This is an old revision of the document!
Big Boss & Foxhound Requirements
Big Boss/Foxhound is the highest rank achievable in many Metal Gear games. Speedrunning Big Boss/Foxhound rank appeals to some for the challenge and prestige. In addition, Big Boss/Foxhound represent a skilled level of play according to the game's definition of ranks, which involves stealthy play. Below are requirements and notes for the games that feature the ranks.
Metal Gear MSX
- Difficulty: Original
- Time: Under 45 minutes
- Continues: 0
- Alerts: 8
- Kills: 0
- Ration: 1
- Saves: Infinity ∞
Notes: Ranks do not exist in the original MSX version. All 8 alerts are mandatory.
Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake
- Difficulty: Original
- Time: Under 2 Hours(?)
- Continues: 0
- Alerts: 2 to 6
- Kills: 0 to 5
- Rations: 0
Notes: Ranks do not exist in the original MSX version. 2 alerts are forced.
Metal Gear Solid
- Difficulty: Extreme on all versions except Original Japanese
- Time: Under 3 Hours
- Continues: 0
- Alerts: 3 to 4
- Kills: 25 or less
- Rations: 0 to 1
- Saves: 0 to 80
Notes: There are 11 required kills in the game for all bosses. The original Japanese release is Easy difficulty only, but the top rank is Big Boss.
Metal Gear: Ghost Babel
- Difficulty: Very Hard
- Time: Under 2 Hours
- Alerts: 0 to 5
- Kills: 0 to 24
- Rations: 0 to 1
Notes: Continues do not matter on their own for Big Boss Rank. Continues can cause additional alerts depending on where the checkpoint is. Getting spotted again in Caution/Evasion counts as an additional alert. If you cause an alert by tripping lasers, and a guard spots you afterwards, that is 2 alerts. You can die during an alert on the screen you were spotted on to remove it.
Metal Gear Solid 2
- Difficulty: Extreme or European Extreme
- Time: Under 3 Hours
- Continues: 0
- Alerts: 3 (ALRTNUM)
- Kills: 0 (NUET)
- Rations: 0
- Saves: 0 to 8 (PRUD ENCE)
- Damage Taken: Under 10 Lifebars on Extreme (499 dmg or less), Under 9.3 Lifebars on European Extreme (279 dmg or less) (DMGA MMOUNT)
- Shots Fired: Under 700 (AMMOUS ED)
- Game Over If Discovered: Not Required
- Radar: Off
- Mech Destruction: To current knowledge, this is an untrue rumor, as setting mech destruction to a high value in Cheat Engine made no difference
Notes: All 3 Alerts are mandatory.
Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes
- Difficulty: Extreme
- Time: Under 3 Hours
- Continues: 0
- Alerts: 8
- Kills: 0
- Rations: 0 to 1
- Saves: 0 to 80
- Game Over If Discovered: Required
- Radar: No requirement
Notes: All 8 alerts are mandatory.
Metal Gear Solid 3
- Difficulty: Extreme or European Extreme
- Time: Under 5:00 hours
- Continues: 0
- Alerts: 0
- Under 10.5 life bars of damage
- 0 to 25 saves
- 0 to 20 meals eaten
- Kills: 0
- Life Meds: 0
Notes: Holding L2 or R2 during Volgins torture means you won’t receive any lifebars of damage. Just make sure to not let go during the torture and until the fade out or you will incur the damage up to that point. To save on meals use the healing radio frequencies. Using Ocelot’s Animal Camo will remove any hand shaking from Snake being hungry. There are some bosses you can fight lethally and won’t count as a kill against FOXHOUND, namely Ocelot and Volgin (the duel in the Weapons Lab). Just know that lethally taking out these bosses means you won't get their Camo, which is relevant for NG.
Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops
- Difficulty: Extreme
- Time: Under 5 hours
- Continues: 0
- Alerts: 0
- Kills: 0
- Comrades Secured: 100+
- Comrades Killed: 0
Notes: Foxhound rank. Extreme is NG+ only. Tsuchinoko is the highest rank on a NG run. The major difference being no requirement of 100 comrades.
Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops+
- Difficulty: Extreme
- Time: ?
- Alerts: 0
- Kills: 0
- Comrades Secured: 10 or 11+ (?)
- Comrades Killed: 0
Notes: Foxhound rank.
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots
- Difficulty: The Boss Extreme
- Time: Under 5 hours
- Continues: 0
- Alerts: 0
- Kills: 0
- Rations: 0
- Saves: Infinity ∞
Notes: You can use lethal means against the Beast form of the B&B corps bosses and they won’t count as kills. You MUST non-lethally take down the Beauty form.