Is PlayStation About To Acquire Kojima Productions?

Is PlayStation About To Acquire Kojima Productions?

Has PlayStation already acquired Kojima Productions? That’s the rumour going around today. Let’s look into it together.

Wait, what?

As reported by Ars Technica, a user on the ResetEra gaming forum noticed that Sony had given its official PlayStation Studios website an update. Contained in that update was a new banner full of hero shots from games created by studios under the PlayStation Studios’ first-party umbrella.

There, on the far left side, was a picture of Death Stranding‘s main character, Sam Porter, played by Norman Reedus. Death Stranding is not a PlayStation Studios title, nor is it a PlayStation exclusive. Furthermore, at the time of writing, Kojima Productions, the studio that produced Death Stranding, is not part of PlayStation Studios.

Much of the banner in question remains the same as it was in 2021. Certain elements have been added or updated to reflect new games — MLB The Show 22, Gran Turismo 7, and Horizon Forbidden West all get fresh art. Bluepoint’s Demon’s Souls remake has been added to the list following that studio’s acquisition last year. This makes Death Stranding the only title in the list not expressly produced by a PlayStation Studios team.

Could PlayStation have put this new banner in place ahead of an announcement? Could it have gone live early and spilled the beans? Or does PlayStation consider its relationship with Kojima Productions so secure that it has become a de facto first-party studio?

A side-by-side comparison

Compare and contrast the two banners below:

kojima productions
The old PlayStation Studios logo (Image: PlayStation)

 

death stranding
The new PlayStation Studios logo (Image: PlayStation)

All this, and then Hideo Kojima started posting on Twitter.

Death Stranding director and Kojima Productions head Hideo Kojima posted this new PlayStation Studios banner, with the logo superimposed in its lower third, from his Japanese Twitter account:

Kojima is known for posting any old thing he comes across online, particularly things that catch his fancy. He is also the world’s most visible Death Stranding stan, regularly sharing fan art and memes about his game. This could just be Kojima spotting the banner, thinking it was neat, and posting it to his account.

But he also posted it to his Japanese account, where he maintains a more businesslike persona than on his fan-centric English account.

A brief history of Kojima Productions

An acquisition by PlayStation would be a massive move for Kojima. Though Metal Gear Solid revived his military stealth series as a PlayStation exclusive, its popularity saw it jump to other platforms quite quickly. Kojima Productions was founded following the completion of Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, and an acrimonious split from long-time publisher Konami. Though the Metal Gear IP stayed in Konami’s hands, Kojima’s new company gave him the kind of creative independence that produces a game like Death Stranding.

PlayStation agreed to publish the title as a console exclusive, while the PC port went to 505 Games. To date, no Xbox version of the game has ever emerged, nor has it ever appeared on Game Pass for PC.

Sony’s most recent acquisition was that of Destiny 2 studio and creators of the Halo series, Bungie. Rumours abound that PlayStation’s acquisition spree is only just beginning as it attempts to keep pace with Microsoft, itself busy throwing eye-watering amounts of cash about.

This could all, of course, be nothing more than a big coincidence, or even a simple error from the graphics department. Nevertheless, we watch with interest to see what comes of this in the next few days.

Source: Ars Technica, Hideo Kojima on Twitter.


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