Last week, it was revealed that Death Stranding 2 could be launching in 2025. Kojima Productions hasn’t confirmed or denied whether this release window is accurate, while evidence pointing to this being true is somewhat shaky. The artist who listed the 2025 window on their online portfolio works for a third party outside of Kojima Productions, and so may not even be aware of the planned release date. I’m sure that out there, some Kojima fans are sweating thinking about the possibility of getting a confirmed release date soon, potentially at The Game Awards on December 7. The thing is, I am not one of them. I do not care at all.
Death Stranding, More Like The Death Of My Patience
Playing Death Stranding was like pulling teeth. Worse, it was like pulling teeth while everybody around me told me that getting their teeth pulled was a revelatory experience that changed them forever. Like many people, the game simply would not click for me. I understand it in theory – it’s unexpectedly collaborative for a single-player game, it emphasises the need for community, and it’s about human connection, at its core. Lead Features Editor Jade King loves the game, and has written many thinkpieces about it. I know it has value. But I just can’t play it.
Like my colleague James Troughton, I simply can’t seem to get through it. While they’re put off by long cutscenes, I find myself getting stuck on the gameplay – and when it comes down to it, if you don’t jive with the gameplay, there’s little chance you’ll get through a game. Gameplay is, definitionally, usually the biggest part of a game. I do not and will never find hiking across a hostile world to be appealing, especially when I’ve got to walk the same route multiple times to make multiple deliveries. Oh, and manage my inventory in seemingly the worst menu ever designed. God’s light does not shine on this game. Nothing about it is compelling.
Hiking in real life, a process far more difficult and physically taxing than hiking in a video game, is still a more enticing idea than trying to play Death Stranding again.
And that sucks, because I want to care. Whenever a game is as divisive as Death Stranding was, I always want to understand what it is people love so much about it. After all, I’m in this industry because I love video games. I want to celebrate them like everyone else. I just can’t bring myself to get far enough in the game to see anything to love about it. It’s intolerably dull! I’m personally a believer that a game shouldn’t be so horrible an experience in its first few hours that a vast proportion of people who play it never get past the first few chapters, but that’s just me.
Then There’s The AI Stuff
To be fair to Kojima Productions, we don’t actually know that generative AI has any place in the making of Death Stranding 2. We don’t know that much about the sequel in general. But there have been hints that Kojima is interested in using artificial intelligence in the game production process. My colleague Ben Sledge wrote a great piece about a particularly suspect tweet from Kojima in September, but there’s also this Q&A Kojima did in June where he said that using AI in a development cycle was an “exciting future”. According to him, it’s more “how you use the AI” that matters. You can’t hear it, but I’m booing at my screen.
It does matter whether Kojima is using generative AI in his games. He is just one man, yes, but his work has had, and still has, a significant influence on the games industry at large. His ignoring the backlash against AI and using it anyway will legitimise a technology that is often used to cut out workers and improve efficiency. After all, maximising profit is the name of the game, even when you’re trying to make a video game that doubles up as an art piece, which Death Stranding is often described as being. You can’t keep making games if you don’t make any money, and halving your manpower is an easy way to save on expenses. Again, we don’t know if he’s using it or not, but I wouldn’t be surprised – his statements on the issue have always been down the center, not explicitly being for or against.
I know people are going to be very excited about this game, but I simply can’t bring myself to be. Just thinking about how awful my first two attempts at playing the first game were is enough to make my skin crawl. Yet another major triple-A game will pass me by, and I won’t feel even a little bad about this one.
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