It has been done before and can be done again.
All you need is tons of willpower. I agree with metalion here that the script/story is the biggest pain to come up with. The coding will be fairly doable. But as with all great stories, open a tread start with a intro and let people brainstorm. You are not stealing anything you are just brainstorming and when you have enough material team up with any random person and write the script. Once you have the script share it again and perfect it and then the fun starts all alone up in your room step by step every day and... there is a whole treath on that part so I leave it to that, search for the word perseverance here in the forums.
But when doing such a thing in secrecy and for free, finding volunteers is well.... next to impossible
To he honest, I have some kind of script/story in mind.
Of course Big Boss and Sanzibar... Stole again something, kidnapped, scientists, malware, human cloning and dna modification, ai-dogs, super human army, (robots all infected with malware an ongoing), world domination and dictatorship....
Snake has to stop Big Boss, find lab, find persons, destroy, kill, etc...
At the end he escapes to space, world is done, etc etc
I do not like to change character, with or without eyepatch, konami must make a stand I think.
There is a lot of reading available from others as well.... also about history of solid snake
The advantage we nowadays have is AI, creating or modifying sprites or updating can be done quite rapidly..
AI is also wonderful in porting games, for example chatGPT, does ok work in translating 6505 assembly into Z80 assembly.
There are numerous ways to use openAI for example, graphics, movement, etc..
I am no designer so, first instance is using what people did in the past using spriters-resources and such sites.
It is a hell of work, script/story, time-line, contacts, dialogs, music, coding, in fact too much for one person I think.
Of course after finishing dumping on doorstep of konami and kojima, they like it or not.. pay up or not...
If you have graphics template it is easy to modify names and logo's....
Some artwork:
if you are going for it anyway just rip the sprites and redraw ones that you can find from other sources. Its not that you can make any profit or fame from such a project anyway. You do it because the game deserves a proper sequel on MSX.
I love the game and in my opinion after 35 years it needs a proper sequel again.
On the net I have seen some Metal Gear 1 makeovers with Metal Gear 2 graphics and layout.
Really stunning piece of work! Looks like totally different game.
There are also NES romhacks where Metal Gear 1 has a Metal Gear Solid Ghost Babel, overlay / graphic substitution.
I have several games in mind I like to create, or make ports from. The advantage of the Metal Gear franchise is that there are so many graphics produced during the 35 years of existence you almost drown in it.
Also in this franchise there are not a lot of colors used, converting graphics to MSX, if done correctly and some adjustments you can get quite good quality.
For me it is a challenge and using / testing techniques to create an homage and show gratitude for Konami's MSX legacy which still keeps people playing this game 35 years later.
If I wanted profit, fame or making a name for myself, I would target a different audience and platform.
Profitability is like comparing msx exhibitions in the 90's and 2023.
If there are more people who like to see a sequel, running old hardware, more people can do more than one.
I assume you can code the engine? If you can automate some of the tasks such as ripping the sprites etc. I wouldn't mind helping. That is after november though.
I think I will be able to code the engine. I have already gathered a lot of graphics which can probably be used. However the real challenge is how to use the graphics with all the limitations of the VDP as well as speed of the VDP and Z80.
Currently I am testing some routines whether it is possible on MSX hardware. I like to keep programming simple and do lots of conversions. Loading sprites from sheet in VRAM and automatically converting in hardware sprites. Using multiple SATs and try having smooth movements of characters.
I would love to have smooth page scrolling horizontal and vertical, like GBA or NES.
Possible? I don't know yet.
Also playing with screen 7 for graphics. Converting Metal Gear graphics from other platforms to MSX screen 8 and up looks quite stunning, but speed of CPU slows dramatically and not enough VRAM to do things.
I like to support 64kb Ram and 64kb VRAM, but impossible. I think minimum will be 64kb ram and 128Kb VRAM, to keep it as close to original hardware as it can be.
Thanks for offering help. Always welcome. We will be in touch, maybe project is not feasible due to limitations or going right direction.
If you go for screen5 you could have a look at the code of tile tile. Which uses smooth multidirectional scrolling and runs at the most efficient way possible. Tiletile is full open source and runs on z80 and v9958.
IHowever the real challenge is how to use the graphics with all the limitations of the VDP as well as speed of the VDP and Z80.
Exactly the same way how MG1 and MG2 were done. It worked then, it will work now.
They were games about story and inmersion, not about perfomance.
are software sprites an option as well ? probably without smooth scrolling then ?
