Metal Gear and Death Stranding mastermind Hideo Kojima is "really sad" about Sony's decision to stop producing physical copies of new PlayStation games in 2028, calling the idea of not being able to access the media we want in the future "frightening."

I'm not sure I can think of a single person who's happy about PlayStation's move to soon kill off its new physical games – it's devastating news for collectors, worrying for game preservationists, and raises concerns about all sorts of things from ownership to the second-hand game market, sharing with friends, and more. Kojima is understandably also upset, as he reveals in comments at the Il Cinema in Piazza film festival (translated by @Genki_JPN on Twitter).

"Since production is ending in 2028, this is about video games, but I grew up with physical media, so I find it really sad," he begins. "Currently, I've been buying up a lot of Blu-rays, such as various movies, and CDs too.

"The situation is different for games, as they are downloaded to the hard drive, that means the game data remains on your own hardware. However, if things shift to streaming in the future, that won't be the case anymore."

He looks to streaming services like Netflix as he notes that "there is a server somewhere, and you essentially just have the right to turn the tap, and when you do, the data flows out." However, he continues, because you don't download the data of those movies and shows, but rather gain access to them via your subscription, "the consequence of that is that you don't actually possess the data yourself."

And there lies a bigger problem – while the "companies that own these servers" will "let you 'turn the tap' for a monthly fee," things might not stay the same forever. "With nations, politics and various ways of thinking, one naturally has to consider the possibility that if there is a change, the data inside will stop being distributed," Kojima says. "And if that happens you won't be able to watch or play the movies and games you like. That is what is frightening."

As a huge fan of movies, Kojima clearly has concerns that this same issue approaching PlayStation could end up impacting the film industry, too. "So, what is happening to video games in 2028, might also happen to movies," he adds. "I'd like everyone to keep that in mind."

Kojima is far from the only developer worried about the death of physical media – last week's news saw many devs and publishers speak out against Sony's decision, with Larian Studios publishing director Michael Douse calling the situation "heartbreaking." Sony apparently already has another use for its disc factory in the form of microlenses, and has reportedly recently invested €30 million into the technology for manufacturing them. Needless to say, it doesn't seem likely that the company could backtrack on the idea, despite the mass backlash.

PlayStation's disc-less future could "heavily influence" Xbox and Nintendo's approach to physical games, former Sony boss says, calling the decision "dramatic."

The gaming world is getting philosophical ahead of the end of PlayStation game discs, and you can count Hideo Kojima among those concerned about the world's move to ephemeral digital data. At least, he was quite concerned about it back in 2021, and given today's news his five-year-old comments have taken on a new life.

"Eventually, even digital data will no longer be owned by individuals on their own initiative," Kojima said in a tweet on August 5, 2021. "Whenever there is a major change or accident in the world, in a country, in a government, in an idea, in a trend, access to it may suddenly be cut off. We will not be able to freely access the movies, books, and music that we have loved. I would be a have-not. That's what I'm afraid of. This is not greed."

There's a, uh, lot to chew on in there that goes well beyond your ability to get GTA 6 on a disc, but I'm not about to start philosophizing on the spread and decay of information in the modern era. Suffice to say, many players have found Kojima's words fairly prophetic in light of the PlayStation news, even if he didn't mention games specifically here. The tweet got some engagement back in 2021, but now you'll find thousands more quotes, replies, and retweets made just today.

Kojima already has a reputation for being a pop culture prophet. The world of Death Stranding, released in 2019, felt scarily close to the one we all began living as part of the COVID-19 pandemic, and way back in 2001 Metal Gear Solid 2 was predicting a future where AI feeds us half-truths by processing massive piles of junk data across the internet for easy consumption. The gaming world's cultlike admiration of Kojima might be a little extreme, but the man certainly knows how to build sci-fi that feels distressingly real as time goes on.

And, of course, Kojima himself is responsible for one of the most bitter reminders of what happens when a publisher fully cuts support for a digital game. PT was intended to be something of a demo for Silent Hills, but in the wake of that project's cancellation and Kojima's messy breakup with Konami, PT was delisted from the PlayStation Store. Not only that, Konami even prohibited users who'd played it from redownloading the game.

PT is perhaps the most extreme example we have of what happens when publishers do not care what happens to their digital games, and its reputation has only grown stronger given how high it stands among the best horror games of all time. Wanting to hang onto games like this? I don't think that's greedy, either.

Hideo Kojima says his pitch for OD sounded "crazy" to every publisher except Xbox.

Renowned video game developer and internet darling Hideo Kojima has become an action figure.

More specifically, he's going to be an adorable Nendoroid toy. Created by the Good Smile Company, these figures have built up a reputation for being high-quality, stylized display figures that look like chibi artwork come to life (AKA some of the best toys around, because c'mon – look at them). Now that same treatment has been applied to Hideo Kojima, and it's actually a bit eerie how well they've captured the famed game designer down to his intense stare and knowing smile.

Available to pre-order as we speak, the Hideo Kojima Nendoroid figure is $38.99 from Good Smile and is due to ship around this time next year. (Yes, the amount of time toy production can take is wild.)

Besides extensive articulation that allows you to pose the toy however you want, this mini Kojima comes with a host of alternate looks and a couple of accessories – there's a serious face, smiling face, thinking face, thumbs up, glasses, sunglasses, and a Ludens Duck. He's also wearing a Kojima Productions t-shirt, because of course he is.

Personally speaking, I'm a big fan of Nendoroids – to the point that I've made it my life's mission to get the Wind Waker version of Link, because it's truly magnificent. There's just so much character to them; you'd need a heart of pure, frigid ice not to be brought a smattering of joy by looking at them. Plus, they feel incredibly premium despite being quite affordable on the whole. Trust me, that's not always the case in the collectibles market; you're frequently paying through the nose for the privilege.

What do you think of the Kojima Nendoroid? Will you be adding it to your shelf, so he can peer pensively at you while you play OD or other upcoming Kojima games?

For more cool replicas, be sure not to miss the best Lego sets.

Hideo Kojima says he was called "crazy" while pitching the concept for his upcoming horror game OD, and only former Xbox CEO Phil Spencer understood what he was trying to do.

Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Kojima explains that he had trouble getting OD picked up by any publisher since "I pitched to many people, to the big companies, and also to the up-and-coming companies. All of them said the same thing."

Kojima continues, "They said that I'm crazy, and that they really don't understand the concept – that they will not be able to do it."

First unveiled during The Game Awards 2023 (following leaks the prior year as Overdose), OD claims it's going to be a horror experience "no one has ever seen before," and it's being made in collaboration with the likes of horror director Jordan Peele and a larger group of collaborators Kojima is calling his "Avengers." OD's concept (and namesake) is for the player to "overdose" on horror, with Kojima hyping it up as a game that goes "beyond the limit of 'scariness.'"

The idea ultimately appealed to Phil Spencer, who understood the concept and took it on board. Current Xbox CEO Asha Sharma also calls the project a "deeply moving game." She adds, "I've got great artists and creatives that can pick a great game better than I can, and so I want to give it space, but most importantly, I think it just represents another kind of game."

OD currently doesn't have a release date, and outside of a very naked leak and a couple of quick trailers, we really don't know too much about what it has to offer. It seems like the studio was waiting until Death Stranding 2 launched before going all-in on development, as Kojima said his studio was just beginning to work on OD last year. Both OD and Kojima's upcoming stealth game Physint were impacted by the SAG-Aftra strike in 2024, so it'll probably be The Game Awards at the earliest before we see another glimpse of them.

Hideo Kojima recommended Norman Reedus his "favorite" anime, and it sounds like The Walking Dead actor wants to turn it into a live-action movie.

If video game royalty Hideo Kojima is to be believed, Kojima Productions' upcoming single-player horror game OD is going to scare you so much that you'll contemplate quitting, but the game is designed in such a way to help you persevere.

If that all sounds incredibly vague and confusing, don't blame me. Kojima tiptoed around the topic of OD in an interview with Entertainment Weekly for Xbox's 25th anniversary. He's been tightlipped about the project since its reveal back in 2023, and it doesn't help that he's previously described it as "a new form of media" that "explores the concept of testing your fear threshold, and what it means to OD on fear." What exactly that means still isn't clear, but Kojima says there's a whole new system that'll help you navigate the horror if OD happens to go beyond your threshold for fear.

"I wanted to go beyond the limit of the 'scariness' that other games had reached," he says. "It's a single-player game, and I wanted to make it as scary as possible.

"But for those that might stop playing when it gets too scary, I have thought of a system that will allow them to keep going. I can't say much more, because it'll give too much of a hint on the system, and I could get in trouble for saying too much!"

As a self-professed scaredy cat, who just happens to love horror games much to the detriment of my blood pressure, I'm cautiously reassured by this. Kojima is responsible for one of the scariest games I've ever played in PT, and if that "playable teaser" was any longer than an hour or so, there's no way I would've been able to beat it in one sitting. I'm relieved to hear Kojima and co. are considering wimps like me while developing OD, but it's hard to feel completely comfortable until we know the details of this new system.

Capcom tackled the issue of fear thresholds masterfully in Resident Evil Requiem, which frequently bounces between the unbearably tense Grace Ashcroft sections and the cathartic, action-packed Leon Kennedy sequences, offering much-needed breaks from the tension that you don't get in Resident Evil 7 Biohazard, which director Koshi Nakanishi has admitted was "possibly too scary." Hopefully we'll learn more soon about Kojima's plans to keep sissies like me from tapping out while playing OD.

Hideo Kojima recommended Norman Reedus his "favorite" anime, and it sounds like The Walking Dead actor wants to turn it into a live-action movie.

Metal Gear Solid 2 is now approaching 25 years old, and players are still discovering things about the classic game.

Metal Gear Solid 2 is one of the PS2 titles that truly felt 'next-gen' when it came out, or so I'm told since I was five at the time and only cared about Crash Bandicoot. But all of the little details that make that game's world so special are well known now – things like how the ice cubes would melt slowly if you shot the bucket at the bar, or Snake getting a cold if he stays out in the cold too long.

And yet, multiple playthroughs later (including one about a month ago), and I never knew about one hidden detail, and it looks like almost no one else did, either. "After more than 2 decades of playing MGS2, I thought I'd seen everything, then this happened", a user on Reddit writes, sharing an extremely specific interaction that can happen towards the end of the Tanker chapter.

When Snake is making his way to the room where Metal Gear Ray is housed, there are multiple open areas you can hide in off to the side, but as has now been discovered, peeking round the corner at the approaching enemy will cause a metal pipe to fall, alerting them.

After more than 2 decades of playing MGS2, I thought I'd seen everything, then this happened. from r/metalgearsolid

The comments are just as shocked as me to find this out, with the top response saying: "Holy shit, what? Same here. This game is legendary, man." A response adds: "I think the insane level of detail on these games, particularly MGS2 and MGS3 is often overlooked. I was absolutely blown away by MGS2 when I was a teenager playing it for the first time, and even now I think the graphics and overall environment design are unbelievable." Meanwhile, another puts it perfectly, "This is the kind of stuff somebody posts on an online forum in 2005 and no one believes it to be real."

And sure, a pipe falling over isn't exactly mind-blowing stuff, but it's just one of the myriad details that makes Metal Gear Solid as a series so beloved.

Metal Gear Solid Snake actor David Hayter didn't understand all of Hideo Kojima's story while recording, but says he didn't need to: "That's what makes Metal Gear, Metal Gear."

Metal Gear and Death Stranding mastermind Hideo Kojima has stated that he's "not interested" in AI-generated art, despite his recent appearance in an AI-generated short film created by Pusher and Drive director Nicolas Winding Refn (who also did the motion capture for Heartman in Death Stranding and its sequel).

Late last month, many Kojima fans weren't exactly pleased to see the game director – or rather, an AI-generated version of him – show up in an AI-generated video promoting Satellites 2, a new Prada Mode art exhibition that's been open to the public in New York over the last few days. The video sent Kojima's AI lookalike on a journey through space alongside AI Refn, before landing on Earth and seemingly checking into the Hotel Chelsea, where the exhibition was being held.

Now, though, at the exhibition itself, Kojima has expressed disinterest in the technology. Speaking to The Washington Post, he explains that he thinks real people need to be present when art is created.

"Art is life," he begins. "But in 50 years, 100 years, I don't know. Maybe AI could create art, but while I live, I don't think I'll see it. I'm not interested in it."

Kojima continues: "We'll find a good way, a good path to how we use technology, and it's really up to young people on how we use it."

The Metal Gear creator has shared his take on AI numerous times over the last year or so – he previously said that instead of using AI to come up with ideas, he would personally "lead the creative part and use AI to boost efficiency" and "handle the tedious tasks." He also once spoke about the "trend" of AI "coming into game creation" and likened it to an evolution like games becoming 3D and using online connectivity.

I can't help but wonder if Kojima's now clearly stated disinterest in AI art could partially come in response to the negativity that followed his appearance in the Satellites 2 video. To be clear, he didn't personally create it, but his association with it didn't go down very well, to put it lightly. Even so, he doesn't acknowledge this backlash at all when speaking to The Washington Post, so it remains somewhat unclear exactly where he stands on that specific video.

Hideo Kojima learns that Higgs is the world's favorite Death Stranding 2 character, but he's just glad all his children have fans.

Metal Gear Solid and Death Stranding 2 director Hideo Kojima has finally gone to space thanks to a new short film from Drive director Nicolas Winding Refn, though you'd have to wonder if the price of admission was worth it. Reactions to the video, made with the aid of GenAI, are swiftly being met with disappointment from many of Kojima's fans, to put it mildly.

As reported by Women's Wear Daily, the 14th edition of the Prada Mode event was previewed at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this week. Part of that involved the film in question, which sees Kojima traveling through space, crashing on a planet, and finding the Chelsea Hotel – the site of Prada Mode.

"Throughout our extended friendship, Hideo Kojima and I have shared the feeling that we were somehow split from the same consciousness moving through different lives while orbiting the same obsessions. That idea became the spark for a film: a space odyssey following us as we traverse a sci-fi dreamscape," Winding Refn says, adding, "the project is both an artistic experiment and a playful exploration of new creative possibilities through AI technology."

And so, Kojima goes to space, something the director has been talking about for years, which also saw Valve boss Gabe Newell set up a SpaceX tour that doesn't appear to have gone ahead yet.

So it goes with films made with AI; it looks terrible. Kojima's face morphs into different faces pretty much every time you see him, and it has that general filter of crap that is prevalent in all AI art. Clearly, hiring people to hang out on a soundstage with low-budget props is clearly too much effort, even if 60's Star Trek holds up better.

Reactions to the post on Twitter have evoked the reactions you'd expect: "Heartbreaking to see such great artists resort to generative AI slop," one response says, while Alien Earth artist Reid Southen responds, "With all the resources you have, AI is what you're going with here? And it's even worse than the typical slop." While another puts it perfectly: "This looks like shit from a butt."

While I'm not too bothered about Winding Refn, seeing Kojima involved in this is extremely disappointing. Obviously, he's always seems keen to mix it up with anyone in Hollywood, but signing on to this after releasing multiple games that directly touch on this is a bit embarrassing. One Bluesky user summed it up well by posting, "Kojima: At long last, we have created The Patriots from my iconic video game Metal Gear Solid 2: Do Not Create the Patriots."

Maybe it's just because Metal Gear Solid 2 is fresh in my mind after a recent replay. Hopefully, this is a one-off, because my goat is washed otherwise.

Reminisce over better times by seeing how good Metal Gear Solid 4 looks in its upcoming Master Collection treatment.

Konami has revealed the first gameplay of Metal Gear Solid 4 in Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol 2, and fans have noticed subtle changes and the return of the iPod.

While Metal Gear Solid 4 was in PS3 jail, many speculated that it was just a game that would be impossible to bring back, thanks to all its dumb little details and licensed content. But in a stream on the WasayaganaTV YouTube channel – hosted by Jujutsu Kaisen actor Yuichi Nakamura and radio personality Mafia Kajita – we got our first look at Guns of the Patriots running on new platforms. And within the steam it was shown that the Apple iPod is back in the game, signaling the return of its licensed content.

We didn't see them in the stream, but elsewhere in Metal Gear Solid 4, Otacon uses an Apple Mac computer, so it's probably safe to assume that sticks. There's also a crossover with Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed series, which allows Snake to don Altaïr's robes while sneaking around – this was confirmed to be returning in an interview around the time Solid Snake was added to Rainbow Six Siege. Also, fans spotted that the "No place for Hideo" box is still in the game; however, the link to the now-defunct Hideoblog was removed.

Naturally, however, fans are speculating about how some of the PS3-specific parts will translate. Notably, there's an iconic scene during the game's Shadow Moses segment, in which Otacon pushes Snake to swap to disk 2 before realizing "we're on PlayStation 3" before talking about how good Blu-ray discs are. The question is whether this scene will remain in the game as is, be replaced with new voice lines about the specific consoles, or be nixed entirely.

The rest of the stream also showed some of the improvements coming to this version. Notably, Metal Gear Solid 4 running at 60fps is witchcraft we could've only dreamed of, and as one Twitter user pointed out, the loading times are way shorter when transitioning between areas. Although if you aren't stuck on a loading screen between chapters staring at Snake smoking for 15 minutes, are you really playing Metal Gear Solid 4?

I replayed Metal Gear Solid 4 last year for the first time in about a decade after beating Metal Gear Solid Delta, but I may just find myself returning to it sooner than expected to experience the upgrades on show.

Metal Gear Solid Snake actor David Hayter didn't understand all of Hideo Kojima's story while recording, but says he didn't need to: "That's what makes Metal Gear, Metal Gear"

A modder is fixing an issue that has persisted with Metal Gear Solid 3 since 2011's HD Collection release – one that most people didn't really notice.

Metal Gear Solid 3 is the greatest game ever made – this was the subject of the first thing I ever wrote for GamesRadar+, about a game I've inhaled as many times as Kirby inhales a Waddle Dee. And yet, somehow, I never noticed that the 2011 HD collection version of the game, which was then ported over to Master Collection in 2023, actually had a broken camera in it the whole time.

As spotted by PC Gamer, Afevis Solmunko, one of the developers behind the MGSFix mod – who also found a hidden third-person mode in Metal Gear Solid 2's HD port – is working on a fix for the Metal Gear Solid Master Collection to fix the framing of cutscenes so that they match how they appeared in the PS2 original.

"In both 2011 [HD Collection] & 2023 [Master Collection], the camera in ALL of MGS3's cutscenes is ~10% higher than PS2's framing, cutting off the bottom of the screen," he explains. "Now fully corrected/properly centered by MGSHDFix."

Turns out, Metal Gear Solid 2 has the same issue, with Solmunko also speaking about potentially fixing that one, too, in a message on the Metal Gear Network Discord server.

Granted, there aren't massive things being missed in the HD version's framing, as in, there's nothing as bad as The Simpsons was on Disney+ at launch. Clearly so, since most of us never actually noticed the difference for 15 years.

Metal Gear Solid's Snake actor didn't want to sound like the character Hideo Kojima took so much inspiration from it reportedly nearly got him sued.

Hideo Kojima has shared his verdict on Return to Silent Hill – and he says a lot with very few words.

"Watched 'Return to Silent Hill' on Amazon Prime," he wrote on Twitter. Ouch.

Kojima is known for his long, poetic reviews for movies he loves, but he never posts a negative review. When he posts shorter, sparser summaries, then, fans immediately assume he hates what he's just seen (by contrast, for example, Kojima's glowing review of Stephen King adaptation The Long Walk clocked in at 219 words).

And he wouldn't be the only one to have a less favorable view of Return to Silent Hill. The movie has a score of only 18% on Rotten Tomatoes, with our own Return to Silent Hill review giving the film 1.5 stars. Our reviewer criticized "a confusing plot, mediocre visual effects, and over-the-top acting" in director Christopher Gan's new take on the franchise.

Loosely based on the 2001 video game Silent Hill 2, Return to Silent Hill stars Jeremy Irvine as James Sunderland. The movie does what it says on the tin, as James returns to the town of Silent Hill after he receives a letter from a former lover. But, when he gets there, he finds that the town is now covered in fog and most of its inhabitants have left or died due to a mysterious disease.

Return to Silent Hill is now available to rent at home. For more, check out our guide to the best upcoming video game movies on the way in 2026 and beyond.

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Hideo Kojima is one of the most major figures in the gaming biz - I mean, after all, his genius mind (and past teams at both Konami and Kojima Productions) did bring us the likes of Metal Gear Solid and Death Stranding, to name but a few, which makes him worth putting on a pedestal.

Being behind so many major gaming franchises means that there's plenty of merch out there with his name on it, and quite literally too. If you're a die-hard Kojima fan and want to show off your fandom for the man who's brought you countless hours of entertainment (and countless head scratches), then you can pick up everything from Kojima Productions shirts to an official Metal Gear solid mouse mats, and even cute chibi figures of Sam and Higgs from Death Stranding 2 that can sit on your monitor.

While Kojima doesn't have his hand in Konami releases these days, I've still gathered a fair share of merchandise spanning his projects past and present, so there's a little something for every type of Kojima fan. I even found an official anime model of the Kojima Productions lumens mascot by Kotobukiya, because of course that exists.

Check out our guides to the best Nintendo gifts and the best Lego sets if you're after more gaming merch to add to your growing collection.

After 15 years, Metal Gear Solid 2's unfinished third-person camera mode has finally been found in the Master Collection version of the stealth classic.

Afevis Solmunko – one of the developers behind the MGSFix mod, which spruces up the PC version of Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol 1 – posts on Twitter (spotted by PC Gamer), "accidentally found third person view in MGS2MC" while sharing videos of it in action. They note "it locks the camera to overhead view when in super-tight corridors so you don't clip through walls, but otherwise... yeah, it been there for 15 years."

15 years in this case refers to the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection, released by Bluepoint Games in 2011, and the basis for the versions of Metal Gear Solid 2 and 3 in Master Collection.

As a user in the responses points out, series creator Hideo Kojima mentioned in an interview around the release of HD Collection that "we experimented with putting a 3D camera in there" and turns out the experiments were hidden in there the whole time. This change effectively gives Metal Gear Solid 2 the same treatment as Metal Gear Solid 3 Subsistence, where you can turn it into a more traditional third-person shooter style of play.

It's definitely going to be fun to return to Metal Gear Solid 2 to check this out, but I can also see it being a Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes situation. The GameCube remake of the original Metal Gear Solid added in the first-person aiming from its sequel, which in turn absolutely killed the balance of the game, since the world wasn't planned for you being able to properly aim (the most notable being the Revolver Ocelot fight, which becomes a total joke). So, a third-person MGS2 could definitely see the same balance issues, but as a fun way to replay the game, I'd have loved to see an official version of this emerge for the HD Collection.

Metal Gear Solid's Snake actor didn't want to sound like the character Hideo Kojima took so much inspiration from it reportedly nearly got him sued.

Hideo Kojima recently polled fans on their favorite Death Stranding 2 trailer, and obviously, the winner was Higgs. But while Troy Baker's villain came out on top, he didn't run away with the votes. Kojima himself is pretty happy about that, since he's been pouring his heart into character creation for years and can now rest assured that all his children have their fans.

If you've stumbled upon Tomorrow's Nightmare in Death Stranding 2, you've already been asked to choose between Higgs, Rainy, Fragile, and Tomorrow. The game doesn't really present any criteria for the choice, simply imploring you to "choose well." Are you meant to pick your favorite character? The one you'd like Sam to become romantically entangled with? (That would be weird for a lot of reasons.) The one you feel the deepest spiritual connection to? That's for you to decide.

Kojima put the question a lot more simply when he polled his followers on Twitter. "Which character is your favorite?" the poll asks (via machine translation), with the same four options represented. With 1,443 votes counted, Higgs took 33.8% of the responses, with Tomorrow coming in second at 30.3%. That left Fragile in third with 24%, and Rainy in fourth with a still respectable 11.9%.

"Higgs was the top favorite, but since all four had fans, that puts me at ease," Kojima said (again via machine translation) after the poll had run its course. "It's not just DS—up until now, I've always poured especially a lot of love into character creation."

Of course, Kojima's games have always toed a fine line between a loving gaze and an uncomfortable leer at their central characters, and that's especially true now that they're all modeled on real-world actors. Certainly, Death Stranding 2 was built to give us a whole lot of time with Norman Reedus' butt and Elle Fanning's feet.

But I think the fact that it's the campy, melodramatic Higgs leading the poll that suggests that Kojima's devotion to his characters does help fans build a real connection to them. After all, a cadre of impossibly attractive movie stars has nothing on an evil robot cowboy with clown makeup and a guitar gun.

Hideo Kojima said Half-Life had a "kind of soul" which Japanese games lacked, and Metal Gear Solid 2 was directly inspired by Valve's classic FPS.

Hideo Kojima wants to go to space. He's made this very known, and frankly, I'm not sure the world would be ready for whatever game he'd come up with after escaping the planet for a while. But Valve boss Gabe Newell was clearly eager to help the Metal Gear mastermind make the right connections, as emails have now been released showing Newell asking Elon Musk to give Kojima a tour of SpaceX.

As spotted by PC Gamer, the newly revealed emails have appeared as part of the Musk v Altman lawsuit, listed in the "amended joint exhibit list" filed on April 24. For some background, Musk is suing the CEO of OpenAI, Sam Altman (who's also one of the co-founders alongside Musk), and the company itself, with the first complaint filed in August 2024 alleging that "Altman assured Musk that the non-profit structure" of OpenAI "guaranteed neutrality and a focus on safety and openness for the benefit of humanity, not shareholder value. But as it turns out, this was all hot-air philanthropy – the hook for Altman's long con."

Anyway, this email from Newell dates back to October 2018, and he gets right to the point. Kojima - "Metal Gear series, a real visionary in our field" - had just visited Valve, "talking about his new game," he says – which we can infer was the first Death Stranding, given the timing of his visit (and resulted in a delightful photo of the pair). Newell says Kojima "mentioned the importance he places on future work in AI."

This part isn't too surprising – more recently, the Death Stranding mastermind has stated that he'd "like AI to handle the tedious tasks that would lower cost and cut down on time," but "would lead the creative part" himself. However, while he can see uses for the technology, he's also expressed concerns that "humans would become spoiled" if they became too reliant on it.

Emailing Musk, Newell says he told Kojima that he'd be "happy to introduce him to the people at OpenAI," but that's not all. "The second thing is he was talking about how much he wants to go into space, and I offered to introduce him to you," Newell writes. "He'd love to get a SpaceX tour."

Responding to Newell's email, Musk seems enthusiastic about the idea. "Sure, it would be great to meet Hideo Kojima and he's welcome to see the rocket factory," Musk writes, telling the Valve boss to "send him my email."

Sadly, this plan still hadn't come to fruition by 2020, when Kojima seemingly made reference to some of these details in an interview with The Game Awards host Geoff Keighley. Mentioning that he visited Valve "maybe four, five years ago" (which would place this well before Newell's 2018 email, so the timeline isn't entirely clear here), Kojima explains: "Gabe said, 'Since we love space so much, let's go visit SpaceX because I know Elon Musk, and I'll contact him, and let's go.'" Poor Kojima seemed slightly disappointed, however, when he added: "Actually, I was really anticipating really going together, but we haven't done that yet."

That didn't lead to Kojima giving up on his dream, though. In 2023, he explained that "I want to go to outer space and create a game you can play in space," pleading: "Please someone send me up to space." Then, last year, he told The Guardian that he wants to "go to the International Space Station and stay there for a few months," adding: "I could probably make games in space. I want to be the first."

At the very least, an image of Kojima appears in the night sky in Death Stranding 2, so he's made it up there in some form. But who knows, perhaps one day we'll see him and Newell set off to the moon together.

Valve chief Gabe Newell saw today's consoles coming a long time ago: "All the consoles are using PC graphics hardware now."

Despite being the star of the series, Metal Gear Solid actor David Hayter says he doesn't fully understand the story of the series either.

Speaking to Fall Damage, Hayter is asked about the series' storyline, responding, "Do I understand the story of Metal Gear Solid? Uh, basically I do; Do I understand all of it? Absolutely not," adding, "I didn't understand all of it while we were recording it."

"I'd be like, 'What does this mean?' and they'd say, 'just say it. And I'd be like, 'Okay.'" Hayter recalls. But he doesn't begrudge the series for it, as he adds, "again, that's what makes Metal Gear, Metal Gear." Hayter explains, "There's more information. There's more character development. There's more detail to the story than you can ever possibly absorb, no matter how many times you play it." He adds, "that's what makes the world feel real and rich and lovable."

Metal Gear is one of those series that gets hit with the 'nonsensical story' stick often, and while it does venture into some wild territory, the core storyline has always been pretty easy to follow. Not to mention it takes place across seven canon games, so we're hardly talking about Kingdom Hearts or Persona, where a golf spinoff would somehow be canon.

Although even the most hardcore of Metal Gear fans like myself will admit that it got a touch convoluted around Metal Gear Solid 4, with elements like a possessed character actually just brainwashing themselves to think they were possessed for two games, a character who was immune to the villain's greatest weapon because he has chronic IBS, and some frankly dumb retcons to tie things into other games.

Metal Gear Solid's Snake actor didn't want to sound like the character Hideo Kojima took so much inspiration from it reportedly nearly got him sued

Metal Gear Solid lead actor David Hayter says he intentionally didn't try to mimic Snake's inspiration when creating the voice for the character.

Speaking to Fall Damage, Hayter says, "When we started Metal Gear and I started taking on Snake, I didn't want him to sound like Kurt Russell from Escape from New York." He explains: "I knew that there were similarities there and I felt like he needed to sound more weathered, you know, that he had been through a lot more than I had been through at that point in my life."

Russell played the character Snake Plissken in the film, a mullet-donning, cigarette-smoking, eyepatch-wearing badass, to which Hideo Kojima was clearly inspired for both Solid Snake and Big Boss. He even acknowledged this, with Metal Gear Solid 2 introducing Iroquois Pliskin a character who looks suspiciously like Solid Snake (but it couldn't be, he died on that tanker two years ago).

Before Hayter was replaced as Big Boss – with Kiefer Sutherland playing the role in Metal Gear Solid 5: Ground Zeroes – Kojima actually tried to get Kurt Russell himself to play the character in Metal Gear Solid 3. Escape from New York director John Carpenter also revealed that the studio wanted to go after the game for ripping off the film, but "I told them not to do that. I know the director of those games, and he's a nice guy, or at least he's nice to me."

Hayter has a point, though, while Metal Gear Solid was many people's entry point to the franchise, Solid Snake was already in retirement by the time that game took place, with the original MSX2 games taking place 10 and six years before the PS1 title (where he would get a voice for the first time). So, the weathered take on the character was probably the right one, and would prove to be one of the most iconic voices in gaming.

Hideo Kojima and Dark Souls creator Hidetaka Miyazaki's games have something other AAA titles don't, former PlayStation boss says: "You can tell it's their visions."

Former PlayStation boss Shuhei Yoshida says he prefers indie games because you can feel the developer's vision, something he feels that isn't present in most AAA releases.

Speaking to GameSpot in a new interview, Yoshida, former president of Sony Interactive Entertainment Worldwide Studios, says: "You can feel the game developer's vision in indie games because indie game developers don't have to ask for approvals." He adds, "I used to work at a large company at PlayStation, and even though we are allowed to have the developer and studio propose what games to make, there are many people involved."

When it comes to AAA releases, he says "It's really hard to tell who is the creator" aside from a few notable exceptions. "Maybe [Hideo] Kojima-san is an exception, or maybe [Hidetaka] Miyazaki-san – you can tell it's their visions [when you play] their games, but most other AAA [games] are a group vision. It's not one person's vision."

Kojima, of course, made Death Stranding and its sequel, and it's hard to see anyone else in the AAA space manage to get away with 'game where you walk and deliver parcels and barely shoot things' without the Metal Gear Solid pedigree behind him. Meanwhile, Miyazaki's games released at a time where hardcore games were becoming rare in the AAA space, and gave birth to the Soulslike genre. Even though Elden Ring is massive, its the culmination of goodwill from creating beloved games for a long time.

Yoshida – who was a big proponent of bringing indie games to PlayStation during his tenure – explains that indie devs are "very excited about this certain subject, even though no one seems to be interested in the subject at the time, but after three years, that might become the latest and the most exciting thing," and in turn, the indie developers end up leading innovation for the entire industry.

"The AAA studios are big fans of many of these game designers and look at indie games for inspiration, and so the indie games play a really important role for the whole industry to keep innovating."

The unfortunate thing is that with the way the industry is now, where a massive game like Marvel's Spider-Man 2 reportedly needs to sell 7.2 million copies just to break even, playing it safe in the AAA space is a natural side effect, unless you're a Kojima and Miyazaki – proven creators with ingrained fanbases – thus given the space to get weird with it.

Of course, there are some who handle this better than others. Capcom is using the guaranteed money it makes from the likes of Monster Hunter, Resident Evil and Street Fighter and investing it in smaller and more esoteric projects like Exoprimal, Kinitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess, and Pragmata, and while not everyone is a winner, you can't innovate without trying. Exoprimal and Kunitsu-Gami may have not set the world on fire, but Pragmata sold over 1 million copies in just two days and is one of Capcom's highest-rated Steam releases ever.

Releasing PlayStation games day one on PC isn't "a good strategy" for its AAA titles, former Sony head says, but he hasn't seen proof its abandoning the platform altogether.

Thanks to a visit by Hideo Kojima to Valve HQ, the internet is reminiscing about a note from the Metal Gear Solid 2 developer diary in which he recalls playing the original Half-Life.

There's a multitude of reasons many still cite 1998 as the greatest year ever for video game releases, and two of the reasons were Metal Gear Solid and Half-Life – two industry defining games that released months apart (there were also some other games you may have heard of like, Tekken 3, Resident Evil 2, Crash Bandicoot Warped, Baldur's Gate… I could fill out my entire wordcount with bangers). But when it came to Game of the Year, our friends at Edge picked… The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, but for some reason, Kojima singled out Half-Life.

In the January 12, 1999, entry, Kojima notes, "I asked Kume-chan to buy Half-Life for reference for MGS2," as it was selected as a nominee in Edge's Game of the Year awards. He explains, "While the graphics are somewhat underwhelming, the gameplay and attention to detail are astounding. Once again, I felt that sense of 'We’ve been outdone by the Americans!' Most of all, the atmosphere is incredible. The real-time direction is superb, and you can feel the soul of the creators in the game."

Kojima also says "Japanese blockbuster games lack this kind of soul" and that "While it's not an especially groundbreaking game, its careful attention to detail, direction, and mechanics is more than enough to build a compelling game world. Everything in the game can be destroyed, bullet holes appear, and when you throw wooden crates or barrels into the river, they float." Metal Gear Solid 2 is known for its level of interactivity – most famously, the bottles and realistically melting ice cubes on the Tanker area – so it wouldn't be a stretch to say Half-Life could have inspired this.

He also pretty much confirms that Half-Life is to thank for VR Missions returning in the Metal Gear sequel, saying, "Half-Life has a training mode called 'Hazard Course.' This was originally introduced by Tomb Raider, but it seems to have become standard in modern PC games. I had been thinking about removing VR mode from MGS2, but now I’m reconsidering."

Hideo Kojima sparks Xbox Project Helix speculation as he meets execs to pose with a mysterious box – but the reality probably isn't that exciting.

A picture of Hideo Kojima with Xbox CEO Asha Sharma and CCO Matt Booty has prompted speculation the developer might have his hands on Project Helix.

Over on Twitter, Kojima posts a photo of the trio after a visit to the Xbox offices, with him and Booty donning Kojima Productions x Xbox Game Studios jackets (presumably produced for OD). However, the interesting part of the photo is the case Kojima is holding, which has a label saying "Xbox for Kojima." Xbox has already confirmed it's working on its next console, Project Helix, so naturally some fans in the responses are assuming it's perhaps a dev kit for the upcoming console.

However, the box itself looks a bit too small to be a dev kit, as in most cases the dev kits for consoles are usually far bigger than the actual console turns out to be (unless Project Helix is really, really small). Not only that, but Xbox itself confirmed at GDC 2026 that dev kits for the upcoming console are being shipped out to developers in 2027, which we're still a little bit out from.

Kojima also met with other notable Xbox names like former CEO Phil Spencer and Master Chief during his visit to Microsoft, however, neither post gives any indication as to what he was doing there. Sharma also quotes the post, saying the meeting was a "wonderful way to close my first 60 days."

The Xbox-partnered horror game OD is next on the list of upcoming Hideo Kojima games, so hopefully this meeting is a good omen that we'll see more from the game in the near future.

Hideo Kojima flexes on NASA, shows Death Stranding 2 players traveled further than the Artemis 2 mission.

Now that Death Stranding 2 has been out on PlayStation 5 and PC for a while, plenty of folks have had the opportunity to experience the Hideo Kojima masterpiece – including Mike Ybarra, former Blizzard Entertainment lead and Xbox corporate vice president at Microsoft.

Ybarra reveals as much in a new online post, praising the game while sharing a screenshot of his Death Stranding 2 stats on Steam. It shows his hours spent in-game and achievements unlocked, which he has apparently 100% completed.

"91.8 hours, probably idle for 10-15 of those," writes the ex-Blizzard boss. "Hell of an experience, and beautiful graphics and sound throughout the entire game. Well done, Hideo Kojima and team."

It sounds like he thoroughly enjoyed it, which isn't all that surprising – after all, we're talking about the game that saw its PC port impressively surpass the Steam concurrent player peak of both versions of the original game combined in just 24 hours. Heck, it boasts thousands of reviews and an "Overwhelmingly Positive" rating with a perfect 5/5 score on Steam, too.

What is a bit mind-boggling, however, is Ybarra's admission in his comments.

Upon a fan asking which story is better – that of Death Stranding 2 or its 2019 predecessor – Ybarra shockingly replies, "1." In other words, the Microsoft veteran believes the original game has a better plot… or, at least, that's what it sounds like.

I suppose I can understand and respect that it's a matter of perspective, but not everyone agrees. One response to Ybarra reads, "Don't think it's remotely fair to even say that. It's a true sequel. The story is coupled."

Everyone's got their own opinion, I guess – I'd argue that, while Death Stranding 2 presents its "story" more quickly and apparently, the first game definitely harbors a surreal allure I'm not sure the second nails as well. So, I see where Ybarra's coming from… but I also get the other side.

All in all, though, I'm more impressed by the achievement completion. That's a whole "lot of deliveries," as Ybarra himself admits in the thread.

We'll just have to wait and see if Death Stranding 3 – which Kojima said he's already written a concept for but wants someone else to make – outdoes the first two games, should it ever come to fruition. Here's hoping it does.

Hideo Kojima flexes on NASA, shows Death Stranding 2 players traveled further than the Artemis 2 mission in the same time span.

Hideo Kojima is casually flexing on NASA by sharing a graphic showing the cumulative Sams in Death Stranding 2: On the Beach have travelled further than the Artemis 2 Lunar Flyby Mission did in the same 10-day period after the PC version launched.

In a graphic shared onto Hideo Kojima's Instagram account, titled "Sams vs Artemis 2," records taken "from a 10 day period after the PC version launch" are shown. Between April 1 and April 10, 2026, the Artemis 2 mission's Orion spacecraft had travelled 700,237 miles, but in that same period, Death Stranding 2 players had travelled 969,703 miles as Sam on-foot during in-game delivery missions.

Granted, it's not specified if this is just from the PC version of the game, or rather just a way to advertise the recently-released PC version, although I'm not sure why you would even specify in that case. But regardless, the Sam Porter Bridges hivemind has travelled further than a spacecraft and Kojima is going to flaunt that as is. One user points out the implications of counting every player, saying: "I like the idea of every instance of Sam controlled by us is canon, implying he did it all."

However, now the question is, will Kojima take this competition literally? If Death Stranding 3 ever happens, could we see Sam delivering packages through outer space in an effort to connect the galaxy? Probably not, but it should.

Hideo Kojima would "rather have the player walk away impacted than entertained," Troy Baker says.

Hideo Kojima still has plenty of creative fuel left in the tank, according to Death Stranding and The Last of Us actor Troy Baker.

Kojima's already put out hit after hit for decades, delivering wild spectacles and outlandish stories at every turn between the war-riddled Metal Gear Solid series, the nightmarish corridors of PT, and his two most recent Death Stranding games. But with the upcoming Hideo Kojima games - horror experiment OD and stealth-action game Physint - Baker told GamesRadar+ that the famed director's "not running out of ideas anytime soon" in an interview ahead of the 2026 BAFTA Game Awards.

"I've learned to trust Hideo, and he's not running out of ideas anytime soon," Baker says after portraying flamboyant antagonist Higgs in both Death Stranding and its sequel. "I think that there's a lot that he did to set up this world and these characters that we could extrapolate from. But I also understand him as a creator going, 'I don't want to spend the next 20, 30, years of my life in one world.' We've already seen he's got so many other ideas and things that are already in development."

"So, I guess, for me, I always try to approach this as an audience member, and what is it that I would want to appreciate from [creators], and if I get the opportunity to double down and be a part of it, then that's gravy," Baker adds. "That's a bonus. But at the end of the day, I think I just, for these creators and these developers that I've worked with, I think, at the end of the day, I'm more excited to see what they come up with next, and one way or another, be a part of it."

Decades into his already storied career, Kojima's clearly not hurting for new ideas. His Death Stranding games are almost allergic to the open-world trends that have followed the genre for the better part of two console generations, Physint is said to straddle the line between film and video games, and OD, well, I don't think anyone totally knows what's going on in OD.

Despite starring in The Last of Us, Death Stranding, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, and many more, Troy Baker feels like he "just got started" and "my best work is ahead of me"

In an interview with GamesRadar+ ahead of the 2026 BAFTA Game Awards, actor Troy Baker describes Metal Gear and Death Stranding creator Hideo Kojima as a developer who puts "big swings" and creative risks above some need to entertain.

Baker, who played Higgs in Death Stranding 2 and has acted in dozens of high-profile games, says working with Kojima was a process of trust. "It was him trusting me with that role," he says. "It was me trusting him to go, 'You know where this story is going. I'm going to do my part and I'm going to hand it over to you.'"

Higgs was well-received because of how the character "fits into the whole thing," Baker reckons, and that broader vision leads back to Kojima and the way he makes games.

"I think that there's a lot of people that are making games – and I don't blame them – that, right now, are trying to razzle dazzle the player the entire way and make sure that they're having fun," he says. "After all, it's entertainment. But I think that there's other people who go, 'I would much rather have the player walk away impacted than entertained.' And that takes a lot of trust. That takes a lot of faith. That takes big swings only. And you do risk a lot, you do put a lot in the middle when you take that kind of philosophy in making something, especially of this size and this magnitude."

Baker tips his hat to Lucas Pope, creator of Papers, Please and Return of the Obra Dinn, who he calls "a brilliant game designer," as an example of modern developers creating incredible, atypical experiences with small teams (in Pope's case, one-man teams). For Kojima's atypical creations, he returns to the idea of scope and trust.

"Hideo is still making games in very much the way that he made Metal Gear, where it is so conceptualized, and so huge, and so thought out that I think the only way he knows how to swing is big," Baker says. "And when you do that with trust, and you surround yourself with talented people – not only in the cast, but also in the crew – and you still execute that, man, it's a miracle. Truly is a miracle."

Previously, much was made of Kojima's alleged decision to make Death Stranding 2 weirder because playtester feedback was too positive. Kojima later clarified that his intent was to make a game that isn't "digestible," because "something that is not digestible stays in that person for a long time." But the underlying point is consistent: Kojima doesn't seek to make his games suit a mold. And if nothing else, Death Stranding does not fit a mold.

The 2026 BAFTA Games Awards with Google Play will take place on Friday, 17 April 2026, at the Southbank Centre’s Queen Elizabeth Hall, London.

Hideo Kojima put Low Roar in the Death Stranding games because he thinks gamers need more culture in their lives: "I believe that is the role entertainment is meant to play."

Casting details for Hideo Kojima's upcoming Metal Gear Solid spiritual successor, Physint, have reportedly emerged, hinting at the game's villain.

According to MP1st, a new casting call for the project, codenamed "Shimmer," has surfaced, revealing that Mari Ueda, who founded motion capture company Pivot Motion, which worked on Death Stranding 2, will be the casting director for the game. The listing is looking for four actors, with the call looking to fill the roles of passengers on a hijacked bus and a villain (presumably responsible for hijacking the bus). We previously knew that Ma Dong-seok (also known as Don Lee), Charlee Fraser, and Minami Hamabe were also cast in undisclosed roles.

Some of the roles being cast include a mother holding a newborn, five teenagers of different ethnicities, and two additional male passengers. However, the villainous character is the most interesting one, with the role describing "Mads Mikkelsen in Hannibal but with flair," who is slim, quiet, "intense," and "confident in a psychotic way." The casting call also calls for a requirement of a German accent, which, if anything, makes it sound like they really want Christoph Waltz for the role.

Shooting for Physint is apparently scheduled to start in June of this year, but given that Kojima said last year that the game was still "another five or six years" away from being released, we probably won't be seeing too much of it for a while yet. Kojima said in August 2025 that he was working on it "all by myself" while the rest of Kojima Productions was busy with OD, so at the very least, it may mean OD will be coming in the near future.

I'm always down for any upcoming Hideo Kojima games, but as a Metal Gear Solid die-hard (and a big baby when it comes to horror), his new tactical espionage game Physint is straight at the top of my list over OD. Typically, I'm all for artists being able to branch out and create new things instead of making sequels – we wouldn't have Devil May Cry if Hideki Kamiya kept making Resident Evil, and no Okami if he kept making Devil May Cry – but selfishly I'd love a new Kojima-led Metal Gear Solid, so I'm hoping that Physint captures the magic and scratches the itch.

Hideo Kojima put Low Roar in the Death Stranding games because he thinks gamers need more culture in their lives: "I believe that is the role entertainment is meant to play."

It's important in life, I believe, to maintain a broad palette when it comes to culture and the arts. Hideo Kojima agrees, as he continues to use video games like Death Stranding to introduce people to music and other elements they might not otherwise discover.

In an interview with Vogue, he spoke about using his games as a platform for highlighting the artists he'd like people to explore further. "Take the band Low Roar from the previous game, for instance," Kojima explains. "When someone hears a song in the game and feels, 'Oh, I like this,' I want that spark to lead them to discover the band, to explore Icelandic music more deeply, or even to seek out related films."

Low Roar is a strong example, because there were likely many, many Death Stranding players who were unfamiliar with the post-rock, ambient, and electronica scenes in Iceland before playing. For acts that exist in such specific niches, that kind of exposure is incredible.

Kojima believes a substantial amount of the audience for games tends to be relatively insular in their tastes, and he wants to help push them toward artistic expressions they're otherwise overlooking. "I believe that is the role entertainment is meant to play," he muses. "Games have a tendency to remain closed systems that exist only within themselves, but I want players to step outside of that."

We need only look at the influence of the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater series on millennial music tastes to see the potential here. The right playlist and musical artists used in the right way in the right game can make a huge impact on those playing. Hell, I still remember the band Cold because of that song they did for Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy.

Nu metal trips down memory lane aside, Kojima has the right idea, and you can feel it through his trailers and full releases. The question now is, who's getting the rub for OD?

Death Stranding 2 dev says Hideo Kojima "wanted more people to enjoy" the sequel "all the way to the end" after complaints that the first game "might've been a little bit slow."

Despite word that Hideo Kojima made Death Stranding 2: On the Beach a weirder game in response to early player feedback that was apparently "too good," a lead dev actually says he aimed to make the game in a way that it would be more likely for players to see the game through to the end.

The comments arose from the game's co-composer Woodkid, however, Kojima clarified what actually happened after focus tests, saying that he actually made the game "more playable," and rather, he didn't want the game to be something that is "digestible." Kojima explained, "Something that is not digestible stays in that person for a long time. So that's what I meant by, 'I want to do things differently.'"

Now, speaking to PC Gamer, Death Stranding 2 lead level designer Hiroaki Yoshiike further clarifies the story, saying, "Kojima wanted more people to enjoy the game all the way to the end. This was an order he provided." Yoshiike explains that because the first game was forced to be "very elaborate" as they "introduced all the new concepts and what the world is like," player feedback was that the game "might've been a little bit slow."

He continues, "In the second game, we didn't need to provide too many worldbuilding elements; we could make it less elaborate. For completionists, they can enjoy it, but at the same time, people who don't necessarily care about it that much, we made sure they can follow the story through other supplemental elements within the game. That was one of the design choices that we made."

"We've gotten a lot of feedback that it's much easier to recommend DS2 to people." Yoshiike explains, adding, "We're able to see the metrics, and we saw that people progress much further than they previously had. So that was just as we designed, I think."

Hideo Kojima says a Hawaiian proverb led to the new Death Stranding 2 trailer, because what else did you expect: "I gave it the special title 'No Rain, No Rainbow'"

Death Stranding 2's PC launch has beaten the concurrent player record of the original game, and is one of the highest for a PlayStation-published game on Steam.

Word emerged earlier this month that Sony is reportedly pulling back from releasing single-player PlayStation games on PC, with the likes of Ghost of Yotei and Saros likely not coming to the platform. However, that hasn't stopped PlayStation's latest single-player PC release from being a hit.

Looking over at SteamDB, Death Stranding 2: On the Beach hit a concurrent player count of 55,444 players on Steam shortly after it debuted on the platform yesterday. The original Death Stranding hit a high of 32,515 when it launched on the platform back in July 2020, while the Director's Cut edition of the original hit a peak of 22,080 back in June of last year – when Death Stranding 2 launched on PS5. There's a chance this isn't even the peak for Death Stranding 2 yet, as most games tend to hit their highest on the Saturday or Sunday of their opening weekend.

As far as PlayStation games on PC go, the high of 55,444 places Death Stranding 2 as the sixth highest-played game on Steam, behind Horizon Zero Dawn, Spider-Man Remastered, God of War, Ghost of Tsushima Director's Cut, and Helldivers 2. Death Stranding 2 only needs just under 22,000 more players to beat Tsushima and land the second-place spot, but I think it's very unlikely for it to beat Helldivers 2, which peaked at 458,709 at release.

Hideo Kojima says a Hawaiian proverb led to the new Death Stranding 2 trailer, because what else did you expect: "I gave it the special title 'No Rain, No Rainbow'"

Trailers for Hideo Kojima games are truly a genre unto themselves, often esoteric as they are. A promo accompanying Death Stranding 2: On the Beach's PC launch is no different, and the man himself took to Twitter to explain his ideas for it. They're exactly what you'd think, which is to say, you couldn't have possibly predicted this.

"For this trailer, I gave it the special title 'No Rain, No Rainbow,'" he says. "It's originally a Hawaiian proverb, carrying the positive meaning that no matter the hardship or sadness, something good will always follow."

That's definitely poetic, and speaks to Kojima's multifaceted approach to his projects. You can't say he doesn't bring a variety of influences to the table. The track 'Story of Rainy' by Woodkid is used as the music, a big, emotive piece of work, in keeping with these ideas.

"I tied it in with the lyrics "from rain to tears, from rain to rainbow," as well as the themes of Death Stranding 2," Kojima adds. You can often sense this depth from his teasers, especially as they usually come from his workstation, as he used to hallmark the arrival of On the Beach's PC version.

That all said, the visual juxtaposition of Woodkid's massive vocal crescendo, featuring a kids choir, and mentions of "Support for Ray Tracing" and "Remappable Key Binds" is hilarious and very entertaining. This is still a video game, and the medium has some necessary quirks when it comes to promotion.

Death Stranding 2: On the Beach comes out on PC tomorrow, March 19. Since that's Sam Bridges's latest venture well taken care of for the time-being, attention turns to OD, his horror game for Xbox, and Physint, another Sony gig. Whatever comes, you can expect the trailers to be memorable.

Death Stranding 2's PC port adds a harder difficulty mode, new live-action scenes, and much more, Sony confirms – and PS5 players are getting them too

Death Stranding 2's PC port has apparently leaked on Steam a few days before its official launch later this week.

Hideo Kojima's latest game, Death Stranding 2, is set to finally get a PC release this week on March 19, allowing more than just PS5 owners to experience one of the best games of 2025. The PC Port is set to add new features to the game, like ultrawide support, new live-action cutscenes, and a new difficulty mode to make things even harder (and the PS5 version is getting most of these too, don't worry). But some have gotten an early taste of the new changes.

As spotted by PC Gamer, the Steam preload for the game apparently provided unencrypted versions of the game files by mistake, and were up long enough for someone to download the 113GB game in full. The game features Steam's own DRM rather than a specialized option like Denuvo, which made the files easy for piracy experts to access, and as a result, people are playing the PC release of Death Stranding 2 right now.

PC Gamer notes that most of the discussion about the pirated port centers on the lack of a Russian-language voice-over, which is hopefully a good omen for the PC port's performance and quality. So those of you waiting until this Thursday for the official release hopefully needn't worry.

Although personally, I'm not really sure why you would want to play a pirated version of a game where a ton of the experience lies in its online functionality, which players of a pirated version would inevitably be locked out of.

Death Stranding 2 lead says Kojima Productions gambled on Horizon studio's Decima engine for "long hoped" for features.

Update: Sony has officially confirmed these changes with a new post on the PlayStation Blog. The post also details the settings exclusive to the PC version of the game, including uncapped framerates, mouse and keyboard support, upscaling, and frame generation tech, and 32:9 ultrawide support for gameplay sections (in-game cutscenes and the PS5 version will be limited to 21:9 ultrawide support).

The post also includes a new trailer edited by Hideo Kojima, which shows off some of the changes with this new update in action.

Original story: Hideo Kojima has outlined some of the updates coming to Death Stranding 2 with the release of its PC version later this week.

On the Spacewalk radio show (spotted and translated by Genki_JPN on Twitter), Kojima explained what's new with the PC release of his latest game and outlined some of the updates launching alongside it. The standout change from this is a harder difficulty mode named after the game's theme song "To The Wilder," which should be a welcome addition to anyone who found the game too easy, plus, Kojima confirms that the game overall has been adjusted based on player data from the PS5 release.

The ability to replay the boss fights with Neil will be added too, which, considering the first game let you replay the Cliff sections, was a weird omission. And – probably the most important inclusion – Tarman's Chiral Cat will show up in Sam's room for you to hang about with. Of course, there are things you would expect for a PC port, including Ultrawide support, which Kojima described as like VR without a headset.

The game also features new live-action scenes, which were mostly cut from the original release. There's a remnant of this when going through the Plate Gate, where there's a scene of someone making sushi, with Kojima confirming that there were meant to be more scenes included that had to be cut toward the end of development. All of these updates will be coming to the PS5 version of the game, too, so if you were itching to replay the game, now is probably the right time for you.

Death Stranding 2 lead says Kojima Productions gambled on Horizon studio's Decima engine for "long hoped" for features

Modern gamers might not recognize Don Daglow by name, but you will certainly feel his influence on the games you play every day. He designed some of the earliest RPGs (1975's Dungeon), strategy games (1982's Utopia), and MMOs (1991's Neverwinter Nights, not to be confused with the BioWare game of the same name) in the industry's history.

Drawing on a half-century of experience behind the scenes of gaming, he concluded a recent Game Developers Conference talk, attended by GamesRadar+, with two pieces of advice to devs today: get a rich family, and develop your own style. Admittedly, one of those tips is a bit more serious than the other.

"I have this as one of my last points, because it is something I wanted to make prominent," Daglow says. "Have a rich daddy." He quickly acknowledged that this part is a joke – at least mostly. "No, that only solves some of the problems."

Instead, his real point is this: "You want to create styles – don't reflect them." He points to the advice given on "singing competition shows," where performers are encouraged to make sure that people recognize their voice and style within the first five seconds of a song. "Lady Gaga is a great example of somebody who does this," he explains. "Billie Eilish does this." He also points to writers like American novelist Richard Brautigan. "You read five words of Brautigan, you knew you were reading Brautigan."

What does that mean for game designers? "It's often mood," Daglow explains, citing the works of Hideo Kojima. "If you play a Kojima game, you recognize pretty quickly it's Kojima. So what you want to do is think about – this is a thing you work on for years and evolve for years, and the answer now might be one thing, and five years from now it might be something different – but we're trying to be a flame that emits heat, not a mirror that's reflecting other people and absorbing heat. That's the whole point behind this idea of having a style, of doing something that makes your work feel unique, and that is the best way to be timeless anywhere in this business and in craft."

Daglow ended his talk with the assertion that "games matter." He asked, "How do we know that games matter? Because if you've done this for a while, someone at some point – if you're around gaming people – they will come up to you and say, 'Oh, you worked on that game. You were on that team. I love that game.' And they will tell you what they loved, who they played with, when and where they were, and they will tell you why they still care."

In my case, they may have played it when they were 11 years old, and they're now 50, but the nice thing is they still care, and then they want to tell you about it. They want to tell you why. Why are they doing that? They're doing that because it matters your work, the work of your teammates, matter, and that's why they want to tell you, if you're early in your career. This may not have happened yet. Once you've been in games for a while, it inevitably will happen when you're around games people, I think it happens for all of us, that we get that experience. And the longer you stay, the more it will keep happening. It's a glorious feeling, but that's what's important, is

This kind of interaction "validates the fact that what we do matters," Daglow says. "We are not just – because this is art – we are not just diverting people. We're not just keeping them from being bored, and we're not just entertaining them. It's something that, when we are at our best, it matters. That's how you know. Now if you believe that, and you buy that observation and that logic, then I have my challenge that I always like to give. That is, if we have the ability to do things that matter in people's lives, and we are so fortunate to have that opportunity, as all of us here do: build something great. Don't take that talent and waste it. Use it, and please build something great."

Sounding like the coolest guy in the room, Hideo Kojima says him being creative "isn't special," it's just as natural as eating: "If creativity were taken out of my daily life, I probably wouldn't survive."

Asus and Hideo Kojima's long-awaited collaboration on the best gaming tablet I've tested to date is now available for pre-order. The Asus ROG Flow Z13 has had the Ludens treatment, with the top-end spec sporting carbon fiber enhancements in a new gold, white, and black colorway. Available now on Asus's own store, this is one premium upgrade.

The 128GB RAM / AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 tablet comes in at a whopping $3,699.99 at Asus - that's $400 more than the same spec without all the regalia. If you don't mind sacrificing Kojima's stamp, though, there are better prices around.

While it's not quite as exciting, the regular Asus ROG Flow Z13 is available with these exact same internals for $500 off its $3,299.99 MSRP. That means you can get the same portable power for just $2,799.99 at Best Buy. Is your Kojima fandom worth $900? Now that's the question.

So what do you get for investing in Kojima's creation?

The Asus ROG Flow Z13 has been outfitted with a bunch of Death Stranding and Kojima-esque iconography, but the star of the show is that gold panel running across the back. It's a slick design, that's to be sure, and it's complemented beautifully by a custom (and exclusive) carrying case that looks like it's been ripped straight from Sam Porter-Bridges' hands.

Of course, $3,699.99 is a lot to pay for a piece of merch - you have to really know the tablet itself is for you. Luckily, this rig shot straight to the top of my recommendations as soon as I finished my Asus ROG Flow Z13 review last year.

While previous models relied on weaker GPUs like the RTX 3050, this thing takes integrated graphics and runs with them. The AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 chipset uses RDNA 3.5 graphics in that Radeon 8060S package. Considering my mind was blown on the weaker AMD Ryzen AI Max 390 configuration, that's some serious horsepower.

In FHD resolution, my system could run pretty much anything I threw at it (though I did still have to steer clear of Ultra settings in Black Myth Wukong). The ceiling drops a little when it comes to QHD, with numbers dipping just below 60fps in more demanding games at higher settings. In reality, though, I made my way through Indiana Jones and the Great Circle and Avowed on this rig and thoroughly enjoyed every second.

So no, you're not getting the same kind of performance as you would one of the best gaming laptops, but if you're looking for something more portable than a full rig and less constricted than the best gaming handhelds, it's certainly worth investigating.

• See all gaming tablets at Best Buy

I'm also hunting down all the best gaming phones for more portable play, or check out the best mobile controllers and best gaming earbuds for some on-the-go accessories.

Hideo Kojima is reminiscing over the Metal Gear Solid 3 Premium Package, and the impressive list of contributors for its included book.

Metal Gear Solid 3 is the best game ever made if you ask me (which you should, because it's true). Over 20 years later, there's a reason the game that was the worst-selling Metal Gear Solid game of the original four entries is one people still talk about to this day, and the one Konami elected to remake with 2025's Metal Gear Solid Delta. And even though he's no longer involved with the series, series creator Hideo Kojima has been reminiscing over his magnum opus.

Over on Twitter, Kojima posts images of one of the books included in the Japanese-exclusive Metal Gear Solid 3 Premium Package, recounting the wild list of contributors included. Names like future Kojima collaborator Guillermo del Toro, filmmaker John Woo, Parasite Eve author Hideaki Sena, and Polish author Stanisław Lem were included in the book. Kojima notes, "The lineup of contributors has now become legendary."

Kojima recalls, "At the time, neither the contributors nor I had any fear. The energy we had was incredible." He also includes photos of messages left by some of the contributors, with del Toro saying "all of a sudden, Pain, Fear, and Sorrow are things I look forward to" in reference to the game's boss fights, adding: "Konami has nailed the mood, the moves, the fights. Awesome!"

Woo says the series has "played an important part in the history of the video game industry," and adds, "The classic battles between Liquid Snake and Solid Snake definitely belong on the big screen."

Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol. 2's included games disappear from storefronts without warning

Death Stranding 2 director Hideo Kojima just revealed what I never knew was possible: the post-apocalyptic game's destroyed version of Australia is compatible with plush turtleneck sweaters. Kojima proves it with an early look at the Death Stranding 2 art book, currently available for pre-order.

Kojima posts photos of his new book sample in a February 13 post on Twitter, showing off incredible early designs for people like Sam, Death Stranding 2's most-valued delivery boy, and phenomena like "tarfalls," which Kojima seems to have first imagined as huge, sticky hills of spilled ink. Then, he gives us a glimpse of Sam and ally Fragile in what he calls a "pre‑COVID setting."

This "pre-COVID setting" must have been much more business casual, since Sam wears an uncharacteristically chic blue suit with a slinky turtleneck, while Fragile assumes a she-EO position with one hand on her hip to emphasize the square lines of her blazer dress. While I'm taking this art as an unfortunate sign that co-working spaces still exist in Kojima's vision of the apocalypse, I'm encouraged not to worry about it by what the director says on Twitter, "Once the pandemic hit, the original pre‑COVID storyline was revised." Otherwise, Sam and Fragile would have appeared "in the final scene" in Monday meeting style.

Of course, there are downsides to Kojima's change of heart about Death Stranding 2's setting. One fan writes, "We could have had the hottest Sam and fragile. FUCK." Better luck next apocalypse.

Death Stranding 2 PC port out in March with "unlocked framerates" and ultra widescreen support, Kojima truthers rejoice.

After some not-so-vague social media posts from Hideo Kojima, the PC port of Death Stranding 2: On The Beach was announced at the most recent State of Play. Besides getting some platform-specific features, there are new modes and other new aspects on the way for both the PC and PS5 versions.

A PlayStation blog from Jay Boor, head of publishing at Kojima Productions, provided a small tease following the announcement. "New modes and features will be coming to both PC and PS5 at launch that will offer players new challenges and rewards," reads the post.

We'll hear more about what this will entail in March. The first game got similar treatment via the director's cut, adding fresh missions, equipment and quality-of-life tweaks to make playing a bit more pleasurable.

The mention of "new challenges and rewards" sounds like On The Beach might be dialing up the difficulty with more optional missions for cool unlockables. But that's speculation, and thankfully, there isn't long to wait. Players on PC will already be able to optimize the second outing of Sam Bridges as they see fit, using upscalers and uncapped framerates.

Ports and re-releases aren't all that's happening in the world of Death Stranding. There are no fewer than three screen adaptations happening: two movies and an animated show. The latter is a spin-off, unrelated to what we see in the two games.

Outside of all of this, Kojima has another major PlayStation project in the works, Physint, which remains unrevealed, and OD, a horror game for Xbox. He's a busy man, that's for sure. Death Stranding 2 comes to PC on March 19.

Sounding like the coolest guy in the room, Hideo Kojima says him being creative "isn't special," it's just as natural as eating: "If creativity were taken out of my daily life, I probably wouldn't survive"

Anyone whose Hideo Kojima sensors were going off this week after the developer kept teasing a mysterious video he was editing: put down your magnifying glass, pick up your party hat, you were right. Death Stranding 2: On the Beach is receiving its PC port on March 19

A short trailer (so that's what Kojima has been staring at on his monitor recently) revealed during PlayStation's State of Play February 2026 livestream explains the port will feature "unlocked framerates during gameplay" and ultra widescreen support. You'll be able to see your Bridge Baby as you've never seen it before. Ultra wide.

The State of Play trailer footage captured on PC looks pretty lovely. There's the hostile Higgs Monaghan, as unsettling as ever in his sneering red mask. Unlocked frame rates mean you can push your PC to the edges of the Earth while shooting Ghost Mechs' arms off, though fine print indicates there's a "compatible PC and Graphics Card required." Helpfully, the game's cinematics will be locked to 60fps, so you can hopefully avoid your PC setup being completely set on fire.

Death Stranding 2 PC players can also enjoy DualSense controller support, plus upscaling and frame generation. The port is available to pre-purchase as of today, February 12, with some useful bonus content originally available with Death Stranding 2's PS5 pre-order: the Battle, Boost, and Bokka skeletons for Sam and a Quokka hologram. Enjoy that in one million frames-per-second.

Sounding like the coolest guy in the room, Hideo Kojima says him being creative "isn't special," it's just as natural as eating: "If creativity were taken out of my daily life, I probably wouldn't survive."

When there's a cryptic Hideo Kojima post, there's a legion of Death Stranding diehards preparing to decode it. In this case, some people are certain Kojima's latest vague references to "editing" mean a Death Stranding 2 PC port is shooting down fast through the pipeline.

Kojima writes casually in a February 9 Twitter post, "Didn't have much time today for editing." It's similar to a post he made last week, where he cries about "Editing for the first time in…8 months?" Notably, the first Death Stranding game from 2019 got its PC port eight months after launching as a PlayStation exclusive, with its definitive Director's Cut arriving around a year later. So this timeline's starting to look prescient…

Sony has also just confirmed its rumored next State of Play is, indeed, happening on February 12 at 5pm ET. Very interesting timing, very interesting.

Even more damning, Kojima's February 9 post includes a photo of his computer displaying some very Death Stranding 2 font advertising "a Hideo Kojima game." Underneath his monitor, Kojima displays a themed Death Stranding calendar for 2026. OK, I think he might be trying to tell us something.

Though, I'm also eager for more news about OD, Kojima's Xbox-exclusive horror collaboration with the great Nope director Jordan Peele. Kojima said – again, cryptically – in December about OD that "I can't say exactly what it is yet, nor do I know if it will work out." Since the project is seemingly Kojima's first horror game since the abandoned Silent Hills in 2015, I'm eager to learn the answers to both those quandaries.

Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes producer says Hideo Kojima and Shigeru Miyamoto's secret isn't just their "genius", it's that they work "really f**king hard."

Silicon Knights founder Denis Dyack attributes the success of developers like Shigeru Miyamoto and Hideo Kojima to them never turning off.

Outside of developing the first Legacy of Kain title, Silicon Knights is best known for its partnership with Nintendo in the early 2000s which saw the release of the iconic GameCube horror Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem and the Konami collaboration on the Nintendo-exclusive Metal Gear Solid remake Twin Snakes. Working directly with Nintendo on a remake of the most iconic Hideo Kojima game of all time would, of course, give you a pretty strong opinion on the creatives behind it.

Speaking to Reece "Kiwi Talkz" Reilly, Dyack recalls, "When I was at Nintendo talking about Eternal Darkness with Mr, Miyamoto as an example. We talked a lot. But he talked to everyone a lot, all the time." Dyack explains, "They have this sort of thing, 'you don't wanna leave until your boss leaves.' I never saw Mr. Miyamoto leave, ever… He was there all the time."

However, Dyack praises Miyamoto's style, recalling: "I would see him listening to someone talking about an issue. And I could just see it in his head where he would think about it and spend time with it." He adds, "He didn't bullshit his way through it, he spent time on it."

Dyack remembers speaking about his own lofty ambitions with Miyamoto: "He would actually listen to me. He would contain all of those things that I was saying into ways that we could execute them."

He also notes that "Mr. Kojima is the same way." He says that he gets asked what it was like working with Kojima often, explaining, "yeah he's amazing, he's a genius, but he worked really fucking hard," adding, "these guys work all the time." Furthermore, while there's "people in the west" with ambitions of being right and owning houses in the likes of Hawaii, "Mr. Miyamoto and Mr. Kojima don't have those things because they have no use for them. Because they're working so hard."

Hideo Kojima is teasing something ahead of rumored State of Play, and almost everyone's thinking the same thing

Metal Gear and Death Stranding creator Hideo Kojima is at it again. In this instance, it's editing some form of video, likely to be a trailer, but for what game? Well, it's hard to tell, but the likely candidate is a port or re-release of a certain blockbuster sequel from last year.

He posted an image of himself at a desk, video editing software up in front of him. "Editing for the first time in… eight months?" says the tweet's caption. You truly can't see anything revealing, but the first half of the screen definitely looks like it says "A Hideo Kojima Game."

This boilerplate is a hallmark of trailers for his games, and the teasers the second Death Stranding have it as presented here, white text on a black background. OD, the horror game from Kojima Productions for Xbox Game Studios, features the phrase as part of a splash with the logo in the first trailer.

The indication people are getting is that he's working on the announcement of Death Stranding 2 coming to PC, getting a director's cut similar to the first, or maybe some DLC. The first is clearly where most heads went to immediately. "DS2 the director’s cut must be on the way," says the top reply.

“PC trailer for DS2?” says another. These reflect dozens of replies, and his post lines up with rumors the next State of Play presentation from Sony will occur this month, February 2026. Tradition dictates one is due to happen around now. If an announcement is coming, that'd be where it's most likely to occur.

Something on OD is possible, but an Xbox Developer Direct happened just two weeks ago, and the last trailer for that game came out in September 2025. We're probably not due an update there for a little while yet. Physint isn't out of the realm of possibility either, but anything substantial on that seems even further away given how little we already know.

Funnily enough, Kojima made almost the exact same tweet last year, again on February 5, only for Death Stranding 2 not to appear on that month's State of Play. Whatever this is for, you can count on his vague-posting to continue unabated.

Hideo Kojima calls Death Stranding 2 his "masterpiece," but that's only because his "latest work" is always his best

Following the release of Jujutsu Kaisen season 3 last week, Hideo Kojima has finally started to catch up with the beloved anime series, although he might have done it in the wrong order (you can read our guide on how to watch Jujutsu Kaisen in order to avoid the same mistake).

"Jujutsu Kaisen 0. I'd only seen the first episode of the series before, but after watching this movie, I think I finally fully understand why it's so popular. And once again – MAPPA is incredible," wrote Kojima on Twitter yesterday, praising not only the series, but also the animation studio that makes it possible.

Although we love seeing Kojima entering the world of jujutsu sorcerers right as the story kicks off The Culling Game, starting with the prequel movie Jujutsu Kaisen 0 having only watched the first episode of the show might not be the best viewing order.

The film is set after the events of the Hidden Inventory/Premature Death arc (the first five episodes of season 2, or alternatively the compilation movie of the same name), and features some characters that viewers get to know and love episode after episode in the series, like the all-powerful Satoru Gojo.

That said, Jujutsu Kaisen 0 is an outstanding watch, even "better than the entire show" for some fans. "I thought I would love the show as much as I loved the movie, but it never happened," wrote a fan, replying to Kojima's post, while others insisted that now he has to watch the rest of the series. "You gotta watch the series. Mappa gets better, season after season," recommended another fan.

Jujutsu Kaisen returned with new episodes on January 8, adapting the Extermination (chapters 137-143), Perfect Preparation (chapters 144-158) and finally the Culling Game arc (chapters 159-221) of the manga.

For more, check out our Jujutsu Kaisen season 3 release schedule to know when new episodes will drop. While you wait, catch up with other new anime releases like Frieren: Beyond Journey's End season 2, and the highly anticipated Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle streaming release date in 2026.

Hideo Kojima is a mastermind of creativity – even if he claims it's nothing special, the guy has a lot of wild ideas, and those apparently don't stop even when he's asleep.

Writing on Twitter, Kojima reveals he's stumbled across "a nightmarish memo" of a bad dream he had in early 2017. The Death Stranding creator says he's "always had a lot of bad dreams," and someone once suggested that he keep a dream diary. While "the nightmares didn't stop, and I eventually gave up," he's now shared an example of one of them.

In the dream, Kojima moves alone "to some hot spring town," where he lives in a boarding house with "only a back entrance," situated in a spot "surrounded by narrow alleyways." He explains: "The alleys twist and turn, and because things are piled up everywhere, they're so tight that only one person can pass through at a time."

Dream Kojima, as I'm deciding to call him from now on, decides to "clean up the surrounding paths that serve as everyday walkways" as a greeting to his new neighbors, and since those paths are just made of "packed-down dirt," he decides to "walk around spraying water with a hose" to "keep the dust down." It's at this point that things start to get a little weird, though.

"As I do this, I start running into various local residents. Most of them are voluptuous nude women who look as if they've stepped straight out of figure sketches or croquis drawings, or scar-covered elderly men who speak in foreign languages," he continues. …Huh.

But that's only the beginning. After finishing his task, Dream Kojima decides to head back to his room. "Then I suddenly notice that, as if the soil has dissolved from the water, four decomposing corpses are buried along the path. They remind me of artistic swimming: only the upper halves of their bodies are exposed above the ground, neatly aligned."

Oh dear. Dream Kojima is a rational man, however, and decides he needs to "call the police." However, as he turns towards his room to do so, "at that moment, all of the corpses begin moving at once. As if nothing were wrong, they shuffle toward my room and start relaxing inside, as though it were their own home.

"Then the doorbell rings, announcing a new visitor," he continues. "At that signal, the decomposing bodies revert to the forms of young men wearing relay race uniforms. From the entrance, a man who seems to be their coach steps inside without removing his shoes and begins scolding the athletes. What the coach was angry about, I can no longer remember."

I don't know about you, but I – as well as real life Kojima, I'm guessing – am left with so many questions. What was the corpse coach so furious about, and what could have been so important that he didn't take his shoes off before coming inside? We may never know, but I'd be very curious to see what the rest of the Metal Gear creator's old dream diary looks like.

With OD and Physint in the works, Hideo Kojima says Kojima Productions is heading towards its "Third Phase," with the creator to focus on "staying grounded and laying solid foundations" in 2026.

ASUS ROG has teamed up with Kojima Productions to create a line of limited-edition gaming accessories, which includes everything from a uniquely designed gaming mouse, a wireless headset, and an exclusive version of the Asus ROG Flow Z13 gaming tablet, all inspired by Kojima's Ludens mascot.

The Flow Z13-KJP, as this version has been aptly named, is the shining star of the collection, which was announced at CES 2026. It's designed in partnership with the legendary game artist Yoji Shinkawa and features slender CNC-aluminum cutouts and intricate gold and white details.

The 2-in-1 gaming tablet doesn't just look the part, but it's also decked out with a 13.4-inch ROG Nebula Display and powered by the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ 395 processor. On its own, it's a dazzling sight to behold, but it looks even more on-point when paired with the rest of the Ludens logo-inspired collection.

Yoji Shinkawa states on the official Asus ROG Flow Z13-KJP product page that he "wanted to create a gadget that belongs to Ludens and I integrated that into this PC design“ and that's apparent from every inch of this tablet. Its angular edges and customized carrying case look on par with the robotic, skeleton mascot, and look like something you'd expect to see Sam be hauling up the mountains in Death Stranding, thanks to its sci-fi aesthetic.

That's definitely the case with the ROG Delta II-KJP gaming headset, too, which is also part of this limited edition collection. As the gaming headset nerd of the GamesRadar+ hardware team, this is the product that's caught my eye the most. It features an RGB-lit up Ludens logo on one side of the cups, and it's equipped with tri-mode connectivity (Bluetooth, 2.4GHz wireless, and wired), the brand's 50 mm Titanium-Plated Diaphragm audio drivers, a massive 110-hour battery life, and a 10 mm Super-Wideband microphone.

Talking of light-up features, it wouldn't be a licensed collab without a matching gaming mouse in the picture. For the ROG x Kojima Productions line, there's a ROG Keris II Origin-KJP Edition gaming mouse, which matches the headset with its own golden-glowing Ludens logo on the palm rest. Under the hood, the white and dark gray mouse is equipped with a 42,000dpi optical sensor, 2.4GHz wireless, Bluetooth, and wired connectivity, and the brand's ROG Micro Switch II switches.

To tie the whole collection together, ROG and Kojima Productions have also designed a matching ROG Scabbard II XXL-KJP mouse mat, which proudly features the Ludens logo drawn by Yoji Shinkawa himself. I hate to admit it, but I much prefer the golden, finely illustrated version of Ludens over the version I see each time I boot up Death Stranding Director's Cut on my PS5.

If this set has reignited your love of Kojima games as much as it has for me, you'll be disappointed to know that there are no pricing or availability details on the ROG x Kojima Productions collection quite yet. The Asus ROG Flow Z13 configuration that our team's Tabitha Baker reviewed late last year had an $1,999.99 MSRP, so I'd expected to pay a pretty penny plus a little extra to account for the licensing fee at least.

You could always grab the non-Kojima Productions versions of the tablet, headset, and mouse in the meantime to save some pennies. However, that won't make you the envy of all your Death Stranding-obsessed friends. Nor will it grant you the exclusive Armoury Crate theme that comes with each part of this collab.

• View all ASUS ROG gaming accessories at Amazon
• Asus ROG Flow Z13 gaming tablet | $2,653.99 at Amazon

We're also rounding up the best gaming chairs, the best gaming mice, and the best gaming keyboards if you want to give your PC setup an out-of-this-world upgrade.

Noted cinephile Hideo Kojima has shared his favorite movies and TV shows of 2025, and he's once again proving he has great taste.

Kojima took to social media to share his picks. His favorite drama shows on streaming were Netflix's surprise hit Adolescence, Netflix sci-fi show The Eternaut, Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan's new Apple TV Plus sci-fi show Pluribus, and Netflix's survival thriller Last Samurai Standing. His favorite streaming movies were two Netflix choices: Guillermo del Toro's lush horror Frankenstein and pop culture juggernaut KPop Demon Hunters.

Kojima also shared his favorite 4K revival theatrical releases: Days of Heaven, The Fall, Le ballon rouge (The Red Balloon), and Les Amants du Pont-Neuf (The Lovers on the Bridge).

Along with these choices, Kojima shared his favorite theatrical foreign films: Conclave, Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In, Girl with the Needle, Love Lies Bleeding, Quand vient l’automne (When Fall Is Coming), Sinners, Heretic, Sirāt, The Shadow’s Edge, and Sentimental Value. His favorite Japanese films released in theaters were Teki Cometh, Dollhouse, Kokuho, and Suzuki=Bakudan.

But, last year, Kojima didn't just enjoy movies – he also starred in one (kind of). He took to the big screen with a voice cameo in the Japanese version of Zootopia 2, voicing Paul Moldebrandt.

Recently, Kojima also took to social media to share his love for Avatar: Fire and Ash. "This film shows absolutely no compromise, right down to the finest details, in the construction of the Avatar 'universe,'" he wrote. "It was magnificent."

You can see our own picks for the best movies of 2025 and the best TV shows of 2025 through the links, or fill out your watchlist with our guide to all the most exciting upcoming movies and upcoming TV shows.

Hideo Kojima has said he would like to see an adaptation of the video game-inspired Predator: Badlands into a video game of its own.

Death Stranding 2 spoilers are mentioned in this article.

Back in November, Kojima tweeted about Predator: Badlands, saying, "It represents a new direction for Hollywood entertainment led by a new generation of filmmakers who have inherited the global 'memes' of manga, anime, and gaming culture."

Director Dan Trachtenberg previously cited games like Monster Hunter, Shadow of the Colossus, and Prince of Persia as influences on the film and said he would love to see a Badlands game, and turns it out Kojima agrees with him.

Speaking to Wired (via Bloody Disgusting), Kojima is asked via a fan-submitted question if there was a specific film he would like to adapt into a video game. Kojima says, "I recently saw Predator: Badlands. That felt quite game-like, traveling with Elle Fanning on your back." The director also cites the TV series Last Samurai Standing as another game-like plot, saying, "I might not make it, but it seems cool."

Trachtenberg himself has caught wind of this clip, and responds on Twitter with a simple message: "Yes please."

Of course, anyone who knows Death Stranding knows that Kojima basically already made a game where you travel with Elle Fanning, given that her character in Death Stranding 2 is revealed to be the baby in a jar you carry around during the events of Death Stranding 1, so perhaps Kojima isn't likely to make this one either. Plus, for my own selfish reasons, in an era where so many developers are busy with other IPs (namely Marvel and Star Wars), having Kojima release original games is a way bigger priority for me.

Sounding like the coolest guy in the room, Hideo Kojima says him being creative "isn't special," it's just as natural as eating: "If creativity were taken out of my daily life, I probably wouldn't survive."

Hideo Kojima has decided to flex on everyone by saying creating things isn't actually all that special, but rather just a simple part of day-to-day life.

Kojima has a massive resume by creating a series that is almost entirely composed of masterpieces with Metal Gear, Death Stranding and its sequel, and has been involved with a ton of cult classics like Snatcher and Policenauts. It's not a stretch to call him one of the most creative game directors due to how wholly unique each of his games is, but as it turns out, being creative isn't a big thing to him.

During an interview with Wired (below) where Kojima is asked questions by fans, he's asked, "What does creativity mean to you, not as a creator, but as a person? And from your perspective, what is the true essence of creativity?" Kojima specifically notes the final question saying, "I'd like someone to tell me that."

He explains, "To me, creating isn't special. It's simply a part of my daily life," which is a flex on the likes of me who has missed deadlines simply because I needed to read the Wikipedia synopsis of WWE SummerSlam 2006. Kojima likens creativity to "sleeping, eating, walking, or bathing" as just something you do day to day. "It's built into my body. It's not unique to me."

Kojima continues, "From waking to sleeping, I'm always thinking. When inspired, I instantly visualize and conceptualize. Then I just go to the office and bring those ideas to life." He reckons that most creatives are the same as him, and says: "If creativity were taken out of my daily life, I probably wouldn't survive."

Hideo Kojima calls Death Stranding 2 his "masterpiece," but that's only because his "latest work" is always his best.

Kojima Productions is 10 years old now, and Hideo Kojima has dubbed 2026 as a year for him to focus on "staying grounded and laying solid foundations" as the studio moves closer to its "Third Phase."

Months after Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain was released and right after Kojima and Konami split up, Kojima Productions was formed (not to be confused with Kojima Productions, the former Konami studio). And somehow, that was over 10 years ago. The studio has now established itself with Death Stranding and its sequel and is now gearing up to expand its repertoire with upcoming Hideo Kojima games: OD and Physint.

Kojima posts a message on Twitter to celebrate the new year, saying, "In 2026, we will move forward with the 'Second Phase' that leads into Kojima Productions' 'Third Phase.'" He explains, "Unlike last year, like I was traveling all over the world, this year will be about staying grounded and laying solid foundations."

Kojima adds, "We will continue development on the horror game 'OD' and move forward with preparations for the espionage action title 'Physint'," which Kojima explains "includes casting actors, scanning, and performance capture shoots." Outside of that, Kojima adds that he'll be working on the Death Stranding film with A24 and the animated film and series based on the game, and teases "several 'events'" coming this year.

Aside from Kojima Productions celebrating its 10th anniversary last month, Kojima adds that 2026 marks another important anniversary – his 40th year in the games industry: "Thank you, as always, for your continued support and supporting Kojima Productions."

Hideo Kojima calls Death Stranding 2 his "masterpiece," but that's only because his "latest work" is always his best.

Hideo Kojima has a lot of amazing games under his belt. Near enough every Metal Gear Solid installment is considered a classic, and the first Death Stranding has its fair share of fans. But when it comes to his "masterpiece," for him it's Death Stranding 2, entirely because it's his most current release.

During an interview with Wired where he answers fan questions from across the world wide web, Kojima responded to someone asking about what he considers his finest work. "My latest work is my masterpiece," he says, definitively. "So that would be Death Stranding 2."

His response ends there. No mention of Sons of Liberty or Snake Eater or anything in the Metal Gear canon. For him, the answer is simply On The Beach, the highly anticipated Death Stranding follow-up that arrived this past June.

This definitely feels on-brand for Kojima as a response. He champions all his projects wholeheartedly, earnestly engaging in long press cycles and doing interviews and events around the world.

But even aside from him simply wanting to spotlight whatever his latest piece of work is, Death Stranding comes from Kojima Productions, a studio he founded, placing it even closer to his heart than other franchises. These games are pure, unrestrained Kojima, for better or worse, and that no doubt puts them a cut above in his personal rankings.

We should circle back on this question when OD, his mysterious horror game for Xbox, arrives. Will it overtake Death Stranding 2? By his stated logic, yes, but we'll have to wait and see to be sure.

Death Stranding and Metal Gear Solid mastermind Hideo Kojima wants to make "a game that delights an AI" and "a game played in weightlessness"

As you may know, Hideo Kojima loves his movies. As a rule of thumb, his Twitter responses to his recent film experiences fall into one of two categories. A short review is an indicator of the Death Stranding creator politely sidestepping the fact he didn't enjoy the work. A longer review, meanwhile, has Kojima falling over himself to tell the world how much he loved it.

Pleasingly, Avatar: Fire and Ash falls into the latter category, with Kojima delivering a 200-word-plus response to showcase his admiration for James Cameron's threequel.

"This film shows absolutely no compromise, right down to the finest details, in the construction of the Avatar 'universe,'" Kojima began on Twitter. "It was magnificent."

From there, Kojima drew comparisons to Cameron's work and his own journey, one which includes "weaving entertainment and art alongside the evolution of cutting-edge digital technology."

In a landscape littered with AI, Kojima also found time to praise the human aspect behind the construction of these works. He wrote, "Lately, films shot entirely in analog, without CG or VFX, have been increasingly praised. Even movies shot on film are celebrated, while digital works are sometimes dismissed with comments like, 'Anyone can make it easily if it’s digital.' But that is a serious misunderstanding. CG works are also created by people. Countless actors, artists, and programmers pour their thoughts and passion into them, breathing life into the work."

Kojima concluded, "Today, this film gave me renewed pride and courage as we look toward the future. It made me feel positive again about continuing to pursue new things using digital technology. Thank you, James Cameron." You can read the full post below.

The nod towards giving Kojima renewed positive energy towards his own work, though, will be the biggest takeaway here for many.

This past year, Kojima has spoken about his own mortality. Having reached 60 and suffering past battles with ill health during the COVID-19 pandemic, the legendary video game developer spoke candidly about his to-do list in an interview with GQ UK.

Kojima said, "I feel nervous. I feel rushed. I still have a lot of things I want to do – that I need to do." He even has a USB full of game ideas in case he passes away.

Thankfully, Kojima is still around and working on several new projects, including Physint and OD, the latter starring Sophia Lillis and Hunter Schafer. It appears that seeing Fire and Ash will spark Kojima into continually experimenting and pushing the boundaries of his connection between technology and gaming. That can only be a good thing.

Avatar: Fire and Ash is now playing in cinemas. For more, dive into our guides to Avatar: Fire and Ash ending and the Avatar: Fire and Ash frame rate. Then, look towards the future with our guide to Avatar 4.

Metal Gear Solid and Death Stranding maestro Hideo Kojima, known for his grand and filmic blockbusters, was sucked into the game industry by an unexpected classic: Super Mario Bros.

The four-decade-old platformer isn't the most obvious influence on Hideo Kojima's work when you look at the type of games he's put out for generations, but it's the one that led to him becoming a developer in the first place.

"[I] played it for a year. I was a college student. I skipped school to play at home," Kojima told Wired Japan. "Without Super Mario, I probably wouldn't have been in this industry. Yeah. I can't really play it now, though. It's a side-scrolling action game. Mario just goes left to right. Basically just jumping."

The auteur game creator noted that the first Super Mario "had almost no story" aside from saving a damsel in distress princess from an evil monster, but it didn't matter much. "It felt like you were on an adventure," Kojima continued. "When I saw that, although it was pixel art with no story, I felt this medium would one day surpass movies. That conviction brought me to the game industry."

Elsewhere in the chat, Kojima cited Martin Scorsese, Stanley Kubrick, Alfred Hitchcock and Akira Kurosawa as film directors who influenced him greatly, but none more than John Carpenter. "He defied genre," Kojima said of The Thing and Halloween director.

Metal Gear Solid 2 is "often mistaken for a story about AI," Hideo Kojima says, but it's actually about "what human life would become" in the digital age