It’s no exaggeration to say that the COVID-19 pandemic influenced Hideo Kojima’s writing of Death Stranding 2.
The Kojima Productions founder officially announced the sequel at tonight’s Game Awards, and after giving it a first look, stayed on stage for a while to answer questions from host Jeff Keely.
“I was writing the story before the pandemic, but after going through the pandemic, I rewrote everything from scratch,” he told Keeley after being asked how the pandemic affected the game. “Also, I didn’t want to predict the future any further, so I rewrote it.”
It’s true that Kojima has an infamous reputation for predicting the future with his game. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty was far ahead of its time in depicting the speed at which misinformation spreads online. And the loneliness theme of the first Death Stranding had some eerie parallels to his COVID-19 lockdown coming into effect just months after its 2019 release. So if Kojima wanted to put the crystal ball away for a while, it might be understandable.
Otherwise, Kojima has remained fairly tight-lipped about the sequel. [the trailer] So I want you guys to talk about it and find out the details in it,” he teased.
For a full rundown of everything announced at tonight’s Game Awards, check out our roundup here.
