Kind of an interesting read. A few really interesting points were made about how much detail they can go into with the PS3. A good read for anyone interested in MGS4 or interested in the PS3.
Quote:
I had to use lots of words to show the characters emotion, as the game machines weren't able to show this graphically. Now the technology has evolved so far we can let the characters show their emotions trough facial animation and movement, Hideo Kojima tells Dagbladet.no
We're meeting Kojima, the man behind the successful game series "Metal Gear Solid", in Konami's HQ in Roppongi, Tokyo. He's in good spirit and smiles as we're entering the conference room, which is filled with several of Konami's arcade machines.
Kojima: - The biggest goal is to tell something, just with the use of the characters eyes. When we earlier made a character say "I love you", it's been done with text only. We will now try and take this to the next level, and let the player understand what emotions are being shown, just by LOOKING at the character. This is something the PlayStation 3 allows us to do.
The characters in the "Metal Gear Solid" games has always been very human-like, even though they were only a part of a videogame. A lot of this is because of Kojima's ability to mix the use of both intense action and subtle humor in both the dialogs and different actions.
Kojima has just showed off the trailer to his upcoming game MGS4 at the Tokyo Game Show. This would later be, together with Nintendo's Revolution Controller, one of the big events at the show.
Dagbladet.no: - One of the big surprises in the trailer was Snake's high age. You've said that this will be your last "Metal Gear Solid" game, can we expect Snake to survive?
Kojima: - Snake won't die in this game. And this isn't the end of "Metal Gear", I just won't be as involved - but I will of course be the producer in the next games too. As long as the masses wants "Metal Gear", I will continue to make "Metal Gear". But if they no longer want it, that's when I'll no longer make the games.
Kojima: - The reason I said I would not make "Metal Gear 5" myself, is that if I design every aspect of that game too, it'll make an impact on the next game I want to make.
Dagbladet.no: - Is this something you can eloborate a bit more about?
Kojima: - Of course, I can't tell you in detail about what I want to do [with the new game]. I have many ideas that's piled up inside me, but there is this one special idea I've been thinking about for the last two-three years now, and that's the idea I will consentrate on now. And since this is something totally new, I can't ask anyone else to do it for me - this is something I have to make myself. That's why I have to sit down and concentrate on this, and this only.
Dagbladet.no: - "Metal Gear Solid" has always shown certain weaknesses in the different characters. Is the aging of Snake a part of this scheme, to make him appear as a person that's not perfect?
Kojima: - The old Snake has been fighting and fighting and fighting, and he keeps fighting, even though he's old. This will have a part in the game, something I feel will give Snake some more "color".
Kojima: - I also feel that this is true to me as well. I make game after game after game, and I feel that I'm aging too. It's one of the messages I'm trying to get trough. Lastly, there's also some black humor pointed at "Metal Gear", which is over it's prime and is now descending - just like Snake.
Hideo Kojima is known to really make things the way he wants them to be when he's creating a game. In his own company, Kojima Productions, it's not like he's just a name in the credits, like some other producers. He's daily in on the development of the game, he cuts the game trailers himself and writes the lines by himself - in addition to supervising everything else.
Kojima: - I'm not a game producer because I want to make money - I just want to MAKE something. There weren't any good producers at the time I was looking for one, so I did it myself. I live and breathe for gaming, and if my job was just to lead a company meeting or something, I would never ever do it.
Kojima: - The technological development is also going so fast now. If you keep away from the development team for a period of time, you can't just pop back in. You just don't know what they're talking about. That's why I can never leave the development phase of games.
In the trailer from "Metal Gear Solid 4", there are elements playing like a FPS game. This has made many people think the series is at a crossroad.
Kojima: - That's exactly the impression I wanted people to get - a WRONG one! You're supposed to belive it's some kind of "Black Hawk Down". In the trailer I wanted to show where FPS games are heading, and simulate it.
Kojima: - "Metal Gear Solid" will, however, NOT go down that road. Graphically it might look like a FPS game, but when you play it, you'll know it's "MGS". It's hide and seek - a sneaking game.
Dagbladet.no: - The graphical quality on the "MGS4" trailer was extremely impressive. Was anything made using computer power?
Kojima: - A lot of developer might want to do it that way [to show off games]. Other trailers you saw on TGS and E3 was using a PC - or at least something other than a PS3. For some reason, the developers and programmers at Kojima Productions doesn't like to use a computer [to show off their games], so everything you saw in the "MGS4" trailer at TGS was made on a early PS3 devkit.
So everything you saw on the trailer will be possible to see in the game when it's released sometime next year. Not only will the game sport a convincing amount of polygons, but lots of effects will be used, like the debt-blur.
Kojima: - Since we're working with such an extreme resolution, it often became TOO sharp and clean. That's why we had to apply some new movie-like effects to make sure the game won't be TOO pretty. We basically had to dirty up the game, to make it look more like a movie.
Kojima grabs his ear and continues: - We also demonstrated how we can let the sun shine through for example ears. This was something that could only be used in computer rendered scenes, and not something we could use in-game before.
We'll also see new stuff on the weapon side, especially when it comes to weapon customization:
Kojima: - PS3 is a very powerful console, which allows us to go into extreme details. This means for example that we can allow the player to customize the weapons and gadgets in detail, and combine much more than before. We'll have over one hundred weapon combinations in the upcoming game.
Dagbladet.no: - Your games aren't tied up to a specific country or culture. Who do you imagine making the games for, and where does this inspiration come from?
Kojima: - I mainly make the games for me, or for someone I know. But this other person isn't someone I've met in real life, but maybe trough books or movies.
Kojima: - When I grew up, there weren't any tv-shows made only for Japan, as the channels couldn't keep up with the viewers wishes. Foreign shows and movies were bought in from around the world, or the shows were inspired by american and european shows. So when I turned on the tv, I got a trip around the world all by myself.
Kojima: - Japan was a mix of cultures back then, not much was our own. A lot was absorbed from foreign cultures, music too. I of course listened to Japanese music too, but mostly european music. Same with books, I read huge amounts of american and french comic books.
Kojima: - I also had a somewhat virtuall perception of the world when I was younger, and a lot of this could of course be wrong and based on stereotypes...
Dagbladet.no: - Satoru Iwata said in his keynote that the industry will be hit by a crisis if nothing is done soon - in their case, the Revolution is the answer to that crisis. What do you mean about this?
Kojima: - What he says is true in a lot of ways. We have to continue to innovate in some way or another, or the gaming industry will shrink down to nothing. I also feel that the Revolution is a wonderful console, especially for me as a game designer - it makes us come up with new ideas so we can make full use of the console.
Kojima: - On the other side lies the fact that many users is waiting for a reality simulator of sorts - a game, but something really like real-life. That's a truth we can't forget.
Kojima: - That's why both the Revolution and PS3 are interesting for game developers and gamers, but in two different ways. These two plattforms are in their own ways the present status of the gaming industry - it's moving in two different directions: One is basing itself on pure fun and happyness while playing, and the other is almost like a simulator.
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