the unescapable ragebait that is reddit death stranding fans genuinely believing the game is just an analogy for kojima’s feelings on the metal gear series/konami situation OR thinking it’s a walking sim with no plot. gags. i feel like im getting my brain scraped with a spoon every time i have to read some godawful & genuinely brainless take from the main sub over there tbh. if i was kojima seeing that i would be inclined to do some voidout shit irl because as a creative having everything you make be associated back to another piece in a negative or reductive light is nightmarish. i love metal gear btw for clarity, it’s my second primary game interest; this is a bash on how reddit ds fans will be unable to move on (cough. #TheThemes moment.) and see something new without boiling it down and hyper-simplifying it until its broken visage fits haphazardly into the shadow left by the existing thing… without even engaging with the existing thing fully. E.g. the political themes which serve as a framework for metal gear’s narrative are analogous to the political themes which serve as a framework for death stranding’s narrative in numerous ways, including in the sense that they are 1) presented to the player via a role of nuanced and interactive complicity from the playable character & 2) a critique on US imperialism etc.! but nobody over there seems to want to think about these Actual overarching storytelling and creative driving factors. instead they are busy wanting to have a “[Video Game]: Explained” moment. it’s never going to be so simple! kojima’s storytelling is so rich because everything is about something else in a realistic & wonderfully multi-factorial and nuanced way. death stranding is comprised of critique and/or analysis regarding the US, manufactured nostalgia as propaganda, isolation as a means and system of control, lack of autonomy, grief & the inability to move forward, systems of abuse and the enviroments which perpetuate them, so on and so forth — there is SO much to strip back. but oftentimes it feels as if so very few people want to engage with ds like that. and THAT is painful.
