Silent Hills cancelled

[tbonesays]

The current CEO is Satoshi Sakamoto. The founder was Kagamaza Kozuki. Every article I've looked up claims one or the other really hates Kojima. I'm not sure exactly when Sakamoto took over or if Kozuki is even out totally. Can't really find any accurate data about that. I'm interested to know the whole story though. The more I look at the whole thing the less it makes sense to me. It looks like certain people got power and just wanted to eliminate the whole console division and boot their senior staff. They aren't exactly earning themselves any admirers. It does happen though, my old company got bought out by some leverage firm and they basically ate the company apart in dividends and loans.

Not that it's all that relevant but when you look at the leaders of Konami gaming and their senior management, I was surprised to see how many were not Japanese. https://www.gaming.konami.com/corporate ... eteam.aspx

I suspect that it is very relevant. Since you seem familiar, are all those officials working out of Japan or do they have a US office?

[unreadphilosophy]

What I don't understand is how anyone at Konami (founder, CEO, etc.) could hate Kojima. That man is the reason that company gained legitimacy in the gaming world when the original Metal Gear Solid appeared on the PS1 back in the late 90s. Aside from that, Kojima has to be one of the most humble and likable developers out there. If I were the head of Konami, I would have had a solid gold statue of him commissioned and placed in front of the company's HQ for everything he's accomplished.

[Agent of God]

Probably because he has reached iconic status, growing bigger than the company itself. From there it's jealousy and nervousness about what they'll do if he ever decided to actually stop making main games in the MGS series. Well, it happened and they secured the series for themselves, without Kojima. Now it's up to the consumers to show Konami if they fucked up or not.

[Alexius Corvinus]

I don't know how much it could help compared to a petition, but if you have a Twitter account, you could send messages to Konami, PlayStation, Sony and Shuhei Yoshida (Sony). If there's enough demand for it, Sony could possibly become involved and help fund a new Japanese developed Silent Hill game for the PS4.

[Matt S]

No one wants a Kojima-less Silent Hills done by Konami, so no point in a petition.

Ideally, konami needs money and sells the Silent Hill franchise to someone that actually gives a shit about it.

If I ever win 100 million or more, I'll personally buy Silent Hill's rights and do it justice...........

There was a dream there; its GONE now

[Alexius Corvinus]

I never said there should be a Kojima less Silent Hill. I said that people should be vocal about wanting another Silent Hill with a respectable Japanese developer, which includes Kojima. If we can't have Kojima then maybe someone like Masahiro Ito, Hiroyuki Owaku or Keiichiro Toyama (who works at Sony). This can be done without a petition (ie Twitter). As far as Hideo Kojima is concerned, personally if I had to choose between him and Toyama I would probably choose Toyama (or Ito, Owaku), but that is my personal preference. With that said, I signed the Silent Hills petition, which exceeded 96,000 signatures so far.

[jdnation]

It'd be better to wait for the dust to settle to see where Kojima goes, and how MGSV sales could make an impact.

What's certain is that Konami is not selling their IPs. They are not desperate for cash. The IP is still useful for licensing.

A Sony/Konami/new KojiPro collaboration could be cool. But for now we simply don't know what's going to happen next, and until that turmoil is over, effort would be wasted because no-one will be in a position to really do anything.

By all means, one can let Sony know over social media how disappointing the situation is. But at the end of the day, it'll come down to Konami to make that call.

But if Sony and Capcom can make a deal for exclusive Street Fighter, then certainly it's possible for Konami and Silent Hill.

However the wild card would be Kojima. Where does he go? If he joins Sony, then that would be simple. But he could start his own and go 2nd party. But would Konami or Kojima be all right with working with each other again? We don't know, and that's for how things go from now to the future to decide.

What's certain though is that this will take a long time. Even Del Toro and Reedus will move on and getting schedules like this worked out again will be hard.

For now we can only play the waiting game.
In a hallway in the dark...

[Mantorok]

I suspect that it is very relevant. Since you seem familiar, are all those officials working out of Japan or do they have a US office?

I would assume they are in the US. I don't think they speak Japanese, it doesn't say they studied Japanese. At least not in any of their bios. I'm not sure I'll have to look into that. They could be in Japan.

What I don't understand is how anyone at Konami (founder, CEO, etc.) could hate Kojima. That man is the reason that company gained legitimacy in the gaming world when the original Metal Gear Solid appeared on the PS1 back in the late 90s. Aside from that, Kojima has to be one of the most humble and likable developers out there. If I were the head of Konami, I would have had a solid gold statue of him commissioned and placed in front of the company's HQ for everything he's accomplished.

No one really KNOWS if there is a big personal problem between anyone and Kojima. If it was a really bad problem I don't think he'd be there 30 years, money or no. It could just be business or petty workplace politics. I briefly got to see Kojima once with a friend in Times Square at a signing. I think it was 2008 or so, he really laughed and loved my friend's FOXhound Tattoo. He seemed like a nice guy.

Kojima is having a classic problem, becoming a victim of your own success. He's spent most of his life and practically his entire adult life with Konami and he's made a big name for himself. When credit is given it's more Kojima from Konami rather than Konami's Kojima. He's a big icon and he's consistently rated internationally as one of the best. Success breeds envy and after years of having the indirect power that Japanese producers had, someone was looking to screw him over just because. It's certainly hurt Konami's reputation but the question is we'll have to see how well Konami's IPs do post Kojima.

I wouldn't say petitions don't work, it certainly opens up companies' eyes about their actions. That petition signed up and grew pretty quickly. The amount of articles and widespread disappointment has been huge and it may make them take a step back and say "what did we just do". We're just gonna have to wait patiently to see what Kojima and Konami do in the future. For right now Kojima is going to do his best on MGSV and you're not going to get any of the dirtier details until after it comes out.

[Mephisto]

Fuck Kojima, man. The problem is that plenty of awesome franchises went to Hell. The bigger problem here is Konami.

People talk like he's some kind of God or whatever. Shit.

[sh#1fan]

If I ever win 100 million or more, I'll personally buy Silent Hill's rights and do it justice...........

There was a dream there; its GONE now

Not if I win 100 million first....

[Matt S]

I never said there should be a Kojima less Silent Hill. I said that people should be vocal about wanting another Silent Hill with a respectable Japanese developer, which includes Kojima. If we can't have Kojima then maybe someone like Masahiro Ito, Hiroyuki Owaku or Keiichiro Toyama (who works at Sony). This can be done without a petition (ie Twitter). As far as Hideo Kojima is concerned, personally if I had to choose between him and Toyama I would probably choose Toyama (or Ito, Owaku), but that is my personal preference. With that said, I signed the Silent Hills petition, which exceeded 96,000 signatures so far.

Fair enough; sorry, still in a mourning/self doubt phase.

So, do not delete those PT demos, everyone. They are no longer re-downloadable in the U.S. at least

If I ever win 100 million or more, I'll personally buy Silent Hill's rights and do it justice...........

There was a dream there; its GONE now

Not if I win 100 million first....

Haha. Awesome. Seriously Silent Hill will rise again....maybe not today nor this year, but I feel it in my bones......

[jdnation]

Shedding some light on how corporations treat employees in Japan - a practice known as 'madogiwa zoku' and what might actually be going on at Konami right now. Interesting NY times article from last year.

Layoffs Taboo, Japan Workers Are Sent to the Boredom Room
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/17/busin ... .html?_r=1

[Alexius Corvinus]

Japan has an honor/shame based collectivist society. I hope Kojima wasn't universally shamed in Japan by his employer. Otherwise, wouldn't it be hard for him to get another job? With his money, he is set for life anyway.

[Its Gone Now]

^ It's true they love a bit of shame in Japan, some people are shamed for things their great grandparents did.

Saying that though I doubt he'll have trouble getting work. Even if he couldn't in Japan there are plenty of American and British devs that could use a bit of eastern flavour.

[Mantorok]

Well that's still nicer than in America where you get thrown away after decades of service at the drop of a hat. It's personally part of the reason of why I'm pro union. The last company I worked for got bought out in a leveraged buyout and that firm took out a billion dollar loan on our companies expense to pay themselves dividends for all the hard work they did running the company for 6 weeks. I laughed because over half the home office and senior management got laid off last year around holiday season, bet they don't think that buyout was so great anymore. Japan will at least pay you to sit in a room.

I don't really believe this is the case but I do find it quite fitting. People are saying this quote in the PT was Kojima giving a message to fans because he figured this was coming.

“Dad was such a drag. Every day he’d eat the same kind of food, dress the same, sit in front of the same kind of games… Yeah, he was just that kind of guy. But then one day, he goes and kills us all! He couldn’t even be original about the way he did it. I’m not complaining… I was dying of boredom anyway, But guess what? I will be coming back, and I’m bringing my new toys with me.”

I'm also surprised how many people signed the petition. It's getting close to 150,000 now. I think it was only around 10,000 when I signed it.

[Alexius Corvinus]

As of the time of this post, the total number of signatures on the petition is over 121,000 signatures and counting.

If Kojima decides to make his own horror game, possibly with another publisher and development team backing him up, could he use the initials PT as part of the title (say for example, he decided to name it Pandora Tree, I know it's a stupid example but that's not the point) without getting into any legal issues with Konami?

[Its Gone Now]

^ Konami can't stop anyone using the initials PT in a title, especially as PT is now done. Though I'm not sure how important the letters P and T are to anyone anymore.

[tbonesays]

As of the time of this post, the total number of signatures on the petition is over 121,000 signatures and counting.

If Kojima decides to make his own horror game, possibly with another publisher and development team backing him up, could he use the initials PT as part of the title (say for example, he decided to name it Pandora Tree, I know it's a stupid example but that's not the point) without getting into any legal issues with Konami?

My guess is NO, he would be trying to profit off the consumer's familiarity of Konami's trademark. He could make a game about a haunted town but had better avoid superficial similarities.

Link to petition?

[Mephisto]

I always thought "P.T." meant "Playable Teaser". Anyway, better use a new name. It sucks.

And tbonesays is pretty much spot on on his guess. I don't think Kojima would do it. It's better to avoid more issues.

[Alexius Corvinus]

I just used that name as an example. I know it sucks.

Yes it stands for playable teaser, I know.

Link to the petition:

https://www.change.org/p/kojima-product ... lent-hills

Also, ideas can't be copyrighted, at least not in the US, though I don't know about Japan. Vague similarities shouldn't be a problem. The Mist and Twin Peaks were created before Silent Hill, and the Mist and Silent Hill employ similar tropes.

EDIT: As of right now, there are over 126,500 signatures. Just for the sake of reference-and probably not a fair comprison given GTA V's popularity-, but the SHS (Silent Hills) petition reached 100k at around the same time frame as the GTA V PC petition. If I recall correctly, it took 9 months to reach 300k and probably 19 months to max out at over 720k. I don't know if SHS will ever reach that many signatures, but it could turn some heads if it accumulates a lot.