Hideo Kojima is one of the most important and influential video game designers of all time, with a resume that ranges from the Metal Gear series to Death Stranding and the newly announced but still mysterious OD.
If you'd like unprecedented access to his gaming studio so you can see his creative process in action, Disney Plus has just the film for you. Hideo Kojima: Connecting Worlds, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival earlier this year, will be streaming exclusively on the best streaming service for families in spring 2024.
The documentary was made during the development of Death Stranding and positions Kojima very much as an auteur, something that's said explicitly by Guillermo Del Toro in the trailer below.
Will Hideo Kojima: Connecting Worlds be worth watching?
Now there's a good question. If you're not interested in Death Stranding, the answer might be no. Gaming site Kotaku, for instance, says no, claiming that it's "the worst kind of fan service". It goes on to say that it's "too in awe of its subject to see him clearly... [it] inflates Kojima's mythology as an untouchable auteur until it totally obscures him, like a cloud". Escapist, which you can usually rely on to give media a good kicking, agrees, saying it's "an hour-long advertisement for his 2019 game, Death Stranding".
Vulture is more generous, but points out that "for nearly half of Connecting Worlds, there isn't a woman onscreen" and suggests that "the film falls flat because it's exploring a game that's very difficult to understand, that's already three years out from launch (a lifetime in gaming) and that has sparse details about Kojima's personal life". While we do get a glimpse of Kojima's personality – "he's quirky and meticulous... he works a lot of overtime and is obsessed with films" – it all seems to be rather superficial, and doesn't really provide any insight into what makes Kojima's work both unusual and successful.
It does seem to come down to how much interest you have in Death Stranding, especially looking at a review from Gamesradar that found plenty of interesting things in the documentary. You might want to read their roundup before deciding whether this is one to stream or to skip – suffice to say, it's not yet clear whether it will make the cut for one of the best documentaries on Disney Plus yet.
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