Quick Look: Death Stranding

@garwalk: You're right, I've definitely seen plenty of this behavior before, it just feels jacked up to 11 with this game.

And I've never been into the angry/ranty stuff, but I guess I get it, and also those usually feel more like bits than genuine negativity.

I get the feeling of validation you can have from hearing/reading someone else share in a negative feeling with you, but it's the part where people are excitedly weaponizing that feeling against others who do not share that negativity that just seems like a real lack of empathy.

It makes me think of last year where I was more or less totally aligned with Dan's feelings of RDR2, but at no point during Dan's rants did I feel a sense of "Ha! Take that!" (of which there was plenty of that in the comments). It was cool to hear my personal feelings voiced by proxy and therefore be addressed by the conversation. But beyond that, I just wished that Dan and I liked that game as much as everyone else, not that everyone else was as disappointed as us.

@alex How many times did you break down in tears?

The best thing Death Stranding ever did was the E3 2018 trailer.

This really doesn't look very fun. I would say that most of Kojima's games have boss fights where you just throw grenades or shoot a rocket over and over, but these don't look like any fun at all.

The idea of a walking-truck simulator actually seems pretty interesting but doesn't look they pulled it off too well.

The part of this video where Alex starts laying out his feelings as they arrive at Port Knot and "Asylums for the Feeling" plays is, in and of itself, an oddly beautiful moment.

I'm really glad Alex and Vinny did this quick look. They seem to be one's amon the staff who are the most educated about Death Stranding and also capable of giving balanced arguments about this game.
I'm so tired of hearing hyperbolic opinions about games, and media overall.

They're trying to warn me, but the second I get off work tomorrow I'm marching into the Gamestop and paying full price. I'm in line for Mr. Kojima's wild ride as people are coming off it sick. I have to see it for myself. Give me that bb. I want that bb.

Watching this QL makes me want to give Red Dead Redemption 2 another shot. Because, mannnnn....

What did I just watch?

What cause the apocalypse in this world?

"Weeeeeeell''', Metal Gear DID have eyepatches and a mullet." Oh, Abby Russelll for the everlovin' WIN.

you guys could have picked the pro-kojima reviewer (dan) or the anti-everything-in-the-universe(alex) reviewer. why pick alex? you could have picked anyone else to evaluate this but given the person i cant trust the review.

I wanna listen to vinny talk about this game for hours... vinny, you should do audio books... (:

Boy if the goal was to show off an argument for why combat shouldn't be in the game then this quick look succeeds.

@stanleynipple: You do realize Dan hates this more than anyone right?

I'm really surprised the gameplay in this looks so unfun when MGS5 had absolutely amazing gameplay. MGS5 is a contender for best stealth action gameplay of all time, whereas I don't think I'd find a lick of enjoyment in playing this.

I was almost entirely sold sight unseen on this game just because of how fun MGS5 was... but I think maybe I'll pass.

@stanleynipple: You also realise that Alex, eloquently and in excruciating detail, explained *exactly* why Death Stranding is not a good game in his opinion? Disagree with him all you want, but saying "I don't trust someone because they disagree with me" is borderline paranoia.

I was going to say based off of the comments in the video, it sounds like they are going to give this game two stars. Then I see the review is up and it is exactly that.

Haven’t watched this yet but I’m way into the game so far after about 5 hours of playing. Idk what it is but I love the feeling of disempowerment and having to balance a ton of shit on your back while climbing mountains.

What they're showing looks really cool and interesting to me. The kind of companionship with other players building stuff together. Being alone and weak in a large, dangerous world. Finding paths through rough terrain to deliver shit.

I can totally see why someone wouldn't like this type of experience, especially if it's stretched over such a long play-time. I'll definitely give it a look on PC though.

Without Kojima this is a 60 meta game. I will say the world's aesthetic design reminds me of FFXV for some reason. Both great looking game sbut neither are good games

He's too busy in a corner listening to my chemical romance and being pissed about the Austin Belt. I KEED I KEED! Don't ban me mods.

I liked Alex's review, and it made sense, but the way he plays in this with killing every BT in his general area just seems to be making the game, and that part, more tedious than it actually is.

A video game in which the protagonist delivers mail. I deliver mail for a living. I don't want to do my real job in video game form. It's not even a question of escapism. Just...no thanks Kojima.

Eh guess my brain is broken as this game kind of looked fun to me.

Then again, I like survival games as a genre and whilst this is not survival, the whole carving a path and making deliveries really hooked me for whatever reason.

All that said, I won't be buying it any time soon just because I have too much to play at the moment.

I want to play a couple hours of the middle bit I don't want to slog through the first few hours or see the story - maybe I'll play it some time in the future if it gets cheap.

I thought I'd spoil myself from wanting to play this by watching too much of it. But this actually made me look forward to the PC release instead.

The gameplay reminds me a whole lot of The Long Dark. A game that's also very tedious to play, but gets a lot of its enjoyment from that tense atmosphere and temporarily "beating" the tediousness, giving in a sense of accomplishment.

That on a AAA budget with Kojima weirdness/attention to detail doesn't sound all that unappealing.

Thank you, for the quicklook. I expected it to be quite redundant to Jeff & Brad's video, but good on Vinny & Alex for talking through it all the way through to offer that depth.

It's sort of odd how there's a whole plot around people being addicted to the act of making deliveries. Like i would've figured that the game would hone in on humanity being addicted to material things over forming meaningful bonds with other people to the point where the postman is their favorite person, not for who he is, but for what he brings them. Perhaps there would be competing services, all aiming to be the best delivery service in the world, and people signing up to work for these companies because it's like the only way a human can feel affection and value from other humans? In a world where everyone shuts themselves off from interaction to the point where they all live in bunkers and only communicate through hologram technology, getting a thank you & a wave from a hologram might be the pinnacle of human warmth. Especially for a guy that can't enjoy the human touch.

That's the kind of stuff i expected Kojima to get into. I didn't expect him to come up with the idea that making the delivery is an addiction onto itself. Like i struggle to figure out what the real world issue is that he's adressing with the mules. Apart from them being humans that love to have posessions and will steal from others if that gives them more stuff. But if making the delivery is their addiction as Vinny said, they're only taking the cargo from you because THEY want to be the ones making the delivery. Not just to have the cargo for themselves to enjoy.

Also weird how the bossbattles all play out the same way. If anything Kojima is known for, it's that throughout all the Metal Gear & Metal Gear Solid games, he has always been looking for ways to make the bossbattles distinct from eachother and play with different aspects of these games. Every bossbattle here coming down to 'throw your blood grenades at them till they die' is dissapointing. Also, i get that Kojima likes working with his superstars, but the last 2 games he has done , the main character has been quite dissapointing. At least with Big Boss, the whole metal gear plot up till that point helped to make Big Boss / Venom more than just a stoic dude, but this time around you don't get to rely on that. I'm speaking for myself here, but the parts of Solid Snake & Big Boss that i enjoyed was how they were cool action dudes, but also how they dropped that tough guy stuff to be nerdy & even goofy in some scenes. Sam Bridges has always looked like the most uninspired main character, so it's sad that he doesn't have any interesting character building at all.

@onemanarmyy:They're stealing the packages because they're addicted to getting the Likes, not necessarily the act of delivering them. I can see why people are rolling their eyes at how straightforward that commentary is, but in the context of an enemy faction it just made me laugh (though I can't tell if I'm laughing with it, or at it).

@teddie

Ah that makes more sense.

@zinkn: i doubt a 2/5 rating could ever count as a sponsorship heh.

Thanks for this video! Alex and Vinny are the best! You two put on a clinic when it comes to showing off a game you're mostly negative on while still being entertaining and informative. I'm certainly interested enough to play this game at some point though I'm in no rush. The action seems as dull as people make it out to be but I'm not necessarily ready to write it off until I can try it for myself. I'm not the kind of person that needs his game boner stoked at every single moment in a video game.

Though I'm sure Kojima got a kick out of working with all these American celebrities I really don't know why they're all that necessary to have in this game. I mean MGS made David Hayter a recognizable name among some segment of gamers when he was pretty unknown at that point (and even used a pseudonym in the first Solid game). Having Kiefer sure as hell didn't pay dividends on a game that fans were going to play regardless. No one's ever going to see him as the definitive Big Boss and he'll barely be remembered for his performance as Venom Snake.

I'm still piciing this up and lookkng forward to it. Need to get in on that zeitgeist.

21:37 to 22:17 is some incredible comedy.

Am I the only one who is upset that Alex didn’t give any likes to the guy who built the bridge outside of Central Knot City?

It's an overly long tedious game to begin with, but I imagine it'd be even worse if you play like the quick look and take 3 times longer to do anything.

Favoring walking instead of just physics-ing over rocks with the bike, taking down each and every alarm ghost instead of just sneaking past or fighting the big bad ghost and being done with it, never letting go of the stabilization triggers so you can move faster, carrying way more ladders and stuff than he'll ever use.

I think over-relying on holding both triggers misses out a lot of gameplay to just moving from place to place by managing your center of gravity, and makes the game slower than it has to be. I saw the two triggers as for when you're navigating tighter spaces with a ton of turns, or to briefly handle a rough patch of rocks.

It's not going to drastically change your whole opinion on the game to play that way, but it makes it a little better.

I just love this game exists. Kojima made an enormous budget walking simulator for him and his team alone. I personally am really looking forward to playing it when the PC version releases next year.

I kinda liked the metaphor of 'people leaving a crater after themselves when they die', but I'm not even sure they meant it that way intentionally.

@zinkn: Yes. They are "sponsoring" this game because they hate it.

Being a huge MGS fan and this being Kojima's first original game since MGS.. I went 100% blackout for this game did not go on the internet and read or even seen nothing at all what people were thinking of this game watched 0 trailers leading up to it.. well seen like 2 min of the one with Guillermo del Toro and Seeing Mads, I knew so little I had no idea what the gameplay was the whole delivering stuff knew nothing... I am surprised of how little the GB crew liked this game, I loved it the whole time I was like WOW I am experiencing something beautiful gave me the same feeling as my first first time Playing MGS or Zelda:OoT... (man 1998 was an awesome year for games) I but IMO Death Stranding is a perfect game..

I honestly ended up really liking the story but then again i love anime and i can assure everyone it gets real anime towards the end.

That doesn't exist in the game aside from special areas for story things, and the snowy areas. Otherwise it looks basically the same aside from details of terrain and elevation etc. There's this little volcanic sort of area but it's very small and basic, basically just a different color with some smoke.

Anyway this game is totally the Super Mario Sunshine to Metal Gear Solid 3's Super Mario World. It's nice that it does a some non-traditional thing for a AAA game, but at the same time so many of these ideas and concepts (besides being a straight-up delivery man I suppose) have been done so much better before in other well-produced games that Kojima's dreadfully trite, bare-bones and pretentious take on them does next to nothing for me. Though Deadman's whole I'm Frankenstein's Monster!!!! scene had me laughing pretty hard. Mads Mikkelsen does a great job and Troy Baker hamming it up as an anime bad guy is good too...oh and the trike is kinda like a Trials game.

I'm glad people found enjoyment in this game, but god damn absolutely nothing in this entire 75 minute video looked fun.

Much like MGS2 and how it's weird to look back at how accurate it was, I have a feeling we'll look back on this game in 15 years and say "Wow, Kojima was right: Amazon does run the government now!"

EDIT: Watching this and hearing Alex/Vinny discuss, it helped me understand why I like this game so much, what makes it unique and why it's not for everyone. It's a rare big-budget exploration game that rewards efficiently and intelligently planning. Most games don't care at all how you traverse and pack items. For me, I always like these aspects in games and try to get the most out of all the systems and items. Resident Evil 2 remake comes the closest by comparison, where you can be punished by not smartly planning your route and considering your inventory. It's really refreshing to have a game that focuses on this and does it so well. I also appreciate how anti-violence the game is -- I don't mind violence in games but it's just nice to have such a wholesome, positive game about connecting with others and trying to avoid conflict.

So..finally watching this as i've gotten past where they are-

weeks later, I'm nearing the end of chapter 3, and still enjoying the 'evolution' or deployment of game/gear/'stuff' and mechanics- I very much enjoy the challenge and logistical terrain navigation- this aspect is something I, like they, enjoy possibly more than the story- I love tactile games, ones that as they say "uses the entire controller"- I just love games that do this, and while it's no super-jump or flying car, I am still finding a lot of enjoyment out of the freedom they give you, to 'realistically' navigate the environment. I think the joys of the bikes and the highways are in themselves nice, as well as a means to get from story beat to to story beat, but generally speaking, it is the moments where you have to really pay attention to how carefully you handle the traversal (or recklessly, which can be as fun during desperate moments, like trying and failing to ramp a gap on a bike while being chased by MULEs, and having to use the canyon I fell into as visual cover until I can find a way/dropped rope to ascend the other side).

However, as far as plot points and reveals, I have hit a bit of a worrying part of the story, and even though I know I will complete the game, without specifying, there is a character that has no real arc, only introduction, and then shortly after a reveal- in a way that should have gravity to it, but feels weightless because there never was much developed lead-up, and have never given you reason to care. In tandem with how few character developmental moments there are, the softball way it is just...told to you.. makes the lack of subtlety stand out in a disappointing way I can look past, but am surprised by., and I begin to see where priorities were placed. It's still intruiging to me, but I can also see someone hitting this part and throwing their hands up at how little consequence there is following this 'reveal'.

This particular moment was where I give them credit, without spoiling it, is as they say, artless in how it is deliverd/acted at you- which - in the context of this particular reveal, ultimately doesn't matter to your story, and the characters, more, the stakes, feel the same as they did as the previous chapter... but it is indicative with how 'to your face' and obvious it is with how the story unwraps at least to the half-way point.

Another however though, is that knowing what I know about the middle section and the vague idea of later chapters disrupting the construction aspect of the game, I took time off to simply load up with ladders, ropes, materials, and just set out and have found myself stalling the story simply to create infrastructure, and this is actually surprisingly fun, from placing ladders to building safe-rooms and timefall shelters. Like, filling your backpack with ladders and bridge-building materials, then travelling to previous areas to build is something people are obviously doing, which supports the social aspects of helping other porters, and is it's own meta-game of lonely builder out there to manipulate the world.

This is something I haven't seen in other games, along with other components I won't wall of text about, but very much appreciate and like to do. Like some of the signs you can place say, I would in general reccomend anyone reaching chapter 3- "slow down". If you got that far, and have no serious desire to conclude the story, this is where the game, for it's intent, is very good and satisfying.

As Tim Rogers pointed out, Sam feels like a tomagotchi- a virtual pet that as you progress gets more complicated and in the presence of other tomagotchi-sams, is cool. The world does 'populate' with other seeable friendly NPC's, robots, stuff, etc, but to me it is abundantly clear that by design, you are supposed to treat this as a Sam-pet simulator, just as much as a walking/truck/delivery simulator- with a frosting of metal gear- style sortie prepping. It's still working for me, and as I said I'll see it through, but I conclude this comment by saying, I feel now that Vinny and Alex have been pretty fair to the game, even if they aren't the biggest fans. I'll say that the likeability of the game will vary from person to person- I really do like what this game is, as well as playing it, but for many people, it takes a while to even get to the point where you have enough of the core mechanics at your disposal to make that decision fairly for oneself. That is in and of itself a fascinating choice Kojima made, but, as always, it loops back around to 'this might not be for everyone', and I am myself a little more cautious about advancing the game to the back-half vinny has warned about for sake of the fun I am having/creating on my own. Of course I'll have more thoughts and likely write an even longer review somewhere, but for now- this QL is fair, even if a lot of the stuff they go over cannot be understood without having played it for yourself; which, in Kojima's sort of intentional way, is successful at creating a game that produces player-produced stories, and that is still very cool to me. Nowhere near my game of the year, but like a final fantasy of climbing, I still like the slow burn of this thing.

Playing this on PC and so far I'm enjoying it. I'm glad this game exists instead of being another shooter.