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Hideo Kojima
Photo: Kolby Ari, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons21

Hideo Kojima

Japanese video game designer (born 1963)

Hideo Kojima (小島 秀夫, Kojima Hideo; born August 24, 1963) is a Japanese video game designer, writer, director, and producer. He is best known for the Metal Gear franchise, which remains his most famous and acclaimed work.2

From Wikipedia’s article on Hideo Kojima (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Born Aug 24, 1963.1

About

His games are noted for being highly cinematic, the result of a passion for film and literature which began during his childhood, and he is regarded as a pioneering auteur of video games.

Upon joining Konami in 1986, Kojima directed, designed, and wrote Metal Gear (1987) for the MSX2. The game laid the foundation for the stealth game genre and the renowned Metal Gear franchise, which he continued to direct for 28 years up to Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (2015). During his time at Konami, he created Boktai and produced Zone of the Enders and Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, as well as directing Snatcher (1988) and Policenauts (1994), which were graphic adventure games that came to be regarded for their cinematic presentation.

Kojima founded Kojima Productions within Konami in 2005, and in 2011 he was appointed vice president of Konami Digital Entertainment. In 2014, Kojima was revealed as the director for Silent Hills, the next installment in the Silent Hill franchise, via the playable teaser P.T. which has been cited as one of the greatest horror games of all time. However, the game was cancelled by Konami in 2015, shortly before Kojima's departure from the company.

He then re-established Kojima Productions as an independent studio in December 2015, and, in partnership with Sony, released his first games outside Konami with Death Stranding (2019) and Death Stranding 2: On the Beach (2025). Following the end of his studio's collaboration with Sony, Kojima is directing the upcoming games OD and Physint in association with Xbox. A longtime film enthusiast, he announced in 2019 that his studio would expand into film production, and is currently serving as producer for three Death Stranding adaptations.

From Wikipedia’s article on Hideo Kojima, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.2

Companies

Early life and education

Kojima was born in the Setagaya ward of Tokyo on August 24, 1963. He has two older siblings. His father, Kingo, was a pharmacist who frequently traveled for business and named his son Hideo as it was the most common name among the doctors he met. He moved with his family to Osaka at the age of four; he later described this stage of his early life as an abrupt change of environment that led him to spend much of his time thereafter indoors, where he would watch television or make figurines. His parents were passionate about cinema—especially European films, horror, and Wild West—and began a nightly tradition of watching a film with their children, who were not allowed to go to bed until the film had finished; his parents also did not limit the type of films the children were allowed to see, regardless of content.

Kojima took an interest in filmmaking when a friend brought a Super 8 camera to high school and began making films together, charging other children ¥50 to see them. He tricked his parents into funding a four-day trip to an island off the coast of Japan without telling them that he was going there because he wanted to use it as a filming location; however, he instead spent his time there swimming, and changed the film's plot to be about zombies on the final day as this idea would be quicker to shoot. He did not show the film to his parents.

By Kojima's teenage years, the family had moved to the city of Kawanishi, Hyōgo. When he was 13 years old, his father died. In interviews, he has discussed the impact of his father's death and the subsequent financial hardship faced by his family. He studied economics at university, where he decided to join the video game industry. He wrote fiction while studying, even including a short story in his thesis.

From Wikipedia’s article on Hideo Kojima (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Career

Occupation: video game designer, writer, game designer, video game developer, radio personality, video game producer, screenwriter, computer scientist.4

Known for: Metal Gear, Death Stranding.5

Early career

While still in university, Kojima was initially searching for a way into the film industry. He hoped that if he were to win awards for his written fiction, he would be approached about directing a film. At that time, he saw Nintendo's Famicom and thought of joining the video game industry. He said he had no friends interested in cinema to encourage him, and his friends were also not supportive when he announced his intention to enter game development. He would frequently lie about his occupation in the early days of his career, when working in video games was seen as a "very low status" job and the word for a video game designer did not exist in the Japanese language, and instead told people he worked for a financial firm; during a wedding reception, the other guests laughed at him when the groom introduced him by saying, "[Kojima's] a very talented and otherwise likeable person. But I am sorry to say that, for some unknown reason, he has decided to join a video game company."

Kojima joined video game publisher Konami's MSX home computer division in 1986. He applied to Konami because it was the only game developer listed on the Japanese stock exchange. He was disappointed with the job initially, hoping to make games for the Famicom, and feeling that the 16 colour palette of the MSX was too restrictive. The first game he worked on was Penguin Adventure, the sequel to Antarctic Adventure, as an assistant director. It significantly expanded upon the gameplay of Antarctic Adventure, adding more action game elements, a greater variety of levels, role-playing elements such as upgrading equipment, and multiple endings. In 2019, Polygon's Julia Lee wrote that for "a game made over 30 years ago, Penguin Adventure had some in-depth features". After Penguin Adventure, Kojima started to design a game called Lost Warld [sic], but the game was canceled when it was found to be too complex to run on the MSX.

Metal Gear and Snatcher (1987–1990)

Kojima was asked to take over a project, Metal Gear, from a senior associate. Hardware limitations hindered the development of the game's combat, and Kojima altered the gameplay to focus on a prisoner escaping instead of fighting, inspired by The Great Escape. It was released on July 13, 1987, for the MSX2 home computer in Japan, and in September that year for Europe. The player controls a special forces operative codenamed Solid Snake, who is sent to the fortified state of Outer Heaven to stop a nuclear-equipped walking tank known as "Metal Gear". Metal Gear is one of the earliest examples of the stealth game genre. A port of Metal Gear was released for the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1987, with altered graphics, difficulty, and an abridged ending without the titular weapon. Kojima has openly criticized many of the changes made in the port, including poor translation and the abridged ending. In an interview, a programmer on the NES version of the game said his team were asked to complete the port in only three months, and the NES hardware was not capable of implementing the Metal Gear fight.

His next project was the graphic adventure game Snatcher, released for the NEC PC-8801 and MSX2 computer platforms in Japan on November 26, 1988. Kojima wrote and directed the game. Kojima planned for the game, a graphic adventure with visual novel elements, to have six chapters, but was instructed to trim it down to two. The team wanted to create a third chapter, but were already over the allowed development schedule so were forced to end the game on a cliffhanger. The cyberpunk-influenced game has a semi-open world design. Kojima and character designer Tomiharu Kinoshita treated the project like making a film or anime rather than a game. Former Konami artist Satoshi Yoshoioka, who designed many of Snatcher's characters, said he was persistently guided by Kojima to make the game as cinematic as possible, which later critics have cited as a staple of his work. Adrian Chen of The New York Times wrote that one of his innovations was "the way he applied cinematic storytelling to console video games". Snatcher draws heavily from Ridley Scott's Blade Runner (1982), and includes enough references that the game strays near copyright infringement. A port for the Sega CD was made without Kojima, but the amount of text and length of the script made localisation expensive and time-consuming, taking three months. Snatcher was modestly successful in Japan, but the western port was a commercial failure, selling only a few thousand units. It has developed a cult following in the west.

In 1990, Kojima wrote a remake of Snatcher, SD Snatcher, a role-playing video game which adapted the storyline of the original Snatcher but significantly changed the environments, details of the plot, and core gameplay mechanics. The "SD" stands for "super deformed" in Japanese media, another way to reference chibi character designs. The characters are depicted in a "super deformed" art style, in contrast to the original game's realistic style. Like the original computer versions of Snatcher, it was only released in Japan. It abandoned random encounters and introduced a first-person turn-based battle system where the player can aim at specific parts of the enemy's body with guns. Such a battle system has rarely been used since, but similar ones can later be found in the role-playing games Square's Vagrant Story (2000), Bethesda Softworks's Fallout 3 (2008), and Nippon Ichi's Last Rebellion (2010). In 2007, J. C. Fletcher of Engadget said that Kojima's choice to stylise the character designs "was some postmodern playfulness from Hideo Kojima [...] downplaying the dramatic aspects of his game and overlaying obvious video game conventions on top of it", and connected that to a similar playfulness in his later games.

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Metal Gear 2 and Policenauts (1990–1994)

The original Metal Gear was a commercial success for its release on the NES, and Konami decided to create a sequel to the game, Snake's Revenge, without the involvement of Kojima. When Kojima was riding on the Tokyo transit system, he was told about Snake's Revenge by a colleague working on the project, who asked him to make a new Snake game of his own. As a result, Kojima began work on his own sequel, Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, and the two were both released in 1990. Kojima's game would not be released overseas in North America and Europe until its inclusion in Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence (2006). Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake was a commercial success. The game has received positive reviews from retro-reviewers. IGN notes that Metal Gear 2 introduced stealth mechanics such as making noise to attract guards, crouching and crawling on the ground, disarming mines, and enemies having view cones.

After memory limitation issues prompted him to take a break during the development of Snatcher, Kojima began to explore concepts for Policenauts. He wanted the game to remain in the adventure genre, feeling it was the best method to express what he wanted with video games. He was also growing frustrated with game development and wanted "a way to take creative control back from the programmers". After the release of Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake (1990), he developed a scripting engine so he could decide when animations and music played instead of the programmers. Development on Policenauts, originally called Beyond, began in 1990, and lasted four years.

Policenauts was released in Japan on July 29, 1994, for the PC-9821. In Japan, critics praised Policenauts for its high level of presentation. Both Sega Saturn Magazine and Famitsu praised the quality of animation, voice acting, and its engrossing setting. Retrospective reviews have regarded the game generally positively, and sought to contextualise Policenauts within Kojima's body of work, as heavily stylized and influenced by films.

Metal Gear Solid subseries and mainstream success (1994–2012)

In 1994, Kojima began to plan a 3D sequel to Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, titled Metal Gear Solid and originally planned for release on the 3DO Interactive Multiplayer. After the 3DO was discontinued, development shifted to the Sony PlayStation. For the transition from 2D to 3D graphics, a new engine had to be developed by Kojima and his team. A gameplay demo was first revealed to the public at the 1996 Tokyo Game Show, and was later shown on day 2 of E3 1997 as a short video. The game was released to critical acclaim. Many outlets noted the game's cinematic qualities and innovative stealth gameplay. Kojima became a celebrity in video game news media, and was surprised when he began to be recognized in public.

In early 2001, Kojima released the first details of the sequel to Metal Gear Solid, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, for the PlayStation 2. The game's highly detailed graphics, physics, and expanded gameplay quickly made it one of the most anticipated games at the time. The game was highly successful and critically acclaimed at release, due to its graphics, gameplay, and storyline, which dealt with myriad philosophical themes as specific as memes, censorship, manipulation, patricide, the inherent flaws of democracy and as grandiose as the nature of reality itself. While Metal Gear Solid 2 appealed to gamers with the discussion of these, the bewildering maze of dialogue and plot revelation in the final hours of the game was a disappointment for many gamers, who expected the Hollywood-style resolution of its forerunner.Before Metal Gear Solid 2 was released, Kojima produced the game and anime franchise Zone of the Enders in 2001 to moderate success. In 2003, he produced Boktai: The Sun Is in Your Hand for the Game Boy Advance, in which players take the role of a young vampire hunter who uses a solar weapon charged by a photometric sensor on the game cartridge, forcing them to play in sunlight. Another team inside Konami, in a collaboration with Silicon Knights, began work on Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes, a GameCube enhanced remake of the first Metal Gear Solid with all the gameplay features of Metal Gear Solid 2 and with cutscenes redirected by director Ryuhei Kitamura.

Afterwards, Kojima designed and released Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater for the PlayStation 2. Unlike the previous games in the series, which took place in the near future and focused on indoor locations, the game is set in a Soviet jungle during the height of the Cold War in 1964, and features wilderness survival, camouflage, and James Bond styled espionage. The North American version was released on November 17, 2004, with the Japanese counterpart following on December 16. The European version was released on March 4, 2005. Critical response to the game was highly favorable. Kojima has said that his mother played it, "It took her an entire year to complete Metal Gear Solid 3. She would get her friends to help her. When she defeated The End, [a character the player faces off during the game] she called me up and said: 'It is finished'."

At that time, Kojima produced Boktai's sequel, Boktai 2: Solar Boy Django for the Game Boy Advance. Released in summer 2004, it makes more extensive use of the cartridge's sunlight sensor and allows players to combine various new solar weapons. Also released was Metal Gear Acid for the PlayStation Portable handheld. A turn-based game, it is less action-oriented than the other Metal Gear games and focuses more on strategy. It was released in Japan on December 16, 2004. Its sequel, Metal Gear Acid 2, was released on March 21, 2006.

Kojima wanted Solid Snake to appear in Super Smash Bros. Melee, but Nintendo refused, due to development cycle problems. When Super Smash Bros. Brawl was in development, series director Masahiro Sakurai contacted Kojima to work and add Snake and content related to the Metal Gear series, including a stage based on Shadow Moses Island (the main setting of Solid), into the game.

Released in June 2008, Kojima co-directed Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots alongside Shuyo Murata. Initially, Kojima was not going to be director, but death threats made against him made the team nervous, and he made the decision to work with them.

Kojima received a lifetime achievement award at the MTV Game Awards 2008 in Germany. In his speech, he said in English, "I have to say, even though I received this award, let me state that I will not retire. I will continue to create games as long as I live".

Before E3 2009, Kojima stated interest in working with a Western developer. This later turned out to be a collaboration between him and Spanish developer MercurySteam to work on Castlevania: Lords of Shadow.

Although he announced that Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots would be the last Metal Gear game he would be directly involved in, he announced at E3 2009 that he would return to help on two Metal Gear games: Metal Gear Solid: Rising, as a producer and Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker as writer, director, and producer. When interviewed at Gamescom 2009, Kojima stated that he got more involved with Peace Walker because "there was a lot of confusion within the team and it didn't proceed as I wanted it to. Therefore I thought that I needed to jump in and do Peace Walker".

Kojima was at E3 2010 to show off his team's latest project, Metal Gear Solid: Rising. He was also seen in Nintendo's 3DS interview video, where he stated he was interested in making a Metal Gear Solid game for the 3DS and wondered what it would be like in 3D. This game ended up being a remake of Metal Gear Solid 3 titled Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater 3D. In late 2011, Metal Gear Solid: Rising was renamed Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance with PlatinumGames being involved in developing it alongside Kojima Productions. Nevertheless, Kojima is the game's executive producer and showed interest in working in the game's demo. Kojima was satisfied with the final product and expressed the possibility of a sequel if Platinum were to develop it.

On April 1, 2011, Konami promoted Kojima to Executive Vice President and Corporate Officer. At E3 2011, he revealed a new gaming technology named "transfarring", a portmanteau of the verbs transferring and sharing, which allows gamers to transfer their game data between the PlayStation 3 and the PlayStation Portable. Transfarring was used in Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker and the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection. Later that year, he stated he was working on a new intellectual property with Goichi Suda, tentatively titled Project S, and preparing new projects. On July 8, 2011, Kojima announced that Project S was a radio-show sequel to Snatcher, titled Sdatcher as a reference to the show's producer Suda. The show would air on Fridays on Kojima's bi-weekly Internet radio show, starting with episode No. 300 which was broadcast in August 2011. In October, Kojima announced that he would be collaborating with Suda and 5pb. director Chiyomaru Shikura in producing a new adventure game visual novel. It was initially speculated that the game would be the third entry in 5pb.'s Science Adventure series, but it was later confirmed to be a separate title. The game was planned to have an overseas release and an anime adaption. As of 2023, no further news regarding the project has been released.

Final Konami projects and departure (2012–2015)

In mid-2012 and in the following years after Kojima finished work on the Fox Engine, Kojima was connected to the Silent Hill series. During this time, he indicated that he was interested in making a Silent Hill game and the first instance of this was on August 18, 2012. He described his excitement regarding the potential use of the Fox Engine on the eighth generation platforms via a tweet of an image of the DVD for the Silent Hill film: Later, he added what he had in mind for this game in a series of tweets: "Silent Hill is in closed room setting and doesn't require full action so that we can focus on the graphic quality. Enemies featured in the game do not have to be consistent or move fast. It only requires scariness by graphics and presentation. As being a creator, making action games in an open world setting, such a type of game is very enviously attractive. If only someone could create this on the Fox Engine." After a while, and as a result of Kojima's interest in making a Silent Hill game, Konami asked him to do so. Kojima explained the story in an interview with Eurogamer:

In the past I've mentioned Silent Hill in interviews, and as a result of that the president of Konami rung me up and said he'd like me to make the next Silent Hill. Honestly, I'm kind of a scaredy-cat when it comes to horror movies, so I'm not confident I can do it. At the same time, there's a certain type of horror that only people who are scared of can create, so maybe it's something I can do. That said, I think Silent Hill has a certain atmosphere. I think it has to continue, and I'd love to help it continue, and if I can help by supervising or lending the technology of the Fox Engine, then I'd love to participate in that respect.

Additionally, in an interview with Geoff Keighley, when a fan asked "which game do you want to direct or reboot?" Kojima stated without hesitation, "Silent Hill." Keighley jumped in and asked "What do you want to do with Silent Hill?" Kojima responded: "A guy [like myself] that is such a chicken and is so easily scared – making a scary game – I'm very confident that something horrifying would come out from that. But on the other hand I would have to prepare myself to have nightmares every single day. Hopefully sometime in the future I'm able to work on this, but I would really need to prepare to have daily nightmares". In August 2014, the free horror game P.T. was released without announcement on the PlayStation Store by seemingly unknown developers "7780s Studio": it very quickly became popular and received critical acclaim. Its ending revealed that the game's title stands for 'playable teaser', that "7780s Studio" was a pseudonym for Kojima Productions, and that it was a demo for a new game in the Silent Hill franchise titled Silent Hills, set to be directed by Kojima, alongside Mexican film director Guillermo del Toro, for the PlayStation 4. However, in April 2015, the playable teaser was removed from online storefronts and Konami announced that the game was cancelled. Despite never reaching a full release, P.T. remains as one of Kojima's most acclaimed works and is considered among the greatest horror games of all time.

At the 2013 Game Developers Conference, Kojima unveiled Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, which was set to be his final Metal Gear game, noting that this time unlike previous announcements that he had stopped working on the series, was very serious about leaving; it was preceded by Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes, a shorter game released in 2014 and serving as a prologue to The Phantom Pain. In March 2015, reports began to surface that Kojima would part ways with longtime publisher Konami after the release of The Phantom Pain. Konami later stated that they were auditioning for new staff for future Metal Gear titles and removed Kojima's name from the series' marketing material. On July 10, 2015, Kojima's collaborative voice actor Akio Ōtsuka revealed that Konami had closed Kojima Productions; despite reports that Kojima left the company in October 2015, a spokesman for Konami stated that he was "taking a long time off from work." At The Game Awards 2015, Metal Gear Solid V won the awards for Best Action Game and Best Score/Soundtrack, but Kojima did not attend the event, being reportedly barred from attending by Konami. Instead, the award was accepted by Kiefer Sutherland on his behalf. On February 18, 2016, Metal Gear Solid V won the award for Adventure Game of the Year at the 19th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards.

Independent studio (2015–present)

Death Stranding

On December 16, 2015, Kojima announced that Kojima Productions would be re-established as an independent studio, partnered with Sony Computer Entertainment, and that his first game would be exclusive to PlayStation 4. At E3 2016, Kojima personally announced the game's title as Death Stranding in a trailer. The trailer featured Norman Reedus, who was set to play t

From Wikipedia’s article on Hideo Kojima (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Personal life

  • BornAug 24, 1963, Soshigaya6
  • CitizenshipJapan7
  • ResidenceKawanishi, Ibaraki, Osaka, Tokyo8

Kojima is private about his personal life. He is married and has two sons. His mother died in early 2017.

From Wikipedia’s article on Hideo Kojima (this version), CC BY-SA 4.0.

Awards

  • 2020BAFTA Fellowship9 14
  • 2016The Game Awards – Industry Icon9 13
  • 2009Game Developers Choice Award - Lifetime Achievement9 12
  • Date not recordedArt Encouragement Prizes9 10
  • Date not recordedJapan Game Awards Annual Work Category Excellence Award for Death Stranding9 11

Sources

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