What if ZOE goes "snake eater" and makes ZOE 3 the story where you play as Leo between ZOE 1 and 2?
It would be nice to see Leo start as a basic LEV pilot, and in the end finally earn the prototype experimental(there is only one, if you noticed) OF/LEV hydrid Vic Viper.

Then in ZOE 4, is where you finally have the REAL final battles and fight Nohman's ghost.But instead of Dingo fighting Nohman, Leo can finally have his REAL battle against the ghost of Nohman.

I JUST KNOWWWW that the final battle will between Leo, and the never-ending ghost of Nohman.




Then Viola will step in to sacrifice herself to save Leo.

I JUST KNOW IT!!!
I SENSE THIS!


THINK ABOUT THIS:

Remember ZOE Idolo?

Idolo is powered by Radium's life force.
What if your life force is more direct, and stronger when it comes directly from your soul? Hence direct spirit energy?



Viola's "A.I." from ZOE 2 seemed a little bit more like an obsessed ghost partially corrupted by metatron.
IN other words, she digitized her very own soul to function with the frame.



ALSO, AM I THE ONLY ONE WHO NOTICED THAT NEPHTIS IS ACTUALLY A MODIFIED ORBITAL FRAME IDOLO??!

Look at the body itself:
*visor design
*chest core(excluding the "boobs")
*shin/legs design
*shoulders
*even the *antenae* that lean back through the visor are the same.

This design explains how she is still obsessed with Radium and still loves him even after death.
This can't possibly be part of Nohman's plan...

However, keep in mind that at the end of ZOE 1, she mostly hated Leo due to her competitiveness, but in the end... just before being burned up in Jupiter's atmosphere, she noticed Leo's mercy and even felt proud of his compliment on her battle skills.(that cutscene made me cry)

This is why I believe Viola will save Leo in the final battle against Nohman.



Viola's been through quite a hellish life:

*saw her crush/best friend killed
*lost her reproductive functions from radiation poisoning when she was little
*could not pilot Idolo due to radiation poisoning
*she was defeated time and time again by a whiny kid in a stolen orbital frame
multiple times
*she died a slow and painful death and was burned alive in the atmosphere of another planet.


In ZOE 2, she had the right to be a vengeful ghost.I would agree why she went insane and said repetitive things suchas "Jehuty, target bravo, secure or destroy"

It is called a repetitive loop, and that happens when someone is so mind-scrambled that they can't even think straight.



Now in ZOE 3, she mainly wishes to destroy Jehuty, but her inner kindness will compel her to defend Leo against Nohman.

With messages of "Leo don't waste your life the way I did"
or "You must survive! Be as strong as I have been!"



Viola, I look forward to seeing you again soon in the ZOE franchise.
You have been in ZOE Idolo, ZOE 1,ZOE 2, and even in a hallucination of Radium's in the final episode of ZOE Dolores, I.

You are a very important character, and the series cannot exist without you.

Dude... ZoE3 hasn't even been announced and you're already thinking of ZoE4? And I seriously doubt she'll return in any conscious form in any future instalment. Yeah, I know runners' souls can be imprinted onto the frames. But, if you remember, Hathor was the only to actually maintain souls in it. Why?
1) it was made from Idolo's wreckage
2) Idolo was immediately related to Radium's psyche

Nephtis, on the other hand, only had some design resemblances to Idolo and Neith and was piloted by nothing more than an AI. They couldn't have recovered the remains of the original Neith, seeing how it was completely incinerated by Jupiter's gravity. They just used whatever data they had collected on Viola's battle style (possibly through test runs, training sessions and recordings of actual encounters, like Leo vs Viola in ZoE1, among other info they could have had access to).

I've always felt that dead characters should stay dead. I'm going to use some comparisons to Metal Gear (I'm assuming you've all played the series). I think that the story of Big Boss exemplifies what I don't want in the story of a character. Up until MGS4, it had always been established that he died long before. I remember being a little kid wondering about this mysterious Big Boss character that seemed to have so much influence on future events, but never actually lived to see them. In a series, where a major character dies, but the events go on, besides giving a sense of passage of time (for example "Back when Big Boss was still alive..."), it also adds debt to the characters that were there but lived on. I think it helped Big Boss to put him in MGS3, because it was before his established death. I think it was also interesting because I could look at Big Boss and know that he would meet his death at the hands of a clone and wouldn't see the Shadow Mosses incident or the Big Shell incident. It added to the character's legacy. When, in MGS4, when he was brought back (and retconned into a "good guy" when he originally was very evil post MGS3), it just hurt him. I felt live the series wasn't 'moving on' past him.

When it comes to characters that die part way into a series, such as Big Boss, I think that progression that happens after the death helps the series as a whole. Plus, I think that if someone were to go back to an earlier time in the series, where that character was still alive, it would create a sense of nostalgia.

Grey Fox was also brought back from the dead. However, I think that since he hadn't been established as dead for the majority of the timeline, and since when he was brought back, he did suffer from major mental problems that it doesn't hurt him. Also, since he was never brought back to life after MGS1, it created a sense of 'moving on' during MGS2, especially when Snake quotes him about being tools of the government.

Personally, I think that if Kojima wanted Viola to be in ZOE2, he shouldn't have killed her in ZOE1. I thought that the AI thing was a little cheesy, but it didn't ruin the game for me and I still enjoyed the boss fights against th Viola AI. However, I think doing it again for any character (Viola, Nohman) would just hurt the series. However, I think that a prequel (MGS3 style) where you play as Viola, or where she is a major character, would be acceptable.

Yup. That'd be pretty awesome. Maybe the moment between Idolo and ZoE1 would be the most fitting for that, seeing how she started piloting Neith in that time and was when she joined BAHRAM.

Vic, I'm gonna havta contradict you in a few spots.

First and foremost: Big Boss was NOT "very evil" post-MGS3. In Portable Ops and Peace Walker, he's quite obviously just another soldier who cares very deeply for the troops under his command. And MGS4 states his motives as working against the Patriots (Zero, Sigint and Paramedic), and thus for a free world as opposed to one under the control of a narcisistic old Brit. Granted, he wanted a little TOO free a world, but free nonetheless.

And there had to be some reason the US government didn't want to give in to Liquid's demands for Big Boss's body in MGS1, that reason being that the US government (i.e., Zero) knew that Big Boss was still alive. And, c'mon, the man survived rockets in Metal Gear 1 with little damage that was repaired using cybernetics, a tiny Zippo and some hairspray ain't gonna kill him.

Now, I will admit, his methods were a little extreme. Using a nuclear equipped walking tank is... a bit much. He didn't need that much to succeed unless he knew where the Patriot AIs were stored and followed through with the plan Liquid eventually attempted twenty years later.

Now, as for this Viola theory. I liked her character development in Idolo, but as of ZOE1, she was damaged goods and needed some relief, death. I imagine in the years between Idolo and ZOE1, she attempted to find love again and it never worked, so she was left with heartache after heartache after heartache, and then there's the fact that she's already dying of space cancer, so once again: relief is needed. So, in other words: NO for Viola being in ZOE3 or 4 (should we even get there). 10 times out of every 11, when a character dies they need to stay dead, unless the resurrection doesn't muck up the story any.

I have to say that I agree with the Viola part you mentioned but you have to understand the Leo was just a kid at the events of ZOE1 and he wasn't used to the pressure from battling OFs he was receiving, it's completely understandable of his behavior in the events of ZOE1 really. But apart from that you do make some sense though I have to say that the ghost of Nohman thing is something that any member on the forum would be against. And yes, ZOE with be SO much different without her, it just wouldn't be the same... AT ALL... So yeah, Viola will always be remembered! ^^

I understand what you are saying here. I do, however, want to clarify that when I said Big Boss was very evil, I meant just Metal Gear 1 & 2, without any light shed on him from MGS4, Portable Ops, and Peace Walker. Just from MG1 & 2 alone, Big Boss is evil. While it's noted later that he was fighting against the Patriots to carry on The Boss's will, I ignored it. I guess I should've factored those in when I was typing...

Well, yes if you just take MG 1 & 2 into account, but the Metal Gear series is definitely one you have to look at as a whole, or else the pieces don't make sense.