It can now be revealed, secrets of MGS (PlayStation Magazine 1998/11/19)
The following is a translation of a short interview with Hideo Kojima that was published in the Konami Support column of the November 19, 1998 issue of PlayStation Magazine by Tokumashoten Intermedia.
Special thanks to Twitter user HeitaiS for providing the scans, which can be found here.
The Strangeness of Naming
How did you came up with Ocelot’s name?
Well, originally he was going to be named Lynx, which is a wildcat [山猫/yamaneko in Japanese, literally a mountain cat]. However, to a Japanese person that name doesn’t quite convey that image. I thought making him a wildcat would be cool, wouldn’t it? So I really wanted him to be a wildcat.
So there’s a story written by author Yoichi Funato about a certain wildcat and it’s an ocelot, so that’s when I thought “alright, this is the one.” [Kojima is likely referring to the novel Yamaneko no Natsu/山猫の夏, otherwise known as The Summer of the Ocelot.]
That’s right! I decided on Revolver Ocelot since it sounded cool and was the easiest to understand in terms of image. Like an ““old man wildcat” who happens to be sly. It’s the same thing with Raven. There are various birds in the Corvus family, so calling him “Crow” would’ve been too obvious. When a foreigner hears the name Decoy Octopus, it sounds as suspicious as a phony ninja. His name comes from the fact that octopuses are masters of disguises and are good at camouflage. That and “Decoy Chameleon” couldn’t be used. (laughs)
Don’t you think Vulcan Raven seems a bit rough to be an elite university graduate from Alaska?
Well he’s a shaman. He’s a sort of magician, or at least was raised to be that way, and possesses such powers. He went to university since he wanted to support the studies of such powers scientifically.
In contrast to Raven, who is a shaman who harmonizes with the power of nature and prospers mutually with it, Solid Snake is not a man created by nature, which is something that is very interesting to Raven himself. Despite his mythical powers, he cannot read Snake, which frustrates him and fills him with the desire to fight against him. Well, at the end he is pleased to mention that before dying.
Is there any reason why the six members [of FOX HOUND] have animal names?
No particular reason at all. Americans tend to like that sort of thing. But usually they tend to pick poisonous animals, like a cobra.
Does Snake represent a snake that ate the forbidden knowledge, which would be cloning technology?
So it came to this. (laughs) There is such a meaning. Solid Snake’s name does have a significance. A snake is a fluid creature, while “solid” means something that is uncorrupted or a hard object. In other words, a solid snake is a contradiction in adjective. It something that originally didn’t exists like a stiff flexible object or a frozen jelly
So does that Liquid is a pure thing?
You’ll know that when you get to the end, but Liquid is a genuine kind. Apart from that, the fact that Solid and Liquid are siblings is not a mystery. It’s pretty obvious from the beginning. I didn’t make it into a complete mystery, since that would be pretty old-fashioned (laughs). Instead, I want you to play the game while thinking what it means to be recessive or dominant.
