The 15 best Revolver Ocelot quotes
Ocelot is without a doubt one of the most important and cherished characters in the Metal Gear series, making an appearance in nearly every installment. You never know for sure what he’s up to, and manipulating people into doing his bidding is his expertise. There’s always some greater plan going on behind the scenes that only Ocelot (and sometimes his closest allies) are aware of, as he helps steer the events in the right direction with cold blooded confidence and composure. Here are some of his most memorable, best or most entertaining quotes.
“You’re pretty good.”
from Metal Gear Solid / Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater / Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots / Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
This is a quote Ocelot has adopted from Naked Snake. On their first encounter, Ocelot takes down a group of GRU soldiers, and then tries to defeat Snake in a hand to hand battle. Snake proves to be the superior fighter when he bests Ocelot and throws him to the ground. After lecturing him, he does go out of his way to compliment him on his ‘fancy shooting’, concluding with the phrase “You’re pretty good.”. Ocelot remembers this line, and repeats it to Solid Snake years later, when he first faces him during the Shadow Moses Incident. It would become one of his most characteristic and iconic phrases, and they are in fact his final words before he dies in 2014. They are usually accompanied by a hand gesture that’s supposed to mock Naked Snake’s CQC stance.
“Alas, my finger must have slipped…”
from Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
What do you say after you have just shot the president of the United States? Well, if your name is Ocelot, there’s the answer. Clearly, Ocelot doesn’t mess around, and whoever stands in the way of achieving his goals had better watch out. His fingers tend to get slippery.
“So it has come down to it. We’re going to launch that nuke, and ride it all the way into history.”
from Metal Gear Solid
This quote is great if only for the Dr Strangelove-esque images it brings to mind; picture Ocelot sitting on top of a nuclear rocket, shooting across the Alaskan sky, with a majestic aurora in the back… Anyway.
“It doesn’t feel right to shoot an unarmed man… but I’ll get over it.”
from Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater
After Snake and EVA try to escape using the WiG, Ocelot quite literally crashes the party, and dumps Snake’s weapons into the lake. The two battle it out using CQC while EVA frantically attempts to take off. But when Ocelot loses the fight it doesn’t take long before his favorite revolver ends up in his hand. “It doesn’t feel right to shoot an unarmed man…” he admits. “But I’ll get over it.” Yeah, no doubt. EVA quickly tosses Snake a weapon and the two simultaneously pull the trigger several times – but both guns are empty. After that Ocelot proposes to have one more showdown, before the two part ways.
“Excellent speech, my friend. Gift of the silver tongue! They say it’s the mark of a good officer… and of a liar. Americans are too in love with the sound of their own voice to speak the truth.”
from Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
Leave it to Ocelot to make an insult sound so poetic. After marine commandant Scott Dolph finishes his speech about Metal Gear RAY, Ocelot arrives on the scene with a slow clap, and calmly struts towards the commander, his spurs tinkling. His ‘compliment’ quickly turns to an insult, and you just know someone is going to die soon – and it’s not Ocelot.
“Don’t confuse me with those uniformed fools!”
from Metal Gear Solid
Aside from its literal meaning, ‘uniformed’ can be seen as symbolic of the fact that these soldiers are (in Ocelot’s eyes) mindless pawns who just take orders and do as they are told. Ocelot is quite the opposite, as is evident from the ever extending line of superiors he has been betraying for his own end goals. Or rather, who have been used as puppets in his game, making them the ones doing his bidding unknowingly. Confusing Ocelot with one who you can order around and expect to shut off his own thinking, would be a huge mistake.
“Once you create a character and put it out there in the public mind, it warps and twists with every baseless rumor. And before you know it all people see are phantoms. In my case it works out just fine. I’m plenty used to working under aliases.”
from Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
Ocelot has mastered the art of manipulation by assuming different roles and using them to steer others into the direction he wants them to go. Usually his true intentions only become clear at the end of each game. With every alias he embodies a different role, whether it’s Major Ocelot, Revolver Ocelot or, in this case, Shalashaska. He knows he can manipulate people by having them believe certain things about him and his intentions. This quote also refers to the overal theme of MGSV, of the relationship between reality and the concepts that have taken shape in people’s minds, wether it is about the legend of Shalashaska or that of Big Boss.
“This bitch is wearing perfume!”
from Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater
During operation Snake Eater, after Ocelot manages to grab EVA, there are some surprises in store for him. First of all, it turns out he’s holding a female spy, and secondly… the bitch is wearing perfume! Who could forget such a quote? Later in the story this gets a follow-up when Tatyana’s scent gives her true identity away, though not because of the perfume, but because of the gasoline from her bike.
“Metal Gear only has room for one.”
from Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
Can you guess who will be the one to plant his ass in the comfortable seat of the US Army’s latest piece of weaponry? Hint: it’s not the guy who decided that partnering up with Ocelot was a good idea.
“I fought wars in Afghanistan, Mozambique, Eritrea and Chad. Among the Mujahaddin guerrillas I was known and feared as ‘Shalashaska’. I was trained by the Russian GRU. I am not one of those KGB slugs.”
from Metal Gear Solid
With Solid Snake strapped to the ‘rotating bed’ during the Shadow Moses incident, Ocelot sees an opportunity to go over some of the highlights from his impressive resume and let his prisoner know exactly who he’s dealing with. Shalashaska is a name spoken in both fear and respect by his enemies during one of the many battles he was involved in. This quote really helps in establishing Ocelot as a character who has a long war history and knows the battlefield inside out, and who’s more than a simple sidekick to Liquid Snake. He is not someone you should underestimate.
“It’s easier to live a convenient lie than a painful truth.”
from Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
After retrieving Huey Emmerich from the clutches of Skull Face, Ocelot steps into his old role of interrogator. He intends to find out what Huey has to say for himself after being held responsible for the destruction of Mother Base in 1974, but Huey refuses to acknowledge his mistakes and sees himself as a victim rather than a perpetrator. He insists that he was forced to do Skull Face’s bidding, and that he was always on Snake’s side. “You know the hardest man to break?” Ocelot asks. “The type who’s fooling himself. That takes time. It’s easier to live a convenient lie than a painful truth.”
“You were hamming it up as the tragic heroine thanks to the script that The Patriots wrote for you. Pure self-indulgence, absorbed in your own misfortune, you couldn’t get enough of the drama.”
from Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
When Ocelot has an opinion on someone, he doesn’t beat around the bush. This particular tirade is aimed at Fortune, a character with a very bitter and fatalistic view of her own life, ironically due to the inability to end it and join her loved ones who have all been taken away from her. Ocelot is amused by how well she played her part on the stage created for Raiden, without even realizing it. He decides to tell Fortune, who he refers to as a convenient ‘pathetic wretch’, exactly how he would characterize the situation.
“The moment any truth is passed on, it starts turning into fiction. The problem is, fiction inspires people more than facts.”
from Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
Ocelot describes to Snake how the story about Big Boss’ legend has spread around the world, taking on a life of its own. As with his own nickname, Shalashaska, the meaning of the word changed as the story was retold and passed on, until it became detached from what it originally represented. However these stories have a power of their own, the power to rally people, to inspire them, and so they become their own force. And it’s a force Ocelot knows how to exploit.
“Your plan was invalidated even before execution, Solidus.”
from Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
Ocelot loves to mislead people. What he loves even more is to tell them just exactly how profoundly he was able to mislead him. In this particular quote he just gives it to Solidus straight by telling him nothing he has tried to accomplish over the course of the game even had the slightest chance of succeeding. Why? Because it was all part of a much bigger plan, involving, of course, Ocelot. And that is never good news, at least not for anyone other than Ocelot.
“Plain name… but I won’t forget it.”
from Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater
Ocelot and Big Boss (or Naked Snake at the time) develop a strange relationship during the course of Operation Snake Eater. At first they are enemies who fight each other at every opportunity, with Naked Snake trying to provoke Ocelot, and Ocelot reacting in anger. But later on Ocelot’s resentment for Snake turns to admiration. They keep fighting each other, but for Ocelot it’s more like a game, a rivalry in which he tries to equal his idol. He does so by copying Snake’s moves (CQC) and following his advice (using a revolver). At the end, his ever growing admiration for Snake makes sure he will remember his name, regardless of how plain it turned out to be. This quote reflects their relationship: Ocelot mocks Snake’s real name, but at the same time acknowledges the fact that the man made an impression on him, and has earned a place in his memory.
Needless to say, this is just a small selection of all the memorable lines Ocelot has uttered over the years. But these phrases show the various facets to this character; he can be intelligent, relentless, arrogant… and always manipulative, using people like pieces on a chessboard. All while remaining frighteningly eloquent.