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In 2005 Kojima formed his own studio, Kojima Productions, as a subsidiary of Konami. While Metal Gear Solid V, a game about managing and nurturing staff on a "Mother Base" in the middle of the ocean, was being made, 2015 Nikkei reports said Kojima Productions employees were being isolated: their computers were disconnected from the internet, with only internal messages allowed.The themes of Kojima's work have always suggested he has worn the implicit obligation to "save" the traditional Japanese console industry at times proudly, and at times uneasily.
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As a long-suffering feminist in video games, the experience of being bombarded online by men eager to cover this woman up—and then to explain to me, unsolicited, what "objectification" meant and why it was bad—has been uniquely disconcerting. People wanted to know more about why Quiet was naked than why she was silent, which is fascinating when it occurs to you that its well-documented culture of silence is what allows labor abuses in game development to go unchecked.Not even Metal Gear Solid V seems to know who its hero really is, its final act punctuated by infighting, duplicity, and more lectures on the perils of trusting your leaders.
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My favorite game in the Metal Gear canon is Metal Gear Solid 3. At the end, the hero has assassinated his rogue mentor, The Boss, as part of a grand conspiracy to de-escalate the Cold War. You learn, to your horror, that The Boss was complicit in your plot, and that she sacrificed herself to the success of your mission and to the larger cause of world peace. You are welcomed into the US president's office and applauded for your success. But when the president extends his hand, you refuse to shake it.Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain made $179 million on the day of its launch, a rarefied performance by modern standards. Attempts had been made to scrub Kojima's very name from the marketing materials. According to Simon Parkin's report in the New Yorker, neither Konami president Hideki Hayakawa nor its CEO, Sadaaki Kaneyoshi, were seen at Kojima's farewell party. The company continues to deny Kojima's departure, or that his studio will be shut down.Follow Leigh on Twitter.Related, on Motherboard: The Technological Alt-History of Metal Gear Solid