Quote Originally Posted by Forsaken Lover View Post
The other annoying thing about the plot was how the game kind of ended with no real resolution. It has the most unsatisfying end for a game. What the hell are the Patriots and how did they come to be? Who is Rosemary and is her pregnancy even real? What happened to Liquid Ocelot? How does the government explain a top secret fortress crash landing in New York City? What is going to happen to Olga's child? None of this is answered, Snake just tells Raiden to live for the future and gives some sappy metaphor about his deeds being his legacy since he can't have kids, and then the game jumps into a lounge jazz song and the credits, followed by one final mind screw.
I think this is one of the many rifts that separates MGS2 lovers and its detractors.

I would say being left with all those questions was precisely the point.

Raiden: Then what am I supposed to believe in?
[...]
Snake: Listen, don't obsess over words so much. Find the meaning behind the words, then decide. You can find your own name. And your own future...

Raiden: Decide for myself...?

How much of the ending was even real was a much debated topic on MGS forums. I think that was exactly what Kojima wanted. He wanted us to walk away with a ton of questions so we could come to our own conclusions about stuff. (Though, personally, I was always pretty sure Rose did in fact exist and was pregnant.)

Then people balked at this and so he made MGS4. Now nanomachiens are the answer to everything....
God I hate that game.

This is part of why I love MGS2 actually. One reason I enjoy fiction is so I can share my experiences with people on boards like these. I love to play a game or read a booka dn then chat with others who have done the same. We share our different opinions and interpretations. MGS2 provided the most conversation of any of the Metal Gear games.

MGS4...well, the only conversation it sparked was "explain this contrived BS to me." There really is no room for debate or discussion.

Anyway, I can understand being dissatisfied with that kind of ending. It' s a very subjective thing.

Still, I think you're short-changing the credits music. I really like it.
Can't Say Goodbye to Yesterday (Full Version) - YouTube
I didn't short change the end song I simply stated it was a lounge jazz song, but on to more important things.

For me MGS2 just lacked catharsis, killing Solidus wasn't very satisfactory (despite being a pretty good boss fight) partially cause I was rooting for his cause and I kind of felt the whole scenario of their duel was a bit forced by the writing gods. Kojima pulled this same stunt in MGS4 where several of the character deaths and sub-plots were completely unnecessary. The other issue is that while MGS2 left some questions hanging, I could never shake the feeling that the game just ended for the sake of it, and all the resolution and answers were suppose to be there, just cut out and left. Here you are with Snake giving you a pep talk about not worrying about the total mind screw you got, tells you to go rekindle with Rosemary, Raiden's "not girlfriend", and then Snake and Otacon were off to race to some awesome climatic "Big Damn Heroes" moment while the player is kind of told he's not cool enough to come along. It's not that the ending just left you hanging with some questions, it was also that it implied all those questions will be answered off screen. At best it was a Back to the Futue Part 2 ending where the answers would be answered in some future installment, at worst it felt like Neon Genesis Evangelion's TV ending where the answers to a lot of questions were answered off screen and the ending decided to just focus on one part of the story.

I also never felt the idea "was any of this real?" was actually a question left hanging, I felt the game explained everything pretty well, it's just it's rapid fire plot-twist revelation action was not very graceful way to tell the player and I felt that's where the confusion comes from. Despite that, I can agree that MGS2 definetly left players with the most discussion points.