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Just in time for Metal Gear Solid 2's 20th anniversary, a new indie game has arrived on the scene to revive the classic top-down formula of the classic Metal Gear Solid titles. Undetected comes from solo developer Antonio Freyre, the man behind this year's The Chameleon. The Metal Gear Solid influence is noticeable immediately in the trailer: the classic top-down camera view, the familiar tapping sound of your feet as you scurry around, the music is reminiscent of the "Encounter" theme, the lead's voice is strained and gruff like David Hayter's Snake, even the enemies kind of look like MGS1's Genome Soldiers, in their white uniforms. At the end of the trailer, we get to hear a call that starts with a ring very similar to the iconic Codec sound from MGS, as we get to see one of the tools at our disposals - a decoy that projects a holographic dancer, which inspires guards to cheer and dance along, showing an offbeat humour similar to Kojima's signature style.

The biggest departure from MGS is that you will only be allowed to play non-lethally. An exclusive interview with Freyre from NME breaks down how the game will work, most notably that enemies cannot be killed or even put to sleep. Instead, you can only slow down, knock down (but not knock out) or distract guards. Without the option to go guns blazing if you get caught, there will be a larger emphasis on strategy elements during sneaking segments. Disabling lights, employing distraction tools, and monitoring sound (with an on-screen marker) will all play an important role in the stealthing here. There will also be no equivalent to Metal Gear Solid's Soliton Radar, instead giving you on-screen indicators of where enemies are, to help keep you immersed in the environment.

"It’s more of a problem-solving genre than an action genre," says Freyre. To that end, he has laid out his core three tenets of stealth game design in Undetected: information transparency (giving players all the info they need upfront to sneak past an area), intentions over execution (rewarding a player's tactics over their ability to execute their plan gracefully), and a low-punishment environment, so you can get back to planning quickly if you need to rework your strategy.

Undetected is expected to release in 2022.

Undetected Steam page

 

[Chary]

I dislike when indies try to ride on the coattails of bigger franchises so hard, but honestly this looks so so fun.

 

[Joe88]

We also have UnMetal which is a Metal Gear inspired parody

 

[Marc_LFD]

This looks like plagiarism, no more no less. At least should've tried to make it look different.

 

[XDel]

Lost me at the dancing. Soy

 

[HellGhast]

I dislike when indies try to ride on the coattails of bigger franchises so hard, but honestly this looks so so fun.

Yes this looks interesting. The 'non-lethal only' gameplay sets it apart from mgs and brings in an interesting strategy twist that will give this game its own unique feel and identity.

 

[Purple_Shyguy]

"Huh? Footsteps?"

 

[Julie_Pilgrim]

@AncientBoi

 

[pedro702]

why top down? looks preety dman ugly with those graphics imo, it should be 3d person by now, the limitations of the hadware are no more imo, it looks like a crappy unity game made in a rush, probably it will be a mess the same way all those resident evil games that were inspired the OUTBREAK series of games.

unmetal seems far superior imo, this one is damn ugly and you cant see shit lol.

 

[stanleyopar2000]

We also have UnMetal which is a Metal Gear inspired parody

Really hope they have THE TRUCK HAVE STARTED TO MOVE and I FEEL ASLEEP

 

[BLsquared]

Metal Gear Solid and Splinter Cell having a child? Yes. Definitely looking forward to this.

 

[pedro702]

Metal Gear Solid and Splinter Cell having a child? Yes. Definitely looking forward to this.

doesnt look anything like spinter cell, the splinter cell is all about hidding in shadows and such this looks like the same metal gear stealth system where you hid under objects and such i dont see any splinter cell inspiration here tbh.

 

[HK-51]

>top down
>"indie"

hard pass. I dont support drama and uninspired FILLER bullshit that only copies and imitates.

 

[Xzi]

This looks like plagiarism, no more no less. At least should've tried to make it look different.

Heavily inspired/influenced by, sure, but definitely not "plagiarism" or anything that would violate copyright law. As far as I can tell those are all original level designs (though maybe not the best level designs), original SFX, original music, etc. I don't recall MGS games having that fast forward feature either, assuming that wasn't something they added just for the trailer.

 

[darky2003]

just read my avatar

 

[Missing Number]

i'd play the shit out of this. and then when the inevitable 4k mods drop, once more

 

[shattacrew]

Unmetal is a gem. Worth the time and money, i highly recommend to any mgs fan. Not sure about Undetected and not even being able to knock out or put asleep the enemies. Looking forward to it though.

 

[AncientBoi]

LoL, and I'm working on my Splinter Cell Chaos Theory game right now. Odd how this came up. I still have stopped trying to do Metal Gear Solid PeaceWalker at the moment. @Julie_Pilgrim .

 

[pedro702]

LoL, and I'm working on my Splinter Cell Chaos Theory game right now. Odd how this came up. I still have stopped trying to do Metal Gear Solid PeaceWalker at the moment. @Julie_Pilgrim .

played all splinter cell games, they are a blast to play, every few years i play them all again from 1 to 4 xD, not much a fan of conviction, and blacklist is still good but doesnt have that magic idkn.

yeah i played mgs,mgs2,mgs3 and mgs4

couldnt get trough mgs peacewalker or mgs5 they are just trying to become crappy base managers with personal and stuff, i gave up, i just wanted to do a stealth game without any of those things.

 

[Skire]

Interesting. I hope they go beyond mimicking what MGS1 did.