Metal Gear Solid music producer Rika Muranaka has revealed that Hideo Kojima didn’t want Metal Gear to become a long-running “series or franchise like Final Fantasy” but Konami insisted that he continue to work on it because it was a hit.
“Hideo didn’t want to do a series or franchise like Final Fantasy,” Muranaka told Game Developer in a recent interview. “So he kept fighting with Konami because Konami were like ‘It’s a hit.’ That’s what the business people say. Hideo being an artist, he wanted to make a different video game. But it became so successful that everybody wanted a sequel. That’s a kind of hard position to be in. It becomes someone else’s game.”
The interview revolved around the series’ music, which Muranaka revealed that Kojima originally wanted to tap Hans Zimmer for. But Zimmer was too “expensive” so Kojima asked Muranaka to contact Hollywood composer Harry Gregson-Williams, who was working with Zimmer at the time.
“Because we were so successful with Metal Gear Solid, Hideo said ‘Okay, we have a budget, maybe we can hire a Hollywood composer,'” Muranaka recalled. “We went to Media Ventures (now known as Remote Control Productions), which is Hans Zimmer’s studio. We originally wanted to get Hans Zimmer, but he was like ‘No, I can’t do it for that kind of money’ – he’s so expensive, it’s ridiculous.”
Gregson-Williams told Game Developer that he hadn’t considered composing for video games at all back then, but he went on to work with Kojima up until 2014. Gregson-Williams also ended up working on Call of Duty games.
[Source: Game Developer]
