Metal Gear Solid V Will Feature A Different Kind Of Storytelling Than Before

Metal Gear Solid V will feature a different style of storytelling from previous games in the series, creator Hideo Kojima said, speaking to Xbox Wire.

“Naturally, there’s still a good amount of story to be told, but I’m trying to express it in a new way,” Kojima said, when asked about the game’s story and cutscenes.

“It’s different from the linear style of storytelling I’ve used in the past. There will be cut scenes, but they will come together piece-by-piece based on each player’s individual progress through the game.”

The non-linear storytelling will presumably arise from Metal Gear Solid V’s open-world gameplay, which Kojima says is meant to “remove the rails from the stealth experience,” rather than being a traditional open-world experience that players are more used to.

“A more accurate way to describe [the game] would be a “stealth simulator” in an open world environment,” Kojima says. “The open world elements exist to remove the rails from the stealth experience, allowing players to freely plan their own routes and experiment with their own unique infiltration strategies. However, at its heart, the gameplay is all about stealth and we don’t intend to shift the focus away from that.”

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain is in presently development. While development on the game progresses, Konami will release Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes—a prologue to the game—in March 2014 for the Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4.