Metal Gear Rising All Vocal Boss Themes Reaction 

Thanks to Mistplay for sponsoring this video! Download the app for free and get 200 bonus points for signing up here: mistplay.com/definitelynotdefinitive and use our code DND100 inside the app for 100 extra points! (Navigate to ‘Profile’ **dotted icon (top right)** ‘Mistcode’) Code expires 10/31/24. Limited quantities available & valid for new users only.

21:20 Armstrong's theme blew up the internet with memes. This song was going everywhere almost 3 years ago. Especially with his iconic line: "NANOMACHINES, SON!"

The "only love is with us now" is about Sundowner's love of violence and bloodshed, his idea of paradise is a bloody battlefield

Here are some of the common interpretations of the songs in context with their paired bosses: 1) Metal Gear RAY- Former bosses of previous games, but as Raiden's first tutorial bossfight, the former "predator" is now the prey to a new kind of warfare - smaller, human-ish cyborgs now triumphs over giant robots that used to fuel the previous games. 2) Bladewolf: A robo-dog that has a sentient AI installed, but ironically shackled to follow orders or suffer punishment by its current master. The song evokes its will to be free and "be its own master now". 3) Mistral: Ex-French Foreign Legion who grew up in the Algerian Civil War and knows nothing but war throughout her violent life. A stranger during peacetime, until she found a purpose in serving a new master by going back into war (of sorts). 4) Khamsin: A Iraq War veteran who doesn't see the irony of forcing "freedom" onto people, nor does he want to take responsibility for it as a soldier blindly following orders. 5) Monsoon: Someone who grew up in the killing fields of Cambodia under Pol Pot and is nihilistic to a fatal degree. It's the "MEMES, THE DNA OF THE SOUL" guy. 6) Sundowner: A sadistic and entirely unapologetic war criminal who embraces war and thrives off the economy it creates. Yearns for the GOOD OLD DAYS AFTER 9/11! (actual dialogue, not joking) 7) Jetstream Sam: Brazilian samurai who used to fight for his justice until he eventually lost his way and forgotten why he even started fighting in the first place. 8) Metal Gear EXCELSUS: A giant spider robot with blades and lasers. First part of the Armstrong fight is pretty on the nose with using politics, war and money to control the masses using memes and mass media. 9) Senator Armstrong: The second part is the realization that both the main character and the final boss are pretty much on the same wavelength, but like the human condition, it is inevitable that they must fight to see which one triumphs - for better or worse.

I find it really telling how Armstrong’s point is that might makes right, so by Raiden and by extension, the audience, wanting to kill him and prove their ideals correct through violence it’s pretty much proving Armstrong’s entirely right about humanity

I love the fact that the lyrics kind of give you a feeling of what the character is all about, even if you have no idea what the game is about or who these characters are within the game’s plot.

I wish you had a little more context on some of these bosses as you would be able to appreciate the lyrics more because they all talk about the bosses in some way that gives them more depth

"Red sun over paradise" in Sundowners theme refers to the nuclear bombs dropped on Japan because this man just LOVES war

Gonna say it now: You two will LOVE the boss themes. MGRR is the definition of “why do I hear boss music, and it’s not *my* boss music?”

I love that Red Sun gives the imagery of violence in nature and how the narrator adores it as his paradise, giving clues that Sundowner is only here for war

sundowner is a terrifying person. you reacted sharply to the shift to talking about "love and peace". to sundowner, that wasn't a shift at all. he genuinely loves the carnage and has found peace with himself. he's also collected like a billion kid's brains, but that's another story.

8:32 Close, mercenary. And she has references to "The Stranger", in which main character are settler

And this is the moment where we all take a moment to appreciate the work of the composer, Jamie Christopherson. I think he did a great job with this game's soundtrack. Out of all of these themes, my favourite is "The Only thing I know for real" sung by Tyson Yen. The thing I love about this game's soundtrack is, some of the chorus' vocals kick in near the end of the fight during a cinematic moment, makes the player feel powerful.

For context the meaning of some of the songs. "The Hot Wind Blowing". Khamsin blindly follows the orders of his bosses and self righteously believes he is bringing freedom people, unable to see that he's doing the opposite. For "The Only Thing I Know For Real". Sam was once a heroic person who fought for justice, until he did it so long that all those reasons slipped away and all he had left is the fight for it's own sake. "Red Sun Over Paradise" Sundowner is just plain an evil monster who sees nothing wrong with everything that is brutal and terrible about humanity and he desires to revel in that stuff, while looking down on the more positive qualities of humanity. "Collective Consciousness" and "It Has To Be This Way". Armstrong's initial personality presented personality and goals is really all an act and his real goals and beliefs are somewhat noble but also insane. He talks about using things like the "War on Terror" to justify authoritarianism and war for profit, but in reality he doesn't want an authoritarian state and he hates the idea of war for profit. What he really wants is to turn America into what he sees as true freedom, which essentially boils down to chaos and anarchy where the strong survives, his whole authoritarian act is just something he puts on to get into a position of power, to bring about what he really wants. "Collective Consciousness" represents the act he puts on while "It Has To Be This Way" represents his real feelings and how he and Raiden have more in common than they would care to admit.

The Cool thing about the lyrics of ‘It Has to be This Way’ is you can interpret the it as either Riden (the main character of Metal Gear Rising) or Armstrong talking.

Making the mother of all omelettes here Jack. Can't fret over every egg😠👉 Senator Armstrong-2013

Sundowner also has a funny sense of humor. He found it extremely hilarious that blade wolf, an AI, cared about people more than people did.

So the line "Violence breeds Violence, but in the end it has to be this way" is Armstrong/The game saying although Fighting breeds more fighting, right now you two need to fight or it's going to get alot worse for innocents and the line "The world has turned, so many have burned, but no one is to blame" is them saying look so many people have died inthe last 24 hours and no government is taking responsibility for their deaths.

"Don't fuck with this senator!"

I WAS NOT EXPECTING THIS BUT IM SO HAPPY!!!

MEMES, THE DNA OF SOUL

A really interesting thing to note is that the composer, Jamie Christopherson was not at all familiar with metal at the time, and when he got the job, he basically locked himself in a room and binged metal bands for something like a week. Another fun fact is that he also did the music for Toon Town MMO.

I'M F$CKING INVINCIBLE! -Sundowner.

You guys really should react to Senator Armstrong's cutscenes, his speeches are a thing to behold!

At some point, you should definitely react to Metal Gear cutscenes, they're games where the story is a major aspect so doing that would be a great way to get the story, even as more casual gamers.

I DIDN'T KNOW I WANTED THIS REACTION BUT I AM SO EXCITED

Fun fact; All the main bosses barring Sen. Armstrong and Bladewolf are named after violent weather events and the mercenary group they belong to is called The Winds of Destruction. Mistal - a cold and violent wind that blows in from southern France. (Mistral is French) Khamsin - a violent dust storm that blows in from the Sahara desert and parts of the middle east(Khamsin was a US marine fighting in the middle east) Monsoon - a violent rainstorm that occurs in southeast Asia. (Monsoon is Cambodian) Jetstream - a violent wind that blows west to east (Sam is Brazilian and styles himself after a Samurai.) Sundowner - a series of violent winds that often appear at sundown in the US. Also the name of a psychological effect akin to schizophrenia and another name for someone with alcohol issues. (Sundowner is American and incredibly violent)

Violeeeeeeence breeds violeeeeeeeeeence

Someone I watch made an interesting point where "Collective Unconsciousness" is actually supposed to be what the player and protag assume is the true motive of Armstrong, but it's shown in his second theme "It Has To Be This Way" (and in his dialogue) that he actually hates that collective consciousness mentality, and is basically saying that he's following his own path and choice to change it, like how Raiden is following his.

Me, hearing Ken and Bethany are casual gamers: What's up, my casual gamers! 😄

22:45 Well... he doesn't write his own speeches.

Armstrong: 'Well, I don't write my own theme music'.

Whats cool is most of the characterization is from the music. The most blataint is Sam as it basically talks about how he lost his purpose and is now only a weapon, and his fight with jack has given him clarity.

Theirs like 9 bosses in this game ? And because it’s so short we don’t get much information to who they are and what they want. So the songs are like exposition.

you havent heard the senator speak, he's very passionate

Theres actually a channel called fattbrett that did a pretty good deconstruction of Armstrong as a villain. Its also believed that It Has to be This Way is actually more of a song for Raiden rather than Armstrong. Theres a lot going into the reasons that would take a bit to discuss but basically Armstrong's motives go into doong some pretty bad shit and putting on a front to change the system but his ideals and methods are very extreme and would involve mass anarchy. Raiden by this point embraces that hes willing to fight for change as well but has to be willing to get his hands dirty and on this light acknowledges the similarities in their goals while still opposing armstrong for following his wrath of an anarchal approach to changing the system whereas hes chosen to fight smallscale to cut out the corruption even if it labels him a terrorist and a rogue cyborg.

I honestly have no idea how the composer of this music managed to make these one considering what his past one were like.

When I tell you my eyes widened when I saw you posted this. You finally did it! It was worth the wait 🙏. Now it’s time for you guys watch the actual boss battles. 😂

Sundowners "Love and peace" line just comes from the fact that he loves destruction and he is a Terrorist Actual line in the game "Things havent been the same since the Good ol days after 9/11!"😮

We're making the mother of all omletes with this one

The music, gameplay and even down to the characters are just so good. I play this game way to much that I can even see the boss battle while listening to the music.

You should do a journey about the game reacting to all cutscenes, i would love to see ur reaction to it but i love your videos keep it up guys u will always get my support! ❤❤

Ohh man, You guys gonna love to dive into Metal Gear universe, even without playing the game, just watching the cutscene alone would be fun to react to. It's really an amazing work from Kojima and his team of writers.

The way the fights build energy in this game is incredible. For most of the fights the vocals do not even kick in until you are hitting the second half or last third of the fight. So the tension builds and when the player is finally in the zone the vocals kick in as they close out the fight. There are a few exceptions, such as Sam's fight in which the Vocal track is played from the get go and only switches to the instrumental version when you disarm him. But once he grabs his sword again it switches back to the vocal track. They did an incredible job with the soundtrack and implementation of the soundtrack in the game.

Gets character analysis wrong entire video... 18:25 "So he's a prick!" nailed it! LMAO

RULES OF NATURE-

Every single song gives me goosebumps, not only for the volcals, I recall exactly the moment each line starts in the battles from the game, so many badass moments, I wish there was a second game, or completely forgot this, just so I couls experience for the first timw again, Raiden has been my second favorite character from Metal Gear, only after Big Boss.

It’s been a while since I played so I don’t remember the story completely but I think Collective Unconscious was Armstrong mocking that kind of ideology and his actual ideology is more strong survive weak die. That’s why the song doesn’t even try to pretty up what the ideology is and just plainly states it. It’s also why in his actual song he says Raiden is similar to him as he see Raiden as one of the strong. He’s still a douche though you got that observation completely right

I'm my Own Master Now is badass, but gives me the feels too, in the Bladewolf DLC, you see the puppy AI questioning his programming, bring freedom to a country, but he could never b free, he tries to scape but they were just playing with him, so he was a prisioner, being forced to serve the terrorists purposes, untill Raiden destroyed his shell, but saved his memory, buolding a new body and allowing him to make his own choices, making him his own master now.

The only thing that pops in my head when Rules of Nature builds up is "Trolley-Chan lives? TROLLEY-CHAN LIVES?"

Def one of my top 10 games the soundtrack the gameplay just everything is awesome

Theres a video on youtube where the dude manages to sync each song with the boss battles in the game, its really cool to see

I wish you saw the scenes in game where the songs kick into vocals. Nothing really can compete with raiden blocking a building sized sword with RULES OF NATURE being shouted in the background

Metal gear Ray is the tutorial boss, intended to show you how strong Raiden is, the guy you play as. It's a giant robot with sword arms and a laser, and it's memed a ton for the scene where Raiden basically picks it up and chucks it 60 feet into the air and then chops it like Gordon Ramsey. Bladewolf is a robot dog with a chainsaw tail. After its boss fight, it joins Raiden as an ally. It also has its own story mode in a paid DLC. Mistral is a mercenary with cybernetic enhancements whose weapon of choice is a bunch of magnetically attached metal arms turned into a spear. I don't know anything about Khamsin other than he's a boss you fight in Bladewolf's DLC. Monsoon is a really annoying boss who uses his cybernetic enhancements to dodge your attacks by shifting his body parts around with electromagnetism. He uses smoke to teleport and the same weapons that Raphael from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles uses. He's also the guy from the game who canonically says "Memes, the DNA of the soul" Sundowner is a giant d*ckhead who uses 2 swords that turn into a comically large pair of scissors. He uses the brains of children to power some of the most annoying enemies in the game, and he has a generally f_cked up worldview, stating things like "Like after the good ol' days after 911!" He compensates for his d_ckheadery for being the most frail boss in the game that you can entirely ignore the main mechanic of: shields that blow up in your face if you cut them wrong. Jetstream Sam is the absolute GOAT, and you fight him on 2 seperate occasions. On the first time, he cuts off Raiden's arm, and the second time Raiden wins and kills him. His only cybernetic enhancement is in one of his arms, meaning he was outperforming Raiden as pretty much a normal guy. In his boss, it's the most fair fight in the entire game, having no mechanics at all, just a sword duel at sunset. You disarm him at one point in the fight, and yes, it makes the fight harder. In the end, Sam and Raiden have a massive amount of respect for each other, and Sam tells Bladewolf (They're together for a large portion of the game offscreen) to give Raiden his sword, which he gets in the final boss. Sam also has his own paid DLC too. Metal gear Excelsus is another giant robot, but this one is being piloted by Senator Armstrong. It's basically a giant spider with sword legs. You finish the fight by cutting one of the legs off and using it to SWORD FIGHT THE ROBOT WITH ITS LEG Senator Armstrong is the meme poster child of Metal Gear with quotes such as "Nanomachines, son!" and "I'm making the mother of all omelettes here, Jack! Can't fret over every egg!" (Jack is Raiden's real name). His most popular meme is of Raiden rapidly punching him, but the punches aren't doing anything. Armstrong, as suggested by one of his quotes, uses nanomachines across his body, powering up his attacks and making him near invulnerable. His main goal is to end wars, but he was going around some of the wrong methods. He says when you beat him by ripping his heart out that "War will probably go on for a few more years at the least..." leading you to question if at the end you're the bad guy.

If you’re not planning to play the game yourself, there’s probably a good compilation out there that has all the bosses you can watch if you’re interested. Not as stylish as Devil May Cry, but just as badass

Listening to that music along with the brutal combat scenes in the game is much more epic. They know how to place the voices of the song at the exact moment of the fight. The fights begin only with the instrumental of the music and at the best moment the voices begin to sound

Jetstream Sam is the best boss fight of the game, hands down. You get yhe boss weapon after beating them, and yii eventually get Sam's sword, Muramasa. And it's canonically only used to fight Armstrong, because Raiden's sword couldnt hurt him. Raiden even has a speech when he gets it. "I said my sword was a tool of justice, not used in anger. Not used for vengeance. But now... Now, I'm not so sure. And besides... *This isn't my sword!"* Easily one of, if not, the best lines in the whole game. It might be worth checking out the boss speeches to get an idea of who they are. They're genuinely entertaining, and some of them have grains of sense sprinkled in with the insanity. Armstrong actually has some good ideas, what he wants is partly understandable, up to a certain point. It's one of those "if you'd have stopped that speech a few sentences sooner, I'd actually have been on your side" situations. Sadly, while he's not greedy, he's *bat💩 insane!*

Hearing this OST during gameplay is something else. It's the closest you'll get to experiencing synesthesia of your body (controler), eyes and ears. Also "It Has To Be This Way" is Raiden's theme as he has realized his purpose that Sam was asking him of since the start of the game. It's more like a second part to "The Only Thing I know". Collective Consciousness is Senator's theme. Just listen to Sam's song and the last one after the other and you'll hear it.

Reminder that this game came out in 2013, and the main villain is a man running for president, who at one point says "Make America great again!"

18:25 It tracks

Well. Armstrong doesn't write his own speeches.

14:28 one of the things this boss said: "Like in good old days of 9 11"

This reminded me to play the game again, it's an underrated masterpiece.

Fun Fact: Khamsin's theme is used in the Death Battle for Hulk vs Doomsday.

Fun fact: The composer for Metal Gear Rising, Jamie Christopherson, had no experience with composing rock/metal soundtracks when he worked on MGR. It was his very first time working with that genre of music. The very first video game he did music work for was a Disney MMO from 2003 called Toontown Online.

I don't care about lyrics and just care about the sound. But I love collective consciousness for the lyrics. That's how our country thinks in real life. Just bread, circus, materialism, and obey the tv.

Let's rock.

27:35 Here's the full list of all Metal Gear games chronologically: Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops (apparently it's not canon, correct me if I'm wrong) Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain (Ground Zeroes is some kind of a prologue to this game) Metal Gear Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake (these two games are for MSX console, they're all pixels and no voiced dialogues, so I think that you should just get a simple summary of these) Metal Gear Solid (there's also the latest version called "The Twin Snakes", which is on a different engine, but I think most of us will agree that it's worse than original) Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots Metal Gear Rising Revengeance I gotta warn you: Metar Gear franchise is VERY complicated, if you're new to these, so brace yourselves!

Max0r’s summery on this game not only super fun, but I also think the one of the videos that really risen his popularity.

“It had to be this way” is actually from Raiden’s perspective, even if it plays during the Armstrong boss fight.

“If you are willing to kill for your beliefs, surely you are prepared to DIE for them.” -Mistral “War is a cruel parent, but an effective teacher.” -Monsoon “Kids are cruel, Jack. And I am very in touch with my inner child!”- Sundowner “We’ve both heard enough speeches about Higher Purposes for our lives. History will decide who is right.”- Jetstream Sam “The weak will be purged, and the strong will thrive. Free to live as they see fit. They’ll make America great again!!!!” -Senator Armstrong

"No rule of 3? That's against the rules of nature!" You two are so funny together lol. Love this channel ❤

So most of theb bosses here are part of a group known as The Winds Of Destruction. You can tell which ones by the names

I would recommend that check out the Metal Gear Solid Revengence Cutscenes. That will really set the tone for why some of the bosses songs sound the way that they do or at the very least check out the end game cutscenes with Senator Armstrong. It's such an underrated game

Ken is my favorite goober

Hands down, my favorite song is "The Hot Wind Blowing", glad to hear you love it too!

you should def look at some of the boss fights and even cutscenes ...their the definition of hype and over the top badass

Honesty, it's pretty interesting how "Collective Consciousness" is a theme song dedicated to Raiden's initial perception of Senator Armstrong, while "It has to be this way" is a theme song about who Senator Armstrong ACTUALLY is.

Metal Gear Rising not only is my favorite game, but it's one of my favorite soundtracks (besides sonic the hedgehog, street fighter and tekken) Never realized you were gonna react to it though.

Senator has two songs because the first song collective consciousness is what Raiden initially thinks of Armstrong then the second is what he sees Armstrong really is in the end Raiden wins physical battle but loses the philosophial battle and takes part of Armstrong's philosophy and continues his will by going to war for Raiden's own beliefs

So something interesting about Collective Consciousness So, this song plays during a fight against Armstrong's mech called Metal Gear EXCELLSUS, and even though Raiden(that's the protag, in case you couldn't guess) and Armstrong knew about each other, this fight was the first time the two have met face to face, and Raiden thought he had a pretty good idea of Armstrong's motive. The way I see it at least, Collective Consciousness is NOT from Armstrong's perspective, but rather Raiden's. It's what Raiden THINKS of Armstrong as a person and as a politician. In fact, when you compare this to It Has to Be This Way, which plays during the final battle against Armstrong himself and AFTER he laid out his actual motivation, you could read It Has To Be This Way as actually being from both of their perspectives, seeing that they're not actually that different, at the surface level at the very least, but both of their mentalities clash with each other, and their ideologies were simply incompatible, hence one of them has to go. It's interesting because the other songs(apart from maybe Rules of Nature, I'm not really sure) are 100% from the bosses' perspectives, so to have the final two songs in the game be kind of up in the air like that really makes you stop and think

wait until you actually see The fights with these themes...i got chills Just by remembering them...

Collective Consciousness is my favorite, as well as It Has To Be This Way, I appreciate you reacted to these. By the way, i recommend Reacting to the Final Boss and Ending of this Game, if you’re up for it. Also, i highly recommend doing Top 50 Final Boss Themes Part 1-5 by Klagmar at some point, it’s a interesting list.

Oh please do a Metal Gear journey and watch all of the cutscenes of the games, that would be incredible, the metal gear series is simply one of the best stories in all of video games

Def wish you picked a playlist with the boss fight footage. Game is insane.

The reason love is mentioned in Sundowner's theme is because he genuinely gets a sense of inner peace and fulfillment out of his love and embracing of violence. What he considers "warm and pure" and akin to love is...bloodshed.

you should react to the rest of this games vocal tracks, they're not boss themes but they are still INSANELY GOOD! here are the rest of the vocal tracks: Dark Skies (enemy encounter theme 1) Return to Ashes (enemy encounter theme 2) A Soul Can't Be Cut (enemy encounter theme 3) The War Still Rages Within (credits theme) A Soul Can't Be Cut - DLC Version (Jetstream Sam DLC enemy encounter theme. it's instead sung by the vocalist who sang Sam's boss theme in the main game)

Sundowner's theme is the polar opposite of love, his entire character is built on pure bloodshed. So much so he considers himself a warmonger, his entire view on humanity is just war should be normalized and should be accepted that humans are cruel in nature

@18:12 New World Order Theme Song......basically You should react to the ending credits theme....its basically a response...song title ''The war still rages within" The whole MGS franchise is about BREAKING FREE from government elites and systems

Defo watch the boss fights or atleast the cutscenes because the fights go so well with the music playing

PLEASE PLEASE react to the entire franchise in RELEASE ORDER.....Metal gear is honestly one of the GOATS in gaming history MGS2 is of of thee most profound games in history (2001) MGS4 is slowly becoming one of the most profound games...(2008) give it about 5-7 more years of world events

11:55 actually, the first sentence is the name of the song (referring to "the hot wind blowing")

everybody knows that they have to react to the themes with the boss fights in the background now

If you guys do decide to do gameplay for this one, the boss fights have a unique aspect where these themes build up to their lyrical portions about halfway through. As long as you do well you'll be able to hear all of it by the time you finish the fight. I really don't know why there aren't more videos with fights in the background, but I have to assume it's a Copyright problem.

14:20 on the topic of Red Sun’s lyrics, I have a bit of insight. Sundowner believes that humans are naturally violent, and modern society is oppressing human instinct through its condemnation of violent acts. The “out of place” lines actually have relevance to that theme. “Only love is with us now, something warm and pure” speaks of how humanity’s natural emotions and desires are being destroyed through more oppressive societies. The line “find the peace within ourselves, no need for a cure” speaks of how we must come to terms with our natural instincts, and how we do not need to “cure” humanity of our natural instincts. Thats just my interpretation of the lyrics when looked at through the lens of Sundowner’s character.

Fun fact: the composer for these songs also did the music for toon town online, a disney mickey mouse MMO

There’s one missing, raidens “final boss music” the war still rages within

26:16 what you're talking about here Bethany actually applies to a lot of genres like for example rap if you don't listen to it often enough then your ears aren't tuned to hearing what is said

I love the MG Rising Boss Themes. Never heard the Hot Boiling One since that one is a DLC Boss. Never played the DLCs but what a good song. Red Sun, Collective Conciousness and It Has To Be This Way are my favourites. You should try watching a playthrough of MGRising or just the Boss Intros and Fights to get an idea of the characters.

These songs go SO HARD!! I remember playing Rising Revengeance for the first time and the first time I heard the lyrics kick in for that very first boss fight, I got CHILLS! The song feels even more epic when you're seeing the boss fight, so I'd recommend watching an "all bosses" run (if you don't want to play the game yourself). Seriously, the fights in this game are something else and the boss themes, while they stand on their own, sound even cooler when you see someone slashing a boss with a katana 😂