One of the many peaceful moments you can have in The Phantom Pain.
Categories

Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima formally leaves Konami after nearly three decades

  • Posted byby Dean Takahashi
  • Updated
  • 1 min

Hideo Kojima, one of Japan’s most-famous game developers and the creator of the long-running Metal Gear series, has formally left Konami Digital Entertainment, according to the Japanese publication Nikkei.

The Nikkei article said that Kojima plans to start a new game studio. Kojima published his first Metal Gear game in 1987. Since that time, 29 more Metal Gear games have appeared over many platforms. That’s a rare and storied achievement for any video game creator.

Hideo Kojima, the creator of Metal Gear Solid.
Hideo Kojima, the creator of Metal Gear Solid.

Kojima’s troubles with Konami have been well publicized this year, and it was expected that he would leave after the publication of his latest game, Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain.

The news is not a surprise. During the recent airing of The Game Awards, host Geoff Keighley said that a lawyer from Konami informed Kojima that he would not be allowed to travel from Japan to the U.S. to be present for the awards show.

Written by

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat at VentureBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.