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E3 2018: Death Stranding’s Fourth Trailer Is Just As Confusing As The Rest

Posted on June 13, 2018 by Rae Michelle Richards

Kojima Production’s Death Stranding has been confusing viewers since its debut at E3 2016 and the previous 3 trailers gave us no reason to suspect that the first glimpse of gameplay would be any differed.  Coming in at just over 8 minutes in length, this latest look at the game confirms that Norman Reedus’ character is named ‘Sam Porter Bridges’ and that he makes deliveries. Throughout the nearly ten minute presentation we see Sam carry a number of boxes on his back, utilize motorized robots and other delivery related equipment. HOLY SHIT WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT DEATH STRANDING WAS JUST A ‘STACK STUFF ON YOURSELF SIMULATOR’..

Of course, this is Kojima and things aren’t that simple: What we do now know thanks to this trailer:

1) Parts of Sam’s name have appeared on the two different suits that he has worn in trailers 3 & 4. With ‘Bridges’ and ‘Porter’ respectively.
2) As revealed at the end of the trailer – eating one of the slug shaped creatures will ‘keep the Time Fall away’.
3) The time reversing rain that we’ve seen in trailer’s 2 and 3 is known as Time Fall and causes rapid aging.
4) Kojima has talked about how death will not be the end of the game in Death Stranding. Instead, Sam awakens in an alternate death dimension. This is referenced directly by a voice over Sam’s radio in Trailer 4.
5) The invisible ‘things’ that killed the work crew in trailer 3 can be sensed by Sam but not seen, while his new female companion can see them it seems.
6) If Sam is eaten by one of the invisible creatures he will come back back to live but a giant crator will be created, just like we saw in trailer 3.

Now fans get to start piecing together … wait these pieces don’t seem to fit together at all. *sigh* well, we might be back at square one with this. Are the invisible creators (called ‘ludens’ by fans) the souls of former people? Is Sam’s name actually a combination of his job ‘porter’ as in “a person employed to carry luggage and other loads, especially in a railroad station, airport, or hotel.” and ‘bridges’, a company? Why do the little worm things keep the Time Fall away? Do they spawn clones of the carriers?

AAAAAHHH my mind is broken for now. Death Stranding still has no solid release date but it is coming eventually for PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 4 Pro.

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How Death Stranding Subverts a Common Gameplay Mechanic

Posted on December 14, 2017 by Rae Michelle Richards

There once was an explosion within a trailer that ignited a thousand online debates. There once was an explosion within a trailer that confused the hell out of us. The next explosion is brief details about how Death Stranding will play and how the game subverts a very common gameplay mechanic – death itself. 

In a recent interview with IGN.com Hideo Kojima detailed the place that protagonist Sam visits after the large explosion in the latest trailer for Death Stranding is actually a sort of purgatory.  In this world of beaches and water Sam will explore purgatory in a first-person perspective until it is time for him to return to his body. We don’t know how this dimensional travel is possible (is it the babies?? I bet it’s the babies!) but we do know it is due to a “special ability” that Sam possess. 

Kojima contrasted this mechanic with the arcades of the past, where death was a means to suck another quarter from the player: 

“Games started over 40 years ago with arcades. When the player dies, it’s game over. You continue, and time goes back to before you die. You can die as many times as you want, but you always go back to a little bit before you die. That was a mechanic made specifically for putting in coins, and it hasn’t changed since then.”

Aside from digitized versions of Norman Reedus, Guillermo Del Toro, and Mads Mikkelsen, the spotlight has been fixed on the various babies we’ve seen in each of the three trailers. During the interview with IGN, Hideo Kojima confirmed that the baby that washes up on the shores in trailer 1, the baby held by Del Toro in trailer 2 and the baby pointing finger guns in Reedus’ esophagus are one in the same. We also now know that the babies will tie into the purgatory mechanic somehow.’ 

Still no definitive answers about the mysteries of Death Stranding but certainly now we have a lot more pieces of the puzzles. We know that the game takes place in the near future and that the rapid aging rain and the monsters that attacked the corpse disposal crew are common knowledge. We know a little bit more about the babies. We also know that gameplay will be split between third-person open world action while Sam is alive and that death does not mean “game over” but will affect the overall game world. 

Perhaps we will see actually Death Stranding gameplay at next June’s E3 or perhaps Kojima will make a surprise appearance at GDC 2018, like he did at GDC 2013 to promote The Phantom Pain. Rumor has it that Death Stranding is currently targeting a Q4 2018 release window, so the hype should just keep building. 

Oh and all of our internet theories about the baby being a clone of Sam, Mads being the real protagonist or Del Toro being the game’s villain? Kojima eats that shit up and loves every second of it. 

“I think it’s fun, I really think it’s fun. It’s one of the unique things about games, that you can start having fun with people before you release the game. There are things I intentionally put there so that I can start this back and forth process with players, because I think it’s fun for everyone.” 

[Source]

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Death Stranding’s New Trailer Is All Sorts of What The $@#!

Posted on December 8, 2017 by Rae Michelle Richards

Hideo Kojima continues his reputation for mystery and sheer WTF-ery with a brand-new trailer for Death Stranding debuted during The Game Awards. Unlike the debut E3 2016 glimpse at the game or the 2016 Game Awards trailer, this latest trailer gives us quite a few clues about possible gameplay mechanics and a few small strands of the storyline. 

We now know that Norman Reedus’ character is named Sam and that his character will witness a horrific near future sci-fi disaster. Sam and his fellow team members are assaulted by an invisible enemy that can make their victims dissolve into nothingness almost instantly.  During the attack, Sam tells his teammates to stop breathing, presumably because the invisible enemies’ human dissolution powers are airborne. It wouldn’t be a Death Stranding without an appearance from those mysterious babies. This time around we see two things of relevance: 1) That the guy who is about to meet his doom begins to stab his stomach instead of say, going for the throat. 2) Just as Sam is about to meet his maker, the baby attached to his machine becomes fused with his body (just like we saw in the initial E3 2016 trailer). 

There is a lot more to dissect from this lengthy Death Stranding trailer which will keep Kojima fans guessing until its eventual release. Just like with the Metal Gear Solid V trailers, it is completely possible that Death Stranding‘s marketing is full of fake-outs, misdirection and not enough information for us to know for sure. Is Sam even the real protagonist? What is the text written on his power armor? What is up with the babies? 

Start pausing the trailer, squinting and guessing for months or possibly years. 

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New Death Stranding Trailer Paints a Grim Picture

Posted on December 3, 2016 by Rae Michelle Richards

Hideo Kojima surprised the entire internet with a 5 minute trailer for his yet-undated third person action titled Death Stranding last night. In usual Kojima style the trailer contains absolutely no plot or character information, yet this cinematic trailer contains enough interesting moments that we will speculating for months until the release of the next cryptic morsel.

In the opening of the trailer we see a European city under-siege from an army of zombie skeleton soldiers and planes as the camera establishes it self on an unnamed character presumably played by project collaborator Guillermo Del Toro. We see a pair of neon handcuffs around Del Toro’s wrists and in his opposite hand a mechanical womb-like device that contains a fetus. As the the skeleton troops march across the bridge above Del Toro he affixes a tube from the mechanical womb to himself. The camera then zooms down a large drain pipe to reveal more zombie soldiers and a character played by Hannibal actor Mads Mikkelsen.

Alongside the trailer Kojima Productions also released two cinematic style posters:

death_stranding

The world of Death Stranding seems to be an intriguing mixture of World War II era military technology, dystonia undertones, science fiction devices, characters played by well known Hollywood actors and several mysterious babies.

Any other details regarding the game-play, plot or other Death Stranding related topics are merely conjecture. Some folks have speculated that the babies are used as healing items in a future society where the aged literally siphon the essence of youth from the next generation. Others have drawn parallels to the 2006 post-apocalyptic sci-fi film where humans have lost the ability to naturally conceive.

Death Stranding has no release date but more information might be released during Kojima’s panel at the PlayStation Experience today at 1pm PST.

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