Kojima "oversaw" the product?
He was just figurehead executive producer to increase sales.
He supervised it, Drake. He went to MercuryStream a few times, saw the cutscenes mostly (of course</sarcasm>) and the gameplay. As far as the game-game itself, that was MercuryStream but Kojima had
some input in how it went in regards to the game. I won't say it was "him" fully on LoS1, but I'll say him looking into it was a factor.
I think Kojima being chained to MGS is his own fault. That series is his baby and he refuses to let it go. He's also got Castlevania's blood on his hands.
The rest is definitely Konami, though.
Eh, LoS 1 wasn't totally him. IIRC, he just oversaw the project. Probably why it turned out better than LoS2 which didn't have his supervision on it.
I'll agree that MGS probably killed Konami though. That thing was WAYYY ahead of it's time and Konami's been trying to chase that "cutting edge" thing like George Brossaurd or however you spell his name from 3D Realms doing Duke 3D.
Dave Cox made a plea to Hideo Kojima who used his clout to get it approved. Apart from putting his studio's name on the box and giving a few story notes, my understanding is that is the full extent of his contributions. But that first thing he did pretty much cut IGA's throat and Castlevania's at the same time. It's going to be a long time before Konami lets the IP come back from selling 100k WW off a budget over $10 mill. Lords of Shadow was initially pitched to Konami and turned down.
I'm going to have to go look for those Kojima tweets from 2-4 years back, aren't I? I could
swear he supervised about 40% of the title.
