Will Physint bring us the Hideo Kojima of yesteryear?

In an industry as large as the video game industry, few studios or creatives know what their long-term future is. Hideo Kojima is one of those creatives who, after leaving Konami 9 years ago, has begun to chart his course. Just yesterday, during the first State of Play of 2024, he surprised us with what will be Death Stranding 2, but also revealed his return to the world that made him a household name around the world, the action and espionage genre. With the codename Physint, Kojima not only begins to dream ahead, but also projects for the next generation of consoles.

However, we are not looking at the return of a game like Metal Gear, nor to call it a spiritual sequel. The creative promises cutting-edge technology and a breakthrough for when the game comes out. But beyond that, we will have a Kojima who will experiment with crazier ideas in the coming years, even jumping into other genres.

Kojima Independent: From terror to walking and back again

Kojima’s post-Metal Gear Solid journey has seen him continue to explore new genres, while also scratching his filmmaking itch. Before his departure from Konami, we had the opportunity to give him a glimpse of what a horror game with his stamp would look like. The involvement of Guillermo del Toro and Norman Reedus raised the hopes of Silent Hill fans, but in the end, the Japanese’s relationship with Konami would not end well. A door that closed for him opened the window to new horizons, with greater independence.

Death Stranding became the kind of work that if you didn’t play it, you probably wouldn’t understand, and it allowed Kojima to delve even deeper into the Hollywood world that he wanted so much. Though the entire Metal Gear Solid saga had its approaches to that world, it was here that he was finally able to absorb it more fully. Old friends he worked with on what would become Silent Hills were present, and to add to the cinematic feel, Mads Mikkelsen, Léa Seydoux, and Margaret Qualley were on board. It was also a game where Kojima dared to take something as simple as a walking simulator and make it feel with themes of isolation and connection that not only allowed him to tell a story with something that hadn’t been done before, but it also felt like he had predicted the whole pandemic.

Kojima has two projects on his horizon before returning to stealth. The first is Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, with which he will continue to polish a world that was sometimes flat, but never ceased to surprise, and which aims to have much more action. On the other hand, we have OD, a title that aims to horror and that continues to take him to other currents and even puts him next to other great talents, as is the case of Jordan Peele. Of course, this Xbox exclusive does not have a release date yet, but the current generation of consoles is still young.

To say that Kojima will be making a clean return to the tactical or stealth espionage genre is completely false. Physint also points out that it will learn from these two IPs that the studio is working with to deliver what Kojima called “the next step in digital entertainment.