If there’s a single word most commonly used to describe the original Death Stranding, it’s probably “weird.” In many ways, it’s understandable why this label stuck. You played as an American porter, bluntly named Sam Porter Bridges (Norman Reedus), with a jar baby strapped to his chest, fighting ghosts and a glossary of proper nouns as you attempted to make heads or tails of Extinction Entities, Beached Things, Voidouts, and any number of other made up words, all while collaborating with allies who also had Young Goodman Brown-style names like Die-Hardman and Fragile. And also, Sam’s mom is the President, and he loves slamming Monster Energy drinks, and there was an advertisement in the game for Norman Reedus’ real-life podcast—is this Sam’s podcast, or is Norman Reedus, like, a separate guy who also existed in this world?
But while it’s entirely valid to describe Death Standing’s narrative as weird, the arguably more impressive way that the game subverted norms was through its gameplay: this was a AAA videogame about delivering packages. Yes, there were occasional combat encounters and boss fights, but this all took a backseat to the meditative hum of a cross-country road trip, one that involved climbing mountains, crossing rivers, and building things, both for yourself and fellow players. In the rare cases where you had to fight, non-lethality wasn’t only encouraged but borderline necessitated by the metaphysics of this setting because doing otherwise could result in a killed person essentially exploding like a tactical nuke (it’s a long story).
It was essentially the polar opposite of big-budget games that flaunt their violence in red band trailers. Instead of virtually blowing dudes’ brains out with a real-life rifle that may end up in the next lurid headline, you collaborated with players to rebuild a fractured America. It was in these moments of working together with digital strangers that the game’s themes about the importance of cooperation and combating modern isolation felt the most resonant.
However, perhaps the strangest thing about the first Death Stranding is that lots of people played it, a somewhat staggering 20 million, in fact. Much of this attention probably came from the fact that it was the next game from Hideo Kojima, the creator of Metal Gear, and his new studio Kojima Productions, but even still, that’s a lot of people willing to play a game about playing as a post-apocalyptic mailman.
And it’s a good thing that all those people played it because this success paved the way for Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, a sequel that hones its predecessor without losing any of its eccentric charm. Once again, the seemingly mundane act of delivering packages is transformed into a multi-step process that involves careful planning and even more careful execution as you scale hazardous terrain, battle the elements, and make a mad dash to escape goopy ghosts. But more than just maintaining what made the previous game so novel, it also improves on its shortcomings, telling a tighter, much more emotionally engaging story that intermixes brutal farewells with over-the-top anime flourishes. In the process, it avoids the pacing problems of the first game, where an intriguing opening gave way to 30 hours of interacting with dead-eyed holograms until you reached the closing hours, where meaningful storytelling suddenly returned.
This follow-up begins with a sequence that feels like a statement of purpose: 11 months after uniting an America shattered by the Death Stranding, an apocalyptic event that broke down boundaries between the world of the living and the dead, Sam stands on a craggy peak with little Lou strapped to his chest via a BabyBjorn. Looking down from a peak, we get the classic Wanderer above the Sea of Fog shot that open world games love to do, a romantic invitation for exploration. But rather than just admiring these mountains from afar, you immediately begin your arduous journey home, maneuvering Sam as he navigates narrow ridges to the sound of Lou’s adorable baby noises (the award for cutest videogame baby goes to…).
As the camera pans to a wide arc shot—one of many camera flourishes that tastefully break up the standard over-the-shoulder view—you soak in the scope of your surroundings. The view is more imposing and awe-inspiring than in Skyrim or any number of games in this style because you know exploring this terrain won’t be a matter of awkwardly clipping your character up steep inclines with a series of bunny hops but a slow process of finding footholds and paths of least resistance to make your delivery. It also can’t be overstated just how good it all looks, both in terms of graphical fidelity (this is easily one of the most technically impressive games on the PS5) and art design, as these ridges are imbued with a tactile definition that’s essential for visually communicating where you can and can’t climb. And this sight is just the first of many.
As Sam crosses this mountain pass with Lou, there’s an earthquake. You can see individual pebbles tremor, and in the distance, boulders break loose from cliffsides before smashing into the valley below. It’s a comparatively small tremor, but it alludes to one of the most substantive changes with this sequel: this world feels dynamic and thoroughly indifferent to the fact you’re carrying precious cargo. As you make deliveries, rivers flood and dry forests catch fire, frequently sending you from Plan A to B to C as you’re forced to adapt. Here, nature is beautiful, but it’s damn dangerous, too.
As Sam weathers this gate quake (earthquakes caused by complicated in-world stuff I won’t get into), he finally gets back home and finds a visitor, Fragile. Over the past few months, Sam has been on the run from his former allies in the United Cities of America after he went AWOL to save the former Bridge Baby Lou. Lucky for Sam, Fragile has an offer, and if he can link up Mexico with the Chiral Network (the pseudo-magical technology that helps unify the scattered survivors of this apocalypse), his misdeeds will be wiped from the record. This section more or less acts as a tutorial area, getting players back up to speed with the intricacies of this backdrop and performing deliveries.
From here, something tragic happens which I won’t spoil, and then Sam finds himself on a dramatically longer mission to link up all of Australia alongside a crew of bespoke weirdos—they’re a bunch of little freaks, and I love them dearly. They use a levitating ship that looks like the top half of a Metal Gear and lets them navigate through tar-like primordial soup.
This quest to connect Australia to the Chiral Network takes up most of the game’s beefy 50+ hour runtime, and the basic structure is the same as before. You deliver cargo to isolated places and then use your Q-pid device to hook up these shelters spread throughout the continent. While the term “walking sim” has already been sarcastically applied to a completely different kind of game, Death Stranding embodies that phrase in a fairly literal sense. Just like before, its central magic lies in how it makes getting from point A to point B as compelling and challenging as possible by introducing different kinds of terrain, hazards, and other variables that force you to analyze and fully engage with this environment.
On a macro scale, there’s the planning phase, where you stock up on equipment and plan out a route by factoring in terrain and the type of cargo you’re delivering. On a micro scale, you’ll constantly be using your Odradek to scan the surroundings as it lays out slope angles and potential pitfalls to avoid. While most of the main missions involve deliveries, each job feels distinct due to changing factors, like navigating unique biomes or needing to meet specific package requirements, like playing it safe to avoid damaging fragile cargo. Sometimes, you’ll go through rocky territory that demands trekking on foot, while at others, you’ll cross long stretches of flat terrain in a vehicle. Of course, there’s also Timefall to deal with (rain that causes everything it touches to age, including your deliveries), BTs to sneak around, and the previously mentioned natural disasters that force you to react to sudden dangers.
Thankfully, these many challenges are matched by an equally large lineup of slick tools; as you add outposts to the Chiral Network and raise your trust level with shelters, you’ll gain an almost overwhelming number of handy devices. Favorites from the last game, like the zip lines or your trusty three-wheeled motorcycle, make a return alongside tons of new toys, such as a speedy hoverboard coffin that lets you zip over tar. Existing tools are improved as well, with vehicles driving much better thanks to a greater sense of traction and control, and the added gadgets make it rewarding to interact with each challenge. At one point, I carried an injured kangaroo on my back while navigating a burning forest, using the Tar gun to douse a thin trail through wildfires. At another, a sudden avalanche forced me to U-turn, gun it, and hide behind a rocky outcropping to avoid getting swept away, a maneuver made possible thanks to my upgraded off-roader.
Since there’s rarely a one-size-fits-all solution to your problems, the planning phase before a mission comes with actual consideration, making it seem like you’re gearing up for a genuine journey instead of just going through the motions. Add in the extremely impressive number of upgrades to earn by completing missions and a whole other progression system where you unlock abilities that do everything from improving your sensors to letting you more frequently interact with other players’ creations, and there are tons of ways to approach crossing the outback.
Speaking of other players, the “strand” connection system from the last game, where users collaborate to build structures and share resources, makes its return, both working as a neat mechanic and furthering the story’s themes. While the narrative can sometimes bluntly beat you over the head with its overarching message about collaboration and connection, the gameplay more subtly reinforces this by encouraging players to lend each other a hand. I can’t count the number of times I went to build a generator to recharge my ride or craft a watchtower to get the drop on an enemy outpost, only to find that another player had already done so, and that’s not to mention how essential it is to pool resources for bigger projects like road reconstruction. It all creates the sense that you’re truly working together towards a common goal.
Altogether, these deliveries instill a meditative tone, and while it won’t be for everyone, the game’s thoughtful pace sometimes conjures the introspective qualities of transcendentalist films in how it focuses on the mundane details of backbreaking labor—but only if partway through an austere farming scene in Ordet, you were suddenly treated to a battle between a giant robot samurai and a Kiss reject who fights with an electric guitar that shoots lightning.
Death Stranding 2 thrives in this collision between grounded, human details and anime nonsense, and while it retains some of the convoluted details and occasional unevenness of its predecessor, it tells a dramatically more resonant tale. A major problem with the first game was that most of its cutscenes and major story moments were concentrated at its beginning and end, leaving a valley in the middle, where you were mostly just interacting with lifeless quest-givers. By contrast, this follow-up does a dramatically better job of distributing its narrative beats throughout, peppering in shorter, more concise sequences instead of dropping it all in a movie-length sequence at the end.
Much of this success stems from the fact that Sam isn’t alone on this journey, meaning he’s constantly interacting with his allies. He’s part of Drawbridge this time around, a delivery organization created by Fragile, which includes old buddies from the previous game and plenty of great, goofily named newcomers. In between missions, you’ll go back to the DHV Magellan for tactical meetings on the bridge or witness slice-of-life moments that eventually build up well-developed relationships between this supernaturally powered crew.
For instance, Dollman may be a sentient puppet, but his genuine attempts at helping Sam resolve his grief convey his empathy and care. Fragile has a dramatically better, more active role in the story as she lends a hand to other damaged people, a turn beautifully brought to life by Léa Seydoux’s empathetic portrayal combined with some of the best motion capture in a videogame. Together, the group speculates on matters of mind-body dualism, discusses their hopes of building a better, kinder world, and work to help Sam heal from his bereavement (even more so than the first game, this sequel is about navigating the stages of grief). Put simply, this crew is the heart of the game, their bonds naturally tying into the overarching emphasis on the importance of human connection.
But don’t worry, because as previously alluded to, there is still plenty of campiness as Kojima and his team mash together disparate aesthetics into a strange pastiche. There’s a scene early on that feels like the setup for a revenge plot in a Sergio Leone western, while later, we get an unexpected Godzilla homage. A ghost cyborg rises from their coffin-like Nosferatu. George Miller is here (or at least his likeness), and he’s sort of a Captain Ahab type, but then you meet another guy who’s also a Captain Ahab type. Fragile got a redesign that includes a beret and cigarette habit, and she looks cool as hell. Everyone has a weird fixation with giving thumbs-ups, which is sometimes played as a joke and sometimes not. There’s a shockingly well-choreographed martial arts fight with a pizza guy. The bad guys are fitted in stylish techno religious garb, and Luca Marinelli’s character puts on a bandana exactly like Solid Snake before doing cool poses with militarized skeletons.
It’s all a bit reminiscent of something like Tarsem’s cult classic movie The Fall in how it wallops you with eye-catching imagery and then chases that with an intensely earnest beat before barely tying it all together with a convoluted sense of internal logic. Because underneath this ostentation are deeply sincere takes on the importance of connection as Sam works to bring people together, and while the constant allusions to “ropes” (things that connect us) and “sticks” (weapons) are very on the nose, the story and gameplay align so neatly that you’ll be tempted to forgive this.
And then there’s the climax, an awesome display of maximalist imagery and deeply personal drama that ties everything together so neatly that I was more than a little stunned. Are there a few clunker lines and probably one or two too many plot twists packed into an exceedingly long cutscene? Sure. Was the musical number really necessary? (Yes, it was.) But these minor quibbles are washed away as it interlaces the ideas it has been harping on for the past 50-something hours: acceptance in the face of grief and death, the essential qualities of genuine bonds, and human determination against the AI menace, all of which are given an extra punch thanks to the flood of symbolic spectacle. While the first Death Stranding‘s interesting ideas didn’t always fully come together, this sequel leapfrogs its predecessor with an unexpected cohesion.
All of that said, if there was another common complaint about the first game besides its writing, it’s that conflicts felt clunky, whether that was against fellow porters or giant sludge monsters. Going into this sequel, I was particularly concerned about how pre-release coverage indicated there would be an even greater emphasis on confrontation this time around, both because it seemed to contradict the series’ messaging and because I wanted to continue playing my weirdo package delivery game instead of another third-person shooter.
Thankfully, while there is definitely a greater emphasis on the “stick” this time around, these missions are far smoother than they were before, thanks to improvements such as the inclusion of a diving dodge maneuver and a significantly expanded toolset. As you build bonds and unlock schematics, you’ll get access to an arsenal of weapons, ranging from sleep dart sniper rifles to (non-lethal) Rambo-style machine guns. Add in plenty of oddball options, like dog-shaped autonomous explosives, a cannon that lets you para-drop cargo filled with grenades on your foes, or even a Pokémon-inspired sub-system, and there’s quite a bit to choose from. Stealth is also far more robust thanks to new grenade types, like decoys and fake rock holograms (which are a bit like this game’s cardboard box); it may not reach Metal Gear Solid V levels of sneaking perfection, but then again, what does?
These scuffles still aren’t perfect, as movement often feels quite slow as you carry a mountain of cargo on your back, and getting into cover is a bit awkward, but between the relative infrequency of these fights and the many improvements, they work as a solid palate cleanser after long hauls. Or at least they do until the last chunk of the game, which messes with the previously mentioned balance between portering and punching, as the final few chapters have you engage in prolonged shootouts and a bunch of boss fights. This sequence isn’t terrible, but it gets away from what the game does best. Meanwhile, even the deliveries take a hit during this stretch due to a long sequence of icy mountain hauling, which doesn’t mix things up nearly as much as the rest of the experience. Still, these are speed bumps on an otherwise smooth trip rather than anything outright derailing.
In many ways, Death Stranding 2: On the Beach is a reminder of what big budget games can be. Not only does it buck the misconception that every such title needs to be about killing approximately a million guys, but it also fully leverages its expensive-looking graphical fidelity to create new gameplay possibilities. The environments being rendered in such detail is important to the core of what you’re doing as you analyze inclines to pick the best path, dodge boulders that break free after an earthquake, or scramble to high ground to avoid a flash flood.
Meanwhile, all of these smaller adventures dovetail into the bigger one as its central themes of trust and collaboration come full circle, both through its strand elements where players work together and in its narrative about Sam seeking support from his loving band of fellow rejects. Can it be a little hokey? Maybe. On the nose? Definitely. But between its engrossing central loop and genuinely brilliant conclusion, it delivers an affecting mixture of grandiose and heartfelt. Together, it allows you to say something rarely true about big budget games these days, or honestly, most blockbuster media: there’s very little else like it.
Death Stranding 2: On the Beach was developed by Kojima Productions and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. It is available for the PlayStation 5.
Elijah Gonzalez is the assistant Games and TV Editor for Paste Magazine. In addition to playing and watching the latest on the small screen, he also loves film, creating large lists of media he’ll probably never actually get to, and dreaming of the day he finally gets through all the Like a Dragon games. You can follow him on Bluesky @elijahgonzalez.bsky.social.
