Kojima's OD Will Likely Subvert the Obvious Genre Comparison

Summary

Kojima Productions' upcoming horror game, OD, shares similarities with P.T. But promises a unique experience.
OD focuses on exploring the human fear threshold and may be a collaborative multiplayer experience.
Kojima Productions is collaborating with Xbox Game Studios and could emphasize cloud gaming and online experimentation.

The latest ambitious project to come from Kojima Productions is the upcoming horror game OD, which was first announced at The Game Awards in 2023. Not a lot is currently known about the narrative or core mechanics of the title, with the reveal trailer for the game giving more questions than answers in true Kojima fashion, but this has not stopped hype from building around the project.

It is clear, however, that the game will have a huge focus on unique horror elements, and fans are understandably comparing the title to a past Kojima Productions game that also attempted this. P.T. Is another two-letter-titled experimental horror game that fell under the Kojima name, being an iconic horror experience despite only being a demo of a game that was never released. While it seems logical to think that OD will be a very similar venture to P.T., everything that is currently known about the upcoming game suggests it will be a wildly different experience.

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By Dave Francisco

Kojima's OD Already Seems Worlds Apart From P.T.

P.T. Stands as one of the most memorable game demos of all time, bringing huge amounts of attention to a project that ultimately never saw the light of day. It was the demo's unique approach towards its gameplay loop that stuck out so prominently to fans, with the player walking the same route of a house over and over again as their surroundings become more and more sinister.

This demo for P.T. Also came with its own trailer, which briefly teased Norman Reedus as the main character for the title. Of course, Norman Reedus would go on to star as the protagonist of Death Stranding, another Kojima title, as P.T. Ceased development in 2015. P.T. Was a demo for a project known as Silent Hills, a canceled installment in the Silent Hill franchise, yet the upcoming OD appears to be the launch title for an entirely brand-new IP.

The trailer for OD only showed a series of faces repeating the same sentences and becoming increasingly scared, with most of the information surrounding the game coming from descriptions of the title from Kojima himself. The main ethos of the game, according to Kojima, is to test the human fear threshold to its upper limits, while exploring what it means to "OD" on fear itself.

Cloud Gaming and Online Experimentation May Be the Key to Kojima's OD

It is also known that Kojima is working with Xbox Game Studios on the development of OD, with a focus being placed on Microsoft's ambitious plans for cloud gaming. This seems to suggest that OD may play as a collaborative multiplayer experience, testing the limits of fear with groups of players in real-time. Not only does this fit with the alleged experimental angle that OD is trying to achieve, but it paints a gameplay picture that is worlds removed from P.T.

There were some references to P.T. In the teaser trailer for OD, with the Japanese kanji for "silent hill" being spotted by eagle-eyed fans, but it seems likely that this is as far as any comparisons between both titles might go. While it remains to be seen what OD might end up looking like, it seems that the time of P.T.'S popularity has been put behind Kojima Productions for its next major venture. It is a definite shame that P.T. Never got the full release that its success clearly warranted, but the ambitious use of genre-bending premises and cloud gaming integration puts OD in good stead to be its own unique delve into horror that could easily reach the same heights that P.T. Did in 2015.