Collecting something you think is a piece of horseshit lol - put tht 13 quid towards a ps5
I know. I knowwww. Stop making me regret it haha.
I wonder, how did you realized that it's just a walking simulator with a stupid story? From your first 30 min? Please share your wisdom.
Don't get me wrong. But when one achieves a certain amount of emotional maturity, one just doesn't connect with things as they would have in their childhood.
example: At 12, I was knee deep in the "lore" of Evangelion and its supposed deep-meaning behind parent-child relationships, self-loathing and abuse. Blah blah blah.
Now, as an adult I realise it is a barely there mecha anime, which feels disjointed simply because the director had a nervous breakdown due to his bad relationship midway through. The studio pulled the plug as he was another "Kojima" asking for too much money and he ended up finishing the show in a rushed manner leaving the world to dig deep for meaning where there is none.
At 20, I was knee deep in the Kojima myth. The man made one half decent game called MGS on the PS1, which was only groundbreaking for its time as it did not have much competition. As any Japanese director, he let it go to his head and shat out MGS2 which, we all know, was, well, not MGS1. Kojima realised he had screwed up the MGS1 formula and decided to go back to it with MGS3 (which is why it is set in the path). HOWEVER, MGS3 was created with Kojima being on a very tight leash from both Sony and Konami.
Obviously MGS3 is a good game and a success. Once again Kojima let it get to his head and shat out a feeble MGS4 which was a success based on the myth of the man more than any real merit. This led him to be greenlit for MGS5 which is again, immature and pathetic whilst trying desperately to come off as genius.
The issue with people like Miyazaki, Kojima and Anno isn't themselves, it has to do with "celebrity" culture they're exposed to when they gain notoriety in the west. Americans are, by nature, fanatics. When they like something, simply liking it is not enough, it needs to be worshiped in its utter all-encompassing totality. This is incredibly intoxicating for people like Kojima, Anno and Miyazaki and they tend to go off the rails. Anyone would, because in their own cultures they're not used to being treated as "gods".
Its his arrogance and behavior during the development of MGSV which got him fired from Konami because having the man on their projects was just not a profitable proposition. However, in the west, this was taken as heresy, but to Konami Kojima was just a man who was doing his job but becoming problematic.
I need to explain the above before I get into why Death Stranding is a humbling embarrassment for Kojima. The game reeks of Kardashianisms. Kojima used his myth to reel in investors. From renting his offices to getting finances to get the project off the ground.
Story - Your typical post-apocalyptic snooze fest. Its trying to hard to come off as intelligent it is actually quite cringey and stupid. Plus, if you don't see the virtue signalling in a female president, the baby in the bottle being a girl at the end (awwww so hopefull - F off), to the whole "beached things" BS, come on. The story could have been good but Kojima throws everything from every anime and manga and japanese game trope at it as though he's hoping something would stick.
Gameplay - The inventory management, and movement mechanics are over-cooked. But what else is there? Its just tedious. I have seen people argue "well that was the genius of Kojima, he wanted the game to be tedious". Well, sure, but in that case, don't criticise people for calling it boring and tedious, just accept it as Kojima achieving his goal. The only issue is, games are meant to be FUN first and foremost and when a game works against the player as actively as Death Stranding does, in terms of its mechanics, it misses the very point of its existence.
Graphics - Utterly beautiful.
Sound - I swear if I hear one more pretentious "orchestral" droning and whining I will do myself an injury. Literally, change the record Kojinma.
Anyways, the above is only my opinion because you asked. I am not expecting you to change yours and please don't try to change mine. We have wasted enough time on the topic. I am just typing this because its a lazy summer afternoon and I hope you realise people CAN sometimes develop their opinion by experiencing the game first hand. I don't hate the game or I wouldn't have bought it discounted. However, I do not love it and might not even play it, because when I did play it with my friend, we both came away from our 15 hour run thinking "this is bullshit".
Sure, 15 hours might not be enough to get to the meat of death stranding, but part of being a thinking, rational individual one knows when one has given something a "fair chance".
