Hideo Kojima the popular Japanese Game director, screen writer, video-game designer and a producer of widely praised titles has recently joined hands with Sony. This new partnership was confirmed by Sony Computer Entertainment president Andrew House on YouTube late Tuesday night.
Hideo Kojima was the former vice-president of Konami Digital Entertainment, which he left after the completion of his last game Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. The story of Kojima and Konami split was one the hottest topic of content in the gaming world for most of 2015. The split was further fueled by the success of Phantom Pain which raked in $179 million dollars on its launch day.
Kojima has been known to make grand and indulgent games which are popular to go over their initial budget. The New Yorker reported on his leave, that
The work on Phantom Pain known to have been slower and more expensive than the company planned.
A Nikkei report estimated cost of $80 million dollars for development. They also added that “Some people within the video-game industry contend that his resignation was less a result of personal or artistic differences than of tectonic changes in the business—namely, the move away from console games and toward the domain of the mobile device.”. In fact Konami has been moving away from video games in general and focusing its attention Kachinko machines in Japan ever since.
The split was in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons. Konami renamed Kojima Productions LA as Konami Los Angeles Studio, which was later shut down entirely. Kojima was also blocked from attending The Game Awards 2015, as said by the host Geoff Keighley after the event. He also left the Tokyo office of Konami on Friday, October 9, where he had worked for the last 29 years (since 1986). Konami also did away with the mention of Kojima’s name across their website, and the promotion material for their new game, all of which was conspicuous by its absence.
Perhaps the strongest blow of all was the cancellation of the next installment of Silent Hills. A game which was being made with the collaboration of Guillermo del Toro under the leadership of Kojima. The demo of the game, called P.T. was very highly recieved by the gaming industry, and caused some major heart-ache among the gaming industry when the game was finally called off.
Ever since his official resignation however, which was December 15 of this year, Kojima has been showcasing his new partnership with Sony. As it now stands, Kojima has created a new game development studio under the umbrella of Sony. The new studio is simply called , “Kojima Productions” and is set to release games specifically for the PlayStation platform.
In an interview with IGN, Kojima told that the former Metal Gear Solid artist Yoji Shinkawa and producer Kenichiro Imaizumi will also be joining him in his first project which will “slightly more edgy.” In the same interview, Hideo Kojima was quoted as saying: “I’ll KEEP MAKING BIG GAMES ‘AS LONG AS I CAN’.”
Kojima is no slouch when it comes to credentials. He earned Lifetime Achievement Award in MTV’s 2008 Game Awards and also in 2009 Game Developers Conference and also listed sixth in IGN’s top game creator of all time. So its no suprise that Sony were more than happy to scoop Kojima up. It made even more sense when you consider that the Metal Gear franchise initially made its name on the PlayStation format.
What do you think of this new development. Are you a Kojima fan. Do you think this partnership is any good. Let us know in the comments.