Konami says it’s using the upcoming Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater remake as a way to bring new talent into the series and to teach them how Metal Gear games are made. That matters because Hideo Kojima is no longer at Konami, and the company wants teams ready to continue the franchise.
The remake of Metal Gear Solid 3 launches in a few days and comes after a long quiet period for the series since Hideo Kojima left Konami following Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain.
Kojima has moved on to an independent studio and released two entries in the Death Stranding franchise while also working on a project with Microsoft, and Konami’s own recent efforts included the 2018 survival title Metal Gear Survive and 2023’s Master Collection.
At a press event for the Snake Eater launch, Rolling Stone interviewed Noriaki Okamura and Yuji Korekado, producers on the remake who have worked on Metal Gear titles for decades, and the piece explains why they brought in younger staff to learn the series.
Korekado’s credits include The Twin Snakes remake, referenced in a DualShockers feature on the Gamecube, and Okamura has been on the series since Metal Gear Acid 2, so the senior team is pairing experience with fresh developers so the series knowledge is shared.
“We only have a few years left out of us to make a game, right? And one of the things that we noticed, and what really kicked off this project, is that we started seeing a huge wave of new gamers that [weren’t] even aware or didn’t even [know] Metal Gear before,” Okamura told Rolling Stone.
Okamura and Korekado say the remake is meant to introduce the franchise to younger creators while giving those creators firsthand experience with Metal Gear development techniques, and the producers hope that a trained team could produce future releases.
So, one of the reasons why we brought in a lot of fresh meat — all the new, younger developers — is because, not only did we want to give them a chance to figure out how to create and develop a Metal Gear game, but also give them a chance to experience the game themselves. And we’ll still be here for a while, but right now the goal is to build a team that could carry on the legacy on our behalf and could produce, hopefully in the future, more exciting games.
The idea of a new Metal Gear Solid without Hideo Kojima is kinda wild to say ten years after he left Konami, and the company will need to win over long-term fans as well as new ones.
Can newer developers win over longtime Metal Gear Solid fans?
