A Hideo Kojima a Horror Game Would Be Perfect

Now that Death Stranding is on the market, creator and director Hideo Kojima is planning the next game Kojima Productions will work on. It’s an undoubtedly liberating feeling for Kojima and other Konami expatriates, who now feel fully free from the company that saddled them to the Metal Gear series and little outside that for nearly two decades.

Death Stranding itself was the first non-Metal Gear title Kojima created and directed since Policenauts in the mid-90s. It’s good that he and other developers are now in so privileged a position that they can plan another title and likely find a funding partner, though it’s thanks to the Metal Gear series’ consistent quality over the years that they have so many fans. It’s enough for companies like Death Stranding publishers Sony Interactive Entertainment and 505 Games to feel their investment is worth it.

As to make the scariest horror game, I’ll watch the scary movies in order to awaken my horror soul. THE EYE is the Thai horror movie I rent when making PT but was too scary to finish watching. The package is scary so I rented the disc only. Will I be able to finish watching? pic.twitter.com/BVwPruUAvt

— HIDEO_KOJIMA (@HIDEO_KOJIMA_EN) November 22, 2019

Kojima confirmed that his next intention is to make the “scariest horror game” on Twitter, and how, in true Kojima fashion, he wants to “watch the scary movies in order to awaken [his] horror soul.” The key example given in the tweet is The Eye, the movie he rented for inspiration for P.T. The influence can be seen from the promo, as the character in the shadow (sorry, I haven’t seen the movie) is reminiscent of P.T.’s creepy ghost Lisa at certain points of the experience. One clarification, though: The Eye is a Hong Kong film, not a Thai one. Some who’ve watched the movie disputed its scariness, but your mileage may vary there.

Hopefully this project happens. With the directorial style Kojima has exhibited in his most recent works, creating and directing a horror experience would be a perfect fit.

The most obvious example here is the aforementioned P.T., once the Playable Teaser for a sort of Silent Hill reboot known as Silent Hills, a project cancelled by Konami as part of an extremely bitter falling out between Kojima and the company. The experience relied on the kind of psychological fear the Silent Hill series excelled in. The player doesn’t fight any physical enemies in the game (one specific encounter could count if triggered, but it’s not much of a fight), but the player will be psyched out as mysteries unfold in the mostly-abandoned suburban house. It was probably a good setup for the level of horror Silent Hills would have presented, but we may never know that for sure.

P.T. isn’t the only example here. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain features horror-influenced segments, like when a flaming man who resembles Metal Gear Solid 3 main villain Colonel Volgin haunts Venom Snake. There was also the original trailer for The Phantom Pain before it was revealed to be MGSV, which contained scenes comprised of the game’s prologue, though the events weren’t quite as horrifying as that trailer implied. I can only hope this potential horror game will have the same kind of bonkers marketing campaign.

You don’t even need to play Death Stranding to get a glimpse at some of its creepier moments, themes prevalent thanks to it being a sort of spiritual successor to Silent Hills. These include the dead dolphins on the beach, Mama’s ghost baby (with an umbilical cord still attached — somewhat of a nod to P.T.), and the references to war-is-hell film Apocalypse Now. The game’s outright bizarre trailers were fitting for its themes, but they’d be even more fitting for a horror game.

This game could be more special if Kojima can reassemble key staffers from Silent Hills. Movie director Guillermo Del Toro was reportedly well involved in its creative process, who provided the idea of having the experience occur within one location to keep the horror in the player’s face. (Del Toro wasn’t creatively involved with Death Stranding, but his likeness was used for a character.) Horror manga creator Junji Ito was planned to be involved in the game, but the project’s development never advanced to a point where he even provided concepts. Ito may not be heavily involved in this potential horror game, as Kojima will likely retain Yoji Shinkawa as the main artist, but he’d make for a good guest contributor.

A Kojima horror game would also be a good fit for the market because it’s in desperate need of more games in the genre with a budget. The Resident Evil series is the only one left standing in the AAA world, and B-tier examples are almost non-existent these days. Most other horror games are first-person experiences with low budgets, with similarly-budgeted third-person and visual novel examples mixed in. Not to say there’s anything wrong with lower-budget games, but it would be good to have more horror-themed titles with higher production values, and this game could join them. That is, assuming a publisher and funding source finds this potential project as marketable as Kojima and horror fans believe.

If this is indeed Kojima Productions’ next project, it may not be long before we see some sort of teaser for it. Kojima likes to reveal games early these days, shown through how Metal Gear Solid V was revealed in mid-2012 through the separately-released Ground Zeroes prologue. An even better example is how the first Death Stranding trailer was shown in mid-2016, less than one year after both The Phantom Pain released and after the establishment of the new Kojima Productions. Releasing a cryptic trailer that few will make sense out of would be much more fitting for a horror game.

Again, this is assuming the project will get green lit at all. It would be a crying shame if yet another horror project from this team was put on ice, so let’s hope it happens.