Hideo Kojima, the creator behind the Metal Gear Solid series and Death Stranding, has finally broken the silence on the Abandoned conspiracies that came to light earlier this year. The entire debacle is a long and wild journey, but in short, Kojima was dragged into the middle of the conspiracy theories after the internet began speculating that the indie horror game from Blue Box Game Studios and Hasan Kahraman was somehow a marketing ruse for a new Silent Hill game from Kojima.
To summarize the Abandoned conspiracies, indie developer Blue Box Game Studios released a cryptic teaser trailer for its new horror game Abandoned last year. Fans discovered clues in the trailer that suggested it might have something to do with P.T. or the Silent Hill franchise, believing the title to be a clever marketing ruse from Kojima, who has pulled similar stunts in the past (see Metal Gear Solid V‘s bandaged man/Moby Dick Studios and P.T.‘s release, which went under the guise of an unknown indie studio).
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Instead of dismissing the Kojima rumours and conspiracy theories, Blue Box Game Studios and its founder Hasan Kahraman seemingly began leaning into the publicity it was getting, releasing new teaser images that made fans believe it was actually linked to Metal Gear Solid as well. The Silent Hill and Kojima theories continued for months before further digging was done by journalists who quickly discovered the truth: Abandoned had no connection to Kojima or Konami’s properties. In fact, it was simply an indie title that was barely in a playable state.
Since the theories died down, Blue Box Game Studios and Kahraman went radio silent from the internet.
Now, Kojima has finally commented on the entire fiasco via his recent Spotify podcast, Brain Structure. The Game Awards host Geoff Keighley joined this episode where the pair discussed gaming rumours as well as the Abandoned conspiracies. “Users just kept sending me pictures of this ‘Hasan’,” said Kojima. “They still send me collages and deep fake images, like twenty a day, it’s really quite a nuisance. [laughs]”
“When we did that Moby Dick thing, you [Geoff] were in on the whole thing, and that was pretty fun, but people should know that I wouldn’t do the same thing twice,” Kojima added when further discussing the theories with Keighley.
Moby Dick Studios was a fake developer that Kojima created during the marketing of Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. He’d pull off something similar with 7780s, a fabricated indie studio that “developed” P.T. when it was actually Kojima all along.
Kojima’s is currently marketing his next game with a sleuth of cryptic images revealing the actors that will be involved in this unknown project.
Source: Brain Structure
