Kojima's mystery game Overdose leaks in bizarre gameplay video recorded in the worst way imaginable
Behold: a glare- and nipple-heavy phone recording of a laptop playing a video file
Kojima's next game, the enigmatic OD, has gone from vague teasers to full-blown leaks thanks to the haphazard efforts of a topless man.
After months of varyingly cryptic images, a little over two minutes of Overdose gameplay recently leaked online through a Streamable embed (viewable on ResetEra), and it's about as comically ugly as leaked footage can get.
What we have here is a phone recording of a video file played on a laptop (seemingly via YouTube's video suite, which could suggest an impending trailer release), and in a room lit just poorly enough to repeatedly flash the shirtless torso and extremely visible face of the dude who made and presumably shared this recording. If it was shared by someone else, you've gotta wonder how this guy feels about his nipples being broadcast to the world. Leakers usually try to avoid including so much as an identifiable username or file path in videos like this, let alone their entire face and also their bare chest, so you've also gotta wonder how much forethought went into this.
If you squint your eyes and can parse the horrible quality, there is indeed a game buried in here, and it does loosely line up with what little we know about Overdose. If this is a fake, it's a convincing fake, right down to the "A Hideo Kojima game" title card at the end.
A female lead seemingly modeled after Margaret Qualley, who's been tied to several Overdose teasers and previously worked with Kojima Productions on Death Stranding, wanders dark hallways as some sort of humanoid monster approaches in the backdrop. The video is labeled "Camera Player 1," though it's unclear if that's actually an in-game detail or a consequence of this being a non-final presentation of some kind. It's worth remembering that even if this footage is real, it may not accurately reflect the game we'll eventually play.
Pressing on, red points of interest appear on-screen at various points, and it seems the player can interact with them to reveal additional details or have the playable character move to investigate. Things look quite passive otherwise; the only other visible mechanic is a flashlight battery meter in the top-right corner, which steadily ticks down.
This really is just two minutes of meandering around before a scream-backed fade to black, complete with an old-school "Game Over" message. This is arguably par for the course for Kojima's esoteric narrative experiments, but it does make for a confusing, if hilarious video. Here's hoping our next look at Overdose is more official and informative – and less naked.
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Whatever this is, it's unclear whether Overdose is the subject of Kojima's partnership with Xbox.
Austin freelanced for the likes of PC Gamer, Eurogamer, IGN, Sports Illustrated, and more while finishing his journalism degree, and he's been with GamesRadar+ since 2019. They've yet to realize that his position as a senior writer is just a cover up for his career-spanning Destiny column, and he's kept the ruse going with a focus on news and the occasional feature, all while playing as many roguelikes as possible.
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Death Stranding and Metal Gear Solid lead Hideo Kojima once said "everything I make ends up feeling somewhat like a movie" because he'd "grown up with them"