Hideo Kojima and his team at Kojima Productions are now in the so-called home stretch before the final release of Death Stranding, the first game as an independent (although Sony backed the project and will publish it) developer since the split with Konami.
Speaking with the Financial Times in a paywalled article, Kojima-san eccentrically stated even he doesn't quite understand Death Stranding as it's something that has never been done before, which is, of course, a risk.
Death Stranding… even now, I don’t understand the game. Its world view, gameplay, they are all new. My mission is to create a genre that does not currently exist, and which takes everyone by surprise. There is, naturally, a risk in that…
Kojima, the creator of Metal Gear Solid, then explained that game design is a holistic process for him that encompasses all aspects of the title, from the story to graphics and sound.
Now I have my own studio, but what I want to do is the same as before. I want to do monozukuri. Game designing is a holistic thing for me. Working with all the designs, stories, concepts, graphics and sound. That is the meaning of game designing. We might have it more melodic when a character looks in this direction, and then have that fade when they take some particular action. It’s like the cello coming in, or the drums adding accent to movement when Tom and Jerry are wrecking things in one of their cartoons.
Later in the interview, Hideo Kojima briefly looked back at what it was like to join the games industry in the late 80s.
When I first joined the company after graduating from college, it was so difficult to convince others what I really wanted to make.
Normal people didn’t go to work at games companies back then. I thought I was taking a risk, but the technology evolved faster than I expected.
Death Stranding is out on PlayStation 4 starting November 8th. A PC release has long been rumored, but would most likely happen at a later date if at all.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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