Kojima Mentions Ad Campaigns and Sell-Off Tactics

The advertising campaign for Metal Gear Solid 4 was huge. The hype for that game, years in the making, was enormous. It was pushed hard before there were playable demos, and the game's creator, Hideo Kojima, raised expectations with big promise after big promise. It's curious that on the job announcement page for the Kojima Productions site, Hideo Kojima states:

"The creativity of video games is now on the verge of crisis. Massive advertising campaigns are executed for games before their entertainment values are put into consideration all too often, resulting in sell-off tactics happening without hesitation."

And while Kojima and his team did deliver a first class title and while the game did provide a PS3 sales spike, the final product still hasn't sold a million copies in Japan. That might be because MGS is as popular with the home team crowd or whatever. The irony is that Konami is guilty of the hype Kojima seems so critical of.

And apparently, Japanese stores cannot return unsold product to distributors.