Rarely is a major release as divisive as Death Stranding. Splitting general audiences down the middle and lacking the usual universal critical acclaim that almost every major Metal Gear saw at release, it’s hard to evaluate Death Stranding. Is it a masterpiece? Is it a mess? The fact of the matter is that it’s a little bit of both while in between.
Death Stranding is inarguably a well-realized game, one that knows what it’s doing and why, but it’s specifically because of this that so many find themselves alienated. It’s a long, slow game that demands the player’s attention by any means necessary. It ultimately makes Death Stranding one of the most memorable games this decade– but memorable doesn’t mean “good” for everyone.
10 LOVED: The Opening
Death Stranding’s opening is slow, dense, and ends up inferring a great chunk of the main story. Paying attention to those opening hours can pay off immensely in the long run. Kojima drops so many breadcrumbs in the opening act that it’s actually hard to believe how well plotted the story ends up being by the time the credits roll (for real.)
The opening also allows players to forge a genuine attachment to their BB while getting to understand the nuances of the United Cities of America. Considering how fast paced Death Stranding ends up being in its back half, the opening’s slower pace works even better in hindsight.
9 DON’T: Episode 3’s Pacing
On the flip side, while the first two episodes do really well by the slower pace, Episode 3 goes a bit too slow. Episode 3 is the single longest episode in the game and it’s frankly not even close. This isn’t a bad thing as Episode 3 is stationed in one of the game’s more “sand boxy” chunks of the UCA, but the story more or less comes to a screeching halt during this portion of the game.
To its credit, Death Stranding uses Episode 3 to gradually and carefully introduce players to new concepts, but it does start to feel like Sam isn’t making enough progress by the end of the episode. Perhaps that’s the point, and that’d be a valid reading, but it’s hard to deny how exhausting Episode 3 can be.
8 LOVED: BT Encounters
BTs are hands down the absolute best part of Death Stranding. Kojima basically took PT’s atmosphere and weaponized it. The fact that Sam can’t see BTs, only sense them with some help from BB, makes each BT encounter inherently tense. Sure, Sam has plenty of weapons by the end of the game, but the idea of fighting an invisible foe never stops being chilling.
Even with all the Hematic Grandes and Non-Lethal Assault Rifles in the world, BT encounters never stop being engaging– the bosses especially. While each BT encounter is a stealth playground, the bosses all offer plenty of combat variety, ensuring that different play styles are accommodated in some classically designed battles.
7 DON’T: MULE Encounters
On the flip side, MULE encounters aren’t half as interesting. At least not at first. Early on, MULE camps are borderline brain dead. Sam can run in weaponless and just CQC his way through MULE after MULE. By the time he gets the Bola Gun, he’s basically invincible against human enemies. The mid-game adds terrorists into the mix, but it’s too little, too late.
The only thing that can make a terrorist encounter difficult is just killing them outright, something no players should do because no one should be running around with lethal weapons in a MULE camp. The terrorists can deal some nasty damage, but Sam’s agile enough to get away in one piece 9 times out of 10.
6 LOVED: Classic Stealth
Which isn’t a bad thing by any means as Sam’s maneuverability is what makes Death Stranding so much fun to play. While he can’t pull off stealth on the levels of Solid Snake, Raiden, or Big Boss (who can?), Sam gets the job well. BTs inherently prioritize stealth, but Sam’s core mechanics keep stealth in play at all times.
The very nature of cargo means that players need to move carefully, lending itself well to stealth-based gameplay. Stealth in Death Stranding ends up being more about offensive stealth versus defensive stealth. Do players stealth straight through in order to clear enemies? Or do they quietly take the long, but safe, way around?
5 DON’T: Death Has No Real Consequence
For a game very intimately about the nature of death, it has no real consequence. Which is kind of the point for Sam as he can continually come back to life, but this also applies from a gameplay perspective. It’s very hard to lose meaningful progress in Death Stranding and basically only happens when players screw up big time.
Even then, most game overs will just kick players back to either right where they died– meaning that no real progress has been lost– or back to their last save in the event of a critical piece of cargo being destroyed. It’s easy to get the sense that death doesn’t mean much for Sam, but that’s not exactly a great thing.
4 LOVED: The Writing
Hideo Kojima can be a very chatty writer, but that’s part of his charm. It’s not a lack of competence that keeps his scripts long-winded, it’s style. Longer, information filled dialogue helps layer a world different than a script that’s lighter, to the point, and less flowery. Neither style is inherently good or bad, and they both benefit stories in their own unique ways.
Death Stranding’s script is on the nose, convoluted, and very self indulgent. Philosophical, moral, and ethical questions are purported in an increasingly theatrical manner. It’s also nice to play through a game script that actually has a voice. It’s never hard to spot a Hideo Kojima game.
3 DON’T: The Difficulty Curve
Death Stranding’s difficulty curve starts on something of a high before gradually dipping over the course of the game. The tide turns in Sam’s favor very gradually, but it stays in his favor by the end of the game. The final boss is one of the easiest encounters in the game, as amazing as it is on a spectacle level.
There’s no real challenge left by the last act. On one hand, it makes sense considering how much Sam’s gear has been improving. On the other hand, Death Stranding ups the stakes narratively, but doesn’t really indulge on the difficulty side when it comes to gameplay. This is surely to keep the last act manageable even for the worst players, but it doesn’t do right by the curve.
2 LOVED: The Music
Who knew Low Roar was so good? And had so much music? While all of Kojima’s games typically tend to have great music, he made a trend of including real world music in-game starting with Snake’s iPod in Guns of the Patriots. Metal Gear Solid V brought with it a stellar music selection, and Death Stranding has naturally followed suit.
Unlike its Metal Gear predecessors, however, music in Death Stranding is scripted during gameplay. Players are otherwise left in the silence of America. It makes every instance of music meaningful, giving players something to remember on their journey to unite the country. Plus, Sam can just listen to tunes in his private room.
1 DON’T: Holograms
As well written and well-directed Death Stranding usually is, it really feels like Kojima dropped the ball when it comes to the hologram cutscenes. They’re a necessary evil, both in and out of Death Stranding’s internal universe, but they’re just aggressively worse than the rest of the game’s cutscenes. Holograms monologue nonstop on static screens while Sam refuses to emote 90% of the time.
It’s such an obvious sore spot in an otherwise great story, and the fact there are so many of them means that most players will be exhausted by them before they reach the end of the game. Mercifully, they’re pretty much non-existent in the last act and it does take a while for them to truly feel like a nuisance.