"See? This is the Koei way of doing business. We don't need a standing ovation or media headlines. All that matters is that the people who want to buy our games know they're out there."
3:15 PM.
It was Sega's turn.
The tension in the hall had barely eased for thirty seconds after Koei's exit when the Sega logo appeared on the big screen.
The moment the blue "SEGA" letters sprang outward, the reporters who had been leaning back in their chairs straightened up, their bodies collectively leaning forward two inches.
It had been a long day, starting with Konami at 9:15 AM and ending with Koei just now. Over a dozen companies had taken the stage, each with their own approach. But the most anticipated moment remained the first-party publishers taking the stage themselves.
What could Jupiter possibly have up their sleeve?
The first producer to take the stage was a Japanese man in his early thirties. He wore round-frame glasses, a nondescript dark gray jacket, and a black T-shirt.
But when he stepped onto the stage and began his self-introduction in English, his accent was unmistakably Japanese: "My name is Hideo Kojima. I make games that I want to play."
A few Japanese reporters in the audience chuckled.
Those who knew him were well aware of his overbearing confidence, bordering on arrogance.
But the American reporters unfamiliar with him were quite impressed. At least this opening line was far more engaging than the rote, formulaic introductions delivered by 80% of the Japanese producers that day.
Hideo Kojima's English was indeed considered quite good for the Japanese game industry.
A few years prior, Sega had sent him to North America to assist the American branch's development team with Urgent Crisis, a tactical simulation game based on Tom Clancy's novel of the same name. He spent a considerable amount of time in San Francisco.
That experience had elevated his spoken English far above the industry average. Though his speech wasn't particularly fast, and he occasionally struggled with the distinction between "r" and "l," his vocabulary was precise, his logic clear, and he possessed a natural rhythm for storytelling, knowing exactly when to pause and when to emphasize his words.
He wasted no time on pleasantries, simply raising the microphone to his lips and declaring: "Metal Gear Solid 2."
The screen lit up, revealing a distant view of a maritime facility.
Nightfall, torrential rain, and searchlight beams swept across the frothy waves.
The camera slowly advanced, piercing through the curtain of rain, through the distorted reflections of accumulated water on the metal gangway, until it finally settled on the silhouette of a crouching figure behind cover.
This was real-time 3D rendering, not pre-rendered computer graphics, but genuine graphics running live on the Jupiter hardware.
Someone had noticed this a second earlier—the Jupiter hardware logo, along with the text "Real-time rendering," had been prominently displayed in the lower right corner of the screen.
The EGM editor shot up from his chair.
It wasn't that the graphics were particularly groundbreaking.
Objectively speaking, the polygon count of this scene couldn't compare to the FF7 CG sequence from half an hour earlier. Real-time rendering was real-time rendering, and the hardware's computational power was what it was—physically impossible to achieve CG-level polygon counts.
But the problem was... this sequence's art direction was simply too clever.
The characters' 3D models had allocated their polygon budget with surgical precision. The level of detail couldn't possibly rival games like Virtua Fighter 2, which poured all their resources into just two characters. After all, this was an action-adventure game with full environments, multiple NPCs, and real-time lighting calculations.
The development team clearly recognized this limitation and devised an ingenious solution.
Every line defining the characters' silhouettes had been meticulously refined.
Shoulder width, waistline, limb proportions—the 3D models' silhouettes remained highly recognizable even in distant shots, avoiding the awkward "pile of moving blocks" effect common in early 3D games.
The motion capture data—or more likely, keyframe animations painstakingly adjusted frame by frame—was remarkably polished.
Whether the protagonist was crouching, standing up, leaning against a wall, or peering around a corner, each transition was grounded in realistic weight shifts and inertia. This wasn't the stiff, instantaneous pose-swapping of button-mashing games, but a breathing, logical movement system.
More crucially, the game extensively used hand-drawn illustrations and silhouettes in the style of Yoji Shinkawa to handle scene transitions.
Rather than abruptly cutting to 3D dialogue scenes when the narrative needed to establish context, the game employed a technique akin to manga paneling. Sharp-lined, high-contrast character portraits in Shinkawa's style were embedded into the screen, creating a seamless blend of 3D action and 2D storytelling.
The profile silhouettes of characters, paired with a deep voiceover, conveyed dense information while maintaining a cohesive visual style.
"How does this man's mind work?" An editor from NetGeneration put down his pen, offering a rare comment that strayed from technical analysis.
He was referring to Kojima's decision-making logic.
Not enough 3D real-time processing power?
Then don't force it.
Use hand-drawn illustrations to compensate for functional limitations, while pouring all the saved computational resources into enhancing gameplay mechanics and environmental interactions.
This approach ensured that players wouldn't feel the developers were cutting corners. Instead, they would perceive the blend of 2D art and 3D graphics as a deliberate aesthetic choice.
After all, Yoji Shinkawa's art was undeniably stunning.
Those crisp, angular lines born from the nib of a pen naturally suited military-themed settings.
The screen transitioned to a live gameplay demonstration.
The protagonist, Snake, infiltrated the facility's interior. Patrol soldiers moved through the corridors.
Instead of engaging in direct combat, the player maneuvered Snake along the walls, using corners for cover. When a patrol soldier turned, Snake slipped behind him, executed a perfect throat lock, and took him down.
The entire process was quiet and fluid, the delay between controller input and character response imperceptible.
The gameplay feels excellent. An editor in the audience had already formed an opinion, though he kept his thoughts to himself, jotting them down in his notebook instead.
When the demo concluded, Kojima raised the controller. "We have a playable demo at our booth. Come and try it."
His announcement was brief, devoid of any unnecessary flourish.
As the applause began, several American journalists in the front row were already consulting the conference map. Where was Sega's booth? How long was the queue for the demo? These practical details mattered more than any critical assessment.
As Kojima descended the stage, some audience members were still poring over the venue map to locate Sega's booth. But the big screen gave them little time to breathe; the host was already announcing the next producer.
Rieko Kodama.
A Japanese woman in her early thirties emerged from the side curtain. She stood at average height, her short hair neatly pinned back, and wore a crisply tailored black suit with flat leather shoes. There were no high heels, no deliberate affectation.
Her hand held the microphone steady. After settling into position, she nodded slightly to the audience—a small, decisive gesture.
This was the first woman to take the stage all day, among dozens of producers from over a dozen companies who had presented since morning.
The Famitsu editor paused for a half-second, then scribbled the word "female" in his notebook and circled it.
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