Rumor: Konami Reportedly Sabotaging Kojima, Past Employees

A new article from Kotaku, with data compiled from a Nikkei report, paints a picture of a bitter and spiteful Konami going out of its way to make life difficult for Hideo Kojima and former Konami employees who left to join Kojima Productions.

I don’t think it’s any secret at this point that Kojima and Konami parted ways on less-than-amiable grounds. We knew that when it was all said and done that Konami would retain the right to produce Metal Gear games without Kojima, and in true Konami fashion, it surprised us all by announcing Metal Gear Survive, a zombie-apocalypse game that no one was asking for. Reception wasn’t so great, and Kojima made some subtle statement on-stage at the 2016 Tokyo Game Show that indicated he was just as confused as we are.

“I know absolutely nothing about it,” Kojima said. “That’s because it’s totally unrelated to me, right? Um, how should I put this? Well, for me, Metal [Gear] is espionage with political fiction. Right? So, because of that, there’s no reason that zombies would show up.”

After his remark, Konami reportedly sent Kojima a letter accusing him of attempting to “unfairly sully the reputation” of the company. According to the Nikkei report, Konami was also rubbed the wrong way by Tokyo Game Show attendees laughing during the reveal. Ouch.

To make things worse, Kojima has run into some issues procuring a health benefits for Kojima Studios. The company attempted to join the Kanto IT Software Health Insurance Association, which offers discounted rates to tech industry workers, but the studio was denied. Apparently Konami is a big part of that association, and when questioned as to why Kojima Productions was denied, the health association said that it was unable to comment on the issue.

Furthermore, if the report is to be believed, Konami has also sent notices to large game companies warning them against hiring anyone who formerly worked at Konami. It supposedly told TV stations to disregard them, and warned ex-exmployees not to refer to themselves as “formerly of Konami” when looking for work and discussing their career history or resume.

This sounds unbelievably petty, though we have no idea if it’s true. All of this information is coming from second-hand sources, and it almost sounds too childish to believe. Kotaku stated that it had reached out to Konami and Kojima Productions for comments, but neither has responded. If that changes, we’ll let you know.