Does Metal Gear Solid need a new Kojima? Konami have “many people” in mind, but it’s “difficult”

Remake producer hails younger generation but says there’s no new creative head

Image credit:Konami

Almost a decade after his acrimonious departure from Konami, the shadow of Hideo Kojima still looms over Metal Gear Solid . He’s there, barely camouflaged, in the undergrowth of Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater - a remake of the fifth Metal Gear game, originally released in 2004, which tells the tale of a lone US special operator hunting superweapons and old mentors in the jungles of the southern Soviet Union.

I say “remake” but this feels more like a re-release, in spirit. True, it now runs on Unreal Engine, with the option of a manual, third-person perspective and cover-shooter controls in addition to the old top-down viewpoints. Yes, it boasts new flourishes, such as wounds now leaving scars, and clothes picking up stray leaves. Yes, there’s a new interface with floating in-world menus, which makes shuffling between the layers a bit less awkward. It’s the product of much labour, with development split between Konami and external support partner Virtuos. But where Konami’s other big restoration project, Bloober’s Silent Hill 2 remake , is a creative dialogue with the original game , Delta seems consumed by faithfulness to Kojima’s original design.

I’ve replayed the first hour of Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater more than that of any other game, struggling to extract a perfect run from its dorky camouflage systems, which let you switch up clothes and facepaint instantly while lying right under an enemy’s nose. Playing an hour of Delta felt like just another crack at the prize: rescuing my bag from a tree branch, navigating that swampy area with the crocs, hiding from guards in a hollow log, scurrying across an exposed rope bridge to the factory with the Soviet rocket scientist. Konami might call that familiarity a success, but MGS3 has been rereleased twice before - there was the expanded Subsistence version in 2005, and the HD update in 2011, which is still available. I don’t, so far, feel the need for another tour in Naked Snake’s boots, though I guess I can’t blame Konami for being careful with Delta’s design. Their first attempt at a post-Kojima Metal Gear Solid, 2018’s zombie interlude Metal Gear Survive , was a bit of a stinker .

To steal one of Graham’s ideas when we discussed the game last week, the biggest ‘update’ in Delta is simply the awareness that Hideo Kojima is no longer working on the game. It alters my perception of Snake Eater’s quirks and foibles. These are no longer the gambits of an adventurous and obtuse creator-tyrant, but a design-by-committee recreation of that personal vision, with some “modern” bits delicately grafted on. The obvious rebuttal there is that the extent of Kojima’s control and oversight have always been a little illusory, because even at the time of Snake Eater’s creation, Metal Gear Solid games were vast productions. There’s some truth to the idea of Kojima the obsessive having his fingerprints on everything, but this is also a carefully cultivated aspect of Kojima’s brand. It’s what MGS nuts play MGS for, that impression of closeness to the master in every detail.

Can that intimacy outlive “the” creator, or has Kojima become (brace for deep-ish cut) something like the Colonel Campbell who oversees Raiden in Metal Gear Solid 2? And if that’s the case, who could finally oust the figure of Kojima and steer Konami through the creation of brand new, original Metal Gear Solid games? I asked producer Noriaki Okamura about this at the Delta hands-on event. The answer: there isn’t anyone currently, but we have a few people on our radar.

“So in terms of someone to sort of replace that creative director role, there isn’t really a single person that has taken over,” Okamura told me through a translator. “But rather, we’ve created this new Metal Gear Solid team - we’ve got a great team full of young new creative minds, a very talented team that are currently working on this game together.

“And within this team there are many people that we think in the future as well could definitely be people like that, who could create these new ideas, have these creative visions, and this is definitely a team that we would like to develop and grow into roles like that. But there isn’t a specific person that has taken over, necessarily, it’s much more of a team effort.”

Okamura himself seems like he might have the knowhow to cover it, having worked with Kojima on a bunch of Metal Gear Solid games and Zone Of The Enders, but as he went on to explain, the particular blend of designer chops and salesmanship embodied by Kojima is hard to replicate. “With his game design, he’s very particular about very detailed aspects of what he creates. He’s also very good at just creating a product and selling that product and knowing how to promote that product from start to finish. And to find someone like that, who is good at all of those things in the same capacity, is quite difficult. So it’s not like we can just go and find someone else that can do all of the same things, and it’s not something that I think I could do by myself.

“Obviously we have a lot of respect towards his creative vision,” Okamura added. “And in terms of our new team, we’d like to create these games in our own way with our own talented team that we have, with our own creative ideas for the current generation of fans, and the next generation of fans as well.”

Okamura’s answer also gave me the answer to my follow-up question: did Delta’s creators consider taking more liberties with MGS3’s fundamentals, perhaps meddling with the story? I brought this up partly in light of Square Enix’s qualified success with Final Fantasy 7 ’s remakes, which are effectively brand new works with drastically dissimilar combat, writing and framing that respond half-antagonistically to the original. But I also asked because Metal Gear Solid games in particular love to poke fun at their predecessors and the techno-thriller psycho-drama that is Metal Gear as a whole.

The original version of Snake Eater opens with a gag aimed at people who hated Raiden in MGS2, for example. Snake whips off his oxygen mask and lo and behold, it looks like there’s a new Raiden beneath, but then it turns out this is also a mask. This bit of japery is long gone in Delta - I can’t remember if it was removed by this or a previous Snake Eater re-release - which makes sense, given that we’re talking about a 20-year-old fan controversy. Even so, that’s the kind of meta humour and genial trolling I look for in a Metal Gear Solid. So far, Delta seems determined to play its own “remake” status straight.

Okamura doesn’t see things that way, of course. MGS3 is his “personal favourite” of the series, and he wants “both old fans and new fans to experience that same excitement and thrill that I experienced when first playing Metal Gear Solid 3”. For Konami, Okamura went on, “Delta is Metal Gear Solid 3, it’s not something new, it’s not a completely new title. It’s the game as it was for us.

“Obviously it is a 20 year old game now, so the graphics for example needed to be updated, and the controls needed to be updated, to adapt to the current generation of consoles, the current generation of gamers,” he said. “We want them to be able to enjoy the experience the same way as it was, but without thinking ‘I don’t know how to use these controls, I don’t understand what this is’. We want them to be able to experience the game without any struggle whatsoever.”

This caution adds up in the wake of Survive. But still - speaking as an outsider who is blissfully unencumbered by any practicalities, I’d love Konami to half-jokingly reposition Kojima as Metal Gear Solid’s unspoken spiritual nemesis, a forbidding legacy kept alive by comparison with Kojima’s projects after Konami. It would certainly be a plausible extension of the reportedly heated circumstances of Kojima’s exit, which saw him barred by Konami’s lawyers from collecting an award for Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain . Again, though, you need to find the right people to helm the series, or invent them. Turning Kojima into some kind of nebulous archvillain would require the construction and elevation of a new protagonist, a new Boss or Patriots-style inner council of prescient weirdos, with enough egotism and charisma to impose a story on a series that still lives in Kojima’s shade.

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Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater

PS5 , Xbox Series X/S , PC

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All 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints and where to get them

These areas have the highest chance of giving you Blueprints

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Looking for more Arc Raiders Blueprints? It’s a special day when you find a Blueprint, as they’re among the most valuable items in Arc Raiders. If you find a Blueprint that you haven’t already found, then you must make sure you hold onto it at all costs, because Blueprints are the key to one of the most important and powerful systems of meta-progression in the game.

This guide aims to be the very best guide on Blueprints you can find, starting with a primer on what exactly they are and how they work in Arc Raiders, before delving into exactly where to get Blueprints and the very best farming spots for you to take in your search.

We’ll also go over how to get Blueprints from other unlikely activities, such as destroying Surveyors and completing specific quests. And you’ll also find the full list of all 75 Blueprints in Arc Raiders on this page (including the newest Blueprints added with the Cold Snap update , such as the Deadline Blueprint and Firework Box Blueprint), giving you all the information you need to expand your own crafting repertoire.

In this guide:

• What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?
• Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes
• Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders Blueprints obtained from quests Blueprints obtained from Trials Best Blueprint farming locations

What are Blueprints in Arc Raiders?

Blueprints in Arc Raiders are special items which, if you manage to extract with them, you can expend to permanently unlock a new crafting recipe in your Workshop. If you manage to extract from a raid with an Anvil Blueprint, for example, you can unlock the ability to craft your very own Anvil Pistol, as many times as you like (as long as you have the crafting materials).

To use a Blueprint, simply open your Inventory while in the lobby, then right-click on the Blueprint and click “Learn And Consume” . This will permanently unlock the recipe for that item in your Workshop. As of the Stella Montis update, there are allegedly 75 different Blueprints to unlock - although only 68 are confirmed to be in the game so far. You can see all the Blueprints you’ve found and unlocked by going to the Workshop menu, and hitting “R” to bring up the Blueprint screen.

It’s possible to find duplicates of past Blueprints you’ve already unlocked. If you find these, then you can either sell them, or - if you like to play with friends - you can take it into a match and gift it to your friend so they can unlock that recipe for themselves. Another option is to keep hold of them until the time comes to donate them to the Expedition.

Full Blueprint list: All crafting recipes

Below is the full list of all the Blueprints that are currently available to find in Arc Raiders, and the crafting recipe required for each item:

Note: The missing Blueprints in this list likely have not actually been added to the game at the time of writing, because none of the playerbase has managed to find any of them. As they are added to the game, I will update this page with the most relevant information so you know exactly how to get all 75 Arc Raiders Blueprints.

Where to find Blueprints in Arc Raiders

Below is a list of all containers, modifiers, and events which maximise your chances of finding Blueprints:

• Certain quests reward you with specific Blueprints .
• Completing Trials has a high chance of offering Blueprints as rewards.
• Surveyors have a decent chance of dropping Blueprints on death.
• High loot value areas tend to have a greater chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Night Raids and Storms may increase rare Blueprint spawn chances in containers.
• Containers with higher numbers of items may have a higher tendency to spawn Blueprints. As a result, Blue Gate (which has many “large” containers containing multiple items) may give you a higher chance of spawning Blueprints.
• Raider containers (Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, Medical Bags, Grenade Tubes) have increased Blueprint drop rates. As a result, the Uncovered Caches event gives you a high chance of finding Blueprints.
• Security Lockers have a higher than average chance of containing Blueprints.
• Certain Blueprints only seem to spawn under specific circumstances: Tempest Blueprint only spawns during Night Raid events. Vulcano Blueprint only spawns during Hidden Bunker events. Jupiter and Equaliser Blueprints only spawn during Harvester events.

Raider Caches, Weapon Boxes, and other raider-oriented container types have a good chance of offering Blueprints. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints have a very low chance of spawning in any container in Arc Raiders, around 1-2% on average. However, there is a higher chance of finding Blueprints in particular container types. Specifically, you can find more Blueprints in Raider containers and security lockers.

Beyond this, if you’re looking for Blueprints you should focus on regions of the map which are marked as having particularly high-value loot. Areas such as the Control Tower in Dam Battlegrounds, the Arrival and Departure Buildings in Spaceport, and Pilgrim’s Peak in Blue Gate all have a better-than-average chance of spawning Blueprints somewhere amongst all their containers. Night Raids and Electromagnetic Storm events also increase the drop chances of certain Blueprints .

In addition to these containers, you can often loot Blueprints from destroyed Surveyors - the largest of the rolling ball ARC. Surveyors are more commonly found on the later maps - Spaceport and Blue Gate - and if one spawns in your match, you’ll likely see it by the blue laser beam that it casts into the sky while “surveying”.

Surveyors are quite well-armoured and will very speedily run away from you once it notices you, but if you can take one down then make sure you loot all its parts for a chance of obtaining certain unusual Blueprints.

Blueprints obtained from quests

One way in which you can get Blueprints is by completing certain quests for the vendors in Speranza. Some quests will reward you with a specific item Blueprint upon completion, so as long as you work through all the quests in Arc Raiders, you are guaranteed those Blueprints.

Here is the full list of all Blueprints you can get from quest rewards:

• Trigger Nade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Sparks Fly”.
• Lure Grenade Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Greasing Her Palms”.
• Burletta Blueprint: Rewarded after completing “Industrial Espionage”.
• Hullcracker Blueprint (and Launcher Ammo Blueprint): Rewarded after completing “The Major’s Footlocker”.

Alas, that’s only 4 Blueprints out of a total of 75 to unlock, so for the vast majority you will need to find them yourself during a raid. If you’re intent on farming Blueprints, then it’s best to equip yourself with cheap gear in case you lose it, but don’t use a free loadout because then you won’t get a safe pocket to stash any new Blueprint you find. No pain in Arc Raiders is sharper than failing to extract with a new Blueprint you’ve been after for a dozen hours already.

One of the best ways to get Blueprints is by hitting three stars on all five Trials every week. |Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blueprints obtained from Trials

One of the very best ways to get Blueprints is as rewards for completing Trials in Arc Raiders. Trials are unlocked from Level 15 onwards, and allow you to earn rewards by focusing on certain tasks over the course of several raids. For example, one Trial might task you with dealing damage to Hornets, while another might challenge you to loot Supply Drops.

Trials refresh on a weekly basis, with a new week bringing five new Trials. Each Trial can offer up to three rewards after passing certain score milestones, and it’s possible to receive very high level loot from these reward crates - including Blueprints. So if you want to unlock as many Blueprints as possible, you should make a point of completing as many Trials as possible each week.

Best Blueprint farming locations

The very best way to get Blueprints is to frequent specific areas of the maps which combine high-tier loot pools with the right types of containers to search. Here are my recommendations for where to find Blueprints on every map, so you can always keep the search going for new crafting recipes to unlock.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Dam Battlegrounds

The best places to farm Blueprints on Dam Battlegrounds are the Control Tower, Power Generation Complex, Ruby Residence, and Pale Apartments . The first two regions, despite only being marked on the map as mid-tier loot, contain a phenomenal number of containers to loot. The Control Tower can also contain a couple of high-tier Security Lockers - though of course, you’ll need to have unlocked the Security Breach skill at the end of the Survival tree.

There’s also a lot of reporting amongst the playerbase that the Residential areas in the top-left of the map - Pale Apartments and Ruby Residence - give you a comparatively strong chance of finding Blueprints. Considering their size, there’s a high density of containers to loot in both locations, and they also have the benefit of being fairly out of the way. So you’re more likely to have all the containers to yourself.

Buried City

The best Blueprint farming locations on Buried City are the Santa Maria Houses, Grandioso Apartments, Town Hall, and the various buildings of the New District . Grandioso Apartments has a lower number of containers than the rest, but a high chance of spawning weapon cases - which have good Blueprint drop rates. The others are high-tier loot areas, with plenty of lootable containers - including Security Lockers.

Spaceport

The best places to find Blueprints on Spaceport are the Arrival and Departure Buildings, as well as Control Tower A6 and the Launch Towers . All these areas are labelled as high-value loot regions, and many of them are also very handily connected to one another by the Spaceport wall, which you can use to quickly run from one area to the next. At the tops of most of these buildings you’ll find at least one Security Locker, so this is an excellent farming route for players looking to find Blueprints.

The downside to looting Blueprints on Spaceport is that all these areas are hotly contested, particularly in Duos and Squads. You’ll need to be very focused and fast in order to complete the full farming route.

Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun/Embark Studios

Blue Gate

Blue Gate tends to have a good chance of dropping Blueprints, potentially because it generally has a high number of containers which can hold lots of items; so there’s a higher chance of a Blueprint spawning in each container. In my experience, the best Blueprint farming spots on Blue Gate are Pilgrim’s Peak, Raider’s Refuge, the Ancient Fort, and the Underground Complex beneath the Warehouse .

All of these areas contain a wealth of containers to loot. Raider’s Refuge has less to loot, but the majority of the containers in and around the Refuge are raider containers, which have a high chance of containing Blueprints - particularly during major events.

Stella Montis

On the whole, Stella Montis seems to have a very low drop rate for Blueprints (though a high chance of dropping other high-tier loot). If you do want to try farming Blueprints on this map, the best places to find Blueprints in Stella Montis are Medical Research, Assembly Workshop, and the Business Center . These areas have the highest density of containers to loot on the map.

In addition to this, the Western Tunnel has a few different Security Lockers to loot, so while there’s very little to loot elsewhere in this area of the map, it’s worth hitting those Security Lockers if you spawn there at the start of a match.

That wraps up this primer on how to get all the Blueprints in Arc Raiders as quickly as possible. With the Expedition system constantly resetting a large number of players’ Blueprints, it’s more important than ever to have the most up-to-date information on where to find all these Blueprints.

While you’re here, be sure to check out our Arc Raiders best guns tier list , as well as our primers on the best skills to unlock and all the different Field Depot locations on every map.

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ARC Raiders

PS5 , Xbox Series X/S , PC

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