While the existence of Metal Gear Solid 4 was already confirmed last year in a conference call, a recent press event in Germany provided a few new details. The new team of people working on the game has been announced with Hideo Kojima now taking on less of a hands-on role. This new game will be a departure from the series as the first three games comprised a trilogy and this will be a new beginning for a next-generation console.

One of the new themes of MGS4 is "No Place to Hide!" and with no more details beyond that, it's up to speculation as to what that exactly means. This could mean that some guaranteed safe spots, such as the logs or crawlspaces in MGS3 will be absent the next time around. It could also mean that the game will feature a different camera system with a third-person view that fans have been asking for. We will have to wait for further details.

The other theme of the event was "No Place for Hideo!" with Kojima now taking on the Executive Producer role. There is a new producer, Ken-ichiro Imaizumi, and the director is now Alan Smithee. If you're not familiar with Alan Smithee, we suggest taking a peek at his huge body of work. Usually, he's an imaginary person that people in the movie business use when they don't want to be associated with a movie they feel will be a disaster. This is an obvious joke from Kojima and surely there will be an announcement later on as to who the director will really be if there is to be one at all.

Despite the report from the earlier conference call that work had already started on the project, the team announced that the real work would officially start this Sunday. There was no announcement as to any possible release date.

Source : IGN PS3