Steel Gear Stable creator Hideo Kojima is a really busy man. Since parting methods with Steel Gear writer Konami and establishing Kojima Productions as an unbiased studio in 2015, Kojima has launched Loss of life Stranding in partnership with Sony, and introduced three extra titles: Loss of life Stranding 2, action-espionage recreation Physint (additionally with Sony), and OD, a horror recreation revealed by Xbox Recreation Studios.
Not a lot is thought for certain about OD, aside from it can make the most of Xbox’s cloud know-how to make one thing (in Kojima’s phrases) “groundbreaking” and “immersive” that “nobody has performed earlier than.” It can even be a collaboration between Kojima and filmmaker Jordan Peele (Get Out, Nope), in addition to different unnamed creatives. Learn on for each element we’ve been in a position to glean about OD.
What’s OD’s launch date?
No concept, sorry. Kojima Productions and Xbox Recreation Studios haven’t but introduced a launch date for OD. One factor we’ll say is that, with the studio’s Loss of life Stranding 2 set to be launched in 2025, it’s extremely unlikely OD will come out earlier than 2026 on the earliest.
Is OD an Xbox unique?
It’s laborious to say! Because it’s revealed by Xbox Recreation Studios, the idea is that OD might be launched on Xbox Sequence X and Home windows PC, in addition to taking delight of place on the Recreation Go subscription service, as all in-house Xbox video games presently do. However it’s notable that no platforms are talked about within the trailer. Relying on how lengthy it takes to make, it’s not not possible that OD will come out on the subsequent technology of Xbox {hardware}.
It’s additionally attainable that Microsoft will select to publish it on different, competing platforms, equivalent to PlayStation — that’s a selection it’s been making not too long ago for Xbox titles like Sea of Thieves, and, reportedly, no Microsoft recreation is taken into account off the desk for multiplatform publishing. That stated, the purpose of signing a Hideo Kojima recreation to your platform is the status and press protection he brings, versus large gross sales. So, that might be a powerful argument in favor of OD remaining Xbox console-exclusive.
One other potential issue affecting OD’s platform availability is its use of Xbox’s cloud gaming know-how. This might limit it to Xbox platforms — or, simply as probably, it might make the sport simpler to play anyplace, on something. Will OD be Xbox’s first cloud gaming unique?
Who’s within the forged?
OD’s teaser trailer, which premiered on the 2023 Recreation Awards, introduced three actors who might be in OD, and showcased their performances: Sophia Lillis (It, Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Amongst Thieves), Hunter Schafer (Euphoria), and Udo Kier (actually lots of of Hollywood and Euro arthouse movies from the Nineteen Seventies to now). Nothing is thought in regards to the roles the three actors might be taking part in.
One one that is not confirmed to be showing in OD is Margaret Qualley. Qualley appeared in a leaked video demo of a Kojima horror recreation known as Overdose that emerged in 2022, however which can have dated from earlier. Whereas that is presumably the identical undertaking as OD, it’s attainable that the video was a proof-of-concept demo, and that Qualley filmed it when she was working with Kojima on the primary Loss of life Stranding.
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Who else is collaborating on it, apart from Jordan Peele?
When saying OD on the 2023 Recreation Awards, Kojima appeared beside Peele and revealed that he’d be working carefully with the horror film auteur on OD. Kojima additionally stated Peele wasn’t his solely collaborator on the undertaking: He stated he had assembled a group of storyteller “legends” to work on the sport that he known as “The Avengers.”
The identities of the opposite creatives stay a thriller, although Kojima has not been above bragging about their clout. “After we reveal these names, my identify might be utterly forgotten,” Kojima stated on Kojima Productions’ YouTube channel. “Each time I present this listing to brokers and managers, they will hardly imagine it’s true. They are saying ‘How did you handle to assemble all these individuals who received’t hearken to anyone else? How do you do it?’”
Attainable names with a horror background embrace Kojima’s buddy Guillermo del Toro, who performed a task in Loss of life Stranding and was because of collaborate with Kojima on his canceled Konami horror recreation, Silent Hills; and Ari Aster (Hereditary, Midsommar) who’s certainly one of many Hollywood sorts to have visited the Kojima Productions places of work in Tokyo.
What is going to OD’s gameplay be like, and the way will it use cloud know-how?
As soon as once more, OD’s gameplay stays a thriller, though Kojima has strongly hinted that it is going to be uncommon on the very least. When first saying his partnership with Xbox, Kojima stated he was making a “never-before-seen idea,” utilizing Xbox’s cloud gaming know-how to do it. Kojima repeated this message at OD’s unveiling, saying that the title “is a recreation, don’t get me mistaken, nevertheless it’s a film. It’s a brand new type of media.”
Kojima Productions says the sport “explores the idea of testing your concern threshold, and what it means to OD on concern — whereas blurring the boundaries of gaming and movie.”
The leaked Overdose footage (which is not obtainable on-line) confirmed what seemed to be a reasonably commonplace survival horror recreation, with Qualley’s character exploring a spooky deserted constructing with a flashlight and getting caught by a killer. The video additionally had a picture-in-picture factor exhibiting a lady taking part in the sport on what seemed to be a cell system.
An unverified leak from a playtest claimed the sport was an “experimental expertise involving gamers utilizing multimedia” with “lengthy cinematics” and “lively and passive gameplay.” Gamers would allegedly “information” the in-game characters utilizing data from sources exterior the sport, like net pages.
Is there a connection to Silent Hills?
Kojima’s first stab at horror was the canceled Silent Hills, which produced the legendary playable demo P.T. Whereas Overdose isn’t more likely to be linked to Silent Hills in any method (the Silent Hill franchise is a Konami property), Kojima Productions did drop an Easter egg into OD’s trailer that seems to be a — slightly obscure — tribute to the unrealized undertaking.
