I apologize if it took me this long, I was really taking my time with the game. Through all the strenuous tasks of exploring through the rough terrain of both Mexico and Australia, to deliver packages and bring all bases closer together.
For someone who did expect Kojima greatness from a story standpoint, this felt probably the most passive. As for the main game, it's more delivery express x Mudrunner x MGS5n1/2. It's a whole bigger package than the first game. Also, visually spectacular, awestrucking photo realistic graphics, insanely fun sandbox, it's almost as if Kojima is just giving us his leftovers.
Things he left mostly in concept for the first game, now finally being fully explored and utilized for our absolute pleasure. It's the same feeling I had with Dragon's Dogma 2. Honestly, this game is therapy for me now, and never felt like a huge waste of my time.
- Love, humanity, and survival
The world survived a Death Stranding, lived to see another day, and Sam is now living his life with Lou, devoid of any responsibility from his old as he'd moved on. Unfortunately, things are never quite that simple, and faith would have it, it cost the life of one closest to him.
Sam just can't catch a break, because the story needs to force some sort of agency on the character to go on another quest to save the rest of the world. My journey takes me to Mexico shortly before I head to Australia. Doing the usual, but with some quality of life changes and more added features to complement the sandbox. Like, it plays a lot better than the first.
On foot, Sam is controllable as the same as he was in the first game, you just need to tip toe around rough terrain while carrying a heavy package or else you'll trip and damage them. Easy, right? Well, come to Australia's diverse geography, and you'll reassess what that meant once more. Which is why it's always important to deploy Ladders, Climbing Anchors, etc to get by.
Good news, all of it easier to do so, thanks to a better improvement on the Chiral Network online system. Which, basically, meant players online could help others by building structures for use. Also, BTs are easier to spot, enemies are easier to take down, and weather systems.
And no, I'm not talking about Timefall and raining. There will be dry sand storms, river floods, and somehow earthquakes. Lastly, there are now structures that'll make you jump in stupid heights, teleport jump, and most of all, your favorite truck no longer gets stuck in the stupidest of places. And it's not because of the terrain, the physics and trucks are now flexible to get through rough areas. The entire game through Australia, I was driving the truck 70% of the time.
Now, you want the part where it plays like Metal Gear, right? Well, it's no surprise that Sam knows CQC, but here, he's pulling judo moves. Man can deflect attacks, do fast takedowns, later on in the game you get gloves that you can electrocute them with even.
Weapons and gadgets come plenty, the enemy A.I. is a bit sillier here than anything from his prior games. I don't know why they are dumb down, even the mechs are stupidly easy to kill. Even boss battles are underwhelming, sort of passe. But take my word for it, the sandbox is really fun if you can try your best to have fun. And all of this is on the surface of a huge cake.
- Keep on keeping again
By and large, it's an RPG delivery service. There's a lot of groundwork set. And yeah, it's tedious, can get boring at times, and even downright make me drowsy, but there's nothing quite like it. It retains the unique charm of the first game, but going further by giving you way more to do.
Backpacks can have components providing battery, spare ammo, helping you with carrying cargo, and so on. You have skill trees that you unlock as your relations with bases deeper based on the deliveries. You mine resources, and you use a monorail to transport them, you can choose to be in them or not. Also, the graphics, this is a PS5 game alright.
Reaching the mid-game, is where you unlock newer types of weapons, it's more convenient to take enemies and BTs out thanks to their firepower. And at some point, if you're up for military massacres, there's a cheatcode to make them lethal even. Also, traversal, you should check these Jump Ramps out, straight out of a Jackass skit. Chiral Bridges to cross cliffs and hard to reach places. There's also a gun that can grab cargo from afar.
And if you've seen the trailers, you know the female characters are quite the fun company. They're the soft, tame presence in a harsh, grueling grind of the day. That being said, where was the story going? There was strong momentum in the prologue, and it just plateau'd.
You have to ask, putting the hours in, like dozens of it because if you're going for the overall experience of covering much possible, it'll take you 60-70hrs to get around finishing it. Which is why I ask, why isn't there much going on in-between while I'm doing this menial labor? I could be playing Helldivers 2 now, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3+4, and so on. Was this a waste of time?
I love this world, I love being part of it. I missed playing it after getting around to the first one. I also know that anyone can play this, as it is far more accessible.
Above screenshots and GIFs are from personal recordings only
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