Most anything involving Konami over the last year has not been positive outside of Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain itself. The whole Hideo Kojima situation still is unknown and the company’s ceasing of AAA game development did not sound good. Obviously with cutbacks, downsizing would be on the docket and it sounds like the LA studio may be the first to go.
Konami has certainly been moving away from what we’ve known them to be for years, with them focusing more on other interests, such as pachinko machines. According to George Broussard via his Twitter, it appears that Kojima Productions LA Studio is the first one hit by this.
Broussard is one of the co-founders of 3D Realms and has for a long time been involved in the inner circles of the gaming industry, including the reveal of numerous layoffs and such in the past. So any news coming from him about the industry is likely going to have some sort of truth to it.
Broussard also said that the closing of this studio will cost approximately 35 people their jobs, which he says is so disappointing this close to Christmas.
If this holds to be true, and I would assume it is, what does this mean for the latest iteration of Metal Gear Online? Kojima Productions LA Studio was the developer on this and this type of game is something that needs to be kept up. It would be assumed that someone else within Konami would take over the maintaining of Metal Gear Online, but we’ll have to wait and see.
