# How Stephen King watching a train hit a kid led to Kiefer Sutherland making his videogame horse crap on command: A PC Gamer Causality Chain™

- URL: https://talkfuse.com/story/how-stephen-king-watching-a-train-hit-a-kid-led-to-kiefer-sutherland-making-his-videogame-horse-crap-on-command-a-pc-gamer-causality-chain/
- Published: 2026-08-13T15:34:45+00:00
- Updated: 2026-08-13T16:07:48+00:00
- Original publisher: PC Gamer
- Original article: https://www.pcgamer.com/games/how-stephen-king-watching-a-train-hit-a-kid-led-to-kiefer-sutherland-making-his-videogame-horse-crap-on-command-a-pc-gamer-causality-chaintm/
- Topics: Entertainment, Gaming

## Key points

- A childhood tragedy influenced Stephen King’s writing.
- Stand by Me connected King’s work to Kiefer Sutherland.
- Sutherland helped inspire D-Horse’s commandable defecation.

## Summary

The article traces an unusual chain of influence from a childhood incident witnessed by Stephen King to a deliberately absurd feature in Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. It argues that King’s experience helped inspire The Body, which became the film Stand by Me, where Kiefer Sutherland played Ace Merrill; Sutherland later voiced Snake in the Metal Gear game and helped shape its horse-related humour.

The key detail is that Sutherland reportedly asked whether the player could make the horse, D-Horse, defecate on command, an idea ultimately included in the game. The article presents this as a playful example of how real events, books, films, actors and games can connect across decades in unexpected ways.

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Summarised by TalkFuse (https://talkfuse.com/). Quote the original publisher for the reporting and link this page for the summary and discussion.