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- I'm MatPat.
[alarm wailing]
And this is "Game Lab."
Every time!
[static] [typing, clicking]
For the last five years,
I've made a name for myself
overanalyzing video games
using real-world science and math,
but now I'm taking it to the next level
by throwing some of the world's most popular gamers
into the scenarios we play through every day.
Will the games stack up to reality?
And are gamers as good in real life
as they are on-screen?
Welcome to "Game Lab."
[rock music]
♪ ♪
This is insane!
♪ ♪
I'm here at a top secret military base
to learn a little bit more about the grandfather
of tactical espionage action, "Metal Gear Solid."
I wore my military green and everything.
Look at this.
I blend in.
Now you see me. Now you don't.
Now you see me. Now you don't.
When the original "Metal Gear"
hit the scene back in 1987,
it was the pioneer of the stealth gaming genre.
Yeah, you could run into the enemy stronghold
and try to gun your way through,
but that would spell certain death.
Instead the way to win was to survey your surroundings,
memorize security placements,
and quietly make your way through.
In 1998, Konami released the first installment
in the series that most people know, "Metal Gear Solid,"
which brought tactical espionage
into the next generation by making it...
[echoing] 3-D.
And just last year, they released "Metal Gear Solid V,"
considered to be one of the best games of 2015
as Snake winds his way through desert military encampments.
That's the one we'll be focusing on today.
"Metal Gear Solid" has always differentiated itself
by focusing on realism.
When working on the games, the development team
would visit real army bases to learn about the military.
It was so serious that the game's creator,
Hideo Kojima, said...
Pretty ambitious words there,
especially when your protagonist
regularly hides under a cardboard box
to avoid capture.
So today we're putting Kojima's words
to the test.
[ringing]
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
[scanner beeping]
♪ ♪
Hey, guys.
- MatPat. - Good to see you.
Oh, oh, oh! This is nice.
Thank you so much.
- Oh, yes, hello.
- Good to see you. Oh, my gosh.
Awesome.
- No, no, hugging.
- Oh, I get so many hugs today.
This is great.
I see you wore your stealth purple today.
- Yeah, you know, I figured
I want to blend in with all our surroundings.
- Perfect, and you both got the memo
that we're shaving your hair, right?
- Oh, yeah, I was hoping to go,
you know, like, the side shave.
- Oh, yeah. That's a good one.
- Natalie Dormer it up, you know?
- I like that, yeah.
- I'm down with that
if everybody else is doing it.
- Yeah. - And if you do it too.
- Yeah, I'm totally okay with that.
So you guys ready to become, like, stealth experts?
- Yes. - Yeah.
- I think I already am, actually.
- Really? - Yeah.
- Well, show us the way, then.
Please. - Oh, me? Okay.
- Yeah, no, I want to see those stealth skills in action.
[laughing] That's great.
- That was so stealthy.
So stealthy.
- He just disappeared from view.
Terrible.
Hey, guys, it is my extreme honor
to introduce you to JP,
former U.S. Navy SEAL for about 12 years.
- Yes, sir. - Is that right?
The rest is on a need-to-know basis,
completely classified, so...
We're here today to test out the game "Metal Gear Solid."
- Awesome. - Right?
So are you a one-man super soldier?
'Cause in the game, you have Solid Snake,
who's, like, this one-man guy who just infiltrates anything.
He has his team over his kind of intercom,
but other than that, he's going in solo.
Do you do solo missions,
or is there a team kind of infiltrating with you
or mission-by-mission basis, or how's that work?
- I would say it's mission by mission,
but most of the time,
the key word in the SEAL teams is "team."
You always have your boys with you.
- If you were to take a cardboard box,
you were to put it over your head,
and just kind of crawl around, and then every now and then,
if the guards are coming by, you just stop,
like, would that be effective?
- I think you doing push-ups until I'm tired
would be more effective than that.
So you can-- - Like, right now?
- Yeah. - Oh-ho! Ooh.
- You so deserve this.
You so deserve this.
- Over/under on how many he does.
- 8 1/2. - 50.
- 6, 7, 8. - 15.
- I've got 25. He's going strong.
Love it. - Get up.
[laughter]
I have sympathy for him.
- I could have kept going.
- Have you ever parachuted into a place before?
- You can.
- Have you ever?
- You can. - Oh.
all: That's classified.
[laughter]
- I would like to touch on the technology, though,
because such a huge part of "Metal Gear"
is overcoming security technology.
So you use night vision goggles and things like that?
- You can, absolutely.
- Okay, what about, like, infrared technology
or kind of, like, heat sensors or anything like that?
- Yeah, I mean, that technology's great.
Maybe a vehicle had been parked, right,
and it was covering the sun from the area,
and the vehicle moved.
Now that's gonna have less of a heat signature than others,
so you can know something was there and now it's gone.
And it's the same thing for humans.
And as far as, like, maybe, like, trip wires,
like, with fishing line, it's really hard to see.
If you use a visible laser--
Let's say it's down a hallway.
You take a visible laser on your gun,
and you run it up and down.
When it hits that fishing wire, it'll sparkle off.
So now you know something's right there.
- Wow.
So with all this security technology,
do you ever just have those moments where it's like,
"I can just open the door,"
like, they left the door unlocked?
- Oh, absolutely.
Yeah, we set up those situations all the time in training.
- That's amazing.
- The guys are coming up to the door,
and they're putting their explosive breaches on.
They're getting ready.
And I'll come up as the instructor and be like...
"Check the door."
And just open the door.
And just the look of defeat is-- it's so awesome.
- These are definitely all skills
I would have used at, like, summer camp, man.
- Right. Speaking of those skills,
do you have anything you could teach us today?
- I think I have a few things we can do.
You guys up for it? - Yes.
- All right, let's head on over, shall we?
- Let's do it. Sounds good. - Awesome.
I can't wait. Yeah! - [laughs]
- Stealth. Stealth walk, stealth walk.
- Okay. - Just walk like a human.
- We haven't been taught a stealth walk yet.
[militaristic drumming]
♪ ♪
- Go, go, go.
[laughs]
- I think he saw us.
- We were spotted, guys. We were spotted.
So, JP, what do you think?
We looking the part now?
- For what comedy?
[laughter] - Ouch!
- I think we are pretty appropriate.
- We're not ready for stealth mode? Come on.
- This is for stealth, right?
- Yeah. - Yeah.
[rattling]
- Makes a little bit of noise there.
- I suppose you're right.
What about the jaunty scarf?
- It's cute, if that's what you're going for.
- Eye patch, helping focus my sniper eye?
- Not so much. - No.
- You shoot with both eyes open.
- It is kind of ruining
a bit of my depth perception.
- Your depth perception?
- So what do you have to show us today?
- Obviously training is very important in what we do.
I don't have a full 18 months to work with you guys,
so I need you guys to be on top of your game,
coachable, teachable.
What we're doing is a lot of situational awareness,
being aware of your surroundings,
trying to be quiet.
Just walk like a normal human being.
You'll be fine.
So I need you to put this under that back Jeep.
- How do they stick? Are they magnetic?
- Yup.
Onto metal. Just walk normal.
Back vehicle. - We believe in you.
- The back vehicle? - Yeah.
- Okay. [alarm blaring]
- Busted. You're dead.
- Dude, are you serious? - What did I do?
- First to die.
- Oh, my God!
Oh!
Oh, it's so loud.
It's so loud.
My jaunty scarf didn't save me.
Damn it!
- I'd rather you learn a lesson in training than in action.
- No, and I appreciate that.
So take me through my mistake.
- You know, you need to be aware of your surroundings.
- Sure, of course.
- Now, would you want to leave that there,
turn it off, leave it, or take it with you?
- Turn it off.
- Turn it off, but then...
- You leave it there.
- Yeah, 'cause if you take it somewhere,
then they'll be like--
- It might have a tracker device on it.
- But could you use this as a tool?
- Or you could use it as a distraction, maybe?
- Exactly.
Or if you were leaving, if you wanted to set it up
and then to cover your tracks so that you're alerted
if somebody was following you.
all: Oh. - That's smart.
- How you move without making sounds
or being detected or things like that?
- I mean, you don't want to be shuffling your feet.
Your gear, like I was saying, if you were to move around,
I mean, you're making a lot of noise.
We would tape up all the metal.
Sometimes we do little jump tests.
Like, you jump up and down. - Uh-huh, sure.
- Walking, just walking normal.
But just be aware of your surroundings,
like you learned earlier.
- Right, yes. - Okay.
- In the game, Snake does a lot of, like,
crawling through vents, crawling under trucks.
What techniques can you show us?
- You see on some video games or movies,
they're just going like this, and they're pulling themselves.
- Okay. - You're now leaving a track.
We can practice crawling under the vehicle.
One of the parts for crawling, guys, is same thing.
Like, I don't want to be down here, like, pulling myself out.
I want to stay as low as possible if I needed to.
So you're gonna almost pick yourself up and do this.
- Yeah. - Okay.
Good, way to survey the scene.
- Wait, did you look at your surroundings?
- Yeah. - Okay.
[laughter]
- Yeah, this is much slower than it is...
- In the game? - In the game.
- Little--little bit. [laughter]
- What if Snake was doing this, like, "Ugh, like, come on.
This game sucks."
[laughter]
[grunts]
- Here we go. Okay.
I'm already dragging.
- He has way too much stuff.
- Yeah, is that empty bag on your back,
like, necessary?
- You're having to drag all your gear
and carry everything else, and you're stuck.
- Speaking of that gear, I believe I have--
I believe the axle of the truck has caught me, so...
- Okay, so you'd have to reach back behind you
and see if you can squeeze under it.
There you go. - You got it.
- So here are some, you know, basic cutters.
We're gonna want these painted up.
Don't want to be walking around with something red, right?
- Well, this is red and blue.
- Well, we ain't training right now.
- Oh, okay.
- But you can do push-ups until I'm done talking.
- Oh, no!
You got the push-ups.
- Why did I open my mouth?
- You know, these are gonna be
a little more hard-core, you know.
You can see the multiple levers.
You can get up, bud.
- [groans] Okay.
- So something to think about with the cuts,
we don't want to do it right in the corner
'cause we want to be able to hook it back.
Does that make sense? - Mm-hmm.
- So we're gonna make the cut the minimal amount
that you need to go through but also have
the ability to somewhat put it back together.
So from right here, try to slowly squeeze--
And that still made noise. - Right.
- Know what I mean? So then I'd take this.
I would just unhook that. - Okay.
- And so then we're just gonna work our way up.
- You didn't even cut it. - It didn't even cut.
- Use your "musk-les." Spin it.
- It's all the way together.
- Spin it. - Put your purse down.
- Wow. - [laughs]
- "Set your purse down."
- I thought--I thought I did it so quietly.
- These are the ones that are supposed to make it really easy.
- It is easy. It's super easy.
- Who else wants a turn? - Give it to me.
Give it to me. - Yeah.
She's got it under control.
Who knew that cutting a fence would be--
It's like a puzzle. - It's such an art.
- Yeah, it's really crazy.
- All right, so we're gonna try out the chokes.
- Okay. - Okay?
So go ahead and drop down to your knees, bud.
- Okay. - You got it, man.
- I'm making this too easy.
- You're such an accommodating victim.
- I mean, it's gonna happen no matter what,
depending on how you want--
- You want to do this the easy way?
- I should do this the easy way.
- So one thing to think about as you come up from behind,
like, I don't want to go like this 'cause he sees that, right?
- Oh, look, a hand.
- So what I'm gonna do is, I'm gonna--
which applies to this game, I'm gonna snake it around.
- Hey! Well done! - Oh!
- All right, so, I'm just gonna come here.
Come around here.
- Oh, ***. [laughter]
- All right, it has to be done somewhat quick.
- We all got, like, really close together.
- This got serious in a hurry.
- Now I want you guys to try it on me.
- Okay. - Okay?
- So remember... - No.
- Ladies first. - No!
- Ladies first.
- Really?
- Yes, absolutely. - Aw!
You would snake it around this way and up
and then push here
and pull you back?
Oh. Yeah? Did I do it?
- [laughs]
- [laughs] Yeah!
- Do I level up?
- Yes.
Leveled up choking skill.
- All right, next?
- It seems so simple, but...
- Right? It seems so--
- He's also not fighting back.
- Okay, here we go. - Yup, go ahead.
- So I'm here.
And I'm pulling you back like this.
- Bring this up. Squeeze. You got it tight?
- Yup, yup, yup.
Thank you.
[laughter]
Thank you.
I feel like this was a good moment between us.
So I believe our expert here
has set up a little challenge to put our skills to the test.
- Ooh. - All right.
- So shall we go get ready for that?
- Yeah. - Let's do it.
- Here, let's head on out, right?
So I asked JP to design a challenge for us
that's gonna put to test
everything that we learned today.
JP, take us through it.
- The two of you guys, you guys are gonna go inside.
You're gonna infiltrate there.
Need you guys to get to a tent. There's a hard drive.
Get it and get out. - Okay.
- The two of you guys are gonna be inside.
You guys are gonna protect it, okay?
If they capture you guys,
if they put two hands on you, you're out.
If they come up to you guys,
come behind you, choke, tap you, you're out.
All right, any questions?
- No questions. - Mm-mm.
- Just beware the snake.
- Pfsh! - Whoa-ho-ho!
- All right, you guys get going.
We're gonna go this way. - All right.
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
[electronic beep]
- No one's there.
- Can't see anything, Matt. Okay.
♪ ♪
This is gonna be good.
♪ ♪
- The light's back on.
♪ ♪
- Go, go, go.
- Oh, shoot.
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
- I think I went too far.
♪ ♪
- He's coming. ***.
♪ ♪
Okay.
I am currently taking a page out of "Metal Gear Solid"
and hiding in a box.
- How do I know when to get out?
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
I repeat, two people headed your way.
♪ ♪
- She is not moving.
She seems to be listening to your guys' movements.
Use the shadows to your advantage
as you get closer to the tent.
Take them out and get the hard drive
and get out of there.
[alarm blaring]
You don't have any time. You tripped an alarm.
Move now.
[blaring continues]
[alarm silences]
[alarm blaring]
- Choke her as soon as she passes you and go.
[blaring continues]
Matt, just go for it.
Go for it right down the center.
♪ ♪
- [panting]
♪ ♪
[alarm blaring]
♪ ♪
- [screams] Oh, my God.
[laughter]
Are you okay?
[laughter]
Put that back!
You dead.
- Take me. Take me. - Let's go.
- Take me. - [laughs]
Nice try, man.
I had a feeling one went that way.
Are you okay? Oh!
- Oh, ***!
- What the heck?
[laughter]
- I got you!
- Gonna do it anyway. I'll trust you.
- Hard drive's safe.
- Sit down!
- Welcome to prisoner cam.
I'm your host, MatPat.
You weren't responding to me on the walkie.
- She was standing right there.
[laughter]
- Okay, so let's recap here.
This is much harder than I think anyone anticipated.
First off, what were you guys seeing?
What were we seeing? Let's talk about that.
- At first, like, we didn't see a thing.
The spotlight was right on the tent.
We couldn't see anything past the Humvee.
So when you guys came in through the gate...
- That makes so much sense.
- We couldn't see anything.
- Each time Austin and I would peek out around the corner
right at the front of the gate here,
like, Odom every damn time.
It's like, "Oh, there's Odom again.
Odom, leave the damn Humvee!"
- I was just standing there like,
"I know I can see past the light if I just try harder."
[dramatic music]
- Okay, so round two,
it's us four gamers
going up against JP.
Do we stand a chance against an ex-Navy SEAL?
Well, we're gonna try.
♪ ♪
- [whistles]
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
- [whistles]
- [whistles]
♪ ♪
- [whistles]
♪ ♪
- [whistles]
♪ ♪
[yelling in foreign language]
- Oh, my God.
- [yelling in foreign language]
♪ ♪
Come out, come out and I don't kill you.
♪ ♪
- [screaming]
Oh, my God.
[alarm blaring]
♪ ♪
- You're dead. You're dead.
♪ ♪
- Damn.
He's gonna kill me.
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
[alarm blaring]
♪ ♪
- It's like "Five Nights at Freddy's" in here.
He's using his flashlight to check
literally every nook and cranny
and coming back over and over again to the tent.
That was the mistake I made.
- Come get your buddy's body!
He just stole my walkie-talkie.
I don't know what he's gonna do with it.
[alarm blaring]
- You're dead.
- [gurgling]
♪ ♪
[alarm blaring]
I need some ghost with a bazooka.
♪ ♪
- You're dead.
♪ ♪
- There's no chance.
♪ ♪
[alarm blaring]
- Aah! No!
[laughs]
- All four are dead. All four are dead.
[techno music]
- [laughs] - What happened?
- Oh, my God.
- He slaughtered us, that's what happened.
- We died. - We got killed.
- A lot. - He was brutal.
You, sir, are a beast.
[alarm blaring]
Take me through what your strategy was through all this.
- Right away, I saw you guys come in through the front gate.
- Oh, yeah. It was miserable.
- My whole goal was just to kill one of you guys.
I just wanted one so I can grab your radios
and just start messing with you.
- That's me.
He just stole my walkie-talkie.
- I suggest you come and get your buddy's body
before I do unimaginable things to it.
- That screwed me because I didn't
realize you had the radio.
- As soon as I knew these were compromised,
I just took mine off, and I was like, "Nah, ditch that."
- By the way, just-- I have to say,
you were the first to die,
like I said at the very beginning of this episode.
Can we cut back to that?
I told you you'd be the first to die.
- Oh, no!
Okay. - And that's a callback.
- Well, there you go. Final thoughts.
- This was incredibly fun.
It was exhilarating sneaking around
and, like, trying not to get caught.
It was so much fun.
- I thought this was such an incredible experience.
Really gave me even more appreciation
for what you guys do out there.
- Austin, what about you, sir?
- Hard as it was sneaking in against you guys,
it was 100 times harder sneaking in
against someone who actually knew what he was doing.
Compromised our radio system.
Like, he knew where I was.
I told him where I was. - Genius.
- And I think, at the end of the day,
what today really showed is, people like JP
are spending years of their lives
so that way, when they're put into these situations,
where the stakes are phenomenally higher--
it is literally life or death-- they're not panicking.
They are staying true to their training.
So thank you, sir, so much for today.
- Great job. You guys did good, man.
- When it comes to "Metal Gear Solid,"
there's a couple takeaways here.
First, alert mode: just because you're spotted
doesn't necessarily mean you're caught.
Just because an alarm goes off in another part of the place
doesn't mean that your partner's already caught.
So good job, "Metal Gear."
You're actually pretty on point when it comes to that.
- No one brought the cardboard box.
- I used a box. - He was in a box.
- You did? - Yeah.
I don't think he hears me right now.
- That's how he ended up behind me.
I just walked right by him while he was hiding in the box.
- So against amateurs, box strategy for the win.
- I didn't even know he was in a box.
- Boxes may work against people like these guys.
Boxes ain't gonna work against this guy.
Like, he will find that box and stomp it into the ground.
So I think that about wraps things up here for today.
But I do have one final request
before we truly close things out.
One more round. One more round.
You infiltrate on us.
- Get some. - Oh!
- Oh, bring it on, sir.
We'll be seeing you soon.
- Get it.
- Gonna die.
- Team Penetrate.
- Yes! - Yeah!
- The plans--we have so many plans.
- We've got plans A through Y.
- Yeah, yeah. - We're working on plan Z now.
- Plan Z is "scream and run around."
- [laughs]
Aah!
- Run straight for the device.