Hideo Kojima has plenty of praise for one of his earliest wonderful memories: Osaka World Expo 1970. He credits the event as having had a profound impact on his young mind, including helping to shape ideas which would eventually coalesce into Metal Gear Solid, Death Stranding, and more.
On the other hand, Kojima isn’t quite so smitten with Osaka World Expo 2025. Too few attendants have been under the age of 50, he laments, and budgetary considerations prohibited his own ideas from being added to the futurism lineup. Contrasting the two landmark events, while highlighting just how flippin’ awesome 1970’s iteration must surely have been, Kojima Productions’ titular celebrity founder offers us food for thought in a brand-new essay.
Automaton caught sight of a Kojima-penned essay for an-an, a Japanese publication, in which the industry iconreflects on his boyhood wonder at beholding the many-splendored sights of Osaka World Expo 1970. Beginning his thoughts by reciting Minami Haruo’s ‘Hello from Countries Around the World’, a hit song from that fabled year, Kojima pointedly notes that ‘Hello’ is repeated 35 times, dives deeper into its meaning, and then – you know, it’s all very Hideo Kojima 101.
“76 countries, four international organizations, one government (Hong Kong), three US states, three Canadian provinces, two US cities, one German city, and two companies” particiapted in Osaka World Expo 1970, Kojima recalls. “It was a historic event, with over 830,000 people flocking to the expo in one day, and by the time it closed, the total number of visitors had reached 64,218,770.”
Kojima had just wrapped up his tender elementary school years back then, and he regards the global phenomenon as splitting his life between his “personal B.C. and A.D.,” which is one of the most Kojima things I’ve ever read. He was gifted the chance to greet such legends as writer/art theorist Taro Okamoto, science fiction author/screenwriter Sakyo Komatsu, architects Kenzo Tange and Kisho Kurokawa, and fashion designers Hanae Mori and Junko Koshino.
“Without that Expo, my future-oriented approach and globalism would never have developed. Neither Metal Gear nor Death Stranding would have been created.” -Hideo Kojima
Kojima credits the time as the genesis of his “future-oriented approach and globalism.” Alas, he’s visibly less enthusiastic about its 2025 successor. “Six years ago, members of the ‘EXPO 2025’ preparatory committee […] flocked to me in large numbers to hear my opinions,” he explains, as modestly as ever, but after providing “a variety of ideas and insights,” he was rebuffed in full. “[The] young bureaucrats, who had no experience of that Expo, simply smiled wryly and said, ‘We don’t have the money.’ I haven’t had any contact with them since.”
By contrast with 1970, Kojima has found that relatively few young people have expressed interest in the Expo. “More than 70% of the visitors who said ‘hello’ to the 21st Century Osaka Expo were over 50 years old. In other words, they were people who experienced the Showa Expo.” Nevertheless, Kojima desired a venue through which to say “hello” again, 55 years after his life-altering initial experience. “I want to make sure that ‘hello 1970’ was not an illusion,” he concludes. I’m glad an-an gave him that chance.
AloJapan.com