More Than Half Of Death Stranding's Team Defected From Konami - VGC

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More than half of Death Stranding‘s development team is made up of former Metal Gear staff who followed Hideo Kojima to the new Kojima Productions, analysis of the game’s credits reveals.

Of the some 120 core developers who worked on the game at Kojima Productions, 67 worked at Kojima’s former Konami studio – and 62 worked on Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain.

The new Kojima Productions’ president, Shinji Hirano, was also previously a Konami executive and division president.

[UPDATE: Hideo Kojima has suggested that American reviewers may have found Death Stranding difficult to understand compared to critics in other regions.]

Virtually all of Death Stranding‘s lead design and art positions came from former Metal Gear staff, with most newcomers working in programming positions.

A core team of around 250 people worked on Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain.

Hideo Kojima left Konami under difficult circumstances in 2015, after he was reportedly ordered to spend the final six months of his employment working alone on a different floor from his team.

The publisher eventually disbanded Kojima Productions, but Kojima later reformed the studio as an independent company to work on Death Stranding.

The new studio has up until now been funded by Sony Interactive Entertainment.

More than half of Death Stranding’s team defected from Konami — A significant number of Metal Gear developers worked on Death Stranding

More than 70 Guerrilla Games developers worked on Death Stranding, the game’s credits reveal, as well as a various motion capture and CGI support studios.

More than 40 Guerrilla engineers worked on the game, including Horizon Zero Dawn’s lead game programmer (Tommy De Roos), lead programmer (Frank Compagner) and technical director (Michiel van der Leeuw).

Horizon’s art director (Jan-Bart Van Beek), lead environment artist (Kim Van Heest) and technical art director (Maarten van der Gaag) also worked on Death Stranding.

Related: Game credits are still a broken mess

Horizon’s senior quest designer, James Kneuper, is even credited for “guest design” on the Kojima title.

The Death Stranding credits also mention first-party Sony studios Insomniac (Spider-Man) and Bend (Days Gone) as “support partners”, however unlike Guerrilla no actual personnel are listed. Bend added Death Stranding items to Days Gone to celebrate its release.

Death Stranding released on Friday, November 8. It’s available to buy now from retailers including Best Buy, Walmart, ShopTo and Game.

VGC’s Death Stranding review was published ahead of release.

Hideo Kojima has said he expected a mixed reaction to Death Stranding because of its unique design.

A PC version of Death Stranding will release in Summer 2020. Publisher 505 has confirmed that Death Stranding PC will release for both Steam and Epic Games Store.

Death Stranding Kojima Productions credits

(Former Metal Gear staff in bold)

Writers

Hideo KojimaKenji YanoShuyou Murata

Concept art

Yoji Shinkawa Chihoko Uchiyama Toshiki Suda Takayuki Yanase

Lead level designers

Hiroaki Yoshiike Satoshi Matsuno

Lead scripter

Mokuto Yamamoto

Level designers

Satoshi MatsunoMakuto YamamotoZiang TanMasaki SaitoTatsumi BannaiHajime Antoine UmemuraDaisuke SuganumaTakashi OkamotoShota NakanoMasanori Yasuda

Game balance designer

Daizaburo Nakamura

Technical art director

Hideki Sasaki

Lead environment artist

Takayuki Uchida

Environment artists

Shinichi MatsudaShota KurokawaTsuyoshi YakataMamoru OkadaSoichiro HashiiNaoya ShiojiChonnipa Nilusol

Lead character artist

Ryohei Oguma

Character artists

Takeya InoguchiHironobu MatsuiShingo YuriAya HotaniMasahiro NoseAtsushi KatoJames Williamson

Lead mechanical artist

Yoshikazu Hara

Mechanical artists

Tatsuya SekoEric KimKeisuke Isomura

Lead animator

Masaaki Kawata

Animators

Kazuo MaruoAyumu FujitaJames MariejeanneMasaaki WanifuchiGabriele CoenYoshihiro Okada

Lead cinematic artist

Shota Hirasawa

Cinematic artists

Yasuhiro KawakamiTomotaro YasuiRyo NakamuraHiromi KishiYuta Toshima

Lead VFX artist

Yasuhiro Ikoma

VFX artists

Soojin KimYusuke HigaHiromichi HayashiDai SasakiYu Kagawa

Lead lighting artist

Akira Inamura

Lighting artists

Shunichiro WatanabeKenichiro Nishida

Lead UI artist

Tsutomu Hashiguchi

UI artists

Casey Tsuyoshi MatsumotoHirotaka KinoshitaRyotaro Nakano

Technical director

Akio Sakamoto

Lead game programmers

Makoto SonoyamaKunio TakabeTakehiro Nomura

Game programmers

Kenichi MuraokaToshimitsu MichikamiJiaoi ZouTakehiro TachikawaFabian Lorenzo Baytion DayritDuosheno YuTakashi WagatsumaEric JohnsonKenichi Fukuda

Lead game system programmer

Masao Tomosawa

Game system programmer

Taku Endo

Lead UI programmer

Makoto Abe

UI programmers

Yusuke TakanoYuki SatoMotonori NinomiyaYuma Imura

Lead system programmers

Fumito MiyauchiNorihito Hatakeda

System programmers

Katsunori YoshimatsuTatsuma SatoHidehisa Harada

Lead graphics programmer

Takaaki Ishikawa

Graphics programmers

Hiroki TajimaKohei IshiyamaJianxiong Hu

Lead VFX programmer

Yuta Hoshino

Lead animation programmer

Yusuke Nishida

Animation programmer

Nozomu Takeuchi

Lead network programmer

Masayuki Kobayashi

Lead sound programmer

Kotaro Mori

Sound programmer