Konami helping to make a bionic arm for a double amputee Metal Gear Solid fan

Metal Gear Solid 5 publisher Konami is helping to make a prosthetic limb for a double amputee gamer.

The company is working with prosthetics artist Sophie De Oliveira Barata and a team of engineers, roboticists and product designers to make a bespoke arm for 25-year-old James Young, who in 2012 lost an arm and a leg when he was dragged onto the tracks between two carriages of the London DLR as it was pulling in.

Konami said the bionic arm is inspired by the prosthetic limb seen in Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain.

It's perhaps easy to cast a cynical eye over Konami's involvement in the creation of a prosthetic limb inspired by Metal Gear Solid 5, a game in which Snake uses a bionic arm after awaking from a nine-year coma, but Sophie De Oliveira Barata has made a name for herself creating prosthetic limbs that reflect the personality of their users.

She established the Alternative Limb Project, "creating limbs that people look at in amazement instead of looking away". She's made SteamPunk arms and cyborg-inspired legs, as well as the crystal leg used by amputee performer Viktoria Modesta during the opening ceremony of the 2012 Paralympics.

And James, as a fan of Metal Gear Solid, is keen to get involved with the development of what Konami says will be a "highly stylised and multi-functional limb". There's a documentary about the whole thing in the works, which will be published on The Phantom Limb blog after January 2016.