The Polarizing Reception to ‘Death Stranding’
Death Stranding has invoked some of the most exciting discourse that the gaming community has to offer this year, with some lifelong Kojima fans prematurely lauding the game as a masterpiece and industry skeptics who reduce the experience to a “deliveryman simulator” that lacks compelling – and more importantly, fun – gameplay. And in terms of mystery, storytelling, inventiveness, not to mention a naked Norman Reedus, this game has enshrouded itself within unforgettable intrigue and interpretation since it was announced in 2016 – the kind of mystery that drives people toward polar extremes in terms of their expectations about the game. Considering the polarizing reception to Death Stranding – with many describing the game as a masterpiece, while others denigrate the game as “Fetch Quest: the Game” – many are unsure as to how the title meets player expectations after three ambiguous years of building hype. Regardless, the reputation of enigmatic auteur Hideo Kojima solidifies Death Stranding as an easy contender for not only a game of the year for 2019, but a game that redefines this console generation and even paves the way for a new “social strand” genre.
Until last summer, I had never played a Hideo Kojima game. My friend invited me to his place to stream a forbidden game that I could never access on my own, called P.T. It was fabled by both friends and the internet to be the scariest game of all time, but I didn’t know it yet. At the time, even the name “Metal Gear Solid” didn’t ring a bell. And yet here we are: I have pre-ordered the collector’s edition of Death Stranding and almost obsessively follow Hideo Kojima’s every tweet, hoping to understand more about this game.
To believe this strongly in an unreleased game is a unique feeling, especially when considering how cynical the AAA video game market has made me as a consumer. With the pernicious trend of live service business models and microtransactions tucked into every corner, I tend to wait for the reviews to roll in before I consider purchasing a game for myself. But even before the reviews of Death Stranding torrentially downpoured into my Twitter timeline, I knew that with I was committing to a distinct vision that I would never experience elsewhere in gaming.
Recently, I have seen many people express that they are no longer excited for Death Stranding. A lot of what has been said in coverage of the game since the November 1st embargo is that it isn’t “fun” in a traditional sense. I think people are giving up too easily on this front, however, because almost every journalist who says Death Stranding isn’t fun also said that that lack of fun feels like an intentional choice, or as Kirk McKeand wrote, a fascination with attrition. With the exception of the frankly bizarre inclusion of Monster Energy sponsorships or an advert for Norman Reedus’ show “Ride,” not one of these reviews have described Death Stranding’s gameplay or story as immersion breaking. Thus, I am not worried by the divisive reaction to the game in reviews. I maintain fully formed faith that Death Stranding will deliver a completely unique experience.
Part of my faith for Kojima’s new game stems from the brilliantly edited trailers. To understand where that faith comes from, it’s worth exploring why these trailers impacted me so viscerally.
The first trailer unveiled at E3 2016 captivated the world, with a distinctly cinematic and otherworldly approach to game showcasing. Norman Reedus, unconscious on a beach filled with dead sea creatures, suddenly awakes to find himself umbilically connected to an unconscious baby. After cradling it with earnest, it disappears in his hands, leaving a black tar coating them. Tiny handprints – the baby’s – crawl away, and we are treated to a reveal of both Norman Reedus’ behind, but an expansive beach with five floating figures in the sky, far in the distance. We are left with a grungy song that carries on until the name, “Death Stranding,” is revealed for all to see.
The next trailer that made the rounds was aired at the Game Awards in 2016, which begins again on a beach littered with dead sea creatures, mostly crabs. Except this time, the camera observes a demented baby doll, and a worried Guillermo del Toro hides from what looks like early 20th century world war combat. Planes soar above him and tanks rumble past as he hides beneath a cobblestone bridge arch, fearing that an undead army above might notice him. We see that he is protectively clutching a baby encaged in a glass pseudo womb, later to be known as a bridge baby (BB). Meanwhile, the fake baby doll floats down through the underground sewers where del Toro’s character is hiding, leading to a reveal of Cliff and his troops as they silently scour the underground. At this point, we can tell that Cliff is an antagonist, but we don’t know anything more as we watch the baby doll finally open its eye as it floats to him.
The third Death Stranding trailer solidified this game as certifiably badass, and worth paying attention to no matter what kind of games you tend to play. Sam, Norman Reedus’ character, is unconscious in the rain after what looks like an automobile accident with some MULE troops. He examines some of corrupted corpse as the camera pans over to two of the MULE troops, one of which is fatally trapped beneath the overturned vehicle. Sam warns the two men to shut up and not even breathe, where once again we see black handprints make their way across the men’s gear. The nature of these monsters that cause these handprints is still a mystery at this point, and we witness pure fear as these men collapse in the face of this danger. Soon, these men are dragged towards the abyss by muddy, black hands, and one of the men even tries to kill himself with a gun as he is tugged away, fails, and then stabs himself to death as he floats upwards helplessly. Sam narrowly escapes, but is wiped out by a massive silhouetted giant force, whose strands appear to cause a supernova explosion. After some time in limbo between the living and the dead, the trailer ends with him looking over an open crater, newly formed.
There are plenty of other trailers at this point, but these three are the primary reasons why so many people dedicated themselves instantly to the game Death Stranding. Even people like myself who have never played the Metal Gear franchise are sold on the pure weirdness that this game promises. With these three trailers alone, Death Stranding is unlike any visual experience I have ever seen in gaming. Though these trailers are absolutely incredible, we have to of course be careful to remember that these are cutscenes, not gameplay itself. And that is where many people are worried.
From what gameplay has been shown, and from what reviewers have said, Death Stranding is often accused of being a walking simulator. That moniker scares off some players, but I am perfectly happy to play a walking simulator as a delivery man, even though that kind of gameplay isn’t reflected by the aforementioned trailers. As I watch the gameplay unfold, from the kind of balance Sam has to maintain as he traverses the game’s world, to the emotional management of the BB, everything about the gameplay itself strikes me as mundane and tedious. Yet there is something meditative and zen-like about what Death Stranding asks you to do as you focus on what Kojima refers to as building a social strand system in the game. Looking back on what I consider to be remarkable games from this generation, the traversal mechanics of Death Stranding mirror admirable aspects of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, which I have argued is a perfect game, and certainly a contender for the best game that 2017 offered.
In terms of the asynchronous multiplayer that Death Stranding features, I am reminded of games like Dark Souls and how player tips can both be helpful and treacherous. But from what I’ve read in Kojima interviews, the whole effort to include multiplayer in an otherwise purely single player experience is to generate positive connection. I can’t say that I feel positive connection and gratitude towards other players often in online games, yet Death Stranding promises to deliver that kind of connection. I look forward to seeing how I passively interact with people I’ll never meet.
So with an arsenal of completely unique trailers and immersive game demos in mind, the other part of my faith for Death Stranding stems from the absolute madness that I experienced when playing P.T. for the first time last summer.
Since I was a young child, I have known that the horror genre does not appeal to me. When I was in 4th grade, my cousin sat me down and forced me to watch The Ring with her friends. That movie gave me nightmares and irrational fears for at least two years. So when the prospect of reliving that horrific trauma intersects with the unique ability of video games to make me interact with a horror story, I keep my distance. But for some reason, I trusted my friend and dove into P.T.
P.T. is an internet legend at this point, but for those who haven’t played it themselves, the true horror comes from two primary aspects of the uncanny. The first thing that makes the game terrifying and uncanny is the repetition. Kojima places you in a one-way hallway that circles into itself infinitely. You are trapped in a loop that is eerily identical and yet always changing in minor, often disturbing ways. No two hallway loops are the same, even if nothing seems to change. Somehow Kojima creates a claustrophobic and urgently awful emotional feeling that drove me to want to escape at any cost.
I mourn the lost potential that P.T. had as it could have evolved into the full Silent Hills title that it was meant to be. But instead, this demo has been unceremoniously scrubbed from the Playstation store on which it was originally released. You have to be lucky or resourceful to find a playable copy these days, which is a tragedy when considering the brilliance of the P.T. demo. As a piece of art, I even hesitate to call it a demo. Self contained, P.T. is a piece of art.
As the release of Death Stranding approaches, I can’t help but feel some deep camaraderie with Hideo Kojima as I have been passionately and eagerly dogging his tweets for over a year now. And yet I have seen people denounce this game as being overhyped by Kojima worshippers, which may in a sense be true, but is condescending at best for someone like me who has only played one of his games – arguably a game Kojima isn’t as well-known for. In this case, it doesn’t take a lifelong dedication to his games to convince me that there will be something distinct to Death Stranding that can’t be found elsewhere in games.
Death Stranding looks incredible. What we have seen prior to release is visually arresting. Each clip features a star studded Hollywood cast. Every review I can find praises the mocap performance and graphical quality. The game’s overly licensed soundtrack (“Kojima’s Spotify playlist”) is perfectly attuned to the footage we have seen thus far. I think of the CHVRCHES song as a quintessential ending credits theme, for instance. In every way that I can approach Death Stranding, it looks to be scratching an artistic itch that the AAA space of gaming forgot existed – or perhaps never even knew was there.
The collective hype around Kojima’s brilliantly edited trailers, as well as the ingrained respect I have for him as a game designer and storyteller via my time with P.T., gives me immense faith – despite some of the cynical reviews – that Death Stranding will leave a similarly indelible impression on both myself and the video game community at large. I have been counting down the days since I saw the first trailer, and I will report back with my thoughts in writing once I have completed the game. As of now, I yearn for this to be the kind of game that forever changes the landscape of gaming. And if there is any game that has such a chance, it’s Death Stranding.
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