Konami seems very eager to get the Metal Gear series back into the spotlight, as evidenced by it porting some of the classic titles to modern platforms (with seemingly more ports still to come) and the upcoming remake of Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. This new era for Metal Gear, however, obviously lacks any involvement from series creator Hideo Kojima, though producer Noriaki Okamura has said it would “be a dream” if he got to work with Kojima again.
During a recent Metal Gear Production Hotline video to discuss the series (as spotted by VGC), Okamura, alongside promotions director Jiro Oishi and creative producer Yuji Korekado, answered fan submitted questions. The first one asked if any staff members from the original games could ever return to contribute to the series, even in a supervisory role, which Okamura described as a “tough one.”
Okamura, who has served as a producer on titles like Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops and Metal Gear Survive, said it wasn’t his place to speak on behalf of anyone outside of Konami, but he personally would “like nothing better than to work with Mr. Kojima and the rest of the team again. If that could happen, that would be the dream.” Although he also acknowledged that such a dream isn’t entirely feasible as “people have moved on to new things and commitments, and that’s just our current reality.”
Okamura’s desire to collaborate with Kojima once more is a nice sentiment, and one many long-time fans would love to see come true. However, it’s very difficult to imagine Kojima ever working with Konami again. As a reminder, his departure from the company in 2015 was far from amicable, and effectively turned Konami into the games industry’s biggest villain for a long time. Not only did Konami remove Kojima’s name from the cover of Metal Gear Solid V (the final Metal Gear game Kojima worked on), he was reportedly barred from attending The Game Awards that year (per IGN), meaning he couldn’t accept the award for Best Action/Adventure game, which MGS V won. Let’s also not forget that before he left, Kojima announced he was helming a new Silent Hill game with that incredible P.T. teaser, only for Konami to cancel the project and scrub P.T. from the PlayStation Store.
It’s not as if Kojima has struggled to find new work in the following years either. He’s enjoyed great success after founding his own studio and partnering with Sony to releasing Death Stranding. A sequel is now in the works, but Kojima is also working with Microsoft on an Xbox exclusive horror game called OD, and he’s basically doing Metal Gear again with a new stealth espionage game, known only as Physint for the time being. Knowing all that, why would he ever return to Konami, even if it was for a partnership on a new Metal Gear?
While Kojima may have nothing to do with the Snake Eater remake, dubbed Metal Gear Solid Delta, Okamura did stress that he and the rest of the original development team will be credited for their work. “They’re a part of these games too, so absolutely, they’re in,” he stressed.
