 4% career average reminds us that Columbia Pictures could do much, much worse.

Though you might not consider a cell phone game to be a "real" addition to the franchise (on account of it being phoney, you see), you can take solace in the fact that a mobile Metal Gear Solid will bring a whole new level of realism to those infamous codec calls. "Hello, is this the colonel? An earth-shattering megaton, you say? Metal Gear?! Konami announced a 3D MGS cell phone game at their 20th Anniversary event in Tokyo? What do you mean that's it? Stop lying to me, colonel!"

1UP says a release date and price have yet to be announced. The game is expected to come pre-loaded on a special Metal Gear-branded phone from Sony and may require you to speed dial the girlfriend whenever you want to save your progress.

If you're the sort who enjoys snapping unsuspecting necks during the train commute to work, you'd be pleased to learn that the PSP's Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops is due for an expansion -- it should distract your future victims long enough to let you indulge in your disgusting and bizarre habit of killing complete strangers. Announced during the PlayStation Premier event in Tokyo, IGN reports that Metal Gear Solid Portable Ops + will primarily revolve around online play with new characters (including old wrinkly Snake) and stages. The only addition to the single-player aspect comes in the form of a mode called "Infinity Mission."

Japan will receive the expansion on September 20th at a price of ¥2,400 yen, along with a ¥4,300 bundle featuring Portable Ops. Keep an eye out for it (and commuting serial killers).

[Via PSP Fanboy]

In celebration of the illustrious franchise's 20th anniversary and in aid of those newcomers who still find themselves saying, "METAL GEAR?!" Konami has revealed plans to re-release every modern Metal Gear title in Japan, beginning with the PlayStation's monumental (and so very awesome) Metal Gear Solid. Other titles sneaking onto store shelves will be the rug-pulling Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, culinary diverse epic Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater and the PSP's portable opus, Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops.

IGN notes that the games will be sold seperately, as well as in a Metal Gear Solid Collection package. Unless the included version of Metal Gear Solid 3 contains the feature-laden Subsistence disc, it would seem that the original Metal Gear warranting the celebration in the first place has been left out of the all-important loop -- a situation Snake himself is intimately familiar with. Then again, this is from the same Konami that released The Silent Hill Collection sans, you know, Silent Hill. At the very least, this disregard for roots fuels the hope for a (re)release outside of Japan.

Scott Ramsoomair's VG Cats has a new page: a Metal Gear Solid MySpace profile for "David" Snake (screen name solidsnake34). Some of the jokes are subtle; we recommend a viewing or two of Metal Gear Awesome for some clarity. (MGA may in fact not help at all, but we still recommend viewing it for a few chortles.)

In case you're wondering and are too lazy to do some minor investigation, every link on the page directs you to VG Cats' real index. If you're viewing this after April 1, the page may be gone; feel free to use this gallery below as a time capsule for the event.

Columbia Pictures, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, is reportedly in negotiations with Konami for the rights to adapt Metal Gear Solid for the cinema; as breifly noted by Sony exec Yair Landau earlier this week at D.I.C.E. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Columbia has assigned Ghost Rider producer Michael De Luca to the project, while MGS creator Hideo Kojima and JEA's Rick Privman will serve as executive producers. Privman is also the executive producer of the upcoming film version of survival horror game Siren.

Sony producers Doug Belgrad (The Grudge 2) and Sam Dickerson will also be involved with the live-action adaptation; and Josh Bratman, who works for De Luca and introduced the project to Sony, will continue to act as a consultant. Plot details and casting prospects remain unknown.

[Thanks, Nitroid]

Shortly after delivering his convergence keynote at this year's D.I.C.E. summit, the vice chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment confirmed to Gamespot that Sony's film studio would be responsible for dragging Metal Gear Solid into the cinema. "We're working with the Metal Gear guys," says Yair Landau. "It's a very cinematic game, it really lends itself to movie telling. But the question is, 'How do you translate Snake's experience into a full arc that conforms to what audiences expect on the large screen?'"

Lead Metal Gear guy, Hideo Kojima, announced the film at last year's E3, though barely any details have surfaced since then. Apart from crushing the hopes of Dr. Boll, Kojima and co. have said nothing with respect to casting, directing or script. A safe assumption sees Solid Snake strangling inept soldiers and battling at least one psychopath with a penchant for babbling about the philosophical hangups of dropping nuclear bombs ... on the rainforest. The real trick will be to provide a film more entertaining than the infamous Metal Gear Awesome (embedded after the break for old time's sake).

Landau also hinted at an Everquest movie from Sony Pictures, but declined to name the supposedly esteemed producer attached to it. If it winds up being an epic tale of elven mana dealers and over-the-top dragon chases, we'll know it was Jerry Bruckheimer.

The effects of Konami's most recent stealth adventure, Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops, have been frightening to say the least. A simple "hello" to one of the bloggers currently playing it is often unreturned, met only with a vacant stare at the greeter's neck and a forlorn sigh. It is with great, neck-preserving displeasure then, that we report on the status of a sequel to Snake's card-free PSP outing.

In a recent (ish) PSM podcast, Ryan Payton, the assistant producer for Kojima Productions, underlines the strong possibility of a sequel. "If it's successful on the retail level there will definitely be a sequel." It's quite simple. If you desire said sequel, you'd best go buy the game ... and possibly discover that you don't really want a sequel after all.

[Via Eurogamer]

Listen -- PSM Podcast (15:50)

Trains are great. We ride them most days of the week. In fact, today we took a train ride in order to buy two new train-based videogames. That's the scary extent of our railway passion. To avoid those funny looks we keep getting from the station master, we also picked up copies of the games listed here. Just so that we could look at their non-train-related packaging on the way home, to pretend that we weren't really thinking about trains. Mmm ... the 16:09 Express to Kyoto ...

Sorry, those games:

• Ys Origin (Falcom's legend returns, again; PC)
• Seiken Densetsu 4 (Mana, Mana, Mana; PS2)
• Lost Planet: Extreme Condition (ice cool Capcom; Xbox 360)
• Let's Go By A-Train HX ("Artdink" is the funniest developer name ever; Xbox 360)
• Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops (Snake crawls back to Japan; PSP)
• Armored Core 4 (PlayStation 3)
• Railfan (for the jotter and flask crowd; PS3)

A true Metal Gear title on PSP? Not exactly. Yes, gone are all those stinkin' cards, but Portable Ops is no epic. Then again, this could be the game's greatest strength: it's not trying to be a PlayStation 2 title on the go.

With brisk missions, bold Infrastructure modes (see: Cyber-Survival), and gracious load times, Portable Ops is proof that PSP is a capable platform. (Kojima and company even found a use for the GPS attachment.)

• 1UP (95/100) - "[A] game that essentially pushes the PSP in all of its features: graphics, portability, Internet, extra hardware doohickeys, and multiplayer. Sure, it might have hiccups ... [but] it's also a damn good showcase for the PSP."
• Games Radar (90/100) - "Portable Ops feels like what you'd get if you took the Metal Gear Online game from MGS3: Subsistence, simplified it for the PSP and then built a single-player adventure around it ... but rest assured that Portable Ops is anything but shallow ... Portable Ops is one of the only games that's really tailored to all of the PSP's unique strengths. The controls work surprisingly well, the action doesn't feel like a pared-down console game and even the loading goes quickly."
• Gamepro (80/100) - "[It] succeeds because it boldly strays away from the familiar path that was forged by its big console brethren ... But for all its willingness to be different, Portable Ops still suffers from some of the familial defects."

According to a Famitsu report, Hideo Kojima estimates that Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots will need at least another year's worth of development time before it's finished. While Kojima had previously promised to deliver in 2007, he's narrowed that window to late 2007 -- at the earliest. For now, Konami is offering a new trailer, which is currently premiering at Tokyo Game Show.

The new trailer -- partially captured in bootleg form from the show floor here & here -- is allegedly 100% gameplay, although Konami has tweaked the camera perspective for clarity. At just 6 minutes, it's significantly shorter than the E3 presentation, but reveals new gameplay elements, including stealth items (e.g. an oil drum), the Octocam suit, and a shift from stealth-orientated missions to player's choice gameplay (i.e. you have a goal and are free to decide how to achieve it).

[Thanks, nijah]