Review: Zenlike gameplay and offbeat story make Death Stranding a must-play

DISCLAIMER: A review copy was provided by the publisher.
Platform: Windows PC via Steam (reviewed), Epic Games Store
Developers: Kojima Productions
Publisher: 505 Games
MSRP: $59.99

After a bit more than half a year since the original launch of Hideo Kojima’s much-anticipated first new IP in well over a decade on the PlayStation 4, the eccentric artisan has finally unleashed Death Stranding onto the PC platform.
It’s no understatement to say that Kojima Production’s first title after infamously parting way with long-time publisher had an exceptional momentum towards its release. How could it not? The split between the studio and its publisher led to one of the most-beloved franchises become put on ice with Metal Gear Solid. The prospect of not only a new game but an entirely new IP created by Kojima Productions and funded by Sony had PlayStation gamers hooked on the excitement and all other gamers go green of envy.
With the launch of the PC version of Death Stranding this month, an entirely new and sizable gaming audience is now able to experience what Hideo Kojima unshackled can achieve. And what an experience it is.

It’s all too easy to stamp games with unfavorable labels and shove them into a comfortable shelf. Just as the late President Woodrow Wilson once famously stated, ‘If you want to make enemies, try to change something’. Change scares and confuses people who are accustomed to established customs. The same applies to games with arguably none other than indie games being degraded by being called boring walking sims. But without experimentation, there cannot be advancement. And before you know it, you’re playing the nth variation popular game XY.
It takes massive courage to aim for the stars and go where no one went before. Especially in the AAA business where budgets and investments quickly reach double-digit figures in the millions. It’s exactly this that makes me so thankful that Sony has put all their trust – and budget – into Hideo Kojima’s outstanding track record. Make no mistake, the mere existence of Death Stranding is a radical outlier in an industry that has long shifted to the safest shores to set anchor.

Hideo Kojima and his talented team at Kojima Productions have created an AAA game with ambitions hitherto unseen at this scale. Even categorizing Death Stranding is a difficult task since the mixture of all genres at hand here leads to something entirely different from what one might assume from mere bullet points. Yes, there is a lot of intricate walking here. As is combat and stealth. But the way each mechanic plays into each other culminates into an exceptionally cohesive experience.

I see dead people

But I’m getting ahead of myself here. Let’s set the scene before delving into the actual gameplay. Death Stranding takes place in a post-apocalyptic future where humanity has been driven to the very edge of extinction by none other than death itself. The barrier between the living and death has been broken with the afterlife swapping over. It’s not an uncommon setting so to speak but the interpretation absolutely is. There are no undead zombies or fantastical beast, nor depictions of a hellish afterlife. Instead, you are greeted with a Beach. Accompanying this, sterile tech and philosophy are the major design influences in portraying this truly world-ending scenario.
BTs, beings from the other side are making their way to our dimension in places where it rains. It’s not regular water however but instead, a dangerous phenomenon that rapidly ages anything it comes into contact with. Hence, why the remaining people are calling it Timefall.

It’s this world where the protagonist Sam is thrown into. A world where only few humans survived and huddled up in cities that make up the United States of America. Venturing outside is not only a threat for those going but for everyone around. You see, death does not stop with death itself. It only gets worse. People who meet their ultimate end attract BTs who swarm and consume the deceased, leading to a cataclysmic event called Voidout that creates a massive crater around it, destroying everything and everyone. So, you have a world where death is as or even more dangerous than survival itself.

Sam is a loner in this world and practices arguably the most dangerous job. Delivering packages as a Porter. In a world that had to cut all kinds of connections to its surroundings, being connected itself is the most difficult ordeal. Whether it’s scientific samples, machine parts, or even pizza, Sam is the man to reach any destination.
Death Stranding makes it abundantly clear from the get-go what it is all about. Your first duty is to deliver a package to Capital Knot City. Located on the shores of the East Coast, Sam soon experiences a Voidout first-hand. But the surprise of everyone, he returns unharmed. It’s here where you discover that Sam is a Repatriate. A rare group of humans that can cross the barriers into the other world and return. Not only does that make him the perfect Porter but a much-need pioneer to save the USA.
Since leaving the few and far between cities is a dangerous task, Sam is ordered by the President of the USA to go on the perilous journey right across the country and connect all cities with each other once again.

Making this overwhelming task doable in the first place is the futuristic technology granted by Chiralium. A new-found element that originates from the Death Stranding and can be used to 3D print all kinds of objects alongside connect cities and settlements with each other. It’s up to Sam to make his way to the East Coast and connect places on his way.
Not everyone is interested in joining this new alliance though and will need to be convinced of the cause by way of successful deliveries.

There’s a lot more to go into detail about the origins of Death Stranding, the Beach, Chiralium, and more but finding this out piecemeal throughout the entire game is part of the joy and it’d be a pity to be robbed of it. After all, the amount of confusion about the story, technology, and vocabulary thrown at you in the beginning slowly starts to make sense as you make sense of the world itself.

This all might sound overwhelming and that’s because it is. But from the various factions to characters and Sam’s mysterious past itself, each time a package is successfully delivered and a new milestone reached, the game opens up about something new, and I felt more connected with the people and happenings. The developer has also chosen to focus the attention on a relatively small cast of characters which helps keep the confusion in check.
Hideo Kojima’s penchant for cinematic storytelling has reached new heights in Death Stranding with captivating cut scenes and stellar performances. For gamers who like to lose themselves in the game’s world, a steady stream of text logs in the form of in-game Emails and interviews are ready to flesh out characters and ideas.

Talk the Talk, Walk the Walk

Now that the stage is set, it’s time to delve into what you actually do in Death Stranding. As stated above, the main gameplay pillar is the delivery of goods. The lonesome travels throughout gorgeous landscapes can quickly make for Zen-like trips where I found myself utterly absorbed by a gameplay loop that sounds quite flat on paper. Every delivery starts with the appropriate preparation. After glossing over open orders you decide which one to take. Once that is done, you plot your route to your destination, and while doing so scour what kind of equipment might be needed. Craft these, load up on your cargo, and off you go into the wild!

Orders that are mission-critical to advancing the story are marked as such but it’s always up the player when to take them. But taking your time to take on extra jobs is a worthwhile endeavor since they level up the player and enhance the entire experience in actually meaningful ways. There is no real penalty for disregarding them either, so the choice is thankfully ultimately in the player’s hands.

After bringing your first delivery into a new region, you unlock that part of the map and that’s when the magic really starts. Similar to many open-world games, the fog of war clears, with you now being able to better see what the region has to offer. But unlike most games, the asynchronous multiplayer portion also kicks in now. There is no conventional multiplayer in the sense that you see, fight with, or against different players. Think Demon’s Souls but even more passive.

This aspect is directly intertwined with Death Stranding’s other important gameplay pillar. Crafting. The world might be devoid of life but it’s anything but empty. Across your various trips, you come across lost and abandoned cargo that you can choose to pick up and deliver. Apart from those, there are also resources to be found but don’t think you can just grab everything you come across. Sam quickly gets encumbered and once you have too much cargo on you, movement gets slower and you lose your balance much faster. The key is to chose what to take and what to leave.

Collected resources can be returned to terminals and recycled. Once you want to build a structure in the world and need resources, you can pick them up from delivery terminals. The amount of resources available is dependent on the number of things recycled and extra orders taken. But since resources themselves are quite heavy, building any big structure can become a long endeavor in itself. The boons from structures regularly make up for time and effort put into them though. Don’t expect hundreds of cosmetic things. The selection of structures is very modest in its scope and everything has a big reason for its existence.
The awesome aspect here is that players cooperate when it comes to building large structures. It’s a newfound satisfaction to be a part of something bigger when you go out your way and donate a certain amount of resources just to see a massively helpful structure get into shape before your eyes.

Likewise with the building, communicating with other players also happens passively. Players can leave emojis on the map. You always see who left it and can even like it which is relayed to the player. It brings great satisfaction to receive likes from a complete stranger who appreciates a structure you have constructed.
The multiplayer goes even further however with online Postboxes whose contents can be accessed by other players to use. You can also donate materials, resources, weapons, and even vehicles for other players to use. It’s a silent comradery that really helps create a sense of real connection. It’s outstanding how gameplay and story intertwine here so perfectly.

While the structures are a massive help for every Porter, there is another kind of crafting in Death Stranding. The very equipment and gear you take with you on delivery have to be crafted regularly. Either since you lose them in the terrain or they degrade too much.
Death Stranding starts very slow but this only helps emphasize the huge deal that are certain craftable items like exoskeletons and weapons. A certain amount of patience is required to not only move forward the story but also unlock game-changing mechanics.

Yes, there are indeed weapons and combat in Death Stranding. But it needs reminding that this isn’t a shooter at all. You rather should think of them as tools to traverse the treacherous world. Anti-BT weaponry can be used to fend off them when in a pinch. Antipersonnel weaponry likewise is best suited as a last resort. The best tactic is to stealthily navigate around threats, either totally undetected or by way of distraction.
In the end, learning how to best use all the tools in your literal belt is a satisfying process on its own. Even if it means having a difficult time at first leaving behind preconceived notions.

The last major gameplay pillar are interactions with BTs themselves. They tend to appear in places where Timefall takes place and offer by far the tensest experience in Death Stranding. Whenever you approach a place with BT activity, the game shifts into a tense cat and mouse game where you try to slip through the cracks by way of stealthily and slowly moving. BTs are invisible but Sam has a cute helper with him. BB is the most useful tool in your hands at spotting and sensing the exact locations of BTs. It’s quite grotesque that BB is a fetus that has been prematurely removed from his mother’s womb and directly connects to Sam via an artificial umbilical cord. It sounds much grosser than it ends up in the game.
These interactions with BTs are sometimes unavoidable due to story reasons but can be easily circumvented otherwise by careful observation of the weather. It never missed to put me on the edge of my seat since it feels and plays like a horror game.

Since it bears repeating, traversing the world is the name of the game here with everything else playing second fiddle. You will be propping ladders across rivers and erecting them to reach higher platforms far more often than engaging in combat. Likewise, repelling down cliff sides with a rope is arguably as important as stealthily navigating a Mule camp.
The sheer brilliance of Death Stranding’s design is that despite sounding arguably more boring, the walking-sim aspect is the most enjoyable aspect. It’s just that well-thought-out.
What more evidence can there be that the major player character controls you use are dedicated to keeping your balance and adjusting your walking speed!
Yes, Death Stranding is a walking sim by definition of the word but unlike the pejorative notion of the genre that regularly gets laughed at, this is what happens when extraordinary talented people with a clear and concise vision tackle it. Every rocky cliff side becomes a fun challenge to surmount, every rushing river become a treacherous obstacle to overcome, and no cliff side is too steep to repel down. It’s an absurd amount of fun and should rather be called a trekking or hiking sim if anything because there is so much on the line.
Going carelessly about your way is a recipe for disaster. Try running across a river and you’ll quickly be swept by the current with your cargo aimlessly sailing away. Running down a slope at high-speed will end up in you toppling over with packages scattering all around you and taking damage. You have to know how much Sam realistically can carry. When to stabilize and slow your roll.

Rough Rider

But not everything is perfectly designed and arguably nothing more than the vehicles showcase that. There are only a few you’ll encounter, and they are a priceless upgrade in terms of speed and comfort. Sadly, it’s a surprisingly janky affair once you encounter rocky terrain of any sort. The vehicles glitch around in a matter that is outright baffling to witness. It’s so absurd I wondered how this could be intended to work like that. In the end, I found it most suitable to use vehicles in good terrain and completely ditch them when difficult patches started showing up. It does become a hassle although when you plan the extra carrying capacity of them from the start. A very unfortunate design decision and it just does not feel fully thought out.
On the other spectrum, combat while definitely never intended as the main gameplay mechanic still feels a tad undercooked possibly even an afterthought. From mechanics to enemy AI, taken as a tool and last-ditch effort in a pinch it does the job well enough. As such, it’s hard to be all too mad at it.

Death Stranding marks not only a new IP for Kojima Productions but also a technological shift from the Fox Engine the team created themselves while at Konami. I’m happy to report that the Decima game engine used for the game does an outstanding job of realizing a splendid presentation at great performance.
The world takes the absolute cake with at many times photorealistic vistas and assets that are sure to leave many a jaw agape. Rocks, snow, grass, mountains, and more looks so good it could basically pass as virtual tourism.
Character models are no slouch either in portraying the star-studded cast of Hollywood actors in exceptional digital form. Animations are on an industry-leading level which goes hand in hand with Hideo Kojima’s cinematic ambitions in portraying the narrative. Here, every cutscene is a joy in itself thanks to technology and brilliant acting.

In the game’s Photo Mode I had a blast to inspect and share great vistas and scenes of Death Stranding. A plethora of camera options alongside filters offers plenty of tools to capture a moment exactly how I want. The fun additions of choosing a character pose in this mode alongside facial expressions is a really brilliant addition to put some pepper into the lonesome delivery tours.

To the surprise of the PC gaming community, all this visual fidelity does not even require you to break the bank. Death Stranding and the Decima engine run surprisingly well on even modest hardware. Achieving 60fps at 1080p should be doable on even entry-level gaming PCs with higher-end hardware easily reaching 4K resolutions at blistering framerates beyond 60.
It’s a good thing that the game runs so smooth out of the box since the customization options are rather modest. Resolution options are sadly limited to an extent where it is not possible to choose a larger resolution than your monitor to enjoy downsampling. Ultrawide monitor support is here but cutscenes are zoomed in, leading to lost information. Annoyingly, the automatically detected resolution for 21:9 monitors doesn’t entirely fill the screen, leaving thin black bars on the left and right. Small drawbacks to an overall solid technical display.

Then there is the elephant in the room. The world of Death Stranding has its people left utterly disconnected from each other, ending with them being imprisoned in their homes due to circumstances beyond their powers. Connecting people and places is a major motivator. And while all this was clearly smiled upon and even belittled by some gamers and critics as too far out there even for Kojima standards, the picture is an entirely different one today.
With the Coronavirus having the entire globe in its stranglehold for almost half a year, the themes and emotions conveyed in Death Stranding have an eerie and sometimes scary relation to our current real-life situations. It’s much easier to get lost in the game’s world when you can emphasize with it. And in a clearly unintended way by the designers, walking through the large and empty wild of the world in Death Stranding can at times be a cathartic release for what has been put on hold in our lives. It’s an experience that cannot and was not designed but happen by the very reality we are in today.

The Verdict:

In the end, Death Stranding is a game experience unlike anything I’ve had before. The cohesive vision of an unlikely gameplay loop coupled with philosophical themes and the metaphysical story had me at the edge of my seat. Planning the perfect route only to have them tossed out the window because of unforeseen circumstances turns a seemingly banal activity into an exciting and satisfying romp that got me hooked for dozens of hours.
I’ll never look at my mail carrier the same way as before.