The Fellowship – Hideo Kojima 2020 April 1st BAFTA: What are your earliest memories of games? Was there any particular game that lit the creative spark in your imagination? Hideo Kojima: Video games weren’t a thing back when I was a kid. During my childhood, before arcades, I used to play game machines found on the top floors of department stores or in amusement parks – analogue shooting games or racing games that felt like toy cars running on a conveyor belt. Thus, when Nintendo released the home shooting game Kôsenjû SP [light guns with various targets – ed.], I was hooked. At that time, games didn’t have narratives, or inspiring themes, or characters; they were simply ‘toys’ for the sole purpose of providing play. Afterwards, Space Invaders (1978) – what could be called the first authentic video game – created a huge boom, but I didn’t experience this boom in real time as I was in elementary school and was forbidden by my school and the PTA from visiting arcades, which had a reputation as delinquent hangouts. I started to visit them when I was out waiting for friends after entering university, and it was then that I encountered the games. Of these, Namco’s Xevious (1983) featured a singular ‘worldview’ (environment, characters, naming, sound) lacking in other games of the time. I was addicted. In that moment, I remember realising that games were capable of the same worldview or narrative expression as film or novels. Films have been a huge part of your life from a young age. Have they always informed how you approach making games? Not only films; novels and music were also a big part of my life. When I was a child, the digital medium of ‘games’ did not exist. However, I do think I learned from films all the base elements I needed for game creation – worldview, storytelling, directing, visuals, sounds, the boundary between entertainment and art, casting, actor direction, SFX/VFX effects and so on. Yet, what I have been creating in my career are very much games. That is an important distinction. Incorporating such methods and techniques learned from film is one method to make these games stand out. I took the deep impact that films, novels, plays, and music had on my life, explored the possibilities of a new game, then worked to create and define unique games that only I could make. Now, young game creators draw their influence from past games, and thus create new games as an extension of that. I think that is the difference between game creators of the younger generation and me. Your mother was very supportive of you going into the games industry. What do you think you’d be doing now if it hadn’t been for her? Initially, she was not very supportive of my choice. In those days, becoming a stable salaryman, bank worker, stockbroker, or civil servant was the general ideal career for Japanese children, or, should I say, for their parents. It was very conservative. Telling my mother that I was going to enter the still-budding games industry was like saying I was going to become an independent or a free agent entertainer or something. It was a career path with no security or safety net. Back then, there were few young professionals taking risks or starting their own businesses. Japan still had the concept of lifetime employment, so it was considered proper to enter a company as a salaried employee. Therefore, it was best to either join a very large firm with little risk of collapse or become a civil servant. I think my mother, too, hoped that I would do the same if I could. However, my father passed away when I was in junior high and I was forced to give up art school due to the resulting financial hardship. I guess she felt that she had to support me, her son, who she had watched suffer from the sidelines. She began supporting me wholeheartedly once the games I made started gaining worldwide popularity. Yet, when I look back now, I think I would have joined the industry even if she was against it. That said, if my strict father were still alive, I don’t think I would have been able to go against him. Metal Gear (1987) was one of the first examples of stealth-action games at a time when most games encouraged direct combat. What made you decide to take it in that direction? At the time, my company’s instruction was to, “Make a war game like that popular arcade game Rambo!” But I was against that. Both my parents had experienced wartime, and I grew up hearing so many stories about war, from air raid experiences to stories about Auschwitz, countless times. At the same time, I also thought that one muscular guy taking down an entire enemy army as a concept was rather optimistic. But Rambo, a clear example of this character archetype, and the series’ first film, First Blood (1982), were actually anti-war. With that notion, I then thought of a new idea of a ‘war game’ that avoids combat. The first thing that came to mind was The Great Escape (1963). This is one of my favourite movies, where the way to fight is escaping. However, in the hero-dominated game market of that time, I thought no one would enjoy playing a game where they have to run away. I understood that much. Then, I thought of 007 – one man, alone, infiltrating enemy territory. This way, spontaneous fighting could be avoided. If The Great Escape is about escaping, James Bond is about infiltration. It’s also heroic. But at the same time, one tuxedo-clad spy with only a handgun crossing over into enemy lines is, of course, unrealistic. From there, I added in the flavour of the present day to create a slightly futuristic, yet still realistic setting – this is Metal Gear. If I simply followed the direct intention of my company and transplanted the idea of a Rambo-like war game into the MSX platform, perhaps the stealth game would not have been born. There was also the fact that technical limitations of the MSX hardware made it impossible to produce a simultaneous display of the player with multiple enemies and add further shooting elements on top of that. You were already well-established before Metal Gear Solid (1998), but that was the game that turned you into a global name. How did that change things for you? When did you notice it most? Metal Gear (1987) for the MSX2 was the first main title in which I was involved significantly in the development. However, it was for an extremely small market and was not sold in North America. After that, I continued to make games in the minor domestic PC market. Even in Japan, Metal Gear was only developed for a very niche audience. I do think there was a bit of a cult following, but I don’t think it was known at all to the general public, either in Japan or overseas. At that time, the Famicon (NES) and Super Famicon (SNES) were the mainstream consoles. The turning point came with MGS in 1998 when it was released for the PlayStation, localised worldwide, and made its mark as a big hit. After that, everything changed immensely. But the internet and social media were not as they are today; I had no idea about the enthusiasm surrounding the game overseas at all from inside Japan. I probably first realised it at E3 in 2000. It wasn’t until I made an in-person visit that I witnessed the game’s incredible popularity. It was like being treated like a rock star. While in Japan, I had no recognition of my own overseas popularity. I was very surprised by this, every time I experienced it abroad. Yet, once I got on the plane and went back home to Japan, I returned to a normal life and I had to turn off that switch in my head. Creator or not, I was still an everyday salaryman. Even if I had a big hit, my lifestyle hadn’t changed from before. That said, my mindset for creation changed drastically. There were fans of mine all over the world, people to whom I was of service... I was able to experience these feelings and a side of myself that I hadn’t recognised. Since then, to me, creating meant continuing to provide for worldwide fans more than for myself. I decided to devote my life to that. That’s the real reason I continue making games, even at this age. Did you have a sense that you were creating something that would go on to become such a hugely successful franchise? Both the first Metal Gear and its sequel Solid Snake (1990) were developed for the MSX market, so I didn’t really think about it. Even for MGS1, for the PlayStation, I was only focused on the passion of creating a world that I liked that also satisfied the narrative storyline requirement for a game. Because of this, I hadn’t predicted or expected that the game would sell so well all over the world. As a salaryman-creator, I figured it was fine as long as I did the things I wanted within the company’s budget and put games out into the world. That’s all I thought about at the time. After all, making a successful hit doesn’t equal an increase in salary.