Konami Likely Halts AAA Game Development

Published: September 18, 2015 8:45 AM /

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Konami

The information comes from french site Gameblog, with a breakdown of the information from Eurogamer. The report says that despite the massive success with Metal Gear Solid V, Konami has nothing slated for AAA development, but still has the license for another Pro Evolution Soccer game until 2016.

This comes on the heels of news that Julien Merceron, the overseer of Konami's Fox Engine, has parted ways with the company. According to information that Gameblog received from their sources, Merceron's decision for leaving may be due to Konami's shift in focus to mobile gaming. This of course has not yet been confirmed.

The fact that Konami is willing to part ways with Merceron is indicative of their focus away from AAA, seeing as he was in charge of the engine used by Metal Gear Solid V. As of now there are no major titles coming from Konami—at least that they have announced—except for Metal Gear Online.

So that means nothing new in the Metal Gear, Castlevania, Suikoeden, Silent Hill, or more series is currently being worked on—most likely not in the ways most fans would know them anyway. It's still unknown where those franchises will crop up, though considering the move to mobile, it is possible we may see some of them there.

It is worth saying that this is not a report from sources that Konami has no plans to develop AAA games in the future, but that they likely don't have anything going at the moment.

The tumultuous year for Konami continues with rumors of Hideo Kojima leaving the company (also confirming more Metal Gear games will go ahead after he is gone), taking Kojima's name off of box art,  cancelling the new Silent Hills game, announcing their shift towards mobile, and having troubling reports of working conditions come out.

You can read more about the saga with Kojima in an opinion piece by Kindra Pring. Also take a look at Alex Santa Maria's opinion piece on how he saw Konami making the launch for Metal Gear Solid V as difficult as possible.

What do you think of this news, is it surprising? What would you like to see them do with IPs they own? Do you expect Konami to return to AAA in the future?

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Andrew Otton
| Editor in Chief

Andrew is the Editor in Chief at TechRaptor. Conned into a love of gaming by Nintendo at a young age, Andrew has been chasing the dragon spawned by Super… More about Andrew