Keywords: action, doomsday, walking simulator, and delivery.
Since I built a gaming desktop PC, I have used it to play Death Stranding. Now, I would like to write down my humble reviews of this amazing game.
Before I made the purchase, I also did tons of homework to understand the game because I couldn’t easily get an idea from the names or some snapshots. I had never been one of Hideo’s fans, and the reviews online seemed diverging and conflicting so much. That’s really interesting.
After I spent more than 400 hours in Death Stranding, I got a more clear picture of who might love this game and what the game was about.
Lay down all MULEs.
Again.
This is a game for people who were good at combat but hate it. I had been well trained by Ninjai Gaiden II to observe, analyze and then react to lay everyone down efficiently. But I have been tired of fighting action games. Luckily, in Death Stranding, we can avoid most combats and only handle a few boss fights to push the plot progress.
This is a game for people who love hiking, scenery viewing, rethinking, and exploration. I can tell you that more than 350 of my gameplay hours were spent on the deliveries or creating paths for further deliveries. I enjoyed climbing and descending a mountain so that I can build ziplines for my next visit. I enjoyed taking snapshots of magnificent or funny views. I also enjoyed every footstep avoiding dangers toward my destinations while thinking of some other amazing people and things in my life.
Although some people mocked at it as nothing more than a walking simulator in a doomsday background, I can still tell you that’s merely a superficial opinion of Death Stranding. There are too many facts to controvert, but I would just like to enumerate some aspects and tips I think were interesting, useful, and you might haven’t known. If you find it interesting as well, go ahead to experience Death Stranding for more cool things.
1. Lessons and Tips
The first part includes some ideas and tips I summarized. Hope they can help you in the game or talk you into the game.
1.a Map Scale
For this kind of open-world game, the map design might be the most important thing, but there was no official information of the map size or scale telling us how big the world of Death Stranding was. There existed some Redditors that tried to map UCA cities to the existing cities of the USA. Some of them did a good job, but no one can answer my question about the map scale. So I tried to figure it out by myself.
My reasoning for the map scale is as follows: The DS map shrunk the real US map horizontally by 90:1, and vertically by 5:1. It takes roughly 24 hours to drive from the southern border to the northern border in the US while it took me 16 minutes to drive from South Knot City to the north rim of the ruined Central Knot City. The ratio of 24 hours to 16 minutes is roughly 90.
From the googled geometric information “The highest point in Colorado is Mount Elbert at 14,433 feet (4401 m),” but the highest altitude in Death Stranding was 844m. The ratio of 4401 to 844 is about 5.
I theorized that Hideo was trying to reduce the horizontal distance to include more geographic features and biomes into Death Stranding. The world in the game was somehow mimicking the real map of the US, but I can still feel lots of terrains were dismissed or compressed to meet the need of plotted campaigns.
1.b. Chill Delivery
While I started to take all the standard orders, I found the chill delivery hard. Some Redditors said cargoes on ziplines or under the backpack cover can still remain chilled, but those didn’t work actually.
The solution turns out to be super straightforward: a truck can keep the cargo chilled. We were allowed to fabricate trucks since Episode 3, so if we can figure out truck paths to delivery destinations (probably avoiding some BT territories or steep slopes), all chill deliveries can be fulfilled easily.
1.c. Zipline
I and my zipline with my triple-L S rank mark on it.
Sam using his cufflink to fly on a zipline.
Among all methods of delivery, I especially prefer to use ziplines (unlocked since Episode 5). I usually managed to reach some peaks or ridges that seemed dangerous but can fully stretch the maximum range of Lv.2 zipline, 350m. It might be risky to reach those sites, but the profits included less consumption of chiral bandwidth, fewer resources to maintain, and faster traveling speed from preppers to preppers.
There are two important tips regarding ziplines. When getting off from a zipline, you need to turn the camera to face a safe direction and then press the button ‘B’ to leave the zipline. Forgetting to face the correct direction might incur serious falling damages.
The other important trick I often use was the unlimited loading weight on ziplines. Here are the steps to take advantage of it:
- Before setting off from a starting prepper, I put a floating cart on the ground.
- Load most of the heavy items on the floating cart and only a few items on Sam’s back.
- Close the terminal and load all items on Sam’s back. Sam would be overloaded and cannot move. If the floating cart is the last thing Sam can carry, then the amount of cargo is perfect.
- Unload all heavy items from Sam’s back to the floating cart until Sam can easily move.
- Connect the floating cargo and go to the zipline.
- Face the camera to zipline and open the cargo menu to load all items including the floating cart on Sam’s back.
- Sam cannot walk again, but we can directly get on the zipline and go.
As you can see this method is bounded by the maximum volume on Sam’s back. I usually used this method to carry high-density materials for facility repair.
1.d. Umbilical cord cutter
We got some prototype samples of anti-BT grenades from Episode 2 to fight BTs, but the cord-cutter from Mama in Episode 5 was my favorite weapon because it never ran out of batteries or ammo.
Whenever I entered a BT territory, I immediately crouched in lower profile and move stealthily heading toward the closest BT without holding my breath. When the odradek sensor started to rotate, I hold my breath and kept moving while staring the lower half of the screen. Once the “Cut umbilical cord” message popped up, I stopped walking and press ‘X’ to kill a BT. I found Sam’s breath meter got fully restored at the same time, so I can keep moving to kill the next closest BT until the area got cleared up.
The screaming and roaring of BTs must be very scary, but with the cord cutter in our hands, the only thing we needed was to stay calm and carefully execute every move. Only certain rare giant BTs cannot be handled with cord cutter, but we still got options of other heavy anti-BT weapons to remove them.
1.e. Swimming
Getting swept by rapid water cannot kill Sam instantly. Instead, Sam’s HP would get drained gradually. Although most items on Sam’s back would be pulled off and get damaged, we can paddle to either side of the river and pick them up again. I was so panicked and afraid of getting drowned when I stepped into torrents for the first time. That was totally unnecessary. LOL.
If you are interested in developing more swimming skills in DS, there are some pieces of equipment that can enhance Sam’s performance in the water. I would talk about it latter.
1.f. Must-Have Equipment
Lv.3 Battery
It can be obtained when you level up the bridge connection to the Distribution Center North of Mountain Knot City.
We will get more and more types of equipment that consume the battery of Same, like power grove, gravity grove, thermal pad, and exoskeletons. If we can enlarge Sam’s better capacity, deliveries can be more smooth.
Lv2. Backpack Cover
The backpack cover can be obtained when we strengthen the bridge link with a hidden prepper called Collector.
Every item under the backpack cover can be protected from weather and water. If Sam by accident falled onto the ground, the covered items can stay undamaged as well.
Please note that the cover can only clad four medium-size packages or two large ones. If more items were stacked up, the rest would be put above the cover without any protection.
Sticky Gun
Order 36: Retrieve Sticky Guns From MULEs
I always carried a sticky gun on my truck when I set out to maintain my highways. With a sticky gun, I can fetch scattered lost cargoes from the repairing sites. Some retrieval orders can also be accomplished with a sticky gun without entering the poisonous caves or breaches.
1.g Farming Chemicals
While building and maintaining a zipline network, I realized that the only type of insufficient resources was chemical. In the east coast map, we can only keep delivering to accumulate more chemicals on all preppers, but in the central map, we have three faster ways to get more chemicals.
Spiritualist
Light-Weight Chemicals: 600 units in 12 kg
Sending cargoes to the Spiritualist can get some light-weight chemicals as rewards. They are still in large size packages but easy to carry.
Evo-Devo Biologist
Hight-Density Chemicals: in medium-size cargo
Evo-devo biologist rewarded Sam with high-density chemicals, which were in medium size yet perfect for the unlimited weight loading ziplining.
Terrorists in Volcanic Area
Plain Chemicals
Prerequisites: one Lv.2 Bola Gun and Four Lv.4 Armor Plates.
If I ran out of orders to spiritualist and evo-devo biologist, I can ransack the terrorists in the southwest corner of the central map. The terrorists in the volcanic area were equipped with lethal weapons, so please take Lv.4 armor plates and Lv.2 Bola Gun with you.
1.h. Speechless Details
Getting on Truck
If Sam get on the truck from the right side of the vehicle, he will hop from the passenger’s seat to the driver’s seat. And we had to wait until this animation was finished.
Abandoning Truck
If a truck was totally ruined while Sam was inside, Sam jumpped out to abandon the truck before the explosion just like an action movie.
Neck Pillow
I accidentally knocked down a MULE in the water and found he had a neck pillow preventing him from drowning. Wow! What a thoughtful design!
Height Clearance
I used to be too greedy and carried too many things on Sam’s back. Then the low ceiling of MULE’s tents and preppers came to wipe down my cargoes. Crouch to avoid the clearance.
1.i. Hidden Preppers
There are many hidden preppers providing helpful gears as rewards. I am not revealing the locations here, but I would like to list the rewards as incentives for readers to discover them.
Collector
Backpack cover: As mentioned above, it provided protection from weather, falling, and water.
Cosplayer
Otter hood: This is the must-have to a good swimmer.
The Journalist’s Son
D-Cryptobiote: If you visit terrorists very often, this special type of water bears can recover HP more efficiently.
Musician
Harmonica: While taking a break in the wild, Sam can play the harmonica to make BB happy.
The Veteran Porter
Increase of Chiral bandwidth, talisman, and accessibility to other players' facilities.
The First Prepper
Same as the veteran porter.
2. Top 3 Hardest Orders
In this part, I list the three hardest orders in the very hard mode while I worked toward 500 S ranks in Legend of Legends of Legends. To avoid spoiling the gaming experience, I defered my solutions to these orders for your reference to the end of the post.
2.a The Third Hardest Order: 562
From Mountain Knot City to Timefall Farm
Time limit: 7 min 30 sec
Weight: 20 pcs in 1,200 kg
Straight Distance: 2,247 m
Challenges: Crossing the central mountains, one BT area, insufficient battery, and one MULE camp.
The highest mountains and harsh weather seemed unbeatable, scattered BTs were hard to circumvent, and the allowed time budget was super tight.
2.b The Second Hardest Order: 323
From Doctor to Mountaineer
Time limit: 6 min 45 sec
Weight: 18 pcs in 1,080 kg
Straight Distance: 1,152 m
Challenges: Ascending steep mountains, one BT area, and heavily snowy weather.
On the path from doctor the mountaineer, there were a graveyard full of BTs, steep mountains not good for driving, and blizzards blinding our vision very often.
2.c The Hardest Order: 145
From Port Knot City to Capital Knot City
Urgent: 10 min 4 sec
Weight: 44 pcs in 840 kg
Straight Distance: 3,615 m
Challenges: Three BT areas, insufficient battery, and one MULE camp.
This one was almost impossible. I have seen some solutions for the hard mode online, but there seemed no reliable solution for the very hard mode, in which the pieces of cargoes were doubled and the time limit got shortened further.
3. My Reviews
I try my best not to give my reviews without spoiling the story.
3.a. Storyline: 3.5 out of 5
I can guess the ending of the story around the middle of the episodes, so I cannot give a very high score for the story.
But there existed several scenes I think were very moving. For example, the incinerator scenes sending out the beloved ones were always heartbreaking.
The bad guy was disgusting enough, and the border of good and evil was sometimes as vague as the real world. I tried to map some characters into Robert McKee’s Antagonism to analyze why I thought the story was still impressive.
Robert McKee’s Compelling Antagonism in Fiction
Besides good guys and bad guys occupied top-left and bottom-right corners, there were some people who seemly stood opposite Sam. The Junk Dealer, for example, even maliciously asked Sam to fulfill a nearly suicidal order.
To fight against the bad guys, some people adopted extreme, immoral, or uncontrollable methods like the project of bridge baby and the mysterious Chiralium network. They can be categorized into the double negative corner.
With the four corners got occupied, the plot can simulate a real society more vividly through the interactions among each other thereby instead of only having binary good-or-evil characters.
3.b. Sci-Fi Theory: 4 out of 5
We got a world after doomsday. The disastrous timefalls, BTs, voidouts, terrorist attacks kept happening.
People started to make use of the mysterious Chiralium materials to fight disasters. There got to be some expense people needed to pay for overcoming the inconvenience. Then Sam piece by piece figured out that all disasters and useful tools were connected to the same source. I would say the fictitious foundation was well designed.
3.c. Video and Audio: 5 out of 5
As a person who likes hiking, how can I not give full stars to the atmosphere forged by the photorealistic visual and immersive audio effects?
Additionally, those rewarding songs selected by Hideo were all descriptive to the scenes. My favorite songs are Bones, Don’t Be So Serious, Asylums for the Feeling. The beginning song, “Don’t Be So Serious”, told us the mood of Sam and why he was delivering. The lyrics of Bones matched the feeling sending the esteemed elder’s body on her last journey.
After barely passing through a long BT valley and suddenly seeing the destination, Port Knot City, “Asylums for the Feeling” together with the grand overlook brought us a healing effect and a coveted relief.
3.d. Difficulty Design: 4.5 out of 5
The combats with BTs, bosses, and MULEs were easy for me even in the very hard mode.
Most delivery orders were challenging but not ridiculously hard.
Once the player made some mistake, there usually were some error tolerance allowed to get good ranks.
In addition, getting helps from Other Players made the difficulty more reasonable.
3.e Degree of Freedom: 5 out of 5
Players were allowed to arrange the orders, balance cargo weight, schedule time limits, and decide transportation methods. I liked all these designs.
Besides, there were so many hidden elements for players to discover, I just show some here for your reference.
Giant Cryptobiotic Nest.
Abandoned Roadside Factory
Torii
Overall: 4.4 out of 5
In summary, I highly recommend this game to readers. It is something beyond a game, and I can only describe a small portion of it in this post. Go ahead to experience it!
4. Trail Spoiling Warning!
Stop reading if you want the gameplay experience to remain challenging.
4.a The Third Hardest Order: 562
There existed a valley behind the hill close to Mountain Knot City. We can follow NPC porters through the valley and then head downhill to the Timefall Farm.
4.b The Second Hardest Order: 323
It requires some detouring to avoid the graveyard full of BTs. Drive uphill and balance your truck carefully along the pink route.
4.c The Hardest Order: 145
This one stopped most players from getting the 500 triple-L mark.
Before taking order 145, you need to clear a path in the mountainous BT area with Sam’s cord cutter. It is almost impossible to entirely wipe out all BTs, but you only need to clear those BTs close to the pink route along the north wall of the valley.
I would suggest you to clear BTs from right to left upward. Once you reach the hilltop, haste to Port Knot City and take the order. Then drive carefully along the pink route. You might still see some BTs fooling around, just keep some distance to avoid them.
Then the path to the next BT area right below the Ludens' fan prepper is hard as well. I have no better idea. What I did was carefully drive in the shallow water along the river. I was lucky without hitting any BT. I wish you luck as well.
Once you enter the MULE camp area, things become easier. Drive at full speed along the pink route and turn right uphill to avoid the last BT area on the coast. Then, you can directly head to the destination.
I put my streamed gameplay videos on YouTube:
My full playlist.