Death Stranding released just a few days ago and it's been very very polarizing to critics and players alike. Some people love it and think it's a masterpiece while many hate it and think it's really boring. Full disclosure: I haven't played the game. However I have seen a lot about it, and while there does seem to be an attempt to convey larger messages (working together, connections and how social media can empower rather than hinder), I cannot help but find the basic gameplay loop to be extremely boring. To me, the gameplay loop seems to be a glorified deliveries simulator, as if you were working for Amazon Prime after the apocalypse. But again, I haven't played the game, so maybe I'm wrong.

What do y'all think, as game devs and designers?

1) Cool cast, cool music, cool graphics, cool cutscenes

2) Bad gameplay

So I decided to actually try Death Stranding, and while I can't say it's as boring as I thought it'd be, it certainly is...strange. The premise, setting, and story are definitely the plus points of the game. I'm not sure how I feel about the deliveries aspect. So far I haven't had to do a delivery quest that lasted for hours or something, and that's where I begin to wonder if the delivery quests will get really tedious and boring. I generally feel this isn't a game to be played in large bursts. 

I also think the gameplay loop is boring, but it can hold itself with an interesting story and atmosphere. It's fine if you can write a good enough story to make people forget about the gameplay. I can't.

aganm said:

I also think the gameplay loop is boring, but it can hold itself with an interesting story and atmosphere. It's fine if you can write a good enough story to make people forget about the gameplay. I can't.

Well I'm not sure how true it is now. I've put the game down for now after playing a bit. The game was sort of relaxing while I was playing it, in some ways I guess? I think it's really hard to justify the game loop as not being mundane on its own. I'm not sure if it's some meta commentary on something or the other or not.

Isn't this a walking simulator?

fleabay said:

Isn't this a walking simulator?

It is literally a walking simulator. It simulates you walking from one place to another with the need to balance your cargo and balance the character. You then make deliveries. There’s bad guys who want your cargo and there’s ghosts that want to kill you. There is a mechanic where you band together with other people and build structures to help people but it’s not a necessity in its own. There are vehicles and combat too, but that’s still the core of it: walking and delivering.