Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater is a stealth action video game directed by Hideo Kojima. Snake Eater was developed by Konami Computer Entertainment Japan and published by Konami for the PlayStation 2, and was released on November 17, 2004 in North America; December 16, 2004 in Japan; March 4, 2005 in Europe; and on March 17, 2005 in Australia. The game, which serves as a prequel to the entire Metal Gear series, was followed by a direct sequel titled Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops.Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater was well-received publicly and critically, selling 3.6 million copies worldwide. It is also ranked 5th best video game of all time by IGN. and scoring an average of 91% on the review aggregate sites Game Rankings and Metacritic.
Like Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty before it, Snake Eater was first released in North America; the Japanese release was held back for almost a month after that. However, the Japanese version featured a downloadable camouflage pattern unavailable in North America. A limited edition premium package of Snake Eater was released alongside the standard version in Japan.
The premium package came with a special DVD, two special booklets and a painted 1/144-scale model of the Shagohod. A special limited edition CD was given away to those who preordered the Japanese version of Snake Eater, which included several songs from the game's soundtrack, as well as computer screensavers and additional camouflage for the main game. The pre-order package allowed cell phone users to access a special site featuring image and music downloads.
For the European release, Konami added several new features, including the "European Extreme" difficulty setting, a Demo Theater of the game's cut scenes, and a Duel Mode, where players can replay boss battles from the main game, in addition to extra facepaints based on European flags and two new Snake vs. Monkey levels.
