Star Citizen Progress Tracker v1.0

But this part:

> Hideo Kojima is creative and has proven himself time and time again with both his repeated success and his wide array of unusual work.

...I'll disagree with. Kojima seems to be a guy who wants to actively subvert expectations which, with the release of Death Stranding, felt even more like a rebellious teenager wanting to stick it to the system above all else, and not make an actual fun and engaging game. (Not to mention that the premise and general plot have been beaten to death long ago and are well-known for most but the most juvenile of gamers.)

"Unusual work" does not equal "interesting and fun result". In fact I find most modern incarnations of "unusual" to be rebelling against the "norm" just for the sake of it.

But I in general have a beef with a lot of these Japanese "creators". They might be unusual on the background of a lot of the copy-paste Japanese (or generally Asian) works but on the global scale they are nothing special.

In fact they are a running joke in no small amount of circles: "Oh, a Kojima game? I bet now we'll have a crying raven, or a talking baby, or cows will turn out to be the superior race on Earth all along? And I bet there will be a government conspiracy even if most of humanity is already dead? And the protagonist will be just a regular guy who reluctantly saves the world?"

I kid you not, the above is almost word-for-word quote from a table discussion I had with a few other guys and girls when Death Stranding was 2-3 months away from release.

You and others might find this unconstructive and maybe even obnoxious but I'd still like to bring the perspective on you that guys like Kojima are in fact fairly predictable as well, and not in a good way.

I might not be very constructive about it but for years I can't understand what's so different or interesting about the guy. His main goal seems to be randomness. He is so desperate to be different. And of course, he's not.

I mean, neither of us chatted with the creator about it so don't act like you know it for a fact.

Also, "next time do X", really? Gave me a good giggle at least.

You don't need to be flippant about it, if you are so worried about others "ruining" your gaming fun, when why TF are you playing an MMO? That's just like setting yourself up for disappointment.

Nope, I admit I didn't. But I got told by several of my acquaintances, then watched a few videos and I have to admit I wasn't won over -- quite the opposite in fact.

But I get your point, easter eggs are being put in games all the time, that's true.

> I was just giving you advice as if you were a younger me

Sounded like that to me as well but still, no hard feelings. :) I just don't take kindly to anything said that sounds condescending.

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As for our discussion, I am sharing an empirical historical observation. I am not an avid gamer in general -- even though I was there where Diablo 2 and StarCraft 1 came out and I played them in the computer clubs I was frequenting... very long time ago, at least two decades now. I also played Quake 2 and 3 a lot to the point of almost being a pro and winning a few tournaments.

But again, I never was a hardcore gamer in the meaning of playing 100+ games over a course of a year or two, for example.

I did give a good amount of games a fair try however and Kojima's games always struck me as made by a person who just wanted to surprise the consumers of his media -- and coherent story and engaging universe be damned in the process.

Maybe I am too big of a fan of logical and coherent story universes -- could be the case.

But "Death Stranding" for me was a final nail in the coffin. I watched a playthrough and while it was moderately pleasant to consume it passively, the premise is absurd -- dead people turning into nuclear bombs, guys living like spiders, couriers addicted to the rush of delivering packages, and let's not even mention the baby in the bottle or the Lovecraftian monsters the protagonist encounters here and there. Oh, and the protagonist was immortal if I remember correctly? And yeah, a government conspiracy, nevermind that most of humanity is gone and there's no need for it -- although that part I can somewhat understand and maybe justify, since at my age I lost all faith in people and I know that power corrupts and that some people would literally destroy the world just so they can have the last word.

Most of what was in the game felt very... out of place. It's like Kojima threw a dice on each story / premise element.

I enjoy and appreciate artists that try to be unconventional. But my opinion -- and I of course I am not going to claim that my opinion is a fact -- is that his shtick is shock value and randomness. I get it how that can be appealing for people who consume mostly the same stuff all the time but I'd personally grow tired of it at the middle of his second game.