Hideo Kojima says he was ‘shocked’ after Sony cut ties with Physint over a Zoom call: ‘Nothing could’ve prepared me for their decision to step away from the project’

Sony’s recent decision to cut ties with Kojima Productions’s Physint is one of the more unexpected turns of 2026. Even with the industry’s many struggles, and speculation that Death Stranding 2 didn’t sell as well as Sony hoped, the PlayStation studio shutting the door on one of the industry’s most famed and respected designers was a huge surprise.

While Kojima Productions would eventually find a new publisher for Physint in Microsoft, it took a frantic three months of pitching for that happen. This is partly because Kojima himself was similarly blindsided by Sony’s decision, as the veteran designer revealed in the first interview he’s given since switching publishers.

Speaking to IGN, Kojima revealed that in June, Sony contacted him saying they wanted to have a Zoom call, which he agreed to. It was during that call when Sony broke the bad news: “They said they can no longer fund development for Physint. I was shocked and I said ‘What did you say?'” Kojima explained. “I couldn’t quite process what they had said. I wasn’t sure because I was in such shock.”

Kojima told IGN that he understood “the situation in the industry as a whole”, with many studios being shut down and projects being cancelled. But he genuinely believed Physint “was safe” from the industry’s broader turbulence. “I was surprised, but not just surprised. We didn’t understand the reason. I didn’t have any anger or sadness; my first thought was ‘What am I going to do with my studio?”‘

Indeed, Kojima Productions’ financials were such that it would have struggled to continue operating as it had with one of its two projects—the other being the horror game OD—deprived of funding. “I thought I might have to cut all the people working on Physint, right? Or our studio could end up collapsing because we’ll run out of cashflow.” Kojima specified that he has “borrowed money from the bank” to help fund Kojima Productions, and that “If they find out a project has been stopped or cancelled, we’d be in big trouble.”

The reason for Sony’s decision still seems to elude Kojima—or at least, if he does know the reason, he hasn’t stated it explicitly. But there is an implication that his relationship with Sony has shifted, as people he knew at the company have left or retired. “I’ve been working with [Sony] for like 30 years… Mr Ken Kutaragi, Mr. Hirai, I was close with them. But it’s not like that recently.”

Nonetheless, Kojima reiterated that, despite Sony’s decision, he doesn’t view the company negatively. “Nothing could’ve prepared me for their decision to step away from the project. So I thought, ‘What am I going to do from tomorrow?’ But from my side, I love Sony. And I don’t have any bad feelings against them.”

Once Kojima got past the shock, his first thought was to protect his staff: “I can’t really tell them the game has been cancelled. I didn’t want to do the same thing we did for P.T. Of course, I didn’t want to worry.” As such, Kojima began thinking about pitching Physint to other companies.

Rather than pitching Physint as a single game, which he described as being “a very old-fashioned way of doing things”, he decided to pitch it as a broader IP with multimedia potential: “I want to consider everything like movies, dramas, anime, TV, comics, music. Let’s create a new IP with all of this included.”

Kojima made such a pitch to various people, claiming that “everyone had positive reactions”. But Kojima wanted a partner who could feasibly support such wide-ranging plans, which is why he took Physint to Xbox. “I approached Xbox and they were great. They could support us technically. And also we’ve been working on OD with them, so we already had a connection. I made a proper pitch of Physint to them. And then their first reaction was like: ‘This pitch was fantastic. Never seen a pitch like this!’ And that was how it started with Xbox.'”

It may seem odd for Xbox to be considered the safe option, given the company is in the middle of cutting thousands of jobs and recently parted ways with several studios of its own, including Double Fine and Compulsion Games. However, Microsoft clearly sees getting to publish Kojima’s games as a feather in its cap, and it has previously safeguarded the designer’s games from its own downsizing on more than one occasion.