Longtime game developer Hideo Kojima appears to have developed a recent obsession with clocks and time and it's got us mystified.
Hideo Kojima is best known as the man behind Metal Gear and, more recently, Death Stranding. With the recent PC release of Death Stranding Director's Cut, Kojima Productions doesn't have any public projects in the works. Hideo Kojima has since picked up the hobby of taking pictures of a clock for some reason, and it's got us curious to say the least.
What's Going On With Hideo Kojima and Clocks?
Before we go into details about Hideo Kojima's recent obsession with clocks, it's best to explain how this iconic game developer uses his Twitter. Anyone who follows him knows that they can expect to see retweets of media from his games, photos of himself and his colleagues in various situations, and recommendations for movies, books, and albums. Rarely, Kojima-san will publish a micro-essay talking about a particular topic such as when he talked about how the Nintendo Famicom changed his life.
Considering his eclectic tastes, it should come as no surprise that he posted a picture of a wall clock on a chair on April 19, 2022:
— 小島秀夫 (@Kojima_Hideo) April 19, 2022
A theme began to emerge when he posted two more pictures of the same clock in different positions on the next day, April 20, 2022:
Good morning pic.twitter.com/jCeo2z5Bys
— HIDEO_KOJIMA (@HIDEO_KOJIMA_EN) April 20, 2022
— 小島秀夫 (@Kojima_Hideo) April 20, 2022
And finally, we have one more picture today.
Good morning pic.twitter.com/VYJpmg9ep4
— HIDEO_KOJIMA (@HIDEO_KOJIMA_EN) April 21, 2022
Adding to that is a picture from Hideo Kojima's assistant Ayako (who regularly posts pictures of Kojima with the caption "Hideo Kojima today"). While this doesn't feature the clock, it does prominently feature a particular time in the background.
本日の小島監督。
— Ayako (Touchy!) (@Kaizerkunkun) April 21, 2022
Hideo Kojima today. pic.twitter.com/bb9Yg5L4qV
So, here's what we have so far:
- A picture of a clock on a chair showing the time 9:35:09, posted on April 19, 2022, at 12:54 PM Eastern Time
- A picture of that same clock on top of a Gravity-branded equipment stand showing the time 9:56:33, posted on April 20, 2022, at 1:21 PM Eastern Time.
- Another picture of the clock resting on a surface with Hideo Kojima reflected in a mirror. The clock shows the time 3:28:29, and it was also posted on April 20, 2022, at 6:31 PM Eastern Time.
- A front-facing picture of the clock, apparently placed on a Gravity-branded equipment stand once again. The clock shows the time 10:19:20 and this picture was posted today, April 21, 2022, at 1:21 PM Eastern Time.
- A photo of Hideo Kojima taken by his assistant Ayako showing a digital time display behind him, showing either 5:34 or 17:34 and also posted today at 3:02 PM Eastern Time.
So, we've established a pretty clear pattern here -- Kojima-san is on a clock kick for some reason. The bigger question is what this means, if anything.
It's entirely possible that Hideo Kojima has simply decided to take some pictures of a clock because he thought it would be cool. It would be far from the strangest thing he's ever done as an artist.
However, anyone who has followed his career knows that Hideo Kojima is fond of playful secrets, deception, and ARGs -- he's even got as far as to create fake game developers not once, but twice. He created a fake game developer for Metal Gear Solid 5 called Moby Dick Studio and another fake developer called 7780s for P.T., the "playable teaser" for the never-released Silent Hills game. (7780 is the postal code for Shizuoka, which translates to "quiet hills" -- add on an "s," and "7780s" = "Silent HIlls" in a roundabout way.)
Kojima is so good at secrecy, in fact, that a secret ending for Metal Gear Solid 5 was only discovered five years after the game first came out. And, lest we forget, there are the persistent rumors that Blue Box Studios' Abandoned is actually a new Hideo Kojima project. (Blue Box Studios has denied any association with Hideo Kojima in a statement.)
So, is this some subtle teaser for a new project or is Hideo Kojima simply obsessed with clocks for some reason? I honestly have no idea and I'm going to lose some sleep over this tonight -- but at least I won't be alone in thinking about it.
