News [Rumour] Konami are negotiating with Kojima Productions to make a new Silent Hill

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

I'm usually wary about posting rumours because obviously they can lead to very unproductive discussions if they're false. But I thought this was interesting. Take it with a massive grain of salt. Here are the claims made by the leaker.

• I've known since Death Stranding went gold. I've waited to speak because no one would have believed me until some events happened (Kojima speaking about wanting to make an horror game and Imaizumi departure)
• Everything isn't settled yet, but Konami and Kojima are speaking about pre-production stuff, right now. The deal seems to be settled. Konami will land the Silent Hill IP to Kojima production and Kojima production will fund the game on themselves (third-party is helping, Microsoft, Sony or even Steam, but I'm not sure which one). Konami will have a say on the main actor, but that's it, Kojima should get a white card, like originally planned.
• That's the reason behind Kenichiro Imaizumi departure from Kojima Production. He couldn't take working "for" Konami, even if it's from afar. Kojima really want to finish Silent Hill "PT" and think his fans deserve it, even if he has to shallow some of his pride (and he did). Imaizumi went against it as hard as it could, to no avail (fortunately).
• The initial vision of Silent Hill "PT" will be the same, with a different main character (no Norman Reedus). They'll try to get as many famous names as they can in the project.
• Third person. Not an FPS like the teaser was.
• Silent Hill wasn't the reason Kojima had problems with Konami, it was entirely on MGSV.
• It seems Kojima being able to pull out Death Stranding from scratch redeemed him in Konami's eyes. I'm not sure if it was said elsewhere, but Death Stranding is a huge hit worldwide, sales-wise. That might have helped a little too.
• It's internet, I wouldn't blame you to not believe what I wrote, but unless something big happen (again), Silent Hill should be announced soon (2020 at the latest, 2019 during TGA if we're lucky)

Regarding proof, the OP apparently shared something with the mods of the SH subreddit.

OP provided proof that could be legit, but also could be simply the result of "Inspect element". It would be impossible to confirm with 100% certainty, as I can't see how he can provide undeniable proof to be honest. Like if we assume the info is 100% real, he can't prove it more than he already had. It's not conclusive, but we can't logically expect more. So for now, this post stays, but obviously take it with a huge grain of salt. Believe it and ride the hype train or call bullshit; it's up to you.

They also posted a list of things they'd been right about before, including the Nintendo Switch, Metroid Prime 4, etc.


I think the rumour is mildly plausible. I think that the rumours of Konami looking for an outsource developer for Silent Hill are 100% true. I think they could be looking at multiple developers for multiple projects. (There was a rumour of them looking around for a dev to work on a VR experience.)

But whether they've decided to go back to their original choice of Hideo Kojima is completely uncertain. It makes a certain amount of sense, IMO, and the claim that Kenichiro Imaizumi's mysterious departure is due to not wanting to work for Konami is definitely... interesting. It kinda feels like convenient rumour padding, but it does seem interesting.

The part about funding is curious. They're claiming that in contrast to previous projects, where Konami held developers over a barrel with unreasonable deadlines and thin budgets, they're simply licensing Silent Hill to an outside developer, letting them self-fund it, and waiting for their cut of the profits, I guess. The game's funders could be a problem. If Sony fund it, its PC port could be in danger, although obviously Kojima would push for a PC version just as he did with Death Stranding. If MS fund it, it naturally gets a PC version. But the leaker has no idea where the money is coming from.

I think it's a very interesting rumour regardless.

 

[KainXVIII]

Yes please

 

[Tizoc]

Not sure if want.

 

[Chris]

Kojimi did post about reading and watching a ton of horror to make the scariest game lately, I think.

 

[crimsonheadGCN]

It's weird that he includes Valve/Steam in the possible funding of the game.

 

[gabbo]

It's weird that he includes Valve/Steam in the possible funding of the game.

That's one of the signs for why I think this is BS

 

[Arsene]

Its probably fake but imma believe it because I want a new proper Silent Hill game.

 

[TheTrain]

It's weird that he includes Valve/Steam in the possible funding of the game.

The only thing that it could be its the Source 2 engine, other than that yeah...

 

[NarohDethan]

I really doubt someone with an ego as massive as Kojima would accept to work with Konami again. If I were and employee of KojiPro I’d quit on the spot from the disgust of having to deal again with that bs.

 

[ISee]

Or a company with the ego of Konami would propose to work with Kojima again.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

I really doubt someone with an ego as massive as Kojima would accept to work with Konami again. If I were and employee of KojiPro I’d quit on the spot from the disgust of having to deal again with that bs.

That really depends on why individual KojiPro employees chose to leave. Remember that a majority of the original Kojima Productions still works for Konami as Production Studio 8, and they're likely making Metal Gear Solid 6 right now. The group that left was a splinter group. About 60 developers, out of 200+. Some try to paint it as some kind of mass exodus, people escaping the tyranny of Konami, but that's not really how it played out.

Activision and Infinity Ward had a far more catastrophic breakup. Where a minority of KojiPro developers left, essentially the entire development team of Modern Warfare 2 quit to form Respawn, and were replaced with a new people by CoD: Ghosts. Incredible bad blood. Yet a lot of key Infinity Ward developers ended up leaving Respawn and coming back to work on Infinite Warfare and Modern Warfare.

You gotta admit that "Imaizumi mysteriously resigning from Kojima productions is because he doesn't want to work for Konami," is a clever bit of rumour stuffing, if this is all bullshit. A lot of fake rumours tend to involve people joining teams. Aligning your rumour with the unexplained departure of Kojima Production's co-founder shortly before Death Stranding launched is quite clever. People are naturally wondering why such a high profile person left so suddenly, and why Kojima is suddenly talking about making the scariest horror game ever.

It's weird that he includes Valve/Steam in the possible funding of the game.

Indeed. Although they do seem to be some kind of Nintendo-adjacent person which means they might not really know what they're talking about and they're just throwing out random platform holders because they've heard the game is being funded by one of them.

 

[Alextended]

Fire a guy because his game budget keeps inflating, hire him to work on another game without even having him in house to check on him? Don't think so.

Wtf at the sugar coating of the exodus though. For Japan I'm sure it's not that common for 60 devs to up and leave following the studio lead being fired.

And a newly conceived at the time Kojima studio probably couldn't employ all 200, nor would he ask all 200 to leave with him, just his close team.

Plenty skilled workers do prefer the safety of a big company where such shenanigans take extraordinary circumstances, that's a no brainer.

I guess it's possible, anything is, with him having his own studio he maybe has to have some business sense, not just get a salary.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

Fire a guy because his game budget keeps inflating, hire him to work on another game without even having him in house to check on him? Don't think so.

If they're not funding the game, why should they care whether he runs into budget issues again? Interestingly, a poster called snortcannon turned up on the /r/GamingLeaksAndRumours/ subreddit, and they basically say that if anyone is funding the game, it's Sony.

I don't know about this one, but it has a grain of a possibility even if everything he's listed in the thread is lying.
I've heard plenty of rumors about a new Silent Hill game since late 2017 and most of them turned out to be completely false or are yet to be confirmed fake.
I have a friend who told me some info, but this one you should take with a massive grain of salt. Summer of 2019, Sony and Konami sat down to talk about the next Silent Hill entry, and Sony want exclusive rights for it.
So hypothetically speaking if Sony got Konami and Kojima to talk things out, this could be entirely possible and Sony would get a massive boost in console sales since this would end up being an exclusive on their platform.

We both used to work for the same gaming site and he had connections without a doubt. I trust him on this. I can’t add too many details, but this info comes from a sony employee that heard small tidbits about Sony and Silent Hill, but nothing about Kojima doing this.

Wtf at the sugar coating of the exodus though. For Japan I'm sure it's not that common for 60 devs to up and leave following the studio lead being fired.

It's a matter of scale. When you have hundreds of developers, 60 leaving isn't as catastrophic. It's slightly unusual for Japan, and shouldn't be brushed off, true, but there's a tendency to forget that most of the Metal Gear team finished up Metal Gear Solid V, and moved onto their next project. There were departures, but most of them stayed. This isn't one of those situations where the studio got dissolved or something. Konami renamed the studio, and kept its staff intact. Konami was hiring new people to fill the vacancies before MGS V released.

The Konami situation has always been blown out of proportion by people with an axe to grind against the company. Fairly typical Japanese corporate bullshit got spun into tales of Konami tyrannizing their employees. Not to say the systemic issues in the Japanese games industry shouldn't be highlighted, and it is true that Konami went through a period of turmoil but there was this general emotion over facts vibe. This manifested in bonkers hostility towards the original Metal Gear team. Because people deluded themselves into thinking that Konami had dissolved Kojima Productions, Team Silent-style, they viewed the old Metal Gear team, with dev seniority dating back to Policenauts as usurpers of their own freaking series. This explains the absolutely mental reactions when Metal Gear Survive was announced. The dastardly Konami had stolen Metal Gear and given it to the same people who made the other games.

And a newly conceived at the time Kojima studio probably couldn't employ all 200, nor would he ask all 200 to leave with him, just his close team.

The point I'm making is that a minority of devs departed, and for the ones who remained it was business as usual. It wasn't some bloodbath. Kojima Productions was never shut down, merely renamed. They did shut down the American branch and move development of MGO back to Japan, though. If it sounds like I'm sugarcoating, it's only because of how hysterical the "Konami is Satan" version of events tends to be.

 

[Alextended]

60 out of 200 is pretty damn sizable (30%), not to mention it could be more senior/lead figures than Kojima (I doubt he'd just get expendable grunts onboard).

Maybe Konami won't care if they aren't funding it but it's not like it was all amicable if they had to resort to actually firing freaking Kojima to think they want in.

Plenty companies don't have to care if others want to make games with their IP but generally it doesn't happen, they keep them close even if unexploited.

I also don't see why Kojima wants it rather than just make his own new IP and make it the exact same game he would make if it was an official SH reboot.

Again, anything is possible, I just don't see a reason for it to happen for all the needed stars to bother aligning for it to happen. Still, it may for all I know.