Despite the critical acclaim of Metal Gear Solid V, Konami has been having an awful year. If the falling out between the publisher and Hideo Kojima, the cancellation of the new Silent Hill game, andaccusations of a very poor work environment weren’t bad enough, Konami does not have any AAA games in development other than Pro Evolution Soccer 2016. In the video games industry an AAA moniker generally refers to a game’s production and marketing budget. Halo, Call of Duty, Super Mario Bros., Uncharted and Fallout 4 are all examples of AAA games.
“Worse, apart from the series Winning Eleven / PES, no AAA game is currently in pre-production at Konami. All current console projects have been stopped or canceled by the new management,” says a report discovered by Game Blog. Konami apparently holds the console rights to Euro 2016, a football tournament game according to Eurogamer but there are absolutely no indications that game is in development for any consoles.
If you ask any gamer who was playing video games in the 1980’s or 1990’s what their favorite games from those days might be, it would almost be certain that a Konami title would be mentioned. I myself grew up playing Double Dribble, Castlevania and Contra on the NES and I would argue that Konami’s early titles on the SNES such as Super Castlevania IV and Contra III: The Alien Wars were among the systems best games at that point in its library. It is sad to see former gaming giants like Sega and now Konami reducing their focus on the console game market that was once the foundation of their success.
