The Metal Gear games are in no short supply of Snakes. Their overabundance is clear through even the most surface-level synopsis of the series’ premise: It's the story of how Naked Snake and his three clones, each of whom is also named Snake, change the world. However, their stories are not happy ones. Naked Snake gets set on fire by Solid Snake, Liquid Snake dies of a virus, and Solidus Snake is killed by his adopted son. However, there is one Snake introduced in Metal Gear Solid 5 that has it even worse, and the kicker is that he’s not even a true member of the immediate Snake family.
For Hideo Kojima's final Metal Gear game, the esteemed creator opted to toss yet another Snake into the garden — Punished “Venom” Snake. In true Snake fashion, his existence is not an easy one, and his story present in Metal Gear Solid 5 might actually be the most tragic of all the Snakes for one key reason: It isn’t his own.
Metal Gear Solid: Who is Venom Snake?
The man who would eventually be known as Venom Snake was originally an unnamed medic for Militaires Sans Frontieres (MSF), which was the private military company (PMC) founded by Naked Snake AKA Big Boss. In 1975, both the medic and Naked Snake went on a mission to a US black site in Cuba. All went according to plan until the two returned to find MSF under siege by a mysterious militant force named XOF. This conflict ultimately ended with a literal bang; the blast from a hidden bomb rendered both the medic and Naked Snake comatose for the next nine years.
During this time, Zero—a friend-turned-enemy of Naked Snake’s who founded the Metal Gear saga's villainous Patriots—correctly suspected that a former associate of his, Skull Face, was behind the attack on MSF. Despite Zero and Naked Snake’s prior falling out, the former still cared deeply for the latter. Fearing Skull Face would try to finish off his old friend, Zero devised a plan to create a body double for Naked Snake to take the heat off of him. Thus, two Big Bosses were born.
When the medic awoke in 1984, he bore a near-identical facial appearance to Naked Snake. Furthermore, implanted memories of Snake's convinced the medic that he was truly the founder of MSF. From here, the medic took on the title of not just Big Boss, but also Venom Snake.
Venom ultimately played his role well; from the ashes of MSF, he built up a new PMC named Diamond Dogs and finally put an end to Skull Face. At some point after his awakening, he would later learn of his true identity via an audio log recorded by Naked Snake. In this recording, the original Big Boss also declared both he and the former medic would share the title. This division of duties effectively made Venom the public face of Big Boss, allowing Naked Snake to lay low and quietly begin laying the foundation for his military nation of Outer Heaven. Ironically, this nation that Venom played a key role in developing would also go on to be his final resting place.
How Does Venom Snake’s Story End?
Venom Snake’s story ended when the first Metal Gear game was released, but players just didn’t know it yet. Set in 1995, Metal Gear 1 seemingly depicted Solid Snake killing Big Boss. In a shocking turn of events, Metal Gear 2 revealed that Big Boss wasn't quite dead yet, given his presence as the game's antagonist.
For the longest time, it was assumed that Big Boss’ return in Metal Gear 2 was because the character simply cheated death — as is often the case in fiction. But Metal Gear Solid 5’s revelation of two Big Bosses provided a different explanation: Naked Snake didn’t fight Solid Snake twice, but rather, Solid Snake fought two different Big Bosses.
The final boss of Metal Gear 1, long-believed to have been Naked Snake, is actually Venom Snake. True to form, he's indistinguishable from his template, and even Naked Snake's clone, Solid Snake, can't tell the difference between the two. In the game's final act, Venom Snake meets his end at the hands of Solid Snake and is never mentioned again in the Metal Gear series.
His near-total exclusion from the Metal Gear games is almost certainly due to his character being created purely for the series finale, but could also be interpreted as the entire world falling hard for the lie sold by Zero and Naked Snake. Unfortunately, Venom Snake just so happened to lose everything—including his life and identity—in this sale.
Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain is available now for PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One. It is also playable on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S via backward compatibility.
