Hideo Kojima and film director Guillermo Del Toro are reuniting once again... but it's not for Silent Hills or a similar project. The duo are going to be giving a keynote speech at 2016 D.I.C.E. Summit on February 16th at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas, Nevada.
According to Destructoid the two were confirmed to be the speakers by the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences. The speech will be about “creative vision and artistic pursuits”. Destructoid further notes that during this time Kojima will be inducted in the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences hall of fame.
Details about the duo being at the D.I.C.E. Summit only go as far as what's mentioned above. If you were hoping that maybe some super secret game was also in the works, sadly that hasn't been disclosed... yet.
However, fans hoping that maybe this is a precursor for things to come may have to put their anticipation on hold. Del Toro, last year, had mentioned to the press that it was unlikely that he would be diving back into the realm of gaming again. He's had a rather unfortunate run when it comes to gaming, with none of his projects being able to get off the ground, including the latest one with Kojima called Silent Hills. It was supposed to star The Walking Dead actor Norman Reedus, but it ended up getting canned by Konami after the executives were frustrated that Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain cost $80 million to produce and five years to make. It likely would have cost $100 million and six years if Kojima had his way, since there was an entire chapter that was completely left out of the game and had to be axed due to time and budget constraints. In result, The Phantom Pain is a somewhat incomplete but highly regarded AAA outing.
Multiple reports pointed to Konami wanting to move away from AAA development and further toward pachinko machines and pachislots – both of which are big business in Japan at the moment. Silent Hills seemed like too much of a big risk so they cut it off after a lot of hype was built up around the promotional concept known as the P.T. Demo.
What's interesting, though, is that Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain managed to move 6 million units both physically and digitally, as reported by Metal Gear Informer, but Konami's pachislot and pachinko machine business was down by 20% in year-over-year revenue. A lot of that is suspected to be in result of Japan's regulators cracking down on the gambling market and increasing the costs on businesses involved in slot machines and pachinko parlors.
Konami is continuing to support Metal Gear with regular DLC updates for Metal Gear Online, but most people expect the publisher to take further dives now that Kojima has flown the nest. The father of Castlevania has also departed from the company and they don't seem to have any big plans for any major AAA titles in the near future.
Kojima, alternatively, is already hard at work on a new game that's being made in partnership with Sony. I think many fans would love it if it turns out that Del Toro and Kojima are back working together again on the upcoming super secretive project. In the meantime gamers will just have to settle for keynote speeches at the D.I.C.E. Summit.
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