RE: Death Stranding

Death Stranding is the kind of game that’ll make you question what a game can, if not should, be.  

The problem is that, if you’re anything like me, then you’ll be asking that question for all the wrong reasons.

Art is subjective.  So are opinions. And among them -- among all the games out there in the world, from inception to this very moment in the present -- Death Stranding is going to be the biggest exemplar of “subjectivity” we’ll have for years to come.  I remember when the review embargo lifted, and the scores went from as high as a perfect 10 (or its equivalent vis a vis reviewers’ scales) to as low as a 3 out of 10.  This is a litmus test on a disc, to the point where everyone who likes it is justified, and everyone who hates it is justified.

I’m not going to put words in anyone’s mouth.  In the end, the only one I can speak for is myself…and my brother if and when I decide to bring him up anecdotally to illustrate a point. I can only report on my findings, my thoughts, my assessments, my opinions.  Will people agree with me?  Will they disagree?  Who knows?  But I have to be honest here.  As if I haven’t already with those opening lines.

So, let me say this to start: there have been plenty of times over the years when I’ve played video games specifically to write about them on this blog.  To be more precise, I’ve played games longer than I’ve needed to so I can say something substantial instead of rushing something out to avoid death by FOMO.

With Death Stranding?  I’m only a few hours into Hideo Kojima’s latest crazy train.  And right now, I’ve got no interest in ever touching it again.

This is where my subjectivity comes in.  If you’re not familiar with me -- and I’m not sure why you would be -- then you have to understand where I’m coming from on this.  I believe in art.  Value it.  I want to be a writer, and I’m already sitting on one completed manuscript with the first draft of a different manuscript close to completion.  What I look for in art -- in any medium, especially the guys who’ve “made it” when I’m still sitting here from the safety of internet anonymity -- is substance.  Competency, but that’s a given.  Concrete forms.

I don’t think I’m being unreasonable by asking for the basics to be nailed.  Sure, I value “abstractions”.  I like themes.  I like metaphors, allusions, deeper meanings, morals, all of that stuff.  But what I need is what everyone needs, whether they know it or not.  No matter how abstract you are or want to get, you’ve got to get the concrete details down first.  That’s why when I judge a piece of art (anything with a straight narrative, at least), I look at specifics, but -- to reiterate -- the basics.

I look at characters.  I look at plot.  I look at dialogue.  Setting, pacing, tone.  Execution is up there, too.  Is the art succeeding at what it’s trying to do?  Does the story make sense in the context of its world?  Is there a sense of progression?  Am I getting invested in the story, and rewarded for the time I’m putting in?  Is that return of investment increasing along the way?  And sure, the abstract elements of a story are part of the equation.  They work along with the concrete to elevate a piece of art into something stronger, and stronger, and stronger still.

With all of that out in the open, here’s my problem with Death Stranding: it’s incredibly boring.  It’s boring because, in some ways, it’s going for complete abstractions -- banking on them, even -- without relying on the concrete.  It’s weird just to be weird, no matter how much it clashes.  It’s trying to be deep and meaningful, but without anything sensible to anchor it to its world or ours.  It’s doing its best to be serious, somber, and touch the soul, but its efforts to impose THE WEIGHT OF THE GAME YOU ARE PLAYING end up being grating instead of natural or earned.

No wonder I’ve nearly fallen asleep while playing it.  Twice.

The cardinal sin for me is that, as it stands, Sam is a boring character.  No charm, no presence, and not much in the way of redeeming qualities.  He’s tough and gruff and curt and grim, which to be fair makes sense given his situation (and that’s one of the few times Death Stranding is going to make sense).  The problem is that his act doesn’t make for an entertaining lead, which drags the story way down.  The only flair he’s shown so far is that he’s got a soft spot for BB, the baby that helps him detect the big bad ghosties in the world.  But that’s the gist of it.

Sam spends most of the early hours being told what he needs to do and why -- with about as much, and simultaneously as little, exposition you’d expect -- and for much of that time does plenty of whinging about it.  It’s the “refusal of the call” in different forms and different degrees, from a decent number of the characters introduced thus far.  First off, we all know Sam’s going to end up doing it anyway, so why bother pretending otherwise?  Second, even if Sam is going to evolve over the course of the game’s runtime, why can’t he be compelling from the get-go?  Years on, I still remember Penny Arcade’s take on Final Fantasy 13, asking why we can’t start with gold characters and turn them into platinum.  Right now, the most interesting thing about Sam Grumpybuns is the weird stuff that happens to him.  In other words, gimmicks.  Not even abstractions.  Gimmicks.

I’ve yet to find a character I’m intrigued by, or want to learn more about, or even like.  Ideals and motivation aside, President Bridget Strand didn’t do it for me because for now she’s only there to motivate Sam.  Amelie is a cryptic, mysterious woman from Sam’s past (who I swear to God looks and sounds like Elliot from Scrubs) who’s seemingly pulling double-duty as a metaphorical princess to rescue.  Nerdy airs aside, Deadman’s a man of science who doesn’t put much stock in sentimentality or emotion…and that’s about it for now.  Special credit goes to Die-Hardman, whose black skeleton mask completely jettisons me out of whatever serious scene he’s in -- which is kind of a problem when he might as well be the vice president of a broken country.

The tone is all over the place, because Death Stranding can’t get out of its own way.  Even though Die-Hardman’s mask is a key offender, you still get stuff like Monster energy drinks being used and chugged with reckless abandon.  Seeing a promo for Norman Reedus’ Ride on AMC show up when I first had him use the bathroom made me want to shut the game off then and there.  Also, what is with the naming convention in this game?  How can I take this game seriously with names like Mama and Die-Hardman?

It just feels like all of the weirdness and heft is just a smokescreen for the fact that, pomp and circumstance aside, there’s not much to Death Stranding.  At least, there’s nothing there that needs 40 hours’ worth of gameplay to explore.  Rebuilding America is a cool premise, and I’m down to help reconnect the separated cities.  But there’s all this fluff in the way that at times comes off as ideas thrown in for the sake of cool trailer shots, and to get people talking about how mysterious it is, and desperate to make sense of the mystery.  Get answers, get context, what have you.  What are the BTs?  Ghosts, I guess.  What is the Timefall?  Rain that ages stuff, I guess.  Who are your enemies?  Rival deliverymen, I guess. 

There’s all this stuff that’s explained and not-explained (saved for a later date, I’m guessing), but the more I learn about Death Stranding’s world, the less interested I become.  Prior to the release, part of the allure was this weird world so alien and foreign to our own; I know that I wanted to give it a look just so I could make sense of it all.  (I even stopped watching the trailers, because I knew the full game would give me the answers/context I needed.)  Now I’m getting a clearer picture, and, much like a J.J. Abrams mystery box, the answers are never more exciting than the questions.  You’re just left with an open box.

Nothing here has genuinely impressed me.  I get the feeling that nothing will.  Instead of me pulling a Jack Skellington and going “What’s this?  What’s this?” every chance I get, I’m just left sitting there going, “Oh, I guess it’s that” and “So that’s what that is. Okay.”  Maybe the core of the issue is that there isn’t really a mystery being solved here, per se.  Whereas an Abrams movie will have you asking who’s related to who or what’s the deal with that island, Kojima Productions’…production…made a mystery out of basic worldbuilding details.  Now that I have enough of those, I’m not compelled to see it through myself.

Speaking of KojiPro?  Kojima’s expressed a genuine interest in making movies, and it’s probably going to happen somewhere down the line.  God help us all when that happens.  Dark future notwithstanding, the film aspirations are worn on the sleeves like a gallon of mustard.  The player’s first encounter with BTs is very filmic in its presentation, but hardly comes off as real because of it.  It’s a cutscene that feels like it’s ripped out of a horror movie…any horror movie…and many horror movies, with creeping killers that get close to our hero, but can’t quite sniff him out. 

The point of the scene was to establish that I should be scared of the monsters, but I wasn’t.  I was A) bored because despite not seeing a ton of movies I’d already felt like I’d seen that exact sequence at least a dozen times throughout my life, and B) annoyed since I was more keen to ask when I’d actually get to play the game and engage with them for real, on account of the PS4 controller in my hands.  Guess what?  Turns out BTs aren’t that big a deal in-game.  Just a facet at this stage, not an all-out threat.

Normally this is where I’d talk about the gameplay (what gameplay, hurf dee hurr hurr), but I’m not really up for it.  I’m assuming and hoping that it livens up soon, because right now it’s a lot of tensionless walking and a spate of mild inconveniences.  Not exactly pulse-pounding stuff, even with the BT stealth sections.  I want to close this out by (as promised) bringing up my brother.  He’s the one that bought the game.  Bought it, and been excited to play it for weeks and months in advance -- so much so that he bought a Death Stranding-themed PS4 Pro, complete with a pad that simulates a BB’s womb/tank/clumsy symbolism.

When I first asked him what he thought of the game -- during what had to be his first session -- he said “the gameplay sucks.”  But he had an interest in the story, and that carted him along…though that same day, I watched his frustration grow ever larger as things went wrong by way of his BB crying, enemies closing in on him, and his packages getting thrown every which way.  The next time he brought up the game (days later), he said it made him want to blow his brains out.  He’s put significantly more time into Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, and had much more fun with it.  He’s even been keen to play a ton of Pokémon Sword. 

As far as I know, the most laughs he’s gotten out of Death Stranding so far is when he put those big dumb sunglasses on Sam’s face. 

I feel bad for my big bro, which is a rare feeling for sure.  It’s not often that he gets burned badly by games, but I get the feeling that this one burned him the hardest.  That aside, there’s something he asked that’s stuck with me for days on end.  “Can art be fun?  Because if it can, then this isn’t.”  And yes, I get it.  It was a given going in that Death Stranding wouldn’t be a cavalcade of comedy; it’s dealing with some heady topics, however ham-fistedly.  It’s not the only one in the world to try it.  Can dramas be fun?  Can historical fiction be fun?  Should they be fun?

Here’s my take: it’s not necessarily about art being “fun”.  It’s that, no matter the form, art needs to be engaging.  It has to speak to you on some level, and get you to care even if it’s about something fake, fanciful, or simply fantastic.  The art that feels like the most important thing in the world is the kind that earns its spot in its respective pantheon.  Death Stranding doesn’t really feel all that important.  At the end of the day, it’s just another game to me -- and worse yet, one that’s not very interested in being engaging.  It’s not especially shocking, challenging, or anything of the sort.  It’s just kind of…there.  It’s by no means the worst game I’ve ever played, let’s get that right.  Really, I don’t even hate it.  It’s just not for me.

I’m glad it exists.  I’m glad people are enjoying it.  I’m glad there are differing opinions and debates instead of everybody slobbering over 10/10 scores.  But for me, I’ll probably be tapping out pretty soon, if I haven’t already.  Would I recommend it to others?  No.  Not unless I know they’d like it.

So that’s it, then.  Maybe next time, Kojima will learn to reel it in.

But hey, that’s just my opinion.