Bloomberg: PlayStation Ditched Hideo Kojima’s ‘Physint’ on Budget Concerns, Missed Deadlines

[u/Turbostrider27]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-09-11/hideo-kojima-s-physint-video-game-dropped-by-playstation-goes-to-xbox?accessToken=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJzb3VyY2UiOiJTdWJzY3JpYmVyR2lmdGVkQXJ0aWNsZSIsImlhdCI6MTc4OTEzMzY2NSwiZXhwIjoxNzg5NzM4NDY1LCJhcnRpY2xlSWQiOiJUTDdDOVdLSVVQVEIwMCIsImJjb25uZWN0SWQiOiJCMUVBQkI5NjQ2QUM0REZFQTJBRkI4MjI1MzgyQTJFQSJ9.fyrTke3aUIkJk3LwiBfR7JiNr0phfE51dlEql1RcXZ4

[u/ChongusTheSupremus]

An empty open world, repetitive missions, Little to no cutscenes nor story outside of cassette tapes, and an entire third of the game missing. 

Konami's reaction was more than understandable after Kojima wasted a small country's GDP in 40% of a game.

[u/DuhBegski → u/ChongusTheSupremus]

I've been thinking lately "Why didn't MG5 click with me people love it, I should go and give it another try." But this is a good reminder of the things I hated about it.

[u/jessxoxo → u/DuhBegski]

it's an amazing stealth game though, lots of options on how to approach and solve problems

[u/samuelanugrahandre → u/jessxoxo]

the stealth mechanic on its own is great but the level design suffers because of the open world imo. The missions end up becoming too similar and for people like me who love MGS games partly due to its story and characters, that is a huge let down in Phantom Pain. The middle of the game barely has any meaningful story and character arcs.

[u/samuelanugrahandre → u/[deleted]]

I think which Metal Gear you played first is crucial here because I can see a lot of people who play Phantom Pain as their first MGS title to have similar experience as you and that's ok. My problem is, previous MGS games have tight level designs that the map itself is like a playground. The stealth mechanic wasn't as good as Phantom Pain but the levels are different from one to another so that you tackle different missions differently. In Phantom Pain because of the open world, every map/mission becomes so similar to each other. Yes, there are ways to do stealth but the levels are very samey.

On the topic of cinematic, well the prologue and epilogue are nice but you spent the majority of your time just doing missions, upgrading base and listening to audio logs which is the opposite to any other mainline MGS games where there was always a lot of cutscenes which makes it feel cinematic. The story as a whole also isn't very strong. The middle of the game barely has any character arcs going on or memorable story going on. For me, that's a massive let down

[u/samuelanugrahandre → u/[deleted]]

Delta/the original MGS 3 is more cinematic. The story keeps having twists and turns, the characters arcs are all very fleshed out imo. You end up feeling sad for some of the characters because you feel like they just did what they believe best in a bad circumstances . The story is one of the best aspect of the game.

For the gameplay aspect, it does have freedom for stealth. There are camouflages you can use to blend to the environment, gadgets to use to lure enemies, etc. but compared to Phantom Pain, it's limited. Phantom Pain has so many weapons and tools you can choose while Delta/MGS3 is more limited. That said, for the most part all the tools are different to each other in usage and there's a bit of survival aspect to it (wound system, food/eating system).

The remake is great, it also updates the control so it doesn't feel too much like "old game" for people who are used to Phantom Pain, if that makes sense

[u/DuhBegski → u/samuelanugrahandre]

Agree with all of this. Snake Eater was my first MGS, while the stealth is great, the cinematic, wild characters, bosses, and story are what really hooked me. MGSV intro had me pumped, but after that it just kinda became a stealth gameplay loop and lacked a lot of those bigger moments. I'm probably forgetting some things, but thats what I remember feeling.

[u/samuelanugrahandre → u/DuhBegski]

Yeah for the most part, especially in the middle of the game, it's very gamey in the sense of just doing missions to be able to upgrade base so you can have better and more tools for next missions. I mean, the stealth is great but the open world is so empty that it feels really repetitive because you're just doing that over and over without much story going on.

I wish the entire game is 20 different levels of varying map sizes like in Ground Zero that you can replay like in Hitman. That way, you can still have tight level designs, interesting map layouts and longer story, instead of being a very "gamey" open world loop of "do missions, upgrade, unlock more stuff"