Metal Gear Solid: Rising Isn’t The Next “Hideo Kojima” Game

Of late, Hideo Kojima has been tweeting about projects he has in the works again, with some interesting thoughts on game development voiced along the way. Kojima’s most recent tweets are to do with his next major game.

He begins by briefly touching upon the subject of differences in the style of development between Japan and the West:

“The differences between the creators in Japan and the West in this industry… Japanese creators try to express the game’s environment through beautiful artwork, but western developers use technology to draw out the environment. The Japanese make the models and textures carefully to create a world. The West use shaders, lighting, shadows, effects, and programming to create their world.”

Following up this tweet, Kojima mentioned that he’s specifically asking his team to abandon the idea of creating “pretty images” for their next game. Instead, he wants them to create a “beautiful world,” indicating that perhaps he’s more interested in the overall aesthetic rather than details such as texture resolution or individual assets. He writes:

“For my next project, I’m going to mention to the staff to throw out the old ways of production. Do not create pretty images, create a beautiful world. Designers shouldn’t focus only on their part, but also borrow the programmer’s strength to maximize the quality. We shouldn’t measure quality by parts, we will measure by the quality and completion of the entire world.”

And finally, a last tweet on the subject reads as follows:

Had our first meeting for the next “A HIDEO KOJIMA GAME” with the core team members today. Some member are also participating on [Metal Gear Solid] “RISING” so 10 people total this time. We will have a meeting every morning to discuss planning, testing, research, and scouting. An open environment to talk about important issues and share our dreams and concept for the project.

So, while Rising is very much a Metal Gear Solid game, it’s not a Hideo Kojima game. Kojima has stated this numerous times in the past as well.