Metal Gear Solid 3 — Snake Eater Remastered
A childhood game, remastered. 20 years later, I'm playing it again.
20 Years Later
Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater was released on PlayStation 2 in the UK on 4 March 2005.
I bought it on launch day from GAME. £40. I was a 15 year old kid, excited to have the game in my hands. That feeling of knowing you were about to sink into something for days.
Now it’s January 2026. I’m 35. The game has been remastered for PS5, and on a Saturday afternoon it was time to play it again. Not just any urge — that same childhood feeling. The one where you want to get home and disappear into a game. I hadn’t felt that in years.
So I went to CEX and bought it. Physical copy. £10.
On the way home I did what I always used to do — read the back of the case, then opened it up. As a kid, games came with manuals. Thick booklets explaining the controls, the story, the characters. This one didn’t. Modern games don’t.
Holding the disc still felt different. That old sense of ownership. Twenty years later, I was back where I started.
The Driveless PS5
Got home. Took the disc out. Looked at the PS5.
No drive.
I stood there for a moment trying to slide the disc in — front, back, sides — nothing. Then it clicked. The PS5 I borrowed from my boy is the digital edition. No disc drive. Just a white slab that can’t read physical media.
I was genuinely in shock. What kind of man buys a PlayStation without a drive?
I messaged this man about it. He said the digital edition were £100 cheaper. Fair enough. But to me, it’s just not worth it.
I like owning physical property. Digital games take up 100GB of space. You wait for downloads. Constant updates. And Sony can revoke access whenever they want — so do you even own the game? No, you don’t. You’re renting it indefinitely until they decide otherwise.
Plus, I was planning to return the game to CEX after finishing. Get most of my money back. Can’t do that with a download.
However, I had no choice. I started the download, freed up space on the console, and while it was installing I went back to CEX and returned the disc I’d just bought an hour earlier.
Sourdough and Snake Eater
On the way back I thought — let me treat myself.
I’d been writing about sourdough recently, and it had been a while since I’d had a proper sourdough pizza. Franco Manca was on the way. The decision made itself.
Sourdough pizza. Metal Gear Solid waiting at home. Saturday evening sorted.
Luckily I’ve got fast broadband. 100GB downloaded in about half an hour. I loaded up the game, and then came the questions.
Difficulty
The game asks you a few setup questions before you start. Uniform, play style, tips. But the one that mattered was difficulty.
Normal. Hard. Extreme.
I considered Hard. Then I looked at Extreme — life gauge reduced to two-thirds normal size. Fewer resources. Enemies more alert.
Fuck it. I want a challenge.
It’s a stealth game. If I’m getting hit that much, I’m playing it wrong.
Final Settings
Into the Jungle
Saturday 10 January 2026. 19:16.
The game begins. I’m back in the jungle, two decades later, with the same excitement I had at 15 — just with more patience and a better TV.
To be completed after finishing the game.