Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
=== Characters ===
The protagonist of Metal Gear Solid 2 is a young rookie agent named Raiden. He is supported by his commanding officer, the Colonel, and Rosemary, his girlfriend. Allies formed on the mission include Lt. Junior Grade Iroquois Pliskin, a Navy SEAL of mysterious background who provides his knowledge of the facility and later revealed as the claimed terrorist Solid Snake; Peter Stillman, a NYPD bomb-disposal expert; Otacon, a computer security specialist; and a cyborg ninja imitating Gray Fox's persona, first calling itself Deepthroat, then changing its name to Mr. X.
The antagonists of peace are the Sons of Liberty, a group of terrorists who seize control of the Big Shell Disposal Facility, including anti-terror training unit Dead Cell, and a Russian mercenary force. The Dead Cell team members are Vamp, an immortal man exhibiting vampire-like attributes; Fatman, a rotund man with exceptional knowledge of bombs; and Fortune, a woman capable of cheating death by apparent supernatural means. The leader of Sons of Liberty claims to be Solid Snake, previously declared dead after a terrorist attack, later revealed to be Solidus Snake, a third clone in "Les Enfants Terribles" project. Assisting the Sons of Liberty are Olga Gurlukovich, commander of a rogue Russian mercenary army, and Revolver Ocelot, a disenfranchised Russian nationalist and former FOXHOUND agent, Solid Snake's old nemesis, and henchman of Solidus Snake.
Other characters include Emma Emmerich, Otacon's stepsister and a computer wiz-kid; Sergei Gurlukovich, Ocelot's former commanding officer and Olga's father; President James Johnson, held hostage by the Sons of Liberty; and DIA operative Richard Ames. Liquid Snake returns as he communicates via Ocelot because his right hand, sliced by Gray Fox in the previous game, has been replaced with the right hand of Liquid. The game also features cameos by Mei Ling, the communications expert who aided Snake in the first game, and Johnny Sasaki, the luckless soldier with chronic digestive problems.
=== Story ===
==== Prologue - Tanker chapter ====
The game opens with a flashback, two years after the Shadow Moses incident in the original Metal Gear Solid. On August 8, 2007, Solid Snake and Otacon, now members of the non-governmental organization Philanthropy, are investigating the development of a new Metal Gear by the United States Marine Corps. Snake arrives on the tanker transporting the weapon in the middle of an attack by Russian mercenaries, led by Colonel Gurlukovich, his daughter Olga and Snake's enemy Ocelot, who has transplanted the right arm of Liquid Snake following the loss of his own in Metal Gear Solid. After Snake knocks Olga unconscious, he sneaks down to the hold in order to record pictures of the new Metal Gear RAY. As the mercenaries take control below, Ocelot betrays his allies and shoots both Colonel Gurlukovich and the Marine commander. Just before Ocelot can commandeer Metal Gear RAY, Snake emerges and confronts him. Upon seeing Snake, Ocelot becomes possessed by Liquid Snake and escapes with RAY, leaving the ship to sink. In the aftermath, Snake is blamed for the disaster, and is believed to have perished. The Big Shell clean-up facility is later constructed, ostensibly to help clean the Hudson River after the major oil spill that occurred due to the tanker sinking.
==== Plant chapter ====
On April 29, 2009, Raiden (who operates briefly under the code name Snake) is tasked under a reformed FOXHOUND. He has orders to infiltrate the Big Shell to rescue hostages, including the US president, from the terrorist group Sons of Liberty (whose leader claims to be Solid Snake), backed up by the rogue anti-terror training unit Dead Cell, who are also threatening to destroy the facility. All members of SEAL Team 10 are killed by Dead Cell members Vamp and Fortune, and the Big Shell is patrolled by the surviving Russian mercenaries from the Tanker chapter, led now by Olga, who is unaware of the extent of Ocelot's betrayal, and believes Snake was responsible for her father's murder. The remaining members of the SEAL assault team, Iroquois Pliskin and Peter Stillman join Raiden to disable explosives planted on the Shell by Stillman's former pupil, Fatman, now a terrorist. Stillman is killed by Fatman's booby trap in Shell 2, though he manages to warn Raiden in time, who successfully disables the respective bomb in Shell 1, preventing the sinking of the facility. Raiden then survives a direct confrontation with Fortune and Vamp, and kills Fatman on the heliport.
As Raiden searches for the President, he begins to doubt Pliskin's identity, but agrees to the plan of transporting hostages off the Big Shell with a helicopter. However, they are attacked by the leader of the Sons of Liberty, who identifies himself as Solid Snake. Pliskin, however, shouts that the man is not Snake, and assists Raiden in fending off the leader when he attacks with a Harrier Jet piloted by Vamp. The battle ends with the Harrier being shot down, though it is seized by the Metal Gear RAY seen in the Tanker chapter, and the two terrorists escape. Pliskin reveals himself to be the real Solid Snake, who, along with Otacon, helps Raiden locate the President. When Raiden finally contacts President Johnson, he is informed that the Big Shell is a facade to hide a new Metal Gear. Known as Arsenal Gear, it houses a powerful AI called "GW", which is capable of controlling the transmission of digital information. The President also claims that the democratic process is a sham, and the true rulers of the United States are a secret organization called the Patriots. The President then reveals the leader of the Sons of Liberty is his predecessor George Sears, a perfect clone of Big Boss known as Solidus Snake, who fell out of the Patriots' favor following Shadow Moses, and has now gone rogue with Dead Cell to escape the Patriots' control. Ocelot kills the President soon after this revelation. Raiden moves on to disabling Arsenal Gear, going to rescue an engineer, Emma Emmerich (Otacon's step-sister). After fighting Vamp, who seemingly drowns after being shot, Raiden rescues Emma, who agrees to help upload a virus into the "GW" mainframe. However, the upload is halted partway when Emma is attacked by Vamp. Raiden then defeats Vamp by shooting him again, although the injuries Emma suffers prove fatal. Otacon escapes with the surviving hostages, while Raiden is captured by Olga when Solid Snake seemingly betrays him.
Raiden awakens in a torture chamber where Solidus Snake reveals that he once adopted Raiden, a former child soldier, as his son during the Liberian civil war, and that Raiden is now a Patriot agent. Solidus then leaves the chamber, and Olga steps in and frees Raiden, telling him that she is also a Patriot double-agent and that she was blackmailed to aid Raiden in order to protect her child. Olga also tells Raiden to find Solid Snake, who only allowed Raiden to be captured so he could gain access to Arsenal Gear. While Raiden makes his way through the bowels of the facility to rendezvous with Snake, his commanding officer, the Colonel, begins to act very erratically. Upon investigation, Otacon reveals that the "Colonel" is actually a construct of the GW supercomputer, and that the partially uploaded virus is beginning to damage its systems. Raiden receives a call from Rose, whose voice begins to deepen and slow down as the conversation is cut off, but not before she reveals she is pregnant with his child. Raiden reunites with Snake and his gear, and the two then encounter Fortune, who fights Snake while Raiden searches for Solidus. He is then forced into a battle with twenty five Metal Gear RAY units in Arsenal Gear. Olga protects him, before Solidus kills her, and captures Snake and Raiden. Ocelot reveals that he too is a Patriot agent, and that the entire Big Shell mission was a carefully coordinated attempt to reenact the events of the Shadow Moses incident, for the purpose of creating a soldier (Raiden) on par with Solid Snake. Ocelot kills Fortune, before being possessed by Liquid again, who announces his plan to hunt down the Patriots using his host's knowledge and the first Metal Gear RAY. Snake escapes to pursue Liquid, as Arsenal Gear goes out of control.
The next morning on April 30, 2009, Arsenal crashes into downtown Manhattan, launching Raiden and Solidus onto the roof of Federal Hall National Memorial. Solidus attempts to kill Raiden, intending to use his nanomachines to lead him to the Patriots, eliminate them, and form a nation of "Sons of Liberty". At this point, Raiden is contacted by AI's of the Colonel and Rosemary, introducing themselves as representatives of the Patriots, who reveal that the true purpose of the simulation was to see how they could simulate and control human behavior in order to prevent society from dumbing down due to trivial information drowning valuable knowledge and inconvenient truths. Raiden is forced to fight Solidus, after the Patriots threaten to kill Olga's child and Rose if he does not cooperate. After Solidus's defeat, Snake reveals he planted a tracking device on Liquid's Metal Gear. Snake and Otacon plan to follow him, rescue Olga's child, and hunt down the Patriots, whose details were hidden in the GW computer virus disc. Raiden is finally reunited with Rose for the anniversary of their first meeting.
In a brief epilogue, Otacon and Snake discuss the decoding of the virus disc, which contains the personal data on all twelve members of the Patriots' high council. However, it is revealed that all of them in the Wisemen's Committee have been dead for about one hundred years.
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