Hideo Kojima says Metal Gear fans and a health scare inspired his new game Physint

Hideo Kojima has announced a new “action spy game” called Doctor during Sony’s PlayStation State of Play event last month. And to hear the founder of Kojima Productions describe it: Doctor Certainly sounds a lot like a new take on Metal Gear, the stealth series Kojima created, but taken to the extreme.

In a new episode of the YouTube show HideoTube – the first in seven years – Kojima says the constant push from Metal Gear fans to create something new in that vein prompted him to return to the action-spy genre. A health crisis in 2020 also sounds instrumental in Kojima’s choice to tackle a third development project.

Kojima describes Doctor as “both a game and a movie at the same time”, hence the game’s unveiling on the Sony Pictures lot. Kojima emphasized that Doctor will be a game first and foremost. “But if your mother comes in and sees you playing this game, she will think you are watching a movie,” he said in translated comments.

He then talks about the path that led him back to the genre, saying: “Going independent, I wanted to do something new with my own IP. To challenge myself, I first made (Death stranding). Then to create a franchise, I created (Death stranding 2). And I wanted to do something even new, so I started working on it O.D. And many new ideas have emerged since then. But every day for the past eight years, users from all over the world have been asking me on social media to make another Metal Gear and stuff like that.”

Kojima says that in 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, he “fell ill” and underwent surgery for his condition. The creator says he was at his lowest point at the time and was considering quitting game development. Kojima makes his condition sound dire at that moment and notes that he has written his will.

“And at that moment I realized that people are dying,” he explained. “But last year I turned sixty. In ten years I will be seventy. I hope never to retire. That said, I figured if users were craving it that much, I might have to change my priorities a bit. I still want to do new things, but I decided to make an action spy game.”

Kojima also addressed the allure of Hollywood to make a movie (something he’s actually already doing at production company A24). He said his commitments at Kojima Productions make that impossible, but that’s true Death stranding collaborator and film director Guillermo del Toro gave him some advice.

“I talked to Guillermo del Toro about it,” Kojima recalled, referring Doctor‘s creation. ‘And he said, ‘Hideo, what you’re making is already a movie. Continue as you are.’ His words saved me. And since we will be working with many creators in the industry, even if it is a game, the result will not be much different from films.”

Doctor was announced in January as a “brand new original IP.” The action spy game “will use cutting-edge technology and an incredible cast to deliver an experience like no other” and will “blur the lines between film and games, with near-lifelike graphics and a new take on interactive entertainment,” the studio said in a statement. Doctor it sounds like it’s still years away from completion – Kojima Productions still needs to deliver Death Stranding 2: On the beach in 2025, and O.D at an undisclosed date – meaning we might not see Kojima’s return to spy action until the PlayStation 6 era.