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[Konami] I guess they remembered they're supposed to make games?
cloudeagle
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Registered User regular
Because there apparently needs to be some place to talk about it:
Something is rotten in the state of Konami. Let's start with all the weirdness with Metal Gear Solid V. There's reports with Hideo Kojima leaving Konami, and his name/company name has been stripped from the box art, web site and studio. Konami said Kojima will remain to finish MGS V -- though they also said they're looking for new staff to push the series forward.
Next, PT, the extremely well-received demo for a new Silent Hill, was removed from download. I mean, COMPLETELY removed -- you can't even re-download it if you previously downloaded it, which never happens even with licensed stuff. Everyone involved in the game, from Guillermo Del Toro to Norman Reedus, have said the game is cancelled.
...and that's pretty much the only console games we know of that Konami's working on. They typically release a Pro Evolution Soccer in November so that's a possibility, but we haven't heard a peep about it yet.
To add to the weirdness, Konami voluntarily removed itself from the New York Stock Exchange. Being listed reportedly cost Konami $5 million per year. So, they're losing money and panicking, right? Well, no -- in the last fiscal quarter, they reported a profit of $30.9 million, which was up significantly from $7.1 million the year before. They do all kinds of things beyond console games, such as mobile games, arcade games, slot machines, card games, fitness centers and so on, and all that seems to be treating them well. Their next quarterly report comes out May 8 and could show a reversal of fortunes, but for the moment they seem to be doing fine.
So what the hell is going on? Is Konami leaving console gaming, or the west in general?
Something is rotten in the state of Konami. Let's start with all the weirdness with Metal Gear Solid V. There's reports with Hideo Kojima leaving Konami, and his name/company name has been stripped from the box art, web site and studio. Konami said Kojima will remain to finish MGS V -- though they also said they're looking for new staff to push the series forward.
Next, PT, the extremely well-received demo for a new Silent Hill, was removed from download. I mean, COMPLETELY removed -- you can't even re-download it if you previously downloaded it, which never happens even with licensed stuff. Everyone involved in the game, from Guillermo Del Toro to Norman Reedus, have said the game is cancelled.
...and that's pretty much the only console games we know of that Konami's working on. They typically release a Pro Evolution Soccer in November so that's a possibility, but we haven't heard a peep about it yet.
To add to the weirdness, Konami voluntarily removed itself from the New York Stock Exchange. Being listed reportedly cost Konami $5 million per year. So, they're losing money and panicking, right? Well, no -- in the last fiscal quarter, they reported a profit of $30.9 million, which was up significantly from $7.1 million the year before. They do all kinds of things beyond console games, such as mobile games, arcade games, slot machines, card games, fitness centers and so on, and all that seems to be treating them well. Their next quarterly report comes out May 8 and could show a reversal of fortunes, but for the moment they seem to be doing fine.
So what the hell is going on? Is Konami leaving console gaming, or the west in general?
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cloudeagle on
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And boy is that weird. Are they publicly traded in Japan?
After everything that's happened, I won't be surprised if they're exiting the console space for good.
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Konomi leaving the console biz for me would be just as strange feeling if Capcom left the console biz.
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As for Konami, my hope is if they want out of the console business, they just sell their IP. If all their seemingly weird behavior is them trying to cut costs and downsize a whole lot, why not just sell the IP for the extra cash?
I really do hope that Sony somehow takes ownership over P.T., they can patch the teaser at the end out, and relist it on the store. They would be a hero to a lot of people.
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they said like 99% of their trading happens in Tokyo and London, so it wasn't worth it to stay on the NYSE
Yep.
As far as what the NYSE version of Konami stock covered, I didn't see anything that specifically limited it to slot machines. But I did find this fine helping of financial gobbledygook:
So, they felt it wasn't worth it anymore. But the stock traded between $18 and $23 over the last year -- lowish but probably a decent source of funds. Granted it had been trending downward, but money's money. And the timing sure is odd. Definitely feels like the heads of the company are changing its direction.
Skullgirls also got pulled from PSN, and replaced with a newer version that didn't rely on Konami's online infrastructure (maybe this shoulda been an early warning sign ;P) and in that scenario, Skullgirls was no longer available for purchase, anyone who had bought it got the new version 'Skullgirls Encore' for free, automatically added to their download lists IIRC, but you can still download the original version if you wanted. Couldn't play online with it, and it encourages a patch to the Encore version, but they didn't scorch fucking earth trying to get rid of it.
The story I've heard explaining this is pachinko. That Konami is a pachinko company first, and a games company a waaaay distant second. Apparently their profits from those goddamned slot machines are so far beyond what they ever make on video games, it makes sense in a robotic fashion to burn the one we care about down.
Gah, brain fart on the "purchased" bit.
Pachinko is big, but they're still making smartphone games -- in fact they just added a Chewbacca Contra level to their Star Wars app. My theory is that Konami is saying "screw this" to just AAA games, since the risks and development costs just keep going through the roof. The number of AAA releases keep dropping as publishers circle their wagons to try to contain costs, and many of the ones that come out are showing up with crazy bugs as even the boosted manpower strains to keep up. Part of me can understand why Konami wouldn't want any part of that insane scene.
And part of me is heartbroken that we'll never see what PT would have become.
Kind of curious at to what IPs Microsoft has in its vault that it's not using other than some niche stuff that would warrant its inclusion in that remark though, Dartboy. Though I guess that's OT. IDK.
I just hate that MGS is caught up in this...
The gut-wrenching part of it was how loaded the list was on NES and SNES era games (including arcade games of the period). Konami was putting out something like six great games per year. They were making so many games they had to found another company, Ultra, in order to get Nintendo to let them release more games (there was an annual limit per company as part of quality control). And that company was making hits, too.
When it got to the modern era? Almost nothing. Maybe one game made the list on the entire PS3 platform.
Konami has been backing out of this for a long, long time. Production needs for modern AAA gaming doesn't match Konami's approach or structure. Kojima's group was pretty much the only exception to this and the only thing they had going.
None of their scorched earth tactics are really surprising to me. I'm most surprised they're actually putting token efforts into continuing Metal Gear instead of just shutting that down too, but maybe that's just a facade until the final game is released to keep fans from preemptively giving up on it.
I wish they'd just sell their IPs to companies that might do interesting things with them. Bethesda did some great things with Fallout. What could various companies do with Suikoden, Castlevania, Contra, Silent Hill, hell even Skate or Die and Gradius? Will we ever know, or will Konami bury the IPs and force a bunch of "spiritual successors" that wind up skirting too much of the good stuff so as to not get sued?
This was my thought, as well. I would buy the heck out of a new Suikoden game. It's probably the only RPG beyond Elder Scrolls of Dragon Age I can say that about these days.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
It just takes a company motivated by love for the IP, like Bethesda's crew was.
@The Sauce is right -- Konami's gradually been pulling away from console development for a while, moving series like Love Plus to mobile. This move could have been years in the making.
If murayama ever decided he wanted to come back and do a sequel to suikoden III (and provided he had access to the license), I would crowdfund the heck out of that, even if it were just a small project
So in summary, here's what we can expect from Konami going forward;
Original here
Microsoft uses their offshore billions to buy the Suikoden IP... I could see the rage now. :P
Can we list the positive anti-Konami things that have begun with IGA's upcoming game, as well as what I assume will be whatever Kojima does once his contract expires?
Also, these two videos should be linked to the OP:
Watching these two in tandem really paints a bleak picture over the whole thing, and I suspect we're going to get even more insane details about the company for the next year or two.
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They very much are and are still listed in at least one major Western stock exchange. They haven't stopped being a publicly traded company; THAT would be weird.
The point about "pulling out of a stock exchange" superficially sounds really bad, but given that a company is still publicly traded, particularly in the exchanges where the bulk of its operations and revenue occur in, what does it really mean? It's something we don't often see happening in video game companies which alone makes it noteworthy, but I'm not a financial expert. But if it really is true that less than 1% of Konami's stock activity occurs on the NYSE, such that being listed there is more expensive than it's worth for the company, then in that light it's more of a practical decision than anything else.
But doing so at this moment in the company's publicly turmoil definitely creates perception issues.
Like, hope for the best but assume the worst. There's no limit to what Konami might pull at this point.
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That said, I'm a little worried Konami will push it out the door even if it needs delays to fix things, and we'll get yet another AAA game launched with major problems.
The one time I support the frequent brutality of the Twitter comments.
On the one hand I feel a little bad; I'm sure whoever the poor sap posting these tweets is has nothing to do with the decisions of the company.
That being said, I'm glad the anger is consistent and outspoken. Even if they truly give no fucks, let them know how much they've angered us.
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That would probably just prove their point that AAA development is crazy risky and should be avoided.
Mobile, so finding the links would be a pain in my ass, but Konami themselves have outright cancelled Silent Hills, said they did and everything.
Like a few others, the thing that really pisses me off about it all is that I see no reason to believe Konami won't sit on all their IPs and do Fuck all with them. I doubt we'll even see shitty mobile games. Which....is a plus, I guess...
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Yeah this is the rub, after Murayama left back in 2002 they really didn't have any idea about the overall world story of Suikoden, so that is basically when that series died. (Although I really liked Suiko 5)
IV was crap, V was wonderful.
Muuuuch better.
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Are they going to be boo'd off the stage or will the fill all the seats with paid fake hype men and women?
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