Podcaster and movie watcher Hideo Kojima loves being secretive about whatever game he’s currently working on. The Metal Gear creator frequently trades in cryptic hype, marketing his upcoming games with odd, ominous puzzles that hint at themes he’s interested in more than what the game may be like. What he isn’t secretive about, however, is who he’s working on this stuff with.
Given the confluence of his fervent cinephilia and his increasingly cinematic games, Kojima has taken to collaborating with filmmakers and movie stars for inclusion in his games. Death Stranding, for example, was full of them: The Walking Dead’s Norman Reedus of course, but also The Shape of Water and Hellboy director Guillermo del Toro, Drive director Nicolas Winding Refn, and Hannibal star Mads Mikkelsen. This often involves the celebrity in question sitting in front of a terrifying camera rig as their entire visage is digitized in uncomfortable detail, for potential reproduction in a game.
Kojima’s latest victim collaborator is none other than S.S. Rajamouli, the director of this year’s breakout hit RRR, a film that Kojima tweeted rapturously about in support of its Japanese premiere this week.
This means we can look forward to Rajamouli appearing in… well, something. Maybe. Kojima has been scanning a number of people these days, from Elle Fanning (almost certainly involved in one of Kojima’s possible projects) to Ghost in the Shell director Mamoru Oshii, who may not appear in anything.
Maybe he’s just building a collection. For himself. As one does.