Throughout The Recreation Awards final week, Hideo Kojima was given a large chunk of stage-time – alongside horror director Jordan Peele – to indicate off a really temporary, unnerving teaser for Kojima Productions’ upcoming sport, OD.
This weird teaser confirmed two characters, portrayed by Sophia Lillis and Udo Kier, as they recited poetry. After a minute or so, Lillis’ face contorts and she or he begins to scream as we hear a door open, and see its reflection in her eyes. Kier’s character, alternatively, has one thing just a little extra elusive occurring; there are letters showing – albeit very blurred – in his mouth.
First noticed by Central Xbox, these letters finally spell out Atami. Atami is a metropolis in Japan primarily based in Shizuoka prefecture, and when Shizuoka is written in kanji, it reads as 静岡. Cut up aside, 静 can imply ‘quiet’ or ‘silent’, whereas 岡 can imply ‘hill’. That’s proper; Kojima has seemingly had a Silent Hill tease quietly and discreetly inserted into OD’s teaser trailer.
Now, the chance of OD being a Silent Hill sport is slim. Past slim, even. We’ve seen Konami’s plans for its Silent Hill reboot, and Hideo Kojima – after a troubled previous with the writer whereas being slated to develop Silent Hills – shouldn’t be part of these plans. However Kojima’s foray into making a horror sport alongside huge names comparable to Jordan Peele and Hunter Schafer, laced with a Silent Hill-related tease, leads me to consider that OD and P.T. could have extra in widespread than I first thought.
This raises the query; may Kojima’s OD be the P.T. sport we all the time wished? Is it lastly occurring, albeit a decade later? Anybody who retains updated with Hideo Kojima or Guillermo Del Toro on social media will know that yearly, with out fail, the pair will commiserate the cancellation of what P.T. was destined to be: Silent Hills. And finally, OD is not going to be a Silent Hill sport, however for sure, Kojima – like many followers of the P.T demo – has not let go of what may’ve been.
The doorway onto The Recreation Awards stage by way of a mysterious door, Sophia Lillis’ screams, the letters in Udo Kier’s mouth, even the sport identify being OD itself; all proof factors to Kojima hopefully persevering with P.T.’s legacy, with out the shackles of Konami to restrict his studio’s efforts.
Through the Xbox Showcase in 2022, Kojima introduced Kojima Productions’ partnership with Xbox Recreation Studios, stating: “Sure, there’s a sport I’ve all the time wished to make. It’s a very new sport, one which nobody has ever skilled or seen earlier than. I’ve waited very lengthy for the day once I may lastly begin to create it.”
On the time, no person knew what sport Kojima was speaking about. Leaks occurred, rumors of a horror sport referred to as ‘Overdose’ emerged, and nearly all of us additionally bore witness to a topless man filming alleged OD gameplay on his cellphone. Final week, we noticed the sport formally revealed as ‘OD’, and described as “like a film, but in addition a brand new type of media,” with Kojima additionally confirming that there are different inventive collaborators on the mission except for Jordan Peele. Fingers crossed that Guillermo Del Toro is concerned once more.
With all of that in thoughts, it’s protected to imagine that the “sport I’ve all the time wished to make” is a horror sport. Whether or not that horror sport is Silent Hills, we’re unsure, however we have now an inkling – particularly following this teaser trailer – that it’s, and that Kojima Productions is lastly making it with the assistance of Xbox Recreation Studios.
Whereas driving the hype of P.T.’s legacy, the one difficulty that Kojima might be going through is, surprisingly, P.T.’s legacy. The cancellation of Silent Hills resulted in lots of studios and modders creating their very own P.T. like experiences; there’s Layers of Concern, Visage, and even Resident Evil 7, in a approach. Let’s not overlook the endless plight to get P.T. up and dealing on fashionable consoles, which some succeeded with on the PS5 final 12 months.
That mentioned, you possibly can’t low cost the Social Scream techniques employed in OD that we are able to sit up for listening to extra about, both. Maybe Kojima is increasing on his self-proclaimed ‘Strand’ style, constructing a horror sport with social techniques for gamers to assist or warn each other, very like in Loss of life Stranding. We’ll have to attend to listen to extra, however that will surely be refreshing – and enjoyable – to expertise.
It is also essential to notice that whereas it is simple to be enthusiastic about all of this, Silent Hill followers are additionally more and more drained. Konami’s reboot of the sequence was a shock, however after current occasions, lots of hope within the writer and its plans have been misplaced. This fatigue undoubtedly carries over to Kojima Productions’ OD. Followers can solely wait and hope that OD is every thing we would like it to be; a non secular successor to P.T. and extra. One thing to actually reignite the psychological horror-shaped gap in our weary hearts. I additionally maintain out hope that the Silent Hill 2 Remake – which is being developed by Bloober Crew – can put the fireplace in our loins once more, however it’s very simple to not belief or think about Konami’s route.
If Kojima actually does intend to create the Silent Hills sport that he by no means received to make with the creation of OD, then he – and the remainder of the staff working at or alongside Kojima Productions – have gotten their work minimize out for them. There are P.T. clones galore and a moderately spectacular horror revival to take care of (taking a look at you, Alan Wake 2), but when anybody’s able to capturing the sensation of P.T. in 2023 and past, I believe it’s protected to say that my guess can be positioned on Kojima and his cohort of collaborators being the one to do it.