Hideo Kojima is a legendary developer and known for eccentric games. Some of his views and statements are also quite surprising. He has a clear stance when it comes to the expertise of a developer.
Who is Hideo Kojima? If you are unfamiliar with the name: Hideo Kojima is one of the most prominent developers in gaming and the father of the long-running series Metal Gear Solid
, which was created under Konami. For several years, he worked with his own studio on Death Stranding 1 & 2 and is currently working on the sequel project OD.
Kojima is known for his innovative game concepts and also for telling his eccentric stories in extravagant cutscenes at a movie level. Especially important to the developer seem to be the small details that bring a scenario and the characters to life.
Recently, he expressed criticism of the gaming industry, noting among other things that many of his colleagues simply did not know what exactly they were working on. He, on the other hand, has trained.
With Kojima, even the trailers are long – see here the one for Death Stranding 2:
A classic Kojima
What does Kojima say? In a conversation with SSENSE, Kojima spoke about the industry and mentioned that he visited a large studio that sought his advice for a new game.
It was about a stealth game, presumably similar to Metal Gear Solid – no wonder they sought Kojima’s help. However, he seemed quite unimpressed by the game shown to him. It was primarily because developers often do not really understand the subject matter they portray in a game. In the interview, Kojima said:
People who develop military games probably don’t know how to disassemble a weapon or shoot with it. That’s kind of sad.
When asked whether he himself has experience with such things, he replied:
Yes, because I have undergone that training too, and I have learned so many ways to kill people.
He did not elaborate further on the latter statement – a classic Kojima indeed. However, it shows that the legendary developer thinks about all aspects of his games. Kojima wants to understand how an activity, such as shooting a weapon, works in reality.
Let’s just hope that he keeps his knowledge about killing to himself and does not put any of it into practice …
Whether developers really need to be familiar with all the details of their titles is likely a matter of debate. It is certainly helpful to possess some expertise to create authentic and credible scenarios. Or what do you think about it? Feel free to let us know in the comments. A game by Kojima recently made waves: The faces in the game of a legendary developer are so good that players can bypass Discord’s age verification
