Kojima: Sony stopped funding Physint in June

• Kojima says the decision surprised him and left him worried about the impact on Kojima Productions.
• According to the reporting provided, Xbox later took over publishing Physint, though the exact terms were not disclosed.

What happened

IGN reports that Sony informed Hideo Kojima about Physint during a Zoom call in June. Kojima says Kojima Productions president Shinji Hirano and head of talent development Aki Saito were also present. At the time, Kojima said in the same interview that he was also working on OD for Xbox.

According to Kojima, Sony said in that meeting that funding for Physint had been stopped. He says the news caught him off guard and that he could not immediately process what had been said. Kotaku writes that Kojima still does not know why Sony made that decision.

Kojima also says he was concerned about the consequences for Kojima Productions, including the studio’s financial planning and the position of staff working on Physint. The reporting provided also says Xbox later took over publishing Physint, but the commercial and legal terms were not detailed.

Kojima says in the interviews provided that he still approaches Sony positively and does not hold a grudge over the decision.

Background

Physint was announced in January 2024 as a new Kojima Productions project for PlayStation. The current reporting concerns the funding and publishing of that project, not a formal public cancellation by Sony.

Kotaku says Kojima Productions has around 200 employees. That makes his concerns about the studio and the scheduling of multiple major projects more concrete, since Physint and OD were running in parallel during the same period.

The sources provided also place the situation alongside the existing collaboration between Xbox and Kojima Productions on OD. As a result, this is not just about one project, but about a shift in publishing and funding across multiple productions at the same studio.