Hollywood's maniacal watchdog, Nicolas Cage, is apparently getting into the game. Last month, news broke that Nicolas Cage is releasing Dead by Daylight starring Nicolas Cage later this year, followed by a cameo appearance at Summer Games Fest, where he said, "I want you to know when I'm playing Nicolas Cage's Survivor."

Heh. Now, a certain video game director and film enthusiast is obviously watching this situation with great interest and is taking aim at a piece of the action. Director Hideo Kojima is a longtime fan of the actor, and yesterday welcomed Cage to Kojima Productions.

This photo is so astonishing that one wonders if it might be an AI deep fake! Note especially that Kojima took this photo with the Ludens mascot, which represents (among other things) the studio's goal of creating new forms of play.

The more discerning among you will also notice that Kojima is wearing a pin. Kojima showed off this badge a few years ago, and it was the small face of Nicolas Cage, covered in blood and screaming. It's from the movie Mandy, in which Cage plays an alcoholic lumberjack who goes on a rampage after a cult burns his girlfriend alive. It is hilarious.

Kojima later retweeted a photo of his good friend Jeff Keighley making gawking eyes at it. This was because Cage had "met a whole new audience" for his role in DBD during an appearance at a summer gaming festival, and Keighley later joked that he might be in Hideo Kojima's next game. Hmmm. [Kojima Productions has several ongoing projects as well as "Death Stranding 2" and has its own movie studio. So it's not surprising what Cage is doing.

But while this is just speculation, the most likely scenario is that Cage will be a reserve criminal in Death Stranding 2. In the original game, the survivors live alone in the world and Sam delivers what they need. Kojima loves to have his celebrity friends scan into the game and use them as one of these characters, and "Death Stranding" includes talk show host Conan O'Brien, horror artist Junji Ito, director Edgar Wright, Jordan Vogt-Roberts director, Remedy's Sam Lake, and Jeff Keely. My guess is that the deliveries are such that Nic Cage will bring the last extant copy of his film.

In any case, vague teasers are Kojima's M.O. and have been for years. Death Stranding 2 has its big secret-revealing moments, and there will no doubt be another Hideo Kojima trailer (written by Hideo Kojima) soon, but even between these traditional reveals, Kojima has been almost daily releasing bread that fans can read carefully and guess at. He leaves behind a steady stream of scraps for fans to peruse and speculate on. Why would he say that Nicolas Cage will have a cameo in Death Stranding 2?

Kojima later shared more images from his Japanese account, saying, "Nicolas signed Kojima Productions' annual signing board."

"To Hideo and team," it read, "Thanks for a great tour! Nicolas Cage."

Who knows! Twitter user ZeeShanKarimi said, "Is that really Nicolas Cage or is that John Travolta with Cage's face?"