Fri, Aug 20, 2010 | 05:32 BST
It’s possible to beat MGS: Rising without killing anyone, says producer
When your goal is to be the second most invisible person in the fictional world (number one goes to the Invisible Woman for, well, obvious reasons), it’s actually not all that difficult to avoid sullying your hands by snapping some necks.
But when you’re a one-man army/watermelon-dicing machine, being discrete about who you do and don’t slice to ribbons isn’t quite as much of a priority. Rising, however, is still a Metal Gear game. And a no-kill playthrough, according to the game’s producer, is still definitely an option.
“I believe that MGS has a key stealth element in not trying to kill anyone,” producer Shigenobu Matsuyama told Kotaku. “You could actually have a no-kill completion [in Rising].”
“There will be a lot of mechs and cyborgs, but if you slice them up, that will be considered as a no-kill as well. You’ll have the freedom of killing humans, of course, but you can proceed through the game without killing a human being, but slicing up mechs and cyborgs.”
Precision cutting, meanwhile, will allow you to disable enemies’ weapons without flicking the off-switch in their hearts as well.
At the end of the day, though, Rising’s a game about how awesome cutting people is, right? Not quite, as it turns out.
“I will put the essence of the beauty of the no-kill,” Matsuyama said. “I want to emphasize that I will never reward a player for killing human beings in the game. I won’t make it easier to clear the game [that way]. I will probably make it more difficult.”
So let’s get this straight: guns don’t kill people; people kill people. And Raiden doesn’t kill people. But he does kill guns. With a sword.
15 
Posted in: Action, Adventure, Hot, Konami, PC, PS3, Xbox 360
Tags: konami, metal gear solid rising
15 comments
#1
metamorphic
20/08/10, 6:33 am
“Precision cutting”
Mmm… a Move I here!
#2
mington
20/08/10, 8:54 am
It’s possible for me to go buy a pint of milk without killing anyone, but wheres the fun in that
#3
Michael O’Connor
20/08/10, 9:07 am
I was actually a big fan of this in the Metal Gear games. I always tried to complete them without deaths.
How they’re going to be able to apply this to a game where you slice everything up will be… interesting to see.
#4
Gekidami
20/08/10, 9:12 am
Probaly like in MGS2 where the sword has a side you can just beat your enemies with till you knock them out.
#5
Michael O’Connor
20/08/10, 9:17 am
@4 *laughs* I hope not.
The interview seems to hint that it’ll be about how you cut. I’m very, very interested to see how this works.
#6
Thalius
20/08/10, 9:20 am
As long as they dont make a trophy/achievement out of it, it could be nice otherwise it would feel like a obligation.
#7
Michael O’Connor
20/08/10, 9:27 am
@6 They probably will.
You’re not *obligated* to get a trophy though.
#8
Aimless
20/08/10, 9:54 am
@3 Well, slicing off someone’s legs doesn’t necessarily kill them… “I didn’t kill him, the blood loss did!”
Presumably the cutting system allows you to slice up human’s weapons and armour, leaving them open for a knockout roundhouse to the face. So long as Raiden’s remembered not to attach any swords to his feet, anyway.
Oh, it’s also interesting that Konami does not consider killing cyborgs to be murder. Take note, biomechanical overloads of the future.
#9
Samuel
20/08/10, 10:18 am
I knew there had to be a catch of some kind. He said it’d be possible to go through the game not killing any humans, but that there’d still be plenty of robotic enemies you’d have no choice but to fight. That pretty much makes the whole point moot if you ask me. It’s just substituting one enemy character model for another. It would only be truly noteworthy if you could somehow go through the entire game without killing a single anything, at all.
#10
Gekidami
20/08/10, 10:21 am
@3
But cyborgs are meant to be part human, so killing them is technically murder. Now androids on the otherhand…
#11
dirigiblebill
20/08/10, 12:18 pm
Hmmm. I think the problem is that whereas in past Metal Gears you could not-kill people by camouflaging yourself appropriately and distracting them with an object, or otherwise making use of the old non-combative intellectual functions, here it sounds more like you can just opt to skip the finishing strike. What’s the difference between slashing somebody to death and slashing somebody to just-short-of-death, really?
Interested to hear more.
#12
theevilaires
20/08/10, 12:36 pm
This is suppose to be “lighting bolt action” not “stealth espionage” WTF. Just release the game.
#13
The Hindle
20/08/10, 12:44 pm
I can see this being shit for some reason, the metal gear spin offs have always been questionable.
#14
xino
20/08/10, 4:56 pm
don’t care man, I just hope this game will move closer to Hack n Slash action rather than Stealth>:/
#15
albo88
20/08/10, 9:56 pm
ninja gaiden ftw