Tag Archives: mgs4

Ryan Payton, formerly of Kojima Productions, now unemployed in Seattle, thinks the sun is setting on high-end game development in The Land Of The Rising Sun.

“The Japanese public seems to be disinterested in next-gen and high definition gaming,” he told Kotaku. “There is a stigma still attached to western technology there.”

“There have been a lot of good mainstream games built for the Japanese Xbox 360,” he continued. “But they only sold a small number of copies. I think that kind of drained a lot of expectations.”

Most telling, however, are the panicked reactions of those who hedged their bets on “next-gen” gaming.

“It’s apparent, everyone knows it in Japan,” he said. “The developers here feel the pressure. They’re starting to develop more with the West in mind and the tech is in the West now. I’m surprised at how many titles have been produced on the Unreal 3 Engine.”

More poignant commentary, along something about hobos, through the link.

By Nathan Grayson

According to this Kotaku post, Metal Gear assistant producer Ryan Payton has quit Kojima Productions, citing family reasons.

“Back when I joined Kojima Productions in 2005, I hit the ground running and didn’t stop until we shipped Metal Gear Solid 4,” he said. “Then, for the first time in three years, I wasn’t working on any games and I had a three month vacation ahead of me.

“I went back home to my family’s place in Washington state and literally three weeks after MGS4 launched we were hit with some pretty heavy news concerning my mom. I don’t think I need to go into details, but all of this has reminded me about how important family is. So this past month I decided to leave Kojima Productions and look to continue my career working closer to my family in North America.

“It’s not easy leaving my other family (the MGS team), but with everybody taking time off and not having any other big projects to shift focus to, it feels like this is how it’s supposed to be. It’s fate.”

And yes, he does mention MGS5 over there. We salute you, Ryan. Best of luck.

Speaking to Kikizo at E3, Konami creative legend Hideo Kojima admitted that he may well end up producing a fifth Metal Gear game. Never saw that coming.

“When we look ten years into the future, maybe yes, I may well end up spending more time on the Metal Gear series,” he said.

“I always intend to stay true to these statements; I do always say what I actually feel at that time, after each Metal Gear, when I say I am going to move on to the next project.

“But it’s like when Hayao Miyazaki says he is not going to do more, and then always ends up doing it.”

There’s a full interview here.

We all expected Snake’s final adventure to be a smash hit, but now we have numbers, kinda. According to PSU, by way of a Konami sales report, Metal Gear Solid 4 has shipped 3.94 million units worldwide.

However, don’t confuse “shipped” with “sold.” PSU did note that “about one out of every four or five PS3 owners has purchased Metal Gear Solid 4,” but Konami didn’t go into specifics.

We’re not entirely sure how this fits into the 3 million shipped figure Konami gave earlier this week, but we’re just the messenger. So don’t shoot us.

Regardless, it’s always good to see a quality game succeed. Congrats, Kojima and co.

By Nathan Grayson

According to this NintendoEverything piece, Metal Gear dev star Hideo Kojima will return to Germany for Games Convention this year, after demoing MGS4 to press at the event in 2007.

Other stuff the publisher’s looking to air:

Games

• PES 2009
• Silent Hill Homecoming (PS3, Xbox 360)
• Castlevania Judgement (Wii)
• Dancing Stage
• Rock Revolution
• Lost in Blue (Wii, NDS)
• Eledees: The Adventures of Kai and Zero (NDS)

Stage shows and presentations

• Hideo Kojima (Will discuss Metal Gear Solid 4 and Metal Gear Online plans)
• Koji “IGA” Igarashi provides insight into the Castlevania series
• Thomas Hulett (Associate Producer) talks about Silent Hill Homecoming
• Rock Revolution presentation with Associate Producer Niais Taylor
• Dave Cox, responsible for product planning at Konami Digital Entertainment GmbH, own future developments in Konami Europe

We’ll be there. For some of it, anyway.

Speaking to the BBC, Hideo Kojima has spoken about how Metal Gear 4′s life started as a consultation with Sony on the birth of PlayStation 3 itself.

“We started to work on Metal Gear Solid 4 four years ago, after finishing work on Metal Gear Solid 3,” he said. “At that time we really didn’t know what the PS3 was going to be like, so the first two years was all about experimenting, developing and trial and error.

“In the last two years, we’ve know what the PS3 is capable of, the specifications of it and how we can utilise it… PS3 is a monster machine. That’s why it took so much time to create Metal Gear Solid 4.

“Since we’re developing only for the Sony format, Sony has given us a lot of advantage before the actual release of the hardware. So we had many meetings with them to discuss the specifications. We analysed this black box before it was released, and we experimented with it and we gave Sony a lot of feedback, like, ‘Can we do this and can we do that.’”

Watch the full thing through the link. There’s future-gazing stuff there about leaves. We love you, Hideo.

Surprisingly no one, NPD data for JUne has shown that Metal Gear Solid 4 was by far the bestselling game in the US last month, but a shock comes with Guitar Hero On Tour at number two with over 400,000 units sold. There’s no accounting for taste. Figures below.

1. PS3 METAL GEAR SOLID 4 774.6K (Does not include bundles with PS3 hardware)
2. NDS GUITAR HERO ON TOUR 422.3K
3. 360 NINJA GAIDEN II 372.7K
4. WII FIT W/BALANCE BOARD 372.7K
5. WII PLAY W/ REMOTE 359.1K
6. 360 BATTLEFIELD: BAD COMPANY346.8K
7. WII MARIO KART W/WHEEL 322.4K
8. WII LEGO INDIANA JONES: 294.5K
9. NDS LEGO INDIANA JONES: 267.8K
10. PS2 LEGO INDIANA JONES: 260.3K

Last weeks chart here. Another week Nintendo can be proud of. Altus’s Persona 4 goes straight in at the top for PS2. No Metal Gear Solid in sight.

Full list below:

1. [PS2] Persona 4 (Atlus) – 193,000
2. [WII] Wii Fit (Nintendo) – 30,000 / 2,353,000
3. [NDS] Densetsu no Starfi Taketsu (Nintendo) – 29,000
4. [WII] Mario Kart Wii (Nintendo) – 25,000 / 1,560,000
5. [NDS] Daigasso Band Brothers (Nintendo) – 23,000 / 190,000
6. [WII] Biohazard Zero (Capcom) – 21,000
7. [NDS] Derby Stallion DS (Enterbrain) – 20,000 / 206,000
8. [NDS] Hanayori Dango: Koi Seyo Onago (Konami) – 20,000
9. [NDS] Gegege no Kitarou: Youkai Daigekisen (Bandai Namco) – 16,000
10. [PSP] Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G (Capcom) – 16,000 2,277,000

Thanks NeoGAF.

By Mike Bowden

Following last night’s shock news that Final Fantasy XIII will release on Xbox 360, VG247 has been told be a very senior UK industry source that an 360 version of Metal Gear Solid 4 is “inevitable”.

“There’s only MGS left now: for a few months at least,” said the mole. “It’s inevitable. Konami knows how many million they’d sell in the US alone. If FFXIII can make it to 360 when Sony owns nine percent of Square, Metal Gear’s a slam dunk.”

Kojima has constantly said that the game isn’t transferable to 360 as the Microsoft console uses DVD as opposed to Blu-ray.

Money, as everyone’s mother used to say, talks.

The Japanese software charts, courtesy of NeoGAF, are almost completely dominated by Nintendo yet again this week.

See for yourselves:

1. [NDS] Daigasso! Band Brothers DX (Nintendo) – 47,000 / 167,000
2. [PS3] Initial D Extreme Stage (Sega) – 43,000
3. [NDS] Derby Stallion DS (Enterbrain) – 38,000 / 186,000
4. [WII] Wii Fit (Nintendo) – 31,000 / 2,323,000
5. [NDS] Nanashi no Game (Square Enix) – 30,000
6. [WII] Mario Kart Wii (Nintendo) – 28,000 / 1,535,000
7. [WII] Tales of Symphonia Dawn of a New World (Bandai Namco) – 27,000 / 164,000
8. [WII] Super Mario Stadium Family Baseball (Nintendo) – 20,000 / 108,000
9. [PS3] Metal Gear Solid 4 Guns of the Patriots (Konami) – 18,000 / 585,000
10. [PSP] Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G (Capcom) – 18,000 / 2,261,000

By Mike Bowden

Metal Gear Solid: Guns of the Patriots has taken pole in the Spanish and German software charts for week ending June 22, GI reports.

According to figures from Media-Control GfK International, Square-Enix’s Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core is straight in at number three in both territories.

The full chart listings for both countries are through the link.

By Mike Bowden

After the link. This 152-minute video shows someone earning the Big Boss Emblem in Metal Gear Solid 4, which involves beating the game on the highest difficulty with no deaths, no alerts, no kills, no recovery items, no stealth suit and no special items in under 5 hours. Needless to say, watching this will ruin the game for you. Obviously.

Thanks, Joystiq.

More »

IGN’s reporting that MGS4 has shipped a total of 3 million units worldwide.

We already know the game has sold 1 million in Europe in its first week, and that it shifted around 500,000 units in Japan in its first seven days on sale.

The figure was revealed at the Sony PlayStation Business Review in Tokyo today.

This is usually where we say “more through the link” but to be honest, there isn’t any more. That’s it.

By Mike Bowden

Free London newspaper the Metro has reviewed Metal Gear Solid 4 with a 3/5 (equivalent to a 6/10), Videogamer.com reports.

The paper hilariously insulted all Kojima fans by saying the plot was “utterly overblown” and that it “somehow manages to be both rubbish and exceptional at the same time”.

The review jumped at the gameplay as well as the storyline: “Solid Snake is back, older, wiser but unfortunately, if gameplay is anything to go by, more arthritic and boring”.

So, MGS4′s worst review came from a free British newspaper found on public transport. There’s probably some irony in there, if you look hard enough.

By Gareth Chadwick

As Metacritic shows, Metal Gear Solid 4 is now the seconf-highest scoring console exclusive this generation, next only to Mario Galaxy.

MGS4 has an average score of 95 percent, while the vaunted Wii platformer managed 97 percent.

Thanks, N4G.

Speaking to 1UP, MGS4 associate producer Ryan Payton has admitted that running up to the game’s launch was more than a little taxing.

“It’s all kind of a blur,” he said. “I tell people who visited us at the Nasu Boot Camp event back in March that I don’t really remember much about it because I was so tired. There were so many things going on in my head. I had a huge 100-item list that I knew I had to take care of before the game launched. Things I had to check and things I had to fix. I was in a hazy state.”

Payton added that an intense launch period is par for the course, and gave a nice insight into what happens at Kojima Productions when the shit hits the fan.

“A day in the life… when you’re in crunch time, at least in Japan, you sleep when you can. I’m lucky enough that I live close to the studio where I can sleep for a few hours, get a shower, and come back and feel semienergized, whereas a lot of the other guys don’t have that luxury. Really, it’s about squeezing every minute you can to keep checking the game.

“One tradition we have is that we all run to the convenience store for lunch. No more of these one-hour breaks. During crunch time we’re going downstairs to 7-Eleven, and all you see is the Kojima Productions staff doing the same thing – grabbing onigiri, maybe a sandwich, and taking it upstairs. The same thing goes for dinner. That’s what crunch time is like — you put every single minute you have into the game.”

Worth a read.

Metal Gear Solid 4′s gone top of the UK chart, becoming the second fastest selling PS3 game in Britain yet, second only to GTA IV. Last week’s charts here. List is for the week ending June 14.

1. Metal Gear Solid 4 – Konami
2. LEGO Indiana Jones – LucasArts
3. Grand Theft Auto IV – Rockstar
4. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games – Sega
5. Brain Training – Nintendo
6. Race Driver: GRID – Codemasters
7. Wii Play – Nintendo
8. Sports Island – Konami
9. Sid Meier’s Civilization Revolution – 2K
10. Wii Fit – Nintendo

We love you Hideo. Speaking to Der Spiegel – translated here by GamingInGermany, Kojima has summed up the past 21 years of Metal Gear as only he could: by making very little sense.

“Things you consider as impossible – around the world and in the game itself – are still possible,” he said. “In regards to the game’s creator as much as to the player. If a player completes a Metal Gear, he is supposed to question his ideas of what is impossible. The joy, the smiling faces of people who accomplished the impossible – that is what Metal Gear is about.”

One day it’ll all become clear. Or maybe not. Full thing through the link. Via Kotaku.

Gamesradar is reporting that EEDAR’s Jesse Divnich reckons MGS IV will drive PS3 hardware sales harder than GTA IV.

“Sony’s PlayStation 3 can claim a relative small victory as its hardware unit sales were up 150% over last year; additionally, they managed to outpace their closest rival, Microsoft’s Xbox 360,” said Divnich.

“This will likely continue in June as we expect Metal Gear Solid 4 [to] act as a bigger catalyst in terms of driving PS3 hardware sales than did Grand Theft Auto IV,” he added.

For the record, PS3 marginally outsold 360 in last month’s NPD results.

Future’s looking bright for Sony it seems.

By Mike Bowden

According to this eu.playstation.com thread, the MGS4 in-game podcast says that you can play music stored on your HDD on your iPod – although this isn’t currently possible in the game.

Perhaps after Firmware 2.4 is released this feature will become enabled, otherwise it appears someone way have got their wires crossed.

The Firmware update is rumoured to be released sometime this month.

By Mike Bowden