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Thumbnail Credit: Steam User Drasco
Death Stranding is the most timely game of this generation. In an era where political polarization and echo chamber is rampant,it is a beautiful representation of a divided age and an extraordinary attempt of a game design philosophy under the AAA window, although it is sometimes dragged down by confusing dialogue and pacing choices, Death Stranding is undoubtedly a masterpiece of our generation.
After Metal Gear Solid Creator, Hideo Kojima’s highly publicized and bitter divorce with Konami, Sony scooped him and his studio up and gave him the creative freedom he and his studio failed to get in Konami. Kojima with his immense ideas, started the project in 2015.
Going straight to the point here, there is nothing like Death Stranding on the market besides Europe Truck Simulator. I am serious here, it is one of a kind, especially in the AAA landscape. When compared to 2019’s best selling games, it sticks out a lot. Sekiro, Resident Evil 2 remake, Call of Duty Modern Warfare, which are all intense action games, Death Stranding is drastically different. It is a chill game (for the most part), where you walk through the wilds delivering packages, it is different, even it’s most hard nosed critics can agree. But it is fun though. This game requires a click, if you clicked with the game, you will love it, you won’t mind falling down while running or getting your cargo dragged downed by a BT, because you love the payoff behind it, but if you don’t, you find the game boring and frustrating, both are right. The game isn’t for everyone, but it is certaining for me. The bottom line is no one has the absolute judgement of anything, you can love or hate any game you want. But please, give this game a chance.
Death Stranding is set in the future. In this world, the dead, before going to the afterlife, have to go through a place called the beach. One day, several mass explosions, called void outs, occurred in the lead up to an extinction event called Death Stranding, where the dead who were stranding on the beach returned to the living world, as beached things (BTs). People were forced to go underground, living in shelters, not seeing the light of day. All their supplies were then transported by only the porters, notably those with DOOMs, an ability which can help them detect BTs. The United States Government did not dissolve either, the states were reformed into the United Cities of America(UCA) under the leadership of former United States vice-president Bridget Strand. As after the Death Stranding, most people live in isolated shelters with no connection with each other, the UCA carry out two expedits from the East Coast to the West, in order to complete the unification of America. Led by Strand’s daughter Ameile, the first expedit successfully reached the west coast. However, a terrorist group captured Amelie and set up an uncrossable tar belt. A second expedit was set up to rescue, but they were wiped out by a huge void out orchestrated by the terrorists, with only Strand’s adopted son Sam, who is a repatriate, someone who can come back to the real world after their death, survive. Sam went into exile after the event, abandoning his ties with the UCA, becoming an independent porter and taking up a new name, Sam Porter Bridges. This where the campaign starts. Sam was charged to go west to rescue Amelie by the bedside of a dying Bridget. He reluctantly accepts the job and goes west, delivering cargo from city to city, from settlers to settlers, in the hope of reconnecting the country.
So much lore being present before the main campaign starts, it is a trap for bad storytelling form turning into a codex filled borefest, that's what Destiny 1, the Division 1 and Warframe and to a lesser extent, Metal Gear Solid 5, turned into. There is so much to explain in the world, where meaningful story telling cannot be carried out, results in lack of emotional attachment and character development. This is the reason why no one cared about the story in Destiny 1 and why the story in MGS 5 is so disappointing. In Kojima’s first venture after MGS 5, did he repeat the same mistake by botching the cutscene and storytelling, and letting them hidden in the codex and cassette tapes? Another thing is Kojima always has a love for wacky dialogue, which is extremely on the nose. For the first question, he largely avoided the same mistakes, but for the second question, prepare for more.
I would compare Kojima to someone like George Lucas, a visionary with exceptional ideas, but sometimes goes to the deep end and also has no sense of how real humans interact. This may be the reason why their dialogue writing is so weird and on the nose. The peak example is a series of dialogues, where Amelie and Sam were running together on the beach, Amelie said he is Mario and she is “Princess Beach” and the millionth time Fragile said “I am fragile, but not that fragile.” These dialogues are on the same level of cringe as everything Anakin Skywalker said to Padme in the prequels, remember I don’t like sand, it is similar to that level. The pacing is also an issue for both of them. The pacing in the first two prequels are atrocious, with a lot of unnecessary elements. For example the entire romance plot in Attack of the clones can be trimmed down significantly. In Death Stranding, the story simply takes too long to get going, many players left before the story even gets going. The story, to many, only gets going at about Chapter 3. Only 32% of players on Steam have finished Chapter 3. They don’t feel interested enough to experience most of the story. It takes about 14 hours to move through the phase where you don’t understand what on earth is going on, of course players are going to get lost and be disinterested. The pacing is a real issue in Death Stranding, and it is a damn shame knowing some players will get bored playing these fillers without knowing the overarching narrative and interesting gameplay loop.
Let's talk about the story. Death Stranding’s story is incredibly interesting and delivered pretty well if you look past the campy dialogues. The main characters are clearly defined and are performed with loads of personalities. Sam character progression is done very well, from a detached husk of a human being, who wants nothing to do with the UCA, to an empathetic person who is willing to sacrifice his only functional relationship to save the world. This may be a cliche writing point, but through the 50 hour runtime of the game, his character arc is much more defined than a lot of film protagonists. Another standout is Die-hardman, please ignore his pretty silly name, he is first like any NPC character, giving you delivery tasks. You don’t know much about him, as most things about him are hidden behind a black mask. However, as you find out more and more about him, you will start to understand the reason why detached himself from society and the similarity between him and Sam.
Another point of excellence is the acting, and my god, these performances are one of the strongest motion captured performances in Video Games and is on a similar level to Andy Serkis’ performances in film. Motion Capture performances can sometimes go very wrong, LA Noire and Mass Effect Andromeda are two very good examples of how hilarious bad motion captured performances can be. Death Stranding with detailed and realistic facial animations, shows how far the technology can make realistic video game cutscenes. The cast is also one of the best in Video Games, Norman Reedus, Mads Mikkelsen, Léa Seydoux headlines this incredible cast, with Mikkelsen winning the Best Performance award in The Game Awards 2019. The best performance, however, belongs to the more unheralded actors, Tommie Earl Jenkins delivers one of the best performances during a scene where he confessed to Sam about his past sins. This is an incredibly strong ensemble performance and it is one of the most impressive in gaming.
The gameplay is not without blemish but it is good enough. Some mechanics are utterly tedious, the fact that you can trip up by running too fast and lose all your cargo, BTs grabbing all your cargo away, the lack of electricity of your power skeleton. There are more and more mechanics that would be seen as tedious and troublesome. Don’t get me started on the product placement either, every liquid Sam drinks is Monster Energy, whenever Sam takes a shit, an advertisement of Norman Reedus’ TV Show shows up. This makes the game less timeless. Imagine if you are a player playing 5 or 10 years later, these product placement will mean nothing to you, the show is long finished airing, Monster Energy may not be relevant anymore, it is just like outdated reference humor. Which is not a good thing. However, these are only minor issues. The gameplay is very realistic, you need to plan out the route before you set foot in the wild, otherwise you would get lost, you need to take all the tools you need and you need to put the goods up in a balanced pattern to keep the centre of gravity balanced. You need to watch the weather to avoid timefall rain which will damage your goods. You are really like a real life delivery man and it is a breath of fresh air in the AAA market which is filled with FPS and Ubisoft style map marker clearing games. The most interesting thing is the multiplayer mechanics, other games’ multiplayer elements consist of another player appearing in your world and either helps you fight AI enemies or fight against you. The point is, this is a one and done affair, there is not a prolonged impact to the world. In Death Stranding, you never saw another player, you only see their contribution and everything they do, even as simple as delivering their own packages can help you with your journey, showing you the easier the path or kind hearted people who uses their own time and resources to layout roads and bridges, which can massive benefit those who came after. Death Stranding’s multiplayer system encourages connection and contribution, in the world of video games where competition and conflict lies rampant, this is a reminder of decency and helpfulness in an often toxic landscape.
We are in an age where we are divided more than ever. With the political unrest going on all across the globe and the coronavirus spreading in the world, a lot of us live in solitude, separated from those we love. Throughout this journey to the west, we all change. There is a quote from Fallout New Vegas, “War, War never changes. But men do through the roads they walk.” We all change, the world is changing every single day, every single hour. But what is up to us, is whether the change is for the worst or for the good.
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