While most us look forward to Christmas because of the presents, food, and family reunions, many Metal Gear Solid fans this year were eagerly awaiting a broadcast called Kojima Station. The broadcast took place on Christmas day, with many fans hoping that some juicy bits of Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain information would be released. Nearly three hours in, after watching Kojima chat and open presents, something new about The Phantom Pain was finally revealed, but it wasn’t the ground breaking announcement that fans were expecting.

You can watch the stream below for yourself, however, if you want to skip to the relevant part you can find it around the 2:44:00 mark:

That’s right, a chicken cap. The big giveaway should have been Kojima wearing the awful thing earlier in the stream, but then who would guess that he’d make Snake wear that atrocious thing? Well actually, considering that Metal Gear Solid possesses some rather strange humour at times, it’s not that far-fetched.

As strange as it may seem, the chicken cap does actually serve a purpose in the game. Much like the Golden Tanooki suit from the Mario series, the chicken cap is offered to players who are struggling quite a bit and have died a few times in the process. Likewise, in The Phantom Pain, if you die many times or continually keep getting caught, the game will offer you the chicken cap. If you accept, you’ll find the game is a bit easier for you whilst wearing your new feathered accessory, such as enemies taking longer to notice you or reacting to you more slowly. Essentially, it will help less skilled players through more challenging parts of the game.

Just to add a sprinkling of Metal Gear Solid silliness, the hat will also be able to do more random things such as glow in the dark (although enemies will not see this). Be warned though, if you’re feeling in the poultry kind of mood and equip the hat, you’ll even be wearing it in the story cut scenes.

Of course, Christmas is not a national holiday in Japan and Kojima didn’t exactly promise some ground breaking reveal. People may feel they wasted three hours of their Christmas, but Kojima delivered nothing less than promised. The chicken cap is actually a pretty useful item and adds a bit more humour to the game too. No doubt quite a few fans will appreciate it on release of The Phantom Pain when it helps them overcome a troublesome mission.

Metal Gear Solid: The Phantom Pain is due to release sometime in 2015.

SOURCE: YouTube