Snake Eater is an amazing game in every sense of the word, I'll start with that. Everything was handled brilliantly by Kojima and his team, from the tiniest details of the gameplay to the game's story as a whole. Stylistically the game differs itself from its predecessors by changing the aesthetic completely. The new survival aspects really put the “Tactical” into “Tactical Espionage Action”.

Snake’s relationship with The Boss, his mentor and almost mother-like figure, is the center of the game’s whole narrative. Snake Eater is a story about loyalty and patriotism and how these virtues can tear one apart. Big Boss is forced to kill The Boss, giving up his honor and soul for the sake of his country. This is the same country guilty of tarnishing The Boss’ legacy, someone who has also given everything and more to protect it. The game’s ending is a cynical one in which Snake sees that the country he’s given everything to protect is run by people who view people (and their sacrifices) as nothing more than pieces on a board. They praise and reward Big Boss for accomplishing his mission while forever condemning The Boss for doing the same, it doesn’t make any sense. This ending makes it easy to see why BB eventually leaves the US military and goes on to form Outer Heaven, a place where soldiers are not treated as weapons and expendable pieces but as people.

I think the game’s theme of what it means to be a soldier parallels Solid Snake’s and Raiden’s journey in the previous game(s) pretty nicely. Snake Eater was about “loyalty to the end” and following your country almost blindly, always putting the mission first. Ultimately, we saw how this “soldier” mindset affected Snake and The Boss. MGS 1 and 2’s main message is about choosing for yourself what you want to believe in and “being loyal to what matters” as Arthur Morgan would say.