Death Stranding has made some interesting choices in regards to difficulty, as fans learned from Kojima himself this week. In short, the mysterious Death Stranding has a difficulty mode aimed at very casual gamers.
And given that this is a Kojima project, it’s pretty understandable for this choice to be there. This isn’t Dark Souls where the difficulty and absurdity is the draw, at least not the core one anyway. Hideo Kojima sure loves convoluted storylines full of misdirection and confusion, any Metal Gear fan can attest to that. And the confusing and ghost-filled story of Death Stranding doesn’t look to depart from that in any way.
Kojima further explained the choice on Twitter, after Ayako Terashima, Kojima’s personal assistant, revealed the existence of the mode. “Normally there’s only Easy Mode, but we added Very Easy Mode for movie fans since we have real actors like Norman, Mads, Lea starred in.” In a more joking tone, Kojima added, “Even Yano-san who never completed the 1st stage of PAC-MAN, was able to complete the game on Very Easy Mode” Sounds like it’s the perfect fit for those who want such a choice.
This isn’t the first game designer to make this choice though. David Cage games like Beyond Two Souls had very similar options. And although the comparisons between Beyond Two Souls and Death Stranding end there, it’s nice to see video games appealing to a wider audience.
IF you want more news about Kojuma’s latest project, start at the beginning. We first got a real glimpse of the strange game at TGS 2018, where Norman Reedus’ unknown character faced off against some skull-faced weirdo. We learned bits and pieces over the next few months, until we finally got to check out the most recent teasers: “Create the Rope”, “Reconnect” and “Tomorrow is in Your Hands“. These revealed new characters, plotlines and other key details.
Death Stranding is due to launch on November 8th.
