Death Stranding

Life’s a beach and then you don’t die

- IAN EVENDEN

“DO AS I SAY, and it will all make sense,” says Guillermo Del Toro’s character near the beginning of Death Stranding. That might as well be game director Hideo Kojima talking directly to the player, because, as with much of the Metal Gear Solid creator’s latest title, little does make sense. Even if you do as he says.

Set in a post-apocalyptic world, Death Stranding at least has a unique apocalypse. The worlds of the living and the dead became connected, rain began making things age (known as timefall), and invisible ghosts now wander the landscape, violently exploding any living people they touch. What remains of humanity has retreated underground, but the cities have become disconnected. Your job is to wander roughly from east to west across the US, delivering cargo to cities, connecting them to a chiral network that'll magically solve everything, and avoiding the explodey ghosts (BTs), human terrorists (MULEs), and weirder things.