Uncovered via datamining way back in September, Konami has confirmed Metal Gear Solid V’s Nuclear Disarmament event. All players need to do to activate it is dismantle every nuclear weapon in their platform’s region, a task so easy Superman could do it.
Nuke are the ultimate deterrent in The Phantom Pain’s FOB (Forward Operating Base) mode, keeping all but the most heroic of players from being able to invade your stronghold and steal your things. Conversely, building a nuke makes you a massive target to the super-heroic players. The idea is a player builds up their base, crafts a nuke (which takes more than a day to build) and then rakes in points as players fail trying to grab it. Eventually someone is going to steal it, but in the meantime, points.
But now we know for certain what we were pretty sure about already—there’s a special event that occurs when all players in a given console region band together to remove nukes from the game. That means no nukes in existence, no nukes in production.
Since the Nuclear Disarmament ending leaked back in September, players have attempted to organize in order to secure the ending naturally. Other players have risen against them, attempting to keep MGS V nuke-friendly. It’s turned into a meta-game that’s doubtlessly far more entertaining than whatever Konami has up its sleeve.
Along with confirming the event, which will trigger once all conditions are met, Konami also released statistics showing the number of nukes per platform region at the beginning and end of November.
Nuclear weapons owned per platform
By November 1st
- PlayStation 4： 2761
- PlayStation 3： 1685
- Xbox One： 525
- Xbox 360 ： 1011
- PC(Steam)： 36552
By November 25th
- PlayStation4： 352
- PlayStation 3： 250
- Xbox One： 96
- Xbox 360： 85
- PC(Steam)： 15691
The Xbox One and Xbox 360 are the closest to achieving the goal of total nuclear disarmament. This means Microsoft console owners are more concerned with peace. Or less of them are playing FOB mode. The significantly higher PC numbers indicates that the PC community is full of dirty cheaters that cheat.
I don’t see players coming together to make the event happen. I mean it could happen, but there’s always that one person who wants to see the world burn. Our best bet is the cheating PC players banding together to cheat in reverse. Or maybe we just wait until not enough players are bothering with FOB and the nukes just run out.
Whatever happens, I love the idea of it. There’s no reason a video game (or video game website for that matter) can’t educate gamers about the futility and horror of the nuclear option.
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