Speaking with Nice Games back in 1999 (available now due to the great work done on Shmuplations), Kojima explained how the core of what would eventually become Metal Gear was Konami's desire to make a “war game.” Kojima said that a team of veteran Konami developers had an idea for a war game and then scrapped it, and then they came up with another one, and scrapped it, and so on. Ultimately, the project fell into the hands of Kojima, who proposed an idea for an “escape game” inspired by the 1963 film The Great Escape, but was told “'There are no games like that.'”
“I was still a new planner at Konami, so I guess no one was willing to listen to what I had to say… there just wasn't any motivation from the beginning,” Kojima said. “I thought, what do I have to do here? Do I have to start hitting people? (laughs).”
Kojima said he was so frustrated with the situation that he was considering leaving Konami entirely, but another veteran employee came together and presented Kojima's vision, and sure enough, “the people around me started to change their attitude.”
“Of course, everyone still had doubts about the basic premise,” Kojima said. “Everyone was asking, 'Will an escape game really be fun…?' But once we launched a working version and they saw that exclamation point appear when the enemy is surprised, that convinced them and everyone changed their tune: 'This is going to work!'”
Bottom line, thank goodness for that damn exclamation point. To think that the absence of such a relatively minor feature could have meant there being no Metal Gear forever is mind-boggling, and makes you wonder what beloved series exist in other universes but not ours, simply because whoever released it in our universe He didn't do it. shows the exclamation point. I'm going to go to bed.
What do you mean Metal Gear isn't on our list of the best NES games?