Death Stranding

Valderen

Space Pirate
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Since there is such a drought of games right now, I started my 3rd playthrough of this, this time the Director's Cut.

I know I'm strange, but I just enjoy this game so much. It's so chill to just carry stuff from A to B and build stuff. I'm still in Episode 1 in this playthrough, just going maxing my connections with all the delivery place.

Seriously, I just deliver stuff and 2-3 hours have passed and I didn't notice.
 
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Valderen

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We’ll just finished my 3rd play through, this time of the Director’s Cut.

I finished it in 65 hours compared to 90 hours the first time. I did pretty much the same thing, which is to build all the roads, and get almost all of the destination to 5 stars. Think I have only the Collector and First Prepper left that weren’t 5 stars. So I shaved 25 hours just by being more efficient, it showed with building the roads since I collected Metals and Ceramics a lot more efficiently basically having tons of it in my private locker so I was able to build roads immediately as I expanded the Chiral Network. It was just as much fun building my Zip Line network as before, basically able to zip all the way from east to west without setting foot on the ground.

The new stuff you could built was not great in my opinion, most of it I didn’t really make use of sticking mostly with the original structures.

All in all, I enjoyed this just as much as the first time, and it‘s still just as weird and confusing. :)
 
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Rajaah

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Thinking about playing this next / over the holidays because I'm kind of between games and have a lot of free time. I need something to keep me distracted/occupied so I don't think about recent real-life tragedies. I also don't want to ruin any particularly amazing games for myself by playing them right now. Was looking over my shelf and this stood out as, maybe, the thing to go with. Not super amazing, but good, and relaxing / kills time. And also deals with heavy subjects that might resonate with me at this time. I planned on playing Dragonflight and Crisis Core this month but instead here I am, not playing anything.

Should I play on Normal? I want it to be easy and not give me any grief. But I'm wondering if this is one of those games where normal means easy and easy means 4babies.

Anything in particular that I need to know before I start it?

Am I right that this is the kind of game where you can just zone out and play, without getting lost or having to refer to guides at all?
 

Janx

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Thinking about playing this next / over the holidays because I'm kind of between games and have a lot of free time. I need something to keep me distracted/occupied so I don't think about recent real-life tragedies. I also don't want to ruin any particularly amazing games for myself by playing them right now. Was looking over my shelf and this stood out as, maybe, the thing to go with. Not super amazing, but good, and relaxing / kills time. And also deals with heavy subjects that might resonate with me at this time. I planned on playing Dragonflight and Crisis Core this month but instead here I am, not playing anything.

Should I play on Normal? I want it to be easy and not give me any grief. But I'm wondering if this is one of those games where normal means easy and easy means 4babies.

Anything in particular that I need to know before I start it?

Am I right that this is the kind of game where you can just zone out and play, without getting lost or having to refer to guides at all?
Starts a little slow. I really really liked this game and had a blast playing through it. Just a really chill game.
 

Bandwagon

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Thinking about playing this next / over the holidays because I'm kind of between games and have a lot of free time. I need something to keep me distracted/occupied so I don't think about recent real-life tragedies.
This is just my own opinion, but I prefer tequila, uppers, downers and a generous amount of self destructive behavior in that situation.
 
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I'm a big fan of death stranding. pretty chill . you can play it like you want. so you can just walk to each destination, or you can build out infrastructure to make future missions faster. the big setting i adovcate being aware of, is that if you play with online features, other player will shit up your world with their items or roads. so you may come to a new area and have ropes, ladders, bridges and roads built by other people, instead of your own hand. it radically changes the feel of conquoring the wild. that being said, 'full road' building can be time consuming. lots of driving suplies around to accumulate resources to build more. note that you don't 'need' roads. and there's only a few crossroads style places or places with janky terrain i consider them to be vital.

I think higher difficulty makes combat foes harder, you run out of stamina faster, and the stealth portions are way, way more tight.

But by and large the game isn't really overtuned. you can sneak through it, barbarian fight everyone, zoom past on a bike wheely-ing through, or build enough infrastructure to sneak past most challenges. the boss fights will slap your nuts off at first but once you get the flow of them, its really just about having enough resources when you start, or buying time while you find them.
 
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Rajaah

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This is just my own opinion, but I prefer tequila, uppers, downers and a generous amount of self destructive behavior in that situation.

Been there, done that.

I'm a big fan of death stranding. pretty chill . you can play it like you want. so you can just walk to each destination, or you can build out infrastructure to make future missions faster. the big setting i adovcate being aware of, is that if you play with online features, other player will shit up your world with their items or roads. so you may come to a new area and have ropes, ladders, bridges and roads built by other people, instead of your own hand. it radically changes the feel of conquoring the wild. that being said, 'full road' building can be time consuming. lots of driving suplies around to accumulate resources to build more. note that you don't 'need' roads. and there's only a few crossroads style places or places with janky terrain i consider them to be vital.

I think higher difficulty makes combat foes harder, you run out of stamina faster, and the stealth portions are way, way more tight.

But by and large the game isn't really overtuned. you can sneak through it, barbarian fight everyone, zoom past on a bike wheely-ing through, or build enough infrastructure to sneak past most challenges. the boss fights will slap your nuts off at first but once you get the flow of them, its really just about having enough resources when you start, or buying time while you find them.

So basically, don't play it with online features? Not having to spend as much time building infrastructure sounds good, but at the same time "conquering the wild" sounds even better.

Good to hear Kojima is still good at boss fights. The boss fights might be my favorite parts of MGS1/2/3/4, or at least the most memorable parts.
 

Valderen

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Been there, done that.



So basically, don't play it with online features? Not having to spend as much time building infrastructure sounds good, but at the same time "conquering the wild" sounds even better.

Good to hear Kojima is still good at boss fights. The boss fights might be my favorite parts of MGS1/2/3/4, or at least the most memorable parts.

I played through 3 times, and always have the online feature on and I would personally never consider turning it off. The idea is that you're not the only "Porter" out there, and others are building the stuff they need also, and that in my opinion it feeds really well with the concept of the game. Since everyone is pretty much going through the same story, a lot of the stuff you will find is in useful places.

For example, it's pretty cool to be driving your bike and seeing your battery getting low, and finding a recharge station just about where you need it.

That's a personal thing though, if you want to turn it off and build everything by yourself, it's probably a good experience also.
 
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Janx

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Its not like your world is full of all sorts of stuff from other players either. Its kind of piecemeal so you can flesh out existing world items to make it work better for you.
 
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Been there, done that.



So basically, don't play it with online features? Not having to spend as much time building infrastructure sounds good, but at the same time "conquering the wild" sounds even better.

Good to hear Kojima is still good at boss fights. The boss fights might be my favorite parts of MGS1/2/3/4, or at least the most memorable parts.
there are two online settings. one is something like "login on launch" which enables all of it. then you can choose for shared content, "dont' share vehicles structures or signs" or "share everything. By all means do try to start with it on if you'd like. what you'll find is random things built in the world that are helpful, some times abandoned vehicles, and lots of abandoned packages you can pick up and deliver 'for' other people. it does complete for them and give them resources, and if you drop packages they can deliver them for you. the main reason i disabled it (aside from slowly conquoring the world) is that your hud also shows suggested paths other plays took, and i found myself just aping them the first few times. they also leave tons of signs everywehre, which are a bit like elden ring player marks, albeit with less but hole.

the online content doesn't touch your world till you reach an area though. so you can start with it turned on, then sort of like...decide you dislike it, turn off login-on-launch, and restart the game. and no new things will be added. you'll just have world bare of player shenanigans after a bit. i found it to become more jarring in the second region when suddenly there's random patches of road you didn't build, and wonder how they got there.
 

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I don't get this game. delivery boy? hiking? meditation?
its weird to explain. you either like it or you don't. it's just like a detailed mechanics of moving objects from point A to B over various terrain and obstacles. some times you think you'll take on more weight for more payout and get bogged down moving slower when crazy people try to take your packages. or you get caught in the rain. some times you find junk in the wildnerss you can turn in for reward and you weigh if you should throw it on the pack too and move even slower.

you put thought into what you may want to bring in terms of supplies to make a journey. do you carry 2 ladders or 1? do you bring a rope? it all takes up space and/or weight on your frame and you wind up wanting to be choosey about that.

later in the game you get bigger vehicles like bikes and trucks and you can do huge deliveries but you bump into terrain they can't cross and have to walk part. or it makes sneaking very hard.

it's a weird ass game for sure. kind of relaxing.
 
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Rajaah

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Played the first hour or two. Daaaaamn. This game is awesome. It's very Hideo Kojima. So much weird-assedness, horrifying bosses, a generally esoteric and ethereal story that doesn't quite fit in our world. I had trouble turning it off. Stunning. Good for depressed people. I can't wait to see what else this game has in store for me. Hopefully more shadow hell-people and wearing Power-up Babies.
 
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Adebisi

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This game is amazing but prob the worst UI experience I've ever had for something I've put so much time into.

Its obnoxious, really
 
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Rajaah

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This game is amazing but prob the worst UI experience I've ever had for something I've put so much time into.

Its obnoxious, really

I played another hour or so. I can see this game getting super tedious. Having to cross all this landscape, with Sam tripping constantly and having to deal with footing issues... it's realistic, yeah, but it slows things way down. I just want to run from point A to point B. I guess that's why you can build infrastructure. I think I'm less into the construction and the relaxing? terrain-crossing and more into the world-building and all the mysteries around it.

Reminds me a lot of how enraptured I was when I first started watching Lost. Hopefully this ends better than that did.
 

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They give you a motorbike at some point that makes many trips way faster. Tho some regions are just super rocky and you and end up hiking
 

Janx

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I played another hour or so. I can see this game getting super tedious. Having to cross all this landscape, with Sam tripping constantly and having to deal with footing issues... it's realistic, yeah, but it slows things way down. I just want to run from point A to point B. I guess that's why you can build infrastructure. I think I'm less into the construction and the relaxing? terrain-crossing and more into the world-building and all the mysteries around it.

Reminds me a lot of how enraptured I was when I first started watching Lost. Hopefully this ends better than that did.
Never had a problem with tripping once you get used to using the triggers to steady your footing. Think I'd just hit both of them to really hunker down for a sec then get back to it.
 
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