Valve’s Gabe Newell tried to send Hideo Kojima to SpaceX, court docs confirm

Thanks to the ongoing lawsuit between Elon Musk and Sam Altman, a chain of emails from 2018 is now public record, revealing that Valve’s cofounder, Gabe Newell, tried to arrange a SpaceX tour to space for Hideo Kojima with the help of Elon Musk.

Kojima visited Valve’s HQ in 2018 to talk about Kojima Productions’ Death Stranding with Gabe Newell. Considering both Kojima and Newell are visionaries and legends in the video game industry, they seemed to have hit it off naturally.

Gabe later emailed Elon Musk in October 2018 about his meeting with Kojima and said, “Hideo Kojima (Metal Gear series, a real visionary in our field) was here at Valve talking about his new game, and he mentioned the importance he places on future work in AI.”

He offered to introduce Kojima to OpenAI and shared details of their collaborative work. Newell also mentioned that Kojima dreamed of going to space. Gabe said, “The second thing is he was talking about how much he wants to go into space, and I offered to introduce him to you. He’d love to get a SpaceX tour.”

Elon Musk responded to Gabe’s email and said, “Sure, it would be great to meet Hideo Kojima, and he’s welcome to see the rocket factory. No problem to send him my email.”

Kojima also recalled the conversation with Gabe in a 2020 interview with Geoff Keighley, stating that Gabe suggested, “Since we love space so much, let’s go visit SpaceX since I know Elon Musk, and I’ll contact him, and let’s go.”

Kojima said he’d been anticipating going together but hadn’t found the time, to which Elon Musk responded on X, “Welcome anytime.”

Kojima’s passion for going into space is pretty evident if you take a deeper look at Kojima Productions’ mascot, known as Ludens, an astronaut wearing an ECA suit exploring digital space.

Furthermore, Kojima collaborated with NASA and Anicorn to create a limited-edition Space Ludens watch that represents the “correlation of Time, Space, and Homo Ludens.”

Kojima says he’d give up 45 years of his game designer career and even his family just to go to space

Hideo Kojima also talked about his ambitions beyond the game industry in his book ‘The Creative Gene’ and said, “If I could have just one wish in my life, if I could cast a magic spell and make anything come true without hesitation, it would be this. I wish to go to space before I die. It doesn’t have to be anything as extravagant as a trip to the moon or Mars.”

He continued, “I would be satisfied with only a brief orbit, just beyond Earth’s atmosphere, where I can gently brush against outer space. I would give up anything to make that wish come true, even my current place as a game designer, which I’ve built up for forty-five years, and even my family or my own life. That’s how powerfully I yearn for the cosmos.”