Konami's in a weird spot right now. After spending the better part of the current console generation getting people hyped for Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, the company announces that it'd be re-focusing its efforts on mobile games and licensed pachinko machines.
Not only that, but Hideo Kojima — one of the publisher's most prolific creators — was seemingly fired while his ongoing projects were cancelled.
Despite all of this, Konami is probably rolling in a big pile of cash right now: as a part of its latest financial report (via IGN), the publisher announced that Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain had shipped five million units worldwide. Not only that, but Kojima's latest managed to do that in just one month: the report only includes the month of September (The Phantom Pain launched on Sept. 1). Basically, the game did better than some entire franchises.
While shipping five million units is great, that number should also be taken with a grain of salt. Shipping units doesn't necessarily translate into sales — as far as anyone knows, there could be a big box of unsold MGSV games sitting in a warehouse. However, given the critical success of the game, there's a good chance that Konami has already sold more than five million units: again, the report doesn't include October, so that five million unit figure is probably a bit short.
In all honestly, it's not all that surprising that The Phantom Pain is doing well. The game benefited from its lengthy development cycle, as people were able to understand what the game was all about before it even shipped. Considering how niche Metal Gear games can be, accessibility is important — if more people were interested before the game launched, it's safe to assume that Konami made a few extra sales on top of the already-existing fanbase.
If anything, it makes Konami's sudden departure from console gaming all that more confusing. Sure, mobile games make a lot of money, but so does Metal Gear — why cut off such a huge revenue stream?
Either way, it's good to see Metal Gear doing well — if you want to pick up The Phantom Pain, it's available now.
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