Metal Gear Solid 4 PS3 delisting is the latest example of an awful gaming trend

Sony, Sega, and Konami are all guilty of needlessly removing games just to prop up sales of a new re-release.

While remakes and remasters can vastly improve the video games they’re based on, there remains inherent value in being able to experience the original releases. If nothing else, they’re typically cheaper to buy if you can’t afford the shiny new version.

Unfortunately, publishers are keenly aware of this and, in a bid to maximise sales of whatever remake or remaster they’re pushing out next, will always look to delist the original versions.

The latest examples are a pair of Metal Gear Solid games, which were still available on digital storefronts last week but have since vanished following the announcement of the Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection Vol. 2.

As a reminder, Konami only made the announcement last Thursday at the State of Play, with the collection announced as including re-releases of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns Of The Patriots, Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, and Metal Gear: Ghost Babel.

Granted, all three games could do with a new release, especially Ghost Babel, since it was only ever available for the Game Boy Color. Metal Gear Solid 4, meanwhile, has been locked to the PlayStation 3 since its 2008 launch, although anyone who still uses the console could still buy it digitally – until now.

As for Peace Walker, it was still available digitally for the PlayStation Portable (although only via the PlayStation 3 or PS Vita), but you could also buy an HD remaster for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

Word has since spread, though, that these original versions of Metal Gear Solid 4 and Peace Walker have been taken down from the PlayStation store. Checking the Xbox store website, you can see the HD remaster of Peace Walker is gone too.

It’s unclear when exactly Konami delisted these games, but it can only have happened in the last few days and was clearly something the company had no intention of warning people about.

It can be argued that barely anyone is going to be buying these versions in 2026, especially with the new Master Collection coming out, but by that logic Konami had no reason to remove them.

This is far from the only example of this practice, as it’s something that’s been worryingly common for years now. Just recently, with the launch of the Yakuza 3 remake, Sega delisted the much cheaper HD remaster of the original PlayStation 3 game from all storefronts and now gatekeeps it behind an expensive bundle.

Rockstar Games also took down the original versions of GTA: The Trilogy ahead of the new definitive versions in 2021, although that was so buggy at launch that Rockstar made the originals available again as an apology – but only on PC through its own launcher.

Perhaps the most egregious example we can think of is Sony’s handling of the Uncharted: Legacy Of Thieves Collection on PlayStation 5, which contains updated remasters of PlayStation 4 games Uncharted 4 and The Lost Legacy.

Although the PlayStation 4 originals are still available, Sony delisted them as individual purchases in 2021, forcing newcomers to buy them together in a £35 bundle, no doubt to prevent anyone from grabbing the originals for much lower prices.

Not every publisher is guilty of this, at least for the time being. Capcom has ensured the original Resident Evil games remain available in some form alongside their shiny modern remakes.

Likewise, you can still easily buy the original Final Fantasy 7, even as Square Enix continues to remake it as three separate games.

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