Geek Out: Kojima, Konami, and the future of the “Metal Gear Solid” series

This is my finale edition of Geekout so I figured I’d talk about Konami and Hideo Kojima.

Over the past few weeks, rumors have been circulating that the relationship between Kojima, mastermind behind the Metal Gear Solid series, and Konami is dissolving. I’m not going to go through the timeline of events, but as it stands right now, Kojima’s Silent Hill game, Silent Hills, has been canceled and the Kojima name is being taken off of the company’s products. Some people think it’s all a big prank, which wouldn’t be much of a surprise considering how much Kojima likes to mess with people, but I think something big must have happened, especially if you look at how everything has taken place.

First and foremost, there wasn’t some press release explaining that Kojima and Konami are parting ways, which is something that companies tend to do when a longtime employee decides to retire or leave. I firmly believe that Kojima quit and Konami tried to convince him to come back and failed to do so. For years Kojima has stated that he’d like to leave the Metal Gear series and try more new things. He actually stated back when he was developing Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots that this would be the last Metal Gear game. So its plausible that Kojima simply quit or at least told Konami that he was leaving after Silent Hills.

Obviously Konami would want Kojima to stay, the man is the creator of one of the biggest and most profitable game franchises of all time, but they failed to convince him. When they failed to do so they acted out. Honestly, Konami is acting like a child in this situation if what I believe to have happened did indeed happen. The company is actively trying to erase the Kojima name from history. They changed the name of his development studio, the studio’s twitter account, and began to take his name off of titles that were previously released. To top it off the company canceled Silent Hills, a title that Kojima was working on. The cancelation of Silent Hills seems odd. The game was supposed to be released next year and it was generating a lot of positive buzz when it made its debut at last year’s E3. Silent Hills was a sure fire hit for Konami so its cancelation doesn’t make much sense.

At the end of the day its been sad few weeks for fans of Kojima and his projects. If he did quit Konami, Kojima cannot take the Metal Gear franchise with him and Konami has made it clear that the Metal Gear series will continue with or without Kojima, but the thought of a main series Metal Gear game being released without Kojima’s influence is not ideal. In the next few months, more information on the relationship between Kojima and Konami should surface as Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain gets closer to its release date.

Since this is my last week on the paper, I’d like to thank everyone who works for this paper. It’s been a fun two years and I’ve learned quite a bit from everyone here. Special thanks goes to Brad for putting up with me. Thanks for everything man. I appreciate it all. Also a shout out needs to go to my sports section, Mia and Joel, for turning out great articles this semester. I can’t forget to say thanks to Mia who is an unbelievable writer. Her articles aren’t just good, they are great and she tackles issues that most wouldn’t. From the bottom of my heart, thank you for the opportunity.