![]() ![]() For example, Metal Gear Solid 3 forces players to climb a ladder for almost three minutes, inviting reflection on the bewildering one-hour boss battle that preceded it. Kojima is a master of complex emotions but his chief talent as a game designer is his ability to challenge expectations of what games are supposed to do. I hope I can encourage people with trauma to be brave and just go on”. I’m not saying: go over your trauma, but I think people should look at it as their individualism as well. “Everyone has, whether they say it or not. That’s how I lived and who I am today.” Tellingly, the Metal Gear Solid games address complex father-son relationships, but Kojima’s work seems in recent years to have moved from personal reflection to a wider social message. I had to say: believe in yourself, and do what you believe. ![]() I lost my father when I was really young. “Everyone thinks I do crazy stuff, but I’m sensitive. ![]() Kojima’s self-reliance comes from the hardship he experienced when he was young. When Kojima left Konami in 2015 after 29 years, in mysterious, acrimonious circumstances, publishers worldwide queued up to offer him a blank cheque, hoping to tap into his creative kudos and devoted fans. Over five games since 1998, Metal Gear told an indulgent, prescient, anti-war tale about genetics, family, legacy and the rise of the information age, while also proving totally unafraid of a fart joke. Kojima went on to invent “hide and seek” stealth gaming with his hugely influential PSOne hit Metal Gear Solid, but made his reputation by defying fans’ expectations. He soon took a role at renowned Japanese game company Konami, where he foresaw a new era of interactive storytelling. Instead of film he studied economics, but found himself absorbed by video games at university. However, he felt obliged to follow a more responsible path after the death of his father, a travelling salesman. Given Death Stranding’s Hollywood cameos and its epic aesthetic, it is no surprise that, as a child, Kojima wanted to direct movies. Players experience “connection” via Death Stranding’s online world: you will not see other players, but can leave signposts (which can warn of danger ahead or restore stamina), share items such as parcel-repair spray and contribute to construction projects, including building a bridge over one of the game’s wild rivers. The game’s painstaking focus on preparing to deliver parcels – you need to balance your cargo carefully like a Jenga stack – is a metaphor for a duty of care to others. I want people to experience the meaning of connection through Death Stranding’s world and its systems.”Īs video games start to resemble on-demand services, delivered in Netflix-style chapters such as cultural-phenomenon shooter Fortnite, Kojima stands as a lone auteur, obsessing over the texture detail of a doorknob, and inserting tonally jarring gags about Flavor Flav into Death Stranding’s most earnest scenes. “Of course it’s fun, but we’re animals and can’t live alone. “On the internet, like in games, we’re all competing for a headshot,” Kojima says. Yet Death Stranding also stands apart from its blockbuster gaming peers, prioritising a theme of “connection” over traditional video-game violence. He is in town for the launch of the game, which has been more than three years in the making and is one of 2019’s most feverishly anticipated releases. This magical technology should have made people happy, but we’re battling each other,” Kojima explains from the sofa of a central London hotel. Everyone is fragmented, in America or Europe, but at the same time we’re connected by the internet. Norman Reedus and Léa Seydoux in Death Stranding. Inexplicably, it suggests, humanity’s best hope is The Walking Dead star Norman Reedus wearing a psychic jar baby. The focus is on bringing isolated communities together – a response, Kojima has said, to Trump’s wall and Brexit – with the game rewarding players for working together, not drifting apart. Hugely ambitious and hugely divisive, it tasks players with delivering packages across a barren America where the living and dead coexist. “I’ll do whatever the fuck he wants,” said Oscar-winning director Guillermo del Toro of Kojima in 2016.ĭel Toro features, along with the likes of Mads Mikkelsen and Léa Seydoux, in Kojima’s new game, Death Stranding. Indeed, he has actual auteurs lining up at his feet. Over a three-decade career, the Japanese 56-year-old has come to be regarded by his industry peers as something akin to an auteur such as Martin Scorsese or Terrence Malick. Y ou might not know his name, but with 2.8 million Twitter followers and a coterie of Hollywood disciples, Hideo Kojima is the world’s most famous video game designer. ![]()
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