I say "potential" there because I'd like to know how much support studio Virtuos is "helping." I keep hearing, though, how Konami is "making" such wonderful games currently, and dammit, they're not making anything.
- Did you like the Silent Hill 2 remake? That's due to the efforts of Bloober Team - and, of course, the extraordinary original work from Team Silent.
- Did you enjoy the Castlevania campaign in Vampire Survivors? That's all on Poncle.
- The upcoming Silent Hill f? Ryukishi and NeoBards.
- The DbD Castlevania DLC? Behaviour. The Dead Cells DLC? Motion Twin.
It's not Konami that's doing a highly-acclaimed job; it's the individual development studios. Konami's involvement has so far been limited to signing development deals to get checks; they would've been happy to publish pachinko-level no-effort projects for all eternity if it brought them money. Recent Konami projects have earned acclaim only because the studios actually producing the games have, evidently, truly cared about the franchises with which they've been entrusted.
I'm glad, in a way, that Konami's foundational franchises are getting new installments that many fans are enjoying (though I do have misgivings about how they're still, ultimately, being farmed out to hired hands, and I think Silent Hill 1–4 represent an artistic achievement that cannot be divorced from the games' creators). The "Konami did it all" revisionism, though, erases who's doing the actual work here - and let's not forget Konami has a hell of a lot of red in its ledger with the abysmal way they for years treated the creators who made their fortune and the IPs in their care.
