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Death Stranding


DisturbedSwan
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The Elder is really easy to reach? Go down from the Engineer and two nicely placed ladders and I’m up and down, up and down. 
 

I saw the email where he starts to talk about the Death Stranding but I just find it really hard to care and skimmed through it. They should absolutely not put critical story details in random emails. That is always a massive story telling mistake to me when games keep lots of pivotal information in walls of text. He’s email will be the 43rd email I’ve received ?

 

I haven’t even tried experimenting with any of the new stuff the game has provided in the past two hours. Equipment spoilers in case you care but 

Spoiler

Exoskeletons, guns, grenades, holograms, smoke bombs, decoy stuff, whatever. I haven’t used any of them yet. The only thing I need is the bike just to go back and forth the depot and the preppers 


The only cool bit of player agency I’ve had since chapter 3 has started is I stole a truck and loaded it up with cargo and left it on the edge of a Mule camp, and just waited for them to all run at me before knocking them all out. It isn’t that smart or cool because eventually they all turned up at the same time and it became a button bashing fest (They are SO. EASY. TO BEAT.) but one if the few times in the game I almost felt like I did something myself.

 

Even inventory management like you said I haven’t even messed around with. There are a few level 2 bridges and roads I could probably help get to level 3 if I wanted to drive back and forth all the bases getting the materials but there’s just no reason to reinforce a road I’m already using perfectly fine. 
 

Everything so far in this game from the gameplay to the story is overly complicated and underwhelming at the same time. I honestly don’t know why I like this game. I think it is just the numbers going higher and people telling me I‘m doing a good job, which I know I’m being tricked because I’m not, but it is just enough satisfaction to keep chasing those likes and S ranks. Because I feel no pull towards an end goal (Because the game doesn’t do a good job at making me care about the story) but there’s also no push towards any short term objectives either because the moment to moment gameplay is very drawl.

 

And yet, it’s still captivating and every time I put it on I get tired and want to turn it off and every time I turn it off 5 minutes later I want to put it back on again. I can’t explain it. I kind of hate that I like it because it is so stupid and makes me feel stupid for continuing.

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Man, chapter 4 sucks

 

Very cool visually, but I am setting this to very easy just for this section cause it plays so bad ?

 

I dont actually know if the difficulties affect orders tbh ?

Edit, just to be clear I'm not ragging on the game as such. It actually recommended me dropping to easy mode. It just wasn't a great time on hard. Will put it back up when I get my postman pat on

 

(The bit just after this was full of frowney face signs so its not just me I think ?)

 

All problems with the game aside I really like that its mostly just a game about stepping over rocks, not getting swept away by rivers etc. I cant really think of any other game where I've thought about the terrain I walk on, almost every game is Skyrim in that sense.

But it's also why chapter 4 was a bad time for me cause it threw me into something that the game had spent no time training me for. Kojima said he wanted to make a game that wasnt about fighting but it seems like someone fought him on this.

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I see 0 interests in any kind of conflicts here

 

Death Stranding contains a collection of cameos from creator Hideo Kojima's celebrity friends. Poke around and you'll find comedian Conan O'Brien, director Edgar Wright, and Remedy boss Sam Lake. 

You'll also find Hirokazu Hamamura and Necky the Fox - names, perhaps, you're less familiar with. But in Japan, Kotaku reports, their inclusion is stirring up debate. 

 

Hamamura is the high profile former editor-in-chief of Japanese gaming magazine Famitsu and now president of its publisher Enterbrain. Necky the Fox is Famitsu magazine's mascot.

But while Conan O'Brien might feature Death Stranding on his TV show and Geoff Keighley might feature Kojima wherever possible, neither have written reviews of the game. Famitsu has, however, and its inclusion in Death Stranding - a game it awarded a rare 40/40 top score to - has prompted unease among some Japanese gamers

 

 

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2019-11-11-death-strandings-famitsu-cameos-spark-questions-in-japan

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It sounds a bit like your punishing yourself Maf by not playing around with all the mechanics the game offers you. Yes you don't need to use them, but they make the game more fun. Same argument can be made against MGSV and BOTW where you can get through repeating the same tactic over and over but you'll miss most of what the game has to offer that way.

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I don't think theres any way to excuse that animation lock. But this is sort of a game about doing difficult graft with the aim of eventually mitigating the tedium for yourself later. That sounds like a depressing loop, but I find it really interesting. Like the game is constantly showing you how difficult it is to do a thing a manual way, then it shows you a way to streamline or mechanise it and let's you choose.

 

I am on chapter 5 and doing a lot of boring setting up of transit networks between different points on varying degrees of elevation. It is dull on a moment to moment basis but immensely satisfying in the knowing that it will make things easier layer on. In a sense setting up the network and knowing that it works is it's own reward here.

 

But the systems in place cant really be easily gamed by Skyrimming a truck over water. It can work sometimes but often it wont. The terrain analysis would probably mark that current as dangerous and the risk/reward is in the deciding of whether you want to risk all your cargo to make one trip now or take it easier and go more slowly across with ladders.

 

That's what this game is and theres no escaping it really except on chapter 4 which is some true bullshit that shouldn't be in the game imo

 

(I also want to say that they animate really well how Sam suffers through all the bullshit. Half the game I feel like Frodo climbing Mt Doom lol)

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That water was not that deep where I entered, but then one wheel got stuck and it sucked me down and I couldn’t get out. That’s actually the 3rd time that has happened to me (But not always with a truck) where I get stuck in water. You see I had seen it before because of how quick I went looking in the menus as previously I got out of it with reloading my save, but because Sam was never on the ground I couldn’t so that there I had to close the app and relaunch. 
 

I’m also not avoiding mechanics, I just don’t have any that are particularly useful. I just got level 2 floating carrier trays, but haven’t had to use them yet because the bikes and trucks are better. 
 

Also, I know it sounds like I hate the game, but I don’t. It’s just one of those things when it all falls apart it falls apart hard and it’s very annoying. But most of the time there is no trouble and I just go from point to point. 
 

I also can’t pull my self away from side quests. I’m constantly trying to get my shelters (Except for a couple of annoying ones) up to level 5.

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18 hours ago, Maf said:

I’m also not avoiding mechanics, I just don’t have any that are particularly useful. I just got level 2 floating carrier trays, but haven’t had to use them yet because the bikes and trucks are better. 

They can't negotiate rocky slopes easily

 

Particularly downhill ones ?

(Dont watch @Blakey)

Spoiler

 

 

 

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Thinking about this game on the way to work, I think the reason why I like this so much while I didn't like RDR2 is while the fussy gameplay systems in RDR2 got in the way of the player, here the fussy mechanics are the whole point of the game.

 

Additionally it feels like your decisions have much bigger impact than in RDR2. Do I slog this big cargo across rivers and up hills over and over or do I put it off and spend a long time upfront implementing a method to do the same thing much faster much later. 

 

I really really like this game, but I am apprehensive of what it might turn into later on. Hopefully not an action game

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Could you please just put a vid in spoiler tags if I'm not meant to watch it @one-armed dwarf? Also how can you still not do the @ thing ?

 

I don't wanna read this thread and have to dodge reading certain bits and pieces when there's a spoiler tag option for that very purpose.

 

Anyway, played 45 minutes of this last night - which seems pointless but I didn't want to wait until the weekend before playing it again - and unlocked the standard orders. Picked a few of them up from the Wind Farm as they were located in more-or-less the same direction I was going in to my next main objective anyway. It's weird that the BT's

Spoiler

outside the Wind Farm

have just straight up

Spoiler

disappeared

now? I was fully expecting a hard time going through there again with a full load on my back but it was super easy. 

 

I then built a generator at one of the bases and powered up the 

Spoiler

bike

and boy is it easy to get round now. It's pretty crazy, I made my way to the next objective within mere minutes and it controls pretty damn great surprisingly, not unwieldy at all.

 

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The @thing breaks text entry on mobile. It's too tedious to do correctly tbh.

 

I'm excited to hear what you think about later chapters. I started off on a bad foot with chapter 3 but once I got a bit more involved it gets very deep and Kojima-esque with all the systems. 

 

Honestly as soon as ch 2 starts to feel just a little bit rote I'd recommend progressing imo. 

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I really like what this game could of been but think the systems are just too intentionally obnoxious. It’s like what Kojima wanted to make was a cross between Journey and RDR2. A game that is about travelling and connecting, but it is also very deep and involved. Which is a great intention, and sometimes it kind of works, but then Kojima gets in the way of that.


Examples. I don’t understand the point of having so much at the player’s disposal but also giving the player no agency in using items or going in a direction than you absolutely must go

 

Spoiler

Getting to port Knot City. There is only one valley to go through and at best you can skip a little bit of it by going over some rocks, but it’s actually easier and faster to just sneak through the valley than try think or explore for yourself. And this design roadblock is pretty much the core technique of implementing challenge for the entire first 3 chapters. 


Or making really contrived missions that make no logical sense but are designed to ensure the player can’t use any advantages you really should have because of items you have earned and after how long you have played the game.

 

Spoiler

Everything to do with the art and junk dealer. I almost sighed to death when it said I have to carry the hour glass by hand (Just to be told it doesn’t work anyway), or when she had to be strapped to the back of Sam in the bodybag and you have to give up your cargo. How obvious can the game be. 

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Chapter 2 I find is basically the equivalent of the opening section of Witcher III, that little town area I forget the name of. Chapter 3 is like going to Novigrad in comparison, so the lack of options in the 'tutorials' is something I can excuse easy enough tbh.

 

I don't agree that chapter 3 has the same type of railroading. Or at least in general there are some pretty creative ways to optimise routes. Not as deep as an MGS yes but I find myself thinking a lot about properties of different terrain and if I can take more risky approaches (though driving trucks through a current isn't one of them)

 

Just now, wiivo 2.0 said:

Does it address why someone needs to hand deliver everything when there’s so much tech around?

Spoiler

You are the dude who has to install all the tech cause you can suffer the climate when other's cant

 

 

The whole gameplay loop is 'do mundane thing, then think of way to optimise'. This tech in particular is like getting an airship in Final Fantasy, very empowering

 

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*had to double post because I can’t get past the last quote box

 

I just don’t think Kojima can make a game like this because he can’t let go of what he wants the player to do. He really can’t seem to make an “open world” game and be an author at the same time. 
 

When you do side missions you have more ways to use what is given to you, but then all the other players have already built stuff so you don’t have to do it or once you’ve figured out a straight line back and forth centres by bike why would you ever even try to think of finding another way to go? The path of least resistance and all that. 

 

The closest this game ever gets to working for me are those moments when you roll over a hill and see your destination and the music kicks in. There are times when the game wants you to feel both the relief and melancholy of making a hard earned travel alone. Except even then it doesn’t really work because the journey is never hard and the only times it really has challenge is again when that challenge is forced upon the player in the most obvious of unnatural ways. So I don’t feel like I’ve reached the end of another epic, arduous adventure, I feel like endured some really trite game design. 
 

I do honestly like this game, and I really like what it could have been, but despite the tiny design choices that do work overall the game gets too in the way of itself and can’t make the landing on it’s bigger, grander intentions.

 

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