Hideo Kojima got upset because people thought Death Stranding 2 was ‘too good’

A musician in Death Stranding 2 has given some insight into creator Hideo Kojima’s process, as an animated spin-off is announced.

The original Death Stranding is perhaps one of the most polarising games of recent memory, especially for those familiar with Hideo Kojima’s most famous work, Metal Gear Solid.

The sequel, Death Stranding 2: On The Beach, launches later this month and appears to be taking things in a more action-orientated route, based on the trailers, with a stronger emphasis on combat over the original’s methodically paced hikes to deliver parcels.

While we’ll have to wait until June 26 to see if this is actually the case, it seems Death Stranding 2 will at least have some divisive elements – because Kojima insists on it.

This was revealed by French musician Yoann Lemoine, aka Woodkid, who has composed the game’s soundtrack. In an interview with Rolling Stone, he explained how Kojima wanted to alter certain aspects of the game after getting too much positive feedback during playtests.

‘There’s a key moment where we had a discussion, probably halfway [through] when we were doing the game, where he came to me and he said, ‘We have a problem.” Woodkid said.

‘Then he said, ‘I’m going to be very honest, we have been testing the game with players and the results are too good. They like it too much. That means something is wrong; we have to change something.’ And he changed stuff in the script and the way some crucial stuff [happens] in the game because he thought his work was not polarising and not triggering enough emotions.’

‘And he said, ‘If everyone likes it, it means it’s mainstream. It means it’s conventional. It means it’s already pre-digested for people to like it. And I don’t want that. I want people to end up liking things they didn’t like when they first encountered it, because that’s where you really end up loving something.’ And that was really a lesson for me; not doing stuff to please people, but to make them shift a little bit and move them.’

Despite this stance, Woodkid describes Kojima as someone who ‘changes his mind intelligently’ when others present ideas to him.

‘It doesn’t mean that he doesn’t listen, which is why I think he’s a genius,’ he added.'[He’s] shaping his world with the ideas of his teams. It’s not just him bossing around everything. I’ve been feeding him; somehow, at some point shapeshifting and edit or something. But’s always been a dialogue.

‘It’s never been, ‘I know exactly what I’m doing and no one else can interfere in the process.’ So, he’s always been the exact opposite of this – having control by letting people in. People sometimes have the fake impression that Hideo is very egotistical, [but] he’s someone that changes his mind very intelligently based on what people bring him.’

Whether you like his games or not, his stubborn stand against convention is perhaps what makes Kojima’s works so recognisably his – even when it involves pee grenades and looking after babies stuck in pods.

Along with the upcoming sequel, Kojima is helping to develop a live action feature film based on Death Stranding. A new animated film is also in the works, written by Aaron Guzikowski (Prisoners, Raised By Wolves).

According to Deadline, the animated film will be set in the world of Death Stranding, but will not adapt the original game’s events – in a similar vein to recent animated spin-offs like Predator: Killer Of Killers. A release date has yet to be announced.

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