By now you’ve probably seen TheSixthAxis’ own madness-embracing Death Stranding review, with Tuffcub saying “Death Stranding is like nothing I have ever played; beautiful, heart racing, heart breaking, frustrating, epic, stunning, and utterly nuts.” But what about the rest of the gaming press? How have critics as a whole judged Hideo Kojima’s latest? It’s all anyone’s been talking about this morning, so let’s find out.
Alongside our own 10/10, here’s a bunch of the reviews that have led to Death Stranding having an 84 on Metacritic and 85 on Opencritic:
The Daily Star – 5/5
Death Stranding is the most unique big-budget game I’ve ever played, a socially-minded injection of inventive ideas into a genre that has long survived by being lazy and brutish. This ambitious formula-flipper is brimming with empathy and carefully courts cinematic influences, an ensemble cast and a world of eye-watering scale, delivering a sticky gameplay loop to tie it all together and create a console generation-defining experience.
Destructoid – 8/10
Impressive effort with a few noticeable problems holding it back. Won’t astound everyone, but is worth your time and cash.
Eurogamer – Recommended
Hideo Kojma’s first post-Metal Gear game is a messy, indulgent vanity project – but also a true original.
Game Informer – 7/10
The game bears the unmistakable mark of its creator, but doesn’t leave enough for players to enjoy.
Gamespot – 9/10
Death Stranding is a hard game to absorb. There are many intertwining threads to its plot, and silly names, corny moments, and heavy exposition belie an otherwise very simple message. That comes through much more clearly in the game’s more mundane moments, when you find a desperately-needed ladder left behind by another player or receive a letter from an NPC thanking you for your efforts. It’s positive without ignoring pain; in fact, it argues in both its story and its gameplay that adversity itself is what makes things worth doing and life worth living. It’s a game that requires patience, compassion, and love, and it’s also one we really need right now.
GAMINGbible – 6/10
I wanted to like Death Stranding. I’m a big fan of Kojima’s previous games and I enjoy them for the mishmash of ideas they always are, and in theory I’ve no problem with playing a delivery man (I’ve put far too many hours into Euro Truck Simulator), but this game drowns its exciting systems and ideas with a messy execution and dragged out campaign. By stretching it out to such a long playtime, you can’t escape Death Stranding’s weaknesses – repetitive missions, simple combat, and a badly told story.
God is a Geek – 9/10
Death Stranding is an ambitious game, filled with so many different mechanics and ideas that almost always work well together. The story and acting is fantastic, and its visuals are a thing of beauty, not to mention the powerful soundtrack.
IGN – 6.8/10
Death Stranding delivers a fascinating world of supernatural sci-fi, but its gameplay struggles to support its weight.
Kotaku – no score
Death Stranding is not a subtle game. The mechanics are the message. Build connections, use those to literally span divides. Even as the story swells to a convoluted chaos that would make Metal Gear Solid 4’s monstrous canon-welding blush, Death Stranding’s most fundamental point is not hard to understand. Yes, this is hell. Yes, we are falling apart. Yes, this might be the end. But there is redemption in other people.
Metro – 7/10
A work of unbridled ambition and imagination but also a pretentious, contrived, and frequently quite dull gameplay experience – Death Stranding is peak Hideo Kojima.
Polygon – no score
Death Stranding feels like two games in one, designed for seemingly opposite audiences. One is a wholly unique open-world adventure with asynchronous cooperative multiplayer that allows me to feel like I’m part of a community, building a world from scratch. And the other is a long, confusing, deeply strange movie. The former is pulling most of the weight, but they share equal screen time. And, like a steamer trunk full of sperm, it’s impossible to separate the good from the bad. It’s all in the same box.
Push Square – 10/10
Following years of mysterious anticipation, Death Stranding delivers on all fronts. An accomplished, fascinating set of gameplay mechanics allow you to make deliveries the way you want to, while social features let the game live on once you’ve put the controller down. It may become slightly tiresome as you hit the halfway mark, but the phenomenal narrative is on hand to pick things back up again and its outstanding visuals are the cherry on top. Death Stranding doesn’t raise the bar for any particular genre, it creates an entirely new one.
The Telegraph – ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Death Stranding is a sermon on the importance of belief. The power of putting one foot in front of another when hope looks lost, in the belief that things will get better. By working together, a series of small intentional steps can make a difference, and in this often fractured, angry and confusing world; that’s as hopeful as it gets.
Trusted Reviews – ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
It’s going to be polarizing, glacial in its pacing during the opening hours as it expects players to delve into its mechanics, finding out what makes it tick while bonding with other couriers through a personal network of massive significance. I laughed, I cried and I grinned like a stupid idiot at the absurdity of it all. But by the end, I was left wanting more. Death Stranding is one of a kind, cementing itself as a weird, wonderful masterpiece.
USGamer – 3.5/5
Death Stranding might be Kojima’s boldest game to date. It may also be his most tedious. Either way, its originality outweighs its sometimes exhausting structure and poor pacing… but only just. Maybe not a game I would recommend to everyone, but certainly one of the most interesting games of 2019.
The Verge – no score
Death Stranding is a long, bizarre journey that’s both breathtaking and boring.
VG247 – ⭐️⭐️⭐️
If you do manage to hold out, you will be rewarded with flashes of brilliance, it’s just that those flashes are buried as deep as the core story is buried in the endless dialogue. And as profound as it wants to be, this is still a game in which you can equip and unequip your penis so you can piss out Red Bull. The good stuff is waiting for you beyond that piss, beyond the shit grenades, beyond that Ride with Norman Reedus advert unceremoniously plastered into a game universe where I didn’t see a single television set. It’s just a test of attrition.
Video Games Chronicle – ⭐️⭐️⭐️
A bloated, showy post-apocalyptic melodrama that makes a meal of some engrossing mechanics and themes.
