Kojima's father, who had survived the Great Tokyo Air Raid and as a…

The first screening of the Yamato movie in Tokyo fell on August 7, 1977, the day of Kojima’s father’s funeral. While handling related paperwork in Umeda with his mother, Kojima bought a presale movie ticket that included a poster and put up Starsha’s image on his bedroom wall. On the day Yamato opened in Kansai he took the first train, waited for hours in the sun in a very long line, and watched probably the third showing in a packed, fetid auditorium. There, for the first time since his father’s death, he was able to process the loss of the man who loved the Yamato.

“This isn't the kind of movie a child can understand though”

“When we were younger, good camera technology didn't exist, so we assumed that strange things existed but just weren't caught on camera. So for us, UFOs were real.”

Kojima described his father as a chemist involved in the development of new medicines who, within the corporate structure, was nevertheless a salaryman enduring crowded trains, conflicts with coworkers and persistent fatigue while continuing to work, and who finally managed to buy a house in a Kansai suburb. In that newly created town with no shared past, families and children measured one another by academic background and job title as if playing a card game; Kojima rebelled by choosing the then-young video game industry, where he believed titles weren’t necessary and only a person’s ability mattered.

With no VCR to pause the broadcast, Kojima, his brother and his father finished dinner and their baths before the nine o’clock showing, watched attentively without popcorn or candy, and sprinted during the commercials to be the first to get to the bathroom, sometimes following prearranged turns. Kojima did not know that Nagaharu Yodogawa’s commentaries were prerecorded and imagined the presenter was also waiting for the commercial break to go and stand at the toilet.