Metal Gear is the pioneer of stealth-action games. There are a lot of entries into the series, but not all of them are connected to the main plot. Hideo Kojima is the creator of this series and only the projects where he worked are considered canon. Here is the list of canon and play order of the Metal Gear series.
🔵 Metal Gear (1987)
🔵 Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake (1990)
🔵 Metal Gear Solid (1998)
🔵 Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (2001)
🔵 Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (2004)
🔵 Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (2008) [Emulator]
🔵 Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker (2010) [Emulator]
🔵 Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes (2014)
🔵 Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (2015)
🔸 Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection (Vol.1) (2023) Contains first 5 games. Recommended to play with this.
🔸 Although the first two games are officially connected, they are quite old and can be challenging to play. Starting with MGS1 will be fine. The menu in MGS1 includes a summary of the story from the earlier games, which you can easily check out if you want.
🔸 Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (2013) is set in an alternate future. But you must play it.
