Hideo Kojima’s Net Worth in 2022

Hideo Kojima is a Japanese video game designer, director, producer, and writer. He is best known for his time at Konami where he designed and wrote Metal Gear which was released in 1987. Metal Gear laid the foundation for stealth games and marked the birth of the Metal Gear series. He also founded Kojima Productions which was initially part of Konami, but they eventually parted ways. Under Kojima Productions, he developed their first game titled Death Stranding. In this article, however, we will be talking about Hideo Kojima’s net worth in 2022.

Hideo Kojima’s net worth in 2022 (estimate): $30 million

Hideo Kojima’s net worth in 2022 is estimated to be $30 million. This is agreed upon by multiple reputable sources such as Celebrity Net Worth.

Let us now dive deep into his journey and how Hideo Kojima became one of the most well-known video game developers today.

Hideo Kojima was born on August 24, 1963, in Setagaya, Tokyo, Japan, and he is the youngest of three children. His father, Kingo, was a pharmacist who often traveled on business. He named Kojima as it was the most common name among the doctors that he met.

At the age of four years old, his family moved to Osaka, Japan. He said that it was an abrupt change of environment. Due to that, he spent most of his time indoors and watching television or making figurines.

When their family lived in Osaka, Hideo Kojima’s parents began a tradition wherein they will watch a film together each night and they were not allowed to go to bed until the film has finished. Hideo Kojima’s family was fond of European cinema, westerns, and horror.

Hideo Kojima’s interest in filmmaking started when his friend brought a Super 8 camera to school. They then began filming movies together and they charged other children 50 yen to see their work. He tricked his parents to fund a trip to an island off the coast of Japan without telling them that he wanted to film there.

When he was a teenager, he moved to Kawanishi, Hyogo, in the Kansai region of Japan. At the age of 13 years old, Kojima’s father died. He discussed the impact of his father’s death in future interviews wherein he also tackled the financial hardship faced by his family.

He then enrolled at university where he started economics. It was there that he decided to join the video game industry. Despite that, his love for writing never faded as he wrote fiction while he was studying. He even included a short story in his thesis which he said “surprised the professor, but didn’t help my grade much”. This would, eventually, go on to help Hideo Kojima's net worth in 2022.

Due to his affinity for filmmaking, he initially began his career searching for a way into film production. He hoped that if he wins awards for his written fiction, he’ll then be approached about directing a film. Eventually, he decided to pursue a career as a game designer. However, Kojima’s friends were not supportive of his venture and he would frequently lie about his occupation in the early days of his career. He told people that he worked for a financial firm as there was no word for game designer in the Japanese language at that time.

In 1986, he joined Konami’s, a video game publisher, home computer division. The reason he applied to Konami is that it was the only video games developer listed on the Japanese stock exchange. Initially, he was disappointed with the job as he hoped to make games for the Nintendo Entertainment System and claimed that the 16-color palette of the MSX was too restrictive.

The first game that he worked on was Penguin Adventure, the sequel to Antarctic Adventure, where he was an assistant director. Their team worked on expanding the gameplay of its predecessor and added more action game elements, a greater variety of levels, and role-playing elements such as upgrading equipment and multiple endings.

Hideo Kojima was then tasked to take over the project called Metal Gear from a senior associate. However, hardware limitations hindered the game’s combat, so Kojima altered the gameplay to focus more on the stealth aspect, similar to The Great Escape which focuses on a prisoner escaping instead of the fighting elements.

Metal Gear was released on July 13, 1987, on the MSX2 home computer in Japan. The game was one of the earliest examples of the stealth game genre. The game was later ported for the NES with altered graphics and an abridged ending. Hideo Kojima openly criticized the changes made in the port, including poor translation and the altered ending.

The next project Hideo Kojima worked on was the graphic adventure game titled Snatcher, which was released for the NEC PC-8801 and MSX2. He served as the writer and director of the game. Initially, he wanted the game to have six chapters but was instructed to cut it to two, which is why the game ended on a cliffhanger.

Because of Metal Gear’s success, Konami decided to create a sequel to the game titled Snake’s Revenge without the involvement of Kojima. This prompted him to develop his own sequel titled Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake. The game was a commercial success and it received numerous positive reviews.

Hideo Kojima then worked on the 3D versions of the Metal Gear franchise which was aimed for the Sony PlayStation console. He developed Metal Gear Solid, and its sequels Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, and Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots.

On April 1, 2011, Hideo Kojima was promoted to Executive Vice President and Corporate Officer in Konami Digital Entertainment. He was then connected to the Silent Hill series and said that he was interested in making a Silent Hill game. In August 2014, PT was released on the PlayStation Store and he announced that a new game titled Silent Hills was in development. The following year, they announced that the game was canceled.

In 2015, Hideo Kojima parted ways with Konami and he announced that Kojima Productions, previously under Konami, was re-established as an independent studio in partnership with Sony Computer Entertainment.

 

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They soon developed their first game titled Death Stranding and it was exclusive to the PlayStation 4. The game was released on November 8, 2019, and it received positive reviews and was a commercial success. It also won numerous awards such as Best Game Direction and Best Score/Music at The Game Awards 2019.

Aside from his work as a game developer, Hideo Kojima launched his own YouTube channel where he and film critic Kenji Yano discuss their favorite films. He also became a regular contributor to Rolling Stone where he discussed recent film releases.

His work over the years earned him numerous accolades. At the 2008 MTV Awards, he was given the Lifetime Achievement Award for a game designer. He was awarded the Industry Icon Award during The Game Awards 2016. In 2020, he was named a BAFTA Fellowship and was awarded to him during the British Academy Game Awards — making him the second Japanese person to receive the award for his work on video games.

Needless to say, Hideo Kojima paved the way for a lot of game developers as his legacy has been felt throughout the video game industry.

With all of that being said, were you surprised about Hideo Kojima’s net worth in 2022?