Kojima's 'next project' will be 'taboo'

Hideo Kojima is currently wrapping up work on Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, which will continue the Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater and Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops storyline on the PSP on June 8 in North America. However, it would seem as if Konami's celebrated game designer has already begun to fix his eyes on what lies ahead. Spotted by Japanese gaming site Andria Sang, Kojima has begun discussing his "next project" on Twitter.

"I'm thinking about the casting for my next title," Kojima said through his Japanese-language Twitter feed. "The project plan still hasn't reached a detailed level, but everything is advancing simultaneously in my head. Title, game design, story, characters, setting research, the mech that appear, casting, graphic direction, sound, beginning and ending, the major story sequences. It comes together naturally in my head."

Kojima went on to bemoan the distraction of his mysterious next project in a subsequent Twitter update, before offering a cryptic teaser about the game's subject matter.

"The next project will challenge a certain type of taboo," he wrote. "If I mess up, I'll probably have to leave the industry. However, I don't want to pass by avoiding that. I turn 47 this year. It's been 24 years since I started making games. Today, I got an ally who would happily support me in that risk. Although it's just one person. For a start, it's good." Kojima has since offered no other details about the project through his Twitter feed (though he apparently did have Chinese food for lunch).

Beyond Peace Walker, Kojima is also involved in Mercury Steam's reboot of Konami's classic vampire-hunter series, Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. That game is expected to arrive for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 sometime in 2010. In October, he also expressed interest in reviving Kojima Productions' acclaimed Zone of the Enders franchise, a mech-based third-person action series that has lain dormant since 2003.