And how is this even related to Abandoned, which we discussed yesterday?

VentureBeat‘s Jeff Grubb claims that the Japanese genius is in talks with the Redmond-based company to publish his next game. How is this tied to Blue Box Game Studios‘ PlayStation 5-exclusive title? Many people thought that it’s Kojima’s game behind the scenes, but the Dutch studio prevented any further rumours by publishing a statement on its website.

„We received several emails regarding the Hideo Kojima rumour. We have no association with Hideo Kojima nor do we claim to have any association nor was it our intention to claim such a statement. We are a small group of developers working on a passionate title we wanted to work on for a long time. We have been assisting other studios in the past with their projects and we wanted to work on our very first big project. While it is true that we’ve been working on small projects in the past, we certainly didn’t use that for marketing purposes. We hope this has clarified this matter and hope to see you all in our very first gameplay reveal of Abandoned,” Blue Box Game Studios wrote.

But back to Grubb, he wrote the following: „But the biggest piece of evidence I have that Abandoned is not a Kojima joint is that Kojima is in talks with Microsoft about publishing his next game, according to a source familiar with the matter. And yes, that statue on Phil Spencer’s shelf was referencing a potential deal with the legendary developer. I cannot confirm if Xbox closed the deal yet, but my understanding is that Kojima is the focus of a Microsoft plan to leverage Japanese talent.”

What is Grubb referencing here? This tweet shows that Phil Spencer, the head of Xbox, had a Ludens figurine in the background. Ludens happens to be the mascot of Kojima Productions. (But in that case, what about Nintendo and Ubisoft? Seeing what Spencer has on the shelves…)

We have to add that nothing is official yet, but still, if it’s true, Microsoft might be doing a good move to get the attention of the Japanese studios.

Source: WCCFTech

Phil Spencer on stream, he has a Kojima Productions Ludens figure in the background apparently next to the Xbox logo pic.twitter.com/nept872D7n

— Wario64 (@Wario64) February 23, 2021