Almost from the beginning, Hideo Kojima has talked about his latest game, Death Stranding, in the context of connecting people. Like a lot of things pre-release, it was never entirely clear what it was that he talking about as the game was shrouded in mystery for almost all of its marketing. When the veil was finally pulled back on the game, and its various social aspects, it was clear what Kojima was trying to do. And he hopes we all had a positive experience with it.
In a new video, Kojima talks about how connected the world is right now, but how little of it is positive. He hoped that the indirect contact the Strand System provided helped people feel positive without having the anxiety or disappointment of having direct contact. It’s a bit of an odd philosophy, but when you look at the general discourse online, especially in relations to video games, he’s probably not too far off.
Death Stranding definitely got a lot of positive feeling both from within the industry and outside of it, and while the reception to the game was slightly more mixed than probably expected, it was still overall positively received. So Kojima seemingly got his wish to some degree, at the very least.