Konami is finally bringing 2008 PlayStation 3 exclusive Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots to modern platforms. Unfortunately, it’s not bringing its Metal Gear Online modes along for the ride. Those will remain an artifact of the past.
While not mentioned during the reveal during the PlayStation State of Play last year, Konami confirmed on the official web page for the Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol. 2. “METAL GEAR SOLID 4: Guns of the Patriots – Master Collection Version of the Patriots does not include METAL GEAR ONLINE,” the disclaimer reads. I guess war really has changed.
Metal Gear Solid Online offered everything from stealth deathmatch and capture missions to bombing runs and sneak-offs. While Call of Duty was popularizing rapid respawns as players fought through meat grinder choke points, Metal Gear’s riff on online multiplayer offered options for much slower and more deliberate tactical gameplay.
Trying to stealthily sneak around opposing players and steal their dog tags in the kind of experience that’s still rare, even in the live service saturated market of 2026. It would have been cool to see some form of MGSO return with the newest remaster collection, but it’s not a complete shock that Konami is forgoing it given all of the work that resurrecting it likely would have required.
And fortunately there are other options. Unlike MSG4, the remaster of Peace Walker will feature online coop ops and versus ops. The first is for two to four players while the second is for up to six. Local wireless multiplayer will be available, but only on Switch. There’s also the Fox Hunt mode Konami released last year for Metal Gear Solid Delta.
And modders haven’t given up on trying to unofficially bring back Metal Gear Solid Online for players on PC. A modern version of MSG4 will offer modders even more options than trying to navigate the infamously fiddly tech of the original PS3.
During Wednesday’s Nintendo Direct, Konami showed off a new trailer for Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection Vol.1. The upcoming collection of past Metal Gear games includes some of the earliest and biggest games from the popular stealth series. However,2008’s Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots isn’t included, and I’m worried Konami isn’t going to include it in a future, theoretical Vol. 2.
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Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection Vol. 1 was first announced in May. The collection contains the first seven games of the series and will be released on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and 5, and (just announced earlier today) Nintendo Switch. These games aren’t being remastered and they aren’t remakes. Instead, this is a new collection of classic MGS games that will make it easier to play these older titles on newer platforms. The collection will also include screenplay books of each game and some other goodies, too.
However, not included in this collection is the PS3-exclusive Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, which is a shame as the game is currently only playable via emulation or on original PS3 hardware. At one point, MGS4 was available to stream via PS Now, but that is no longer the case. While most other MGS games have been ported to multiple platforms, MGS4 remains locked to the PS3. Why? What is the reason for never porting MGS4 to any other platform?
Why is Metal Gear Solid 4 only on PS3?
If you ask the internet about this, and you’ll not doubt see some of this in the comments, a popular theory that is often spouted off as if it’s a fact is that MGS4 is incapable of running on anything but a PS3. But that’s not true. You can, right now, download an emulator and play MGS4 at 60fps without much trouble.
And assistant producer of the game Ryan Payton suggests in Steven L. Kent’s book The Ultimate History of Video Games, Volume 2 that, at one point, MGS4 was actually running on an Xbox 360 and looked and played fine. Reportedly, that version never happened due to Microsoft’s console using DVDs and not Blurays. Konami didn’t want to spend the extra money on shipping multiple discs for the Xbox 360 version. This is more than likely the main reason MGS4 remained a PS3 exclusive and was even alluded to by former PlayStation boss Jack Tretton in 2008. Konami also said this was the reason in 2014.
Now, in 2023, most consoles use Bluray discs and all of them support digital games—which can be as large or small as you want. So that problem is solved. Yet, I’m still not convinced Konami will actually bring MGS4 to modern machines or to PC. It’s certainly not easy to port a game to new hardware, especially one that exists natively on just one platform. Plus, this whole process wouldn’t be cheap, would involve a good deal of resources, and would likely require tweaks to how the game plays as it heavily relied on the Dualshock 3/Sixaxis controller.
Reports indicate MGS4 isn’t coming to more consoles
Sadly, it seems Konami isn’t going to do the necessary work to help preserve this entry in the Metal Gear franchise. A previous report from Windows Central, which correctly revealed information about the Metal Gear Solid Collection and the MGS3 remake before release also stated that a potential Vol. 2 would not include MGS4, but instead would feature Peace Walker, Portable Ops, Metal Gear Rising: Revegance, and a few other spin-offs.
Sadly, it seems Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots—with all its long cutscenes, weird live-action bits, creepy monkey, and cool stealth camo—will remain a PS3 exclusive. Likely due to technical issues, but also, maybe Konami just forgot about it. There are a lot of games in the series. It’s easy to forget one or two of them. I get it. I forget Metal Gear Acid exists.
Still, I hope that one day, someone over at Konami remembers this game exists and that it deserves a second life on new hardware.
