Death Stranding is “going pretty well” says Kojima, but still no word on when you’ll actually get your hands on it

By Brenna Hillier

Death Stranding, the highly anticipated next game from the creator of Metal Gear Solid, is at the picking tables stage. This’ll make sense in a minute.

Death Stranding came up during Hideo Kojima’s appearance at the Tribeca Games Festival this weekend – unsurprisingly, since we’re all agog to know more.

As reported by Engadget, Kojima said Death Stranding is “going pretty well” when asked about development progress.

Kojima Productions has “the general plan for the project” and a plot, apparently, and is testing various systems; it sounds like he meant both technical and gameplay-related. In other words, Death Stranding is still in the relatively early stages, with lots to lock down.

To illustrate the project’s timing, Kojima said if Death Stranding was a restaurant, he’d be choosing tables and planning menus. Okay.

Kojima had lots to say on various topics and you should hit the link above for more, but the bit I found most interesting was his comment on using famous actors in games, a strategy he embraced for Metal Gear Solid 5 Ground Zeroes and The Phantom Pain with Kiefer Sutherland, and continued in PT with Norman Reedus. Reedus also returns for Death Stranding, which features Mads Mikkelsen as the villain and director Guillermo del Toro in a smaller role.

“By bringing in actors, they do some things that I don’t imagine,” Kojima explained of this new trend in his work. “That alone makes the world bigger, there’s something happening on the stage.” Apparently this creates more realistic characters than the Death Stranding crew could build with imagination and CG alone.

It’s probably the closest we’ll ever get for a decent explanation as to why Kojima ditched beloved Metal Gear Solid voice actor David Hayter in favour of a bigger Hollywood name.

Death Stranding has an advantage over Metal Gear Solid in that it’s a new IP, so we have no expectations for Kojima to upset – although I have a feeling those who go in expecting a military stealth action game may be in for a bit of a shock, despite Kojima’s insistence that it will feel familiar to third-person action fans.

Death Stranding is coming to PS4. Nobody knows when. Probably not in 2017.