Konami shuts down AAA game production

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This means no more MGS, no more Silent Hill, no more Castlevania, and no more of any other titles they worked on in the past. But here's the good news: they'll still make Pro Evolution Soccer games.

Wait...

I am not at all surprised.

Technically there will be more Castlevania, it will just have a different name

Konami has become basically a walking disaster. It'd actually be better, now, if they'd just take a different name, as one way or another, they are NOT Konami anymore. They've turned into.... something else.

But yeah, not surprising.

Though, I cant wait to see Jim Sterling's inevitably upcoming-really-soon video about this. That should be one to remember, for those familiar with him.

I really hope they sell the licenses to those franchises. Just having to sit there and being done nothing with would be so sad.

Actually, I've grown slightly fond of MGS. I'd be happy if it simply ended for good, because I hate what happened to the Spyro franchise. (I will never get over that.)

Konami has been struggling with making profits from their video games for a long while.
This shift happened with PS2 gen.

This is literally what happened:

Silent Hill 1 sold decent (made a small tidy profit)
Silent Hill 2 sold less (made smaller profit)
Silent Hill 3 sold less than 2 (made a smaller profit)
Silent hill 4 sold less than 3 (broke even)

The Silent Hill Origins, The Room, Downpour, Homecoming all bombed on PS3/360 to spectacular results.

Silent Hill Shattered Memories (Wii), was reimagining of 1, but Konami didn't bother to ship enough copies to retailers to meet demand and the game bombed because you literally struggled to find a copy of it.
Oh they also didn't advertised it, so a lot of people didn't know about it.


Zone of the Enders 1 sold decent (made small profit)
Zone of the Enders 2 sold less (made smaller profit)
Zone of the Enders GBA spin off did horrible.
Zone of the Enders 3 is still in development Hell

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is the peak of Castlevania franchise in terms of sales and reception.
The series bombed on PS2 and on PS3/360.

The GBA and DS games kept the series alive thanks to do decent sales and cheap development costs.
The 3DS game bombed (in part due to it being lackluster) killing the franchise.

Metal Gear Solid was one two franchises that saw huge sales increase with each installment with 5 struggling to sustain sales.
MGS3 was supposed to end the series, then it became 4, then 5 is finally the final game.

DDR is the only other Konami series that saw a huge increase in sales on PS2 and Wii due to DDR popularity in the West rising.

PES is strong in Europe and Asia due to soccer fans.

With that said Metal Gear Solid is the only Konami franchise that meets the definition of AAA gaming, all their other games are AA or less.

So Konami was never an AAA developer like EA, Activision, Ubisoft, Epic games, and the rest.

If the talk is true that MGSV cost Konami $100M+ to develop (just development costs alone), with Kojima wanting to delay the game even further and was asking for even more resources, then you can see why it came to an end.
Add in marketing and distribution, it is easily the most expensive game Konami has ever made, with it being one of the most expensive games ever developed to date.

Add this to a highly unstable corporate revenue and profits, with games bombing like crazy for the past 15 years, it was only a matter of time before shareholders revolted and took over the company to restructure it on profit lines.


For those who don't like to read:

*MGS franchise was Konami's only AAA franchise in gaming terms
*Everything else was AA or less
*Everything else not labeled MGS struggled on PS2/GC/Xbox, with everything not named MGS bombing in the HD era
*GBA and DS kept Castlevania afloat that ended with the lackluster 3DS game that bombed
*MGSV is one of the most expensive video games ever developed at $100M+ (just development budget alone), Kojima wanted to delay it again and asked for more resources (at the beginning of the year). Management reigned him in, he fought them and lost.
*Shareholders became feed up with Konami unstable revenues leading to lots of losses and some small profits, they restructured the company in response on profit lines.

Soooo.... if I'm reading this right and am not still a bit confused due to having just woken up, it sounds like this is some confirmation on the idea that AAA games have hit the "gone totally overboard" point that was kinda inevitable? I mean, really, there had to be SOME breaking point. They just cost too much to make. This is what happens when you obsess over graphics and nothing else...

If that IS starting to be the case, then consider me very entertained by the whole thing. Not just because of Konami's involvement in it (I havent cared much at all about them in a long time), just.... in general.