It seems to be a rough time for anyone who is trying to upgrade their software lately. First there was Sony’s problem with their big firmware upgrade, but now we have something else to add to the mix. You all have probably heard this week about the Metal Gear Online “Gene Expansion,” which promised several new maps in addition to two new female characters.

With those things, however, came something else that no one had predicted. The word came down the pipeline yesterday that the expansion pack caused such a calamitous disruption that Metal Gear Online and the game’s Reward Shops went down and the login service was disrupted. Konami’s only solution to this problem as of yesterday was to reduce various IP ranges open to use the shops in order to limit the problems, along with shutting down all the Metal Gear Online “Survival” fights that were due to occur this weekend.

The company is apparently working diligently on the problem as we speak. No update to the situation has been published onto the Metal Gear Online support forum, but as of yesterday, they were still combating the online shop problems. According to the most recent post on the site, the people at Konami “would like to again apologize for the ongoing problems and all inconveniences caused” and that they would “like to inform that there were customers who have found that they have not received their items despite paying for them and of them, the 490 that have made their purchases before 19:00 (PDT) on 17/07/2008.” For those who tried to buy items after that time period, however, Konami said that they “would like to update you subsequently” and asked that users “please keep checking this page for updates.”

Konami’s last word on the matter thus far? “We would finally like to apologize for all inconveniences caused.”

So, Konami is still eating crow, but their choice to make the Metal Gear Online services entirely in-house seems to be having backlashes that make it appear not to have been such a good idea. Apparently, their enthusiasm over the project got the better of them, but we can only hope that this will be the end of the problems for Konami as they were doing so well with Metal Gear Solid 4 before.