bigjoe wrote:There is absolutely no chance, even at gunpoint, that I would ever spoil MGS4 after plaything through and enjoying each of its prequels.
The Patriots (most of this is revealed in MGS: Portable Ops)
The original Patriots were founded by Major Zero, Big Boss, EVA, Para-medic, Siginit and Ocelot. It was founded based on the principles of The Boss's sacrifice in Metal Gear Solid 3, and each of their admiration for them, with a desire to 'make the world whole'. Zero created the Les Enfants Terribles project using Big Boss's DNA and using EVA as a surrogate mother (You meet EVA again in MGS4 and she eventually dies in the course of the story). When Big Boss found out about this project, he left the Patriots and began his 'wars' against the patriots which ended up being Outter Haven and Zanzibar Land. Para-medic ended up being the Dr. Clark that turned Grey Fox into a Ninja and met her end when Grey Fox took revenge on her. Sigint ended up being the DARPA chief that got killed off in MGS1.
After Big Boss's defection, Zero decided to create A.I. successors to the Patriots, since he didn't feel humans could be trusted. Thus he created five A.I's: GW, TJ, TR, AL (named after the presidents on Mount Rushmore) and the head A.I. JD (John Doe) to succeed him and monitor the flow of information in the world. GW is the A.I. on Arsenal Gear that is infected with a virus in MGS2 and is rendered inoperable.
The main plot
Liquid Ocelot is a misnomer, Ocelot is pretending to act like Liquid in order to bait Solid into defeating the patriots.
In MGS4, Liquid Ocelot goes about trying to hack into the A.I.'s using both GW and the body of Solidus Snake (the gentically perfect clone of Big Boss) as a ''front' to prevent suspicion from being aroused by the A.I.'s themselves since they see two bodies they recognize (GW and "Big Boss"...actually Solidus) From there, he then steals Metal Gear REX's nuclear-warhead-launching railgun from Shadow Moses so he can then launch a nuke at the then-defenseless JD. Snake is sent to stop this because the elimination of the AI's would mean that society would collapse, and Liquid Ocelot would found a new world order under his control.
Snake ends up using a virus that was started by Emma from MGS2 and completed by a child genius named Sunny (the child of Olga Gurlukovich from MGS2) with help from Naomi Hunter to supposedly destroy GW once and for all and prevent Liquid from launching the nuke. However, because of Naomi's help (she is actually colluding with Ocelot to help bait Solid Snake), the virus, instead of destroying GW, actually spreads to the rest of the Patriot A.I.'s and destroys them, but leaves their infrastructure intact so society can continue to exist. Liquid Ocelot is then killed by Solid Snake since Ocelot still beleives he is Liquid and that he has a score to settle with his "brother".
Snake's fate
Over the course of the game, it is revealed that Snake only has six months to live because of his advanced aging. However, the FOXDIE in his blood left over from MGS1 is starting to mutate and will eventually target other people other than the specifically engineered 'targets' and gives him three months until that starts happening. At the very end of the game, Snake attempts to kill himself to prevent himself from becoming a weapon of biological warfare, but is stopped by Big Boss.
Yep, that's right, Big Boss didn't actually die during the Zanzibar Land incident. Major Zero found him and put him in a catatonic state under control of the Patriots A.I. When those were destroyed, it released Big Boss.
However, over the course of the game, after the FOXDIE reveal but before the end of the game, Drebin, the resident arms dealer and (unknown to Snake) Patriot agent, injects Snake with a NEW form of FOXDIE designed to kill Ocelot, EVA and Big Boss. Ocelot is killed by Snake through an old-fashioned brawl before he can die from FOXDIE, and EVA is killed when Ocelot steals Solidus' body (thought by EVA to be the body of Big Boss). Big Boss actually dies from FOXDIE when he meets snake at the graveyard and interrupts his attempted suicide. The reason that Big Boss interrupts him, however, is that he reveals that the new FOXDIE 'overwrites' the old, which means that the new FOXDIE will stay 'fresh' and unmutated for the rest of Snake's natural life, about a year or so. Also, Big Boss brings Major Zero with him, now an old man in a vegetative state, and pulls the plug on his life support.
So at the end of the game, Solid Snake leaves Big Boss beside The Bosses grave and lives out the rest of his natural life with Otacon and Sunny.
Raiden
Raiden is now part super soldier and helps Snake out at various points in the game. He left Rose after the conclusion of MGS2 and then Rose went on to marry Col. Campbell. At the end of the game, Raiden wakes up on a hospital bed after a particularly tough encounter left him nearly dead, and he finds Rose coming back to him with their son (which was thought to be Campell and Rose's son).
Vamp
Vamp appears in this game too, but is not actually immortal, it's just that his nanomachines keep healing him at a very fast rate. Snake fights him and injects him with something that disables his nanomachines, and then he has a climatic battle with Raiden, who kills him.
Meryl
Meryl is in this game too. She is part of a mercenary group unknowingly under the Patriots control along with the gag character "Johnny". She and Johnny eventually marry at the end of the game after Johnny rescues her from a few situations, due to the fact that Johnny doesn't have any nanomachines and is thus not susceptible to the many 'attacks' that utilize them as a weapon against themselves.
Final Notes
So there, now you know the entire story to Metal Gear Solid 4 and don't need to buy a Playstation 3. Use the money towards a nice new LCD monitor instead.