Of course, the first question is how the metal gear the series was born. Kojima explains that his parents lived through the war and he always had problems with war games. Players are placed in a war-torn world where no one knows why they are shooting each other. This doesn’t happen in the real world – or at least it didn’t happen back then. Also, not all forms of warfare are about outgunning your opponent, so Kojima set out to create a game that gave context to the conflict in question and allowed players to win that conflict in a different way.
Konami
Also, the MSX, the Japanese computer as the original metal gear was made for wasn’t powerful enough to depict intense firefights. Kojima goes on to explain that his previous attempt to make a game had been a disaster, so it was pretty hard to convince people to join the failed guy who wanted to make less action-y action games. Even a decade later, during manufacture Solid metal gear for the PS1, people still didn’t care about the idea of stealth in games. Kojima says what really got the ball rolling in the game was the direction and depth he gave to all the characters.
Kojima then evokes the origins of Solid Snake, the main character of the Solid metal gear series. Kojima chose that name because snakes are quiet, and also because, well, he’s obviously a fan of Snake Plissken from Escape from New York.
Konami, new line
But as with everything Kojima, it couldn’t be that simple. Snakes are also restless and certainly not very tough creatures – something his main character absolutely had to be, so Kojima took inspiration from a song called Solid State Survivor to come up with the contradictory contrasting name.