Recent reviews by stop

I played Death Stranding for the first time shortly after it came out, got about 40 hours into the game casually before life happened and I had to sell my PS4, but it left an impression from trailers enough for me to buy it in the first place, and the gameplay was fun enough to want it again.

The Steam release found me finishing the game with a fondness for its systems and as tight a grasp on the story as the sea of cutscenes I had just waded through could give me, but I felt slightly cheated by the really interesting cinematics leading up to release. I hadn't played a Kojima game before. Still, this left me enjoying the game enough that I started another playthrough before the Director's Cut was announced, which I then put on hold just after what I would consider to be the tutorial area so I could pick up at release where I had left off.

I first approached playing the director's cut like it was DLC, importing my lightly used save file before very quickly realizing things had been added even early on, so I restarted with the mission to max out every connection before moving on past an area so I could more easily make myself get every star. Had I known I would go on to finish every achievement, I may have instead opted to save myself a few dozen hours and just rush through the story to simplify cleaning up, but I find stopping to smell the roses in this game is extremely rewarding to me personally, and this more deliberate playstyle gave me a deeper perspective on the different tiers of play.

Prior to this final playthrough I racked up ~150 hours in the base game, and at time of review I have now clocked another 150. I don't think it is very likely that I will be playing again anytime soon to do anything other than to get LLL on my remaining couple hundred deliveries, though I may start taking on ranked missions as well. Here's hoping DS2 sees an early PC release.

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• story
  7/10

You are Sam Porter Bridges, "America's Last Hope" in reconnecting after an apocalyptic event known as the Death Stranding occured. Planes no longer fly, radio waves no longer travel nearly as far, and death waits around every corner for us all. Rain is now deadly, and ghosts are capable of turning a body into an antimatter bomb if they catch you. You must navigate the landscapes and ruins of the (quaintly scaled) continental United States as you cross the country to piece it all back together.
Core themes include connection, loss, trust/truth, identity, and death.

I encourage anyone interested in understanding the story to read every in game interview you come across, as many of the best details are hidden here behind the somewhat nonsensical cutscenes.

• visuals
  8.5/10

Overall very cohesive and pretty photorealistic style, good use of colors, and well detailed landscapes. Early portions of the game can look a bit ugly and sparse, and many areas are not populated by many objects other than rocks and the occasional sign of plant life. Pop in present during raised driving sections but not problematic or noticable in other situations. Occasional flickering/shimmering of distant objects makes it hard for me to tell if there is a visual glitch or just a feature. Very few obvious model/terrain errors. Some niche animations seem to have been left unpolished (such as Sam's face while singing in the bath), however the game is beautifully rendered otherwise.

• audio
  9.5/10

Both ambient audio and music are on point, the soundtrack is one of the game's strongest features. Sounds of walking on different terrain, moving machinery, and weapons all feel good. Many moments in the game are scored based on what's happening, but silence will accompany most of your journey. Soundtrack pieces play at key moments and lend greatly to atmosphere. Voice work ranges from servicable to spectacular. Seriously, just listen to the soundtrack.

• gameplay
  9/10

Take on a variety of orders to fetch and deliver thousands of packages across a wasteland. As you progress through more deliveries, more materials and upgrades like weapons for dealing enemies, and tools to ease your future traversal become available. Developing routes through challenging areas and adapting to sometimes changing conditions will see you through to completing larger and more complex deliveries.

Locomotion is the point of it all, you must maintain Sam's balance while protecting your cargo from the elements, enemy humans, and most importantly the ghosts that haunt all the edges of your paths and some spaces in between. Some light resource and energy management is required to progress, which can take a toll with all the menuing required.

At some point the game will require you to engage with gun combat, though nonlethal measures should always be fully explored as a dead body can leave you with more trouble than you started with. I recommend attempting to remain in stealth or avoid most overworld combat encounters unless you plan to clear an area out for a while. The ghosts can present a frustrating challenge for some beginners but become mostly trivial speed bumps around midway through the game.

Death Stranding always leaves me wanting to complete one last haul over and over. Its a very satisfying core loop that rewards planning, building up infrastructure, and engaging with all its systems.

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For those who have played the base game and feel satisfied, this is not a necessary purchase. There is nothing fundamentally transformative from the game you have experienced, though if you would like to play through again I don't recommend against an upgrade if that option is available to you. You will have access to a few new and variant items and overall improved combat experience, a couple new locations and activities, a robust photo mode, and DualSense support. Added context for several characters doesn't go amiss. Overall the combat feel is quite substantially improved, and the added training mode provides fun scenarios to try out each new weapon and help onboard new players to the challenges they will be facing in a low-risk scenario. These are nice touches on an already strong work, but may not be compelling enough to recommend an additional purchase.

Playing through these last 100 or so hours on my PS5 controller has been a wonderful experience, and its all thanks to the adaptive triggers. The effect of having Sam grasping a cumbersome load translate to varying levels of added trigger resistance, and the snappy feeling of firing off shots with some weapons or binding an enemy with your strand is very satisfying and harmonizes with gameplay. I don't recommend going out and buying one just for this, but if you have one to hand its my preference.

great mystery game, the story is engaging and the puzzles aren't too hard. my partner and I finished it over the course of a couple weeks without using hints. very fun, would buy more dlc as long as they made it.

If you can believe it, the gunplay is terrible, and if it weren't so unprofitable to mine at this point I would suspect that is what is happening here.

Don't drink and drive.

Not just the rocks, but the stones and minerals too.

Not very funny or fun, can't say it is a bad time really, just that it is absolutely nothing special. It's like a one room stanley parable mixed with one of those "escape the x" flash games with some really light toilet humor. If you want another game for your completionist showcase it is breezy, otherwise steer clear. Also, what is with the DIY grenade launcher site linked above the urinal? Seems a little suspicious.

Very solid little story, great music and vibes, the sound and character design I think are pretty spot on. Gameplay is simple, arrange some items, walk around, talk to people. If you're looking for something to get you through a rainy day off, I highly recommend it.

I really like walking sims, and this is among my favorites. It is difficult for me to critique the story as I think most of it is best experienced through gameplay, but suffice to say that it is alright, not super great, but the way that the environments unfold around you while you learn more leads to a very satisfying experience in my opinion. I feel like this is a very subjective experience, a lot of people may not see the point, but I would recommend at least trying it out on sale. Not a bad way to spend a couple hours on a long weekend.

Since i saw the changing tunnel tech demo video, I have looked forward to the release of this game, unfortunately I think that as a game it falls very flat. The tech on show is very interesting still, but the implementation of it gives me a headache and there is nothing at all interesting in the mountains of dialogue I encountered. Sorry for refunding.

I originally played on PS4 and got just short of platinum only missed out on the final challenge as controller was just too slow for me to finish in time so I bought it on here so I can try and finally see the last of it.
I played through the whole thing originally in a 2-3 day span of little else, and the trippy effect of seeing the shapes in the world around me after that dive was surreal, and very fun.

The total vision of the puzzle design of the game is really benefited from the open world, allowing the designer to place not only some very interesting environmental elements but also sprinkling through some more complex puzzles that the rules for are explained elsewhere, giving you an interesting peek into what is to come and sometimes allowing you to sequence break a little if you can parse it out yourself. Sometimes it can be a little frustrating trying to figure out what the game wants from you in a particular location, but almost always that can be alleviated by coming back to it later, either because the puzzle element will be explained more simply elsewhere, or because your eyes just need a little break from whatever challenge you are facing, and until almost the very end of the game, there is always another avenue to explore.

There is a lot of feeling that the game is pretentious, or takes itself to seriously, and while I agree that the philosophy can be a bit much at times and feels a little off inside of such a colorful world, I don't think that it is at odds with the more laid back, contemplative vibe here, and few of the quotes and ideas really apply directly to the message of the game in my mind, it is more of an atmospheric element than some sort of self-aggrandizing inclusion to try and make the game seem more grown up than it is.

I can envision a version of The Witness that has none of the elements of the overworld, say something like inbento or any other traditional 2d puzzle game that works perfectly well on a tablet. The Witness has a sense of immersion that is hard to top, and puzzles that are easy to master. Just don't let yourself get frustrated and quit, keep it up and don't try to take too big of a bite, I think you'll like it.