Former Metal Gear Solid voice actor David Hayter, who played the English voice for Solid Snake, has spoken in great detail about his dealings with Hideo Kojima en route to his being replaced by Kiefer Sutherland for Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes/The Phantom Pain.
Hayter told Game Informer that Konami informed him that the team was going in a different direction for The Phantom Pain. On speaking with English casting director Kris Zimmerman, “‘We’re going forward, but it looks like they are going to try and replace you.’ They tried to do that before, and it never worked. They tried to get voice matches, and it never happened.”
Trouble was brewing for some time between Hayter and Kojima with the latter looking to replace the former. Hayter said, “I had to re-audition for Metal Gear 3 to play Naked Snake. They made me re-audition to play Old Snake, and the whole time, they were trying to find somebody else to do it. I heard that Kojima asked one of the producers on Metal Gear 3 to ask Kurt Russell if he would take over for that game. He didn’t want to do it.”
Hayter doesn’t blame Sutherland for replacing him though he wished things had ended better. “I don’t have any ill will toward Kiefer Sutherland or anything like that. The whole thing could have been handled better and a little more respectfully, but I’m not going to cry about it. I’ve got no particular love for Kojima. I don’t feel any need to go back and work with him again.”
That doesn’t mean he couldn’t be pulled back in to work on Metal Gear Solid titles produced by Konami in the future. Stay tuned for more information and let us know what you think in the comments.