Konami Reportedly Blacklisting Ex-Employees Across Japanese Video Game Industry (arstechnica.com) 120
The Nikkei Asian Review newspaper is reporting that the Japanese entertainment company Konami is blacklisting former employees in the Japanese video game industry. "The company is particularly targeting those who work for Kojima Productions, which was founded in 2016 by Hideo Kojima, who used to be a top designer at Konami," reports Ars Technica. From the report: Furthermore, according to the article, Konami is pressuring other companies not to hire its former employees. As the Nikkei Asian Review wrote: "One ex-Kon described his surprise at learning that Konami had instructed an employee at a television company not to deal with its former employees. In another case, a former Konami executive was forced to close his business due to pressure from the gaming giant. Ex-Kons are not allowed to put their Konami experience on their public resumes. 'If you leave the company, you cannot rely on Konami's name to land a job,' explained a former employee. If an ex-Kon is interviewed by the media, the company will send that person a letter through a legal representative, in some cases indicating that Konami is willing to take them to court."
payback (Score:2)
Hello Jim Sterling! (Score:1)
time for another Fuck Konami news!
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Came here to say this. Looking forward to the next "Fuck Konami News" segment on the Jimquisition.
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https://arstechnica.com/busine... [arstechnica.com]
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Between Fuck Konami, "Oh Ubishit", and 17th century aristocrat [youtu.be] ... "Thank God Jim Sterling" :-)
What do you think of the new opening song?
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I didn't care for it at first -- I really miss the old theme "Born Depressed" as the lyrics are crystal clear and fit perfectly. Over time the new song did grow on me though and it's a OK choice.
100% agree what the viewer is just "over-loaded" from the get go -- by the time your brain gets "in sync" with the audio and visuals it is all over. I agree that the lyrics are really hard to get into as well.
I also found that the new animation style grew on me -- I didn't at first. BUT:
1. What kills it for me is
Obvious solution: (Score:4, Funny)
Just use the Konami code to get infinite money. ;)
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ie. lawsuit.
I'm obviously not going to bother if this affects US based employees - but easiest lawsuit ever if it does. Completely and obviously illegal.
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yeah, this would fall foul of so many laws in the us its not even funny.
google and apple got hit a few years back for trying to prevent their former workers from being hired at tech places if they left. They had a quite substantial fine for that one.
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No, they didn't. It was a laughably small fine, far smaller than the amount of money they saved by engaging in the illegal behavior.
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Overwhelming majority of people in those workplaces are staunchly anti-gun and anti-second amendment. I follow a few gun channels on youtube, and seen grassroot level interviews with people who used to work in those companies talking about the issue. For example, apparently there is a small pro-gun group in google, but it's constantly under pressure.
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small pro-gun group in google, but it's constantly under pressure.
Bizarre that this kind of thing is considered OK. For me, keep your pro-gun or your anti-gun personal views at home. Work is work, not a fucking soapbox.
Fuckonami (Score:1)
So, Konami is worthless to work for?
My, how the mighty have fallen. I can't wait for Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night!
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unless you like shitty japan only bejewled clone arcade machines, which is about all they "make" anymore
Hideo Kojima, I feel, is a strong reason Konami is dead though, they went from a strongly diversified company, with little to no bad games, to metal gear old gay cowboy space marine never ending soap opera crap in the blink of an eye. That's not his fault though, they should have never let it get to that
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Which they do because it's steady money cheaply made. I mean, say what you like about selling out artistic vision, but in the end (as sad as it is) that's a compelling bottom line.
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no I have a problem with a series that does not know when to end, you on the other hand saw the word gay and instantly associated it with meaning something negative in my summary of the entire series, so maybe you have some sort of problem
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You seem to have some sort of an issue with the concept of a strong male character who just happens to also be gay.
Nope, doesn't seem like that at all.
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metal gear old gay cowboy space marine never ending soap opera crap
Which game was that? Sounds interesting at least.
Wish they'd put that much effort into their games (Score:5, Insightful)
If Konami put half as much effort into developing their games as they apparently do into harassing their former employees, maybe they wouldn't get so much hate from gamers.
Re:Wish they'd put that much effort into their gam (Score:5, Interesting)
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Something tells me you just don't have the moves.
This is not lame:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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We are apparently less OCD than the Japanese (news flash!!!)
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Konami doesn't care about making video games. They care about making Pachinko machines.
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And Americans still live in the shotgun era.
Re: Fucking barbarian savages (Score:1)
Dont be silly. Shotguns are poor weapons for most applications outside of hunting and hone defense. We live in the era of modern handguns.
Gamers will forgive and forget anything (Score:2)
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Diablo III was tailored/dumbed down too much for the console crowd. And for a game that is all about loot collection, stash expansion is a painful process (unless you happen to live in China, where it is available as a micro transaction).
Overwatch has the FOV capped too low, resulting in motion sickness for many players. They won't change it because of their focus on aesthetic and professional play.
Starcraft II didn't compel me to complete the campaign, and I wa
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You forgot the flying whale.
The story and missions aren't the point of the game. The MGS game have always had disjointed WTF stories. Kojima has a major hard-on for 80s US action movies and loves to reference the hell out of them.
The reason the games are popular are because of the gameplay. You have a large set different systems in the game that you can utilize and play how you want. MGSV is seen as a great game because it actually allows you to play it however you want.
Want a stealthy game? Spend the game
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Yes, the story is an over-the-top, disjointed, incomplete mess. It's clear that Konami killed funding before the game was finished. Nobody argues this.
But how does it PLAY?
Gameplay is king, and MGSV shines here.
is that lawful in Japan? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: is that lawful in Japan? (Score:4, Informative)
Re: is that lawful in Japan? (Score:1, Funny)
"is a clear red flag to anyone praying attention"
FOUND THE JAP!
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Nope. That's be extra "u"s, like in colour, flavour, flour and couca-coula (which we prefer warm, by the way).
Re:is that lawful in Japan? (Score:5, Informative)
It's not only lawful, it's not that uncommon a business practice. Konami is just being more open about it than most.
Japanese companies really feel that their employees are belongings more than people, although they'll try to phrase as 'in the family' or such. By leaving, you've betrayed Konami, stealing the experience you gathered working for them. You're trading on Konami's reputation and past works to benefit yourself - and Konami, like many Japanese companies, will not hesitate to get revenge.
Back in the 90s, it wouldn't be uncommon for a company to call up the new employer of an ex-employee and say something like "We have nothing to do with this individual's child pornography habits" or "We can confirm that the employee was never actually convicted of embezzlement". And, unsurprisingly, the ex-employee would often lost their new job. Even the rumor of a scandal could cost jobs, and with the personal ties between companies (from mom-and-pop shops to the great zaibatsu) being blacklisted in one place often meant losing access to dozens or hundreds of companies, or even entire industries.
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That's what katanas are for.
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You mean they don't have white middle aged men who beat their wives?
That's what you meant, right? Because those are the people shooting up offices and schools.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
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Seems like something reasonable to do, when there's a very clear danger of having your ex-company chase you and try to ruin your life, if you decide to leave for some reason or another.
Re:is that lawful in Japan? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not only lawful, it's not that uncommon a business practice. Konami is just being more open about it than most.
Being common business practice doesn't make it lawful. Japan has labor laws comparable to other advanced economies - weaker than Europe certainly, but stronger than the US's "at will" employment. The problem is a cultural aversion to rocking the boat and demanding the legal rights that they should have.
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Remember, human resources are resources first and humans second.
Re: is that lawful in Japan? (Score:1)
It is allowed. Under the samurai code, ex-employees are expected to commit seppuku. If they choose not to, future employers would be dishonored by employing them.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
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"Probably isn't legal, but that has never stopped Japanese companies pushing the boundaries of labour laws, and bullying their employees."
I can understand they don't want you to leave, what I fail to understand is what's the strenght they have to bully someone?
Can they really succesfully demand you not to put you were there in your resume?
Can they really go to their competition asking for not hiring you with any chance of success?
"a former Konami executive was forced to close his business due to pressure fr
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but to the Japanese ear who has no spine and has been bullied all the way through school
This is just complete bollocks. You might as well say the same thing about the spineless American who was bullied all the way through school. Most people, most companies are nothing like that.
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So you have experience from living in Japan and working in multiple companies there? You have never heard people (in Japan) talking about things like this?
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I lived and worked in Japan, yes. I have friends there.
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local SJW weeaboo
AmiMojo is not a weeaboo. Maybe a Japaneophile (a very superficial one at that), but that's different from weeaboo
Weeaboo is specifically about liking Japanese manga and anime. Manga and anime are not known for their pro-SJW values, especially in how they portray women and girls (this also extends to video games coming from Japan, Nintendo and Mario are great contributors to Anita Sarkeesian's career)
AmiMojo's love for Japan is more general, and only in cherry picked details.
For example, AmiMojo might prais
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Late-stage capitalism doesn't care how honorable your company is. Before the early nineties (and the explosion of the Internet) there were still a good number of thousand-year-old companies in Japan. Sadly, now there are very few. 3 or 4 bad years and Konami are gone.
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Konami was founded in 1969. The fuck are you on about?
They didn't think this through (Score:3)
The answer to this puzzle is simply not to ever work for them. Surely then they will just go bankrupt and disappear, since the best people wouldn't dare join them in fear of similar activity if it doesn't go well.
Do you ever want to work somewhere you can't be fired from?
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The answer to this puzzle is simply not to ever work for them.
That is a great way of dealing with an isolated actor, but not so good when dealing with the cultural heritage of an entire country.
Don't think this is isolated to Konami.... or even the gaming industry.
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Then the answer is simple. Don't work for big companies. Take your ideas and build your own team to execute them.
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Then the answer is simple. Don't work for big companies. Take your ideas and build your own team to execute them.
Sure. While you're at it tell the French to work longer hours, the Spanish not to eat dinner at 9pm, and the Italians to stop napping at lunchtime. Japanese culture is not very welcoming of the ideas you put forward, and they definitely aren't open to these as a suggestion.
What you say would work well in most other countries of the world, not a country where people will happily commute for 4+ hours a day to work in a big city in a big company, or a country where an employee can die at his desk and no one no
Streisand Effect (Score:2)
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This is just: company did something bad and just got called out for it.
If the story was, Konami tries to censor reports about it's blacklisting that would be Streisand.
This sucks for recruiting (Score:2)
Simple solution (Score:3)
Apply for asylum in the US and start indie game shops here... I have many fond memories of classic Konami games: Contra, Castlevania, Belmonts Quest, Life Force (Salamander), Contra: Alien Wars, Gradius III, TMNT 4: Turtles in Time, etc. Make some updated, new games on the same concept with Unreal engine 2D graphics and put it up on steam and sell a few million copies at $9.99 a pop.
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Stupid is as stupid does, apparently. This lie has been spewed by the progressives for years to justify hatred of America, but lets look at the facts:
1. China was invaded by Japan very rapidly thanks to an army of Japanese saboteurs already living in China. Japan was brutal to the Chinese civilians (look it up).
2. Japan invaded the Philippines rapidly, aided by Japanese saboteurs, they were brutal to the Filipinos.
3. The Japanese in Japan and many in the US worshiped Hiro Hito (the emperor of Japan) as
Kill every Konami executive (Score:2)
So much for Japanese "honor", huh? Every Konami executive should have a katana rammed up their asses.
Round one: Fight! (Score:1)
FINISH HIM