He may be more famous today as the creator of Metal Gear and Death Stranding – as well as the owner of seemingly ageless physical features – but Hideo Kojima has more than just Solid Snake and Sam Porter Bridges in his locker.
His career stretches all the way back to 1986 when he joined Konami; a year later, he would design Metal Gear for the MSX2 before moving onto Snatcher, a sci-fi visual novel heavily inspired by Blade Runner and The Terminator.
Following Snatcher – which was only localised in English for one system, the Mega CD – Kojima shifted his attention to Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake before moving on to his second visual novel-style game, Policenauts. Released in 1994 for the Japanese PC-9821 computer, Policenauts combined hard science fiction with detective elements. It was later ported to the PlayStation and Saturn but never received a western release (excellent fan translations now exist for both versions).
Kojima has been reflecting on the development of Policenauts via his Twitter account (thanks, PC Gamer), noting that he completed the "planning, setting, story, storyboard, and commands" in 1990 – 32 years ago – before production was delayed following his transfer to another department.
He adds that he had a sequel in mind, where antagonist Anthony Redwood "comes back to earth for revenge," but Kojima laments that it never happened.
It's unlikely that Kojima will get the chance to revisit any of his Konami-era creations any time soon; he and Konami parted ways under something of a cloud in 2015, with the latter controversially removing the former's name from promotional material for Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain and reportedly barring him from attending The Game Awards 2015 to collect accolades for the game.
Konami would shutter Kojima Productions in 2015, only for Kojima to restart the company at the close of the year with the support of Sony Computer Entertainment. PS4 exclusive Death Stranding would be the studio's first offering, and it is currently working on a sequel.