Jetstream Sam meme appears to have given Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance a boost

Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance is seeing a surge in players, reportedly down to a meme.

The Metal Gear Solid spin-off from Platinum Games was first released in 2013 on PS3 and Xbox 360 (with a PC release in 2014), but has recently seen a rise of 1000 percent in its average concurrent Steam players.

That's been put down by some to the recent popularity of the Jetstream Sam meme, spotted by IGN.

A year ago, the game had average concurrent players on Steam at around 122 players. But that's jumped significantly in the last couple of months, hitting 1213 players last month (according to SteamCharts) - that's an increase of just under 1000 percent.

Peak concurrent players, meanwhile, has jumped from 484 this time last year to 2507.

Without any form of re-release or marketing around the game, its rising popularity seems to be from the Jetstream Sam meme.

The cyborg is one of the game's villains who Raiden must contend with.

However, a gif of the character stroking his chin used ironically has recently gone viral across social media.

Is this the power of the internet? After all, as the game's character Monsoon says: "Memes, the DNA of the soul. They shape our will. They are the culture - they are everything we pass on."

Although it is almost 10 years old, Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance is seeing numbers it hasn’t seen since launch.

📈 concurrent players up 1000%
🏆 peak in achievement activity across all platforms

The cause? Various meme templates featuring characters from the game went viral. pic.twitter.com/Ey6FmYAXJp

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