After a year full of rumours, the Kojima/Konami saga appears to be coming to a close, with the Japanese newspaper Nikkei reporting that Hideo Kojima’s time with the company has finally ended.
The legendary designer, best known for developing the Metal Gear Solid series, will reportedly start his own studio with other former Konami staff. Nikkei reports that Kojima and crew are in negotiations with Sony to debut their first game on PlayStation platforms, according to a translation by NeoGAF user Zefah (and corroborated by Japanese-speaking Wired editor Chris Kohler.)
This news comes after a seemingly endless saga of reports about Konami mistreating Kojima. Earlier this month, Game Awards host Geoff Keighley fired shots at Konami for not letting the celebrated game designer come to Los Angeles and accept an award for his most recent game, Metal Gear Solid V. We’ve reached out to Konami many, many times for comment on all this, and we pinged them again today about this news.
You may have seen a GameSpot tweet and report suggesting that Kojima is forming a studio with Sony; that report is based on a mistranslation and is not what Nikkei reported.
Comments
28 responses to “Report: Kojima Finally Leaves Konami To Start His Own Studio”
Best news.
Silent Hills reboot confirmed!
No because he doesn’t have the rights to that franchise
Surely konami owns the rights
Personally, I’m looking forward to playing Violent Mills.
Or Quiet Topographical Undulations.
I I’m more interested in Iron Cog Firm, and the adventures of Firm Lizard
Firm Lizard is one of my favourite game characters ever.
and Alloy Machine Stable, starring everybody’s favourite spy, Stable Reptile
They can probably still make it possible just under a different name and setting so its not exactly the same. Now with his own studio nothing can hold him back from producing great games again 🙂
PS. Fk Konami!
That was my point. Hopefully they can make something in the spirit of Silent Hills.
Any word on the studio name? Will definitely be one that’s worth watching.
Kojima Productions
…Konami probably own the rights to that too haha
Fuck You Konami (incorporated)
Probably just stick with Kojima Productions, but I’d like to see it called something different.
But…he’s only on holiday
I thought maybe hes visiting the same farm my childhood dog went to so he could get better.
Gold!
I am so stoked to hear this news. With his own studio, he now has full creative control. ANd the fact he is teaming up with Sony to debut on PS makes this even better. I’d love to see him and Del Toro get to work on a new horror game. Something in the spirit of Silent Hills, but obviously not SH, due to Konami owning it.
Can’t wait to see what he comes out with next.
Don’t be so sure about that. The realities of game development costs mean that he’s gonna have to team up with a publisher. If it’s Sony he should be ok, they tend to give developers enough rope, but just look at what Activision’s Destiny decisions have done to Bungie’s reputation once they earned their “freedom”.
Might be out of the frying pan and into the fire on this one, but it’s too soon to tell.
True. Hopefully this doesn’t happen. I’d like to think Kojima would be smart enough not to get into bed with a publisher that will potentially screw him all over again.
I hope to see the day when Konami sees Kojima’s studio overtaking it in popularity and financial success.
I hope he makes enough money to be able to buy Konami just so he can set fire to it and burn it to the ground. With the board and senior management still inside.
So you hope to see Kojima build the best pachinko machines in the world?
Haha well played.
Fuck yes.
Hey may not have the rights to silent hill.
Coming 2016, A Konami game; Silent Krill
Only just started playing MGS5.. his name is ALL OVER IT when you’re in the game.. really can’t understand Konami removing him from the cover.. such a bad move on their part.