Death Stranding 2: On the Beach review – An outstanding work of art

Death Stranding, released in 2019, was Hideo Kojima's response to the division of the mid-2010s – Trump, Brexit, et al – but in retrospect, many will view it as a startlingly prescient tale of pandemic-era isolation.

It's the story of a cold outcast afraid of human touch forced to reconnect America, and by doing so, to learn to connect with its people himself.

The problem with connection is that those bonds must inevitably be severed, one way or another. "Should we have connected?" the game's tagline asks pointedly.

Death Stranding is a story of connection. Conversely, Death Stranding 2 is a story of loss, of grief.

The presence of the beach, a kind of bridge between life and death, links the world and story of Death Stranding inherently with the afterlife.

Following the events of Death Stranding, Sam and Lou disappear. We rejoin them months later, hiding out in rural Mexico.

Tracked down by Fragile on behalf of Drawbridge, the spiritual successor to the now-defunct Bridges, she hires you to continue your work, this time reconnecting Mexico and, more importantly, Australia.

Like its predecessor, Death Stranding 2 is a game best experienced totally blind, so do forgive me for being so scant on the specifics when it comes to story.

Flanked by a largely new cast of characters, with a few familiar friends aboard the DHV Magellan, a ship that acts as a travelling home of sorts, Sam sets out to take on the vast, unforgiving Australian continent.

Dollman, the Alan Wake-looking puppet you may remember from the trailers, joins Sam on his travels, strapped to his belt and spouting small talk along the way.

By virtue of Sam's newfound propensity to connect with his fellow man, this game's story morphs into one that is not entirely his.

Fragile, Tarman, Tomorrow and more, outcasts in their own ways who have found refuge on the DHV Magellan, all have their own demons. Death Stranding 2 is as much their story as it is Sam's.

The stars of the first game who offered up their likeness to the altar of Kojima, Léa Seydoux, Troy Baker and more, are joined by the likes of George Miller, Debra Wilson and Elle Fanning.

There are plenty more bizarre cameos to discover, although none quite had me as speechless as Conan O'Brien in an otter hat.

The way the story unfolds is, again, akin to the first game. The stage is set early on, introducing the threads of conspiracy that run throughout its story.

Some of these story beats resolve quite quickly. Others sink into the metaphorical tar, almost forgotten until rearing their ugly heads 30 hours later.

Death Stranding 2's storytelling vehicle may be the same as 1, but the story itself is, at least in my eyes, even deeper and opaquer.

Obtuse and, at times, seemingly incomprehensible plot points pop up regularly, as gripping as they are confusing.

Within the first hour or two, Sam's life is saved by a giant, android samurai who vanishes in a puff of smoke as quickly as it arrived (like I said, Kojiman). It is more than 20 hours before I see it again.

If you've been watching the trailers, then you will already know who the game's prominent antagonist is, but I will again play coy with the details.

What I will say, however, is that you can expect a riotous, exceedingly camp and award-worthy performance from the villain of the piece.

Every cutscene they grace with their presence ripples with energy. It's infectious. Put simply, these are the kinds of scenes that elicit an audible 'Hell yeah!'"

Solid Snake lookalike Neil steps into the shoes vacated by Clifford Unger, and while the premise for his story is familiar, it veers wildly off course as it unfolds into something entirely its own.

In your encounters with Neil, Sam is sent careening through decadent set pieces, from a carnival showered with sparks to ice-cold underwater depths.

The gameplay loop is, fundamentally, the same. Collect a package, take it to the next settlement, link it up to the Chiral Network, repeat.

Now a legendary porter, Sam is capable from the off. There's no fumbling around, being drip-fed tech, weapons and vehicles across his journey. Within the first few hours, you're effectively as kitted-out as you were deep into the first game.

There are, of course, new additions. New BT types, human enemies, 'Chiral Creatures' and more to keep you on your toes. Conversely, handy new tech provides some much-appreciated quality of life changes from the first game.

Overall, combat is much more prevalent this time around. Local bandits are being heavily armed by an unknown benefactor, at times requiring you to perform some Metal Gear Solid-style infiltrations to take them out.

Clearing these camps can also be beneficial in the long run. One particular camp blocks a narrow gorge bridging the two halves of the continent. Avoid confrontation, and you are forced over the mountains, straddling a precipitous ridge to the north.

In Death Stranding 1, combat was often best avoided. In 2, it feels encouraged, easy almost, to go in guns blazing.

On the face of it, this almost appears a betrayal of the Death Stranding ethos, what made it unique. Thematically, however, it plays out seamlessly.

Every neck snap and shotgun blast feels cathartic. The formerly stoic Sam Bridges reduced to a wreck, mentally ill and lashing out at a world that took everything from him.

Despite Kojima's insistence that he wanted Death Stranding 2 to be more polarising, I found that, at least gameplaywise, it was significantly easier. Perhaps that's because I have only recently come off the back of a Death Stranding 1 playthrough, but I'm not so sure.

A new upgrade system allows Sam to spend points to unlock certain specific buffs, strengthening your preferred playstyle or perhaps making up for your shortcomings.

Materials in Australia are plentiful. I rarely found myself lacking when it came to fabricating new equipment, building roads, ziplines or the new monorails, which themselves link settlements to mines, flooding the game with further materials.

That being said, later on in the game, you are faced with a trek to deliver a single package the entire length of Australia, rewarding players who took the time to develop each area and build infrastructure.

Crossing areas that I had neglected in my rush to finish the game should have dampened my experience, but it was quite the opposite. This gargantuan trek became a puzzle of how best to navigate certain obstacles, and stumbling, feet bleeding, to my destination was a triumph, not a fall.

Australia also makes for a phenomenal locale to explore. A far cry from the largely homogenous greens and greys of DS1's continental United States, Australia is veritable collage of biomes.

Your trek from west to east showcases Australia's vast environmental diversity, criss-crossing between coastal beaches and wetland to the barren outback, circling round to familiar, snow-capped mountains.

Experiencing this world is a delight, not least because Death Stranding 2 is a strikingly beautiful game.

Graphics are not typically something I look for in a game, but I could not help but be shaken by quite how good this looks.

Its live-action opening segment pans slowly into gameplay, revealing that what you thought was real had been in-engine footage all along. I have rewatched the footage over and over, still scarcely believing the technical wizardry Kojima Productions has pulled off here.

Your travels through these gorgeous landscapes are, once again, soundtracked to perfection. Woodkid, Caroline Polachek and more score a series of timely needle drops, poignantly underscoring your otherwise quiet odyssey.

Death Stranding 2 is a game that I could talk endlessly about. This review could easily be twice, or even three times, the length if I allowed myself the indulgence.

There is so much to unpack in this game that it would warrant a dissertation to fully do it justice.

Death Stranding 1 and 2 may tackle different, at times almost opposing, themes, but what links them is that, at their cores, these are two intensely human stories.

While Sam's journey unfolds in a surreal, post-apocalyptic, almost technofascist world, I have seldom related more to a piece of media.

I understand Sam's grief implicitly, because I have grieved as he has, I have mourned as he has, and it's clear that Hideo Kojima has too.

I lost my father last year. Kojima lost both of his parents in the last decade. Despite being on either side of the same coin, developer and player, I have no doubt that these experiences have coloured our experiences of Death Stranding 2 in similar ways and will no doubt continue to do so for many others.

These connections, and the loss of these connections, are what make us human.

This is not a story of grief; it is a story of overcoming grief. Of picking yourself back up and continuing to connect with your fellow man.

Death Stranding is an outstanding work of art. A treatise on the nature of humanity from perhaps gaming's greatest auteur. This is not Sam Bridges's story, but the familiar tale of every person who has ever lived, and an experience that I will never forget.

"Should we have connected?" asks the game's tagline. The simple answer is that we have no choice.

Perhaps my father is waiting for me on a beach somewhere. Perhaps Kojima's parents are waiting for him. Maybe we'll find out one day, but for now, we both have too much left to do here on earth.

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