Topic: Death Stranding OT

@ScarletSpidey Congrats! I hope you enjoyed the payoff for the story

Hopefully the final grind isn't too bad for you. For the deliveries, just focus on doing the heaviest ones possible to get your rankings up. The memory chip one is a faff but decent guides can help you plan routes to collect them as efficiently as possible.

Just started, thanks to premium. I'm very very early...have to deliver my mom? To the incinerator. I was wondering is there free roam times, where not always timed for a delivery. I think it would just be fun to explore. The game looks amazing, best use of my HDR I have seen in a game. I know later on you can build roads and zip lines, but is it always under the pretext of do while your delivering something?

@Elodin The vast majority of the game is focused around deliveries but only a handful have set times. Some optional ones will have bonuses for delivering on time but mostly you can pick and choose what you want to do.

The first main area is pretty big but quite linear… but it looks incredible! The “main” area of the game is massive and there are loads of different ways of getting about. You’ll unlock different ways of getting around steadily as you progress so don’t get too annoyed by trudging around on foot in the early game.

Enjoy though! I only played it at the end of last year and thought it was fantastic.

If you’re thinking of going for the platinum, I’d recommend increasing the difficulty now as you need to do loads of side deliveries at that difficulty. It makes almost no difference to the difficulty of the game other than “combat” so you can drop it down for those sections if you need to.

@Thrillho great! Thanks for the tips. I am enjoying it so far. Quite a unique story. Loving the music as well.

@Elodin The use of music in the game is really well done in those key moments.

The other main tip early on is not to worry too much about getting places up to 5* level straight away. Some give you bonuses for hitting certain levels but it’ll be much easier as you progress and get better gear. You’ll also unlock more delivery missions as you go so you can do multiple stop offs rather than just going back and forward between two places.

@Elodin I think @Thrillho covered it well, but yeah — don’t worry, you’ll have plenty of chances for open exploration at your own pace. In fact, no two people’s playthroughs will be the same. There is always many ways to traverse the countryside and when you start to get to the online portions there is a significant randomness to what’s available and how you are going to be able to approach obstacles in the environment.

I got to the point where I had set paths I liked, but it took a lot of trial and error exploring around to find the easiest paths and tactics.

@ThereThere I'm on 81% and counting. I'm sure you can guess what trophies I'm still working towards.

Growth of a Legend is at 78% and just need to bite the bullet and do some Mule recoveries (I hate them).

Actually, I've got a question for the group. I've almost 5 stared all of the second map. Will all the Memory Chips on map two be available to find when I've done that? I'm thinking I can make use of my roads and ziplines to collect them which might disintegrate by the time I've gone to 5 star the first map.

@ThereThere Still quite early, as I'm only playing when I can get more than an hour at once. I am going as you did and just slowly taking it all In, enjoying the Vistas and the occasional tense sneaking from BTs.

@Elodin I've been playing it since January. Still loving it and will miss it when it's gone (Though I'm definitely going to play a few shorter games before I even consider HZW)

@ScarletSpidey The MULE camps aren’t too bad really. Sometimes it’s easier to clear the camp first to be honest rather than tiptoe around! The camps also stay clear for a while after.

That said, you don’t have to do MULE camp runs for that delivery type, I’m sure there are others? I think the ones for retrieval from random areas count too?

And for the chips, I just used a guide to be honest. Some are pretty hidden and it also minimises the amount of time trudging across the entire map.

Forgot to say, thanks @ThereThere for the tips!

@Thrillho I think it's cause I running in blasting that I have a hard time. I heard you can drop the difficulty, clear the camp, and then bump it back up for Side Orders? I might try that.

Yeah, I need to look for some other missions. I'm getting there anyway! It's only taken me 6 months because I only play for 2 or so hours a week. I make progress every time I switch it on.

@ScarletSpidey i keep unlocking new music. Its all fantastic. Too bad you can't just play it while walking around.

@Elodin Agreed! I actually listen to a lot of podcasts playing the game now that the story is done.

Tempted to get it for ps4, its on sale on ps store, but i notice only the deluxe ed is available, and im not interested in the little extras like the avatars etc.
Too bad they took off the base game from the store, same with tsushima, little greedy tricks to make you pay more.
The base game is on one of the ps extra deals i think, only.
Will get it but id prefer pay a little less without the silly extras.

@Jtheripper Buy a disc off eBay. There were loads for under £10 just before Christmas.

@LN78 yh, i dont know,,im digital only since a while, but i prefer to buy them still instead of subscribe to services though.

I just found out that when online the game is full of signs from other players, and already made stuff.

If i want to play it offline, i can just switch my ps4 to offline i guess?
No need take out the net cable, as i read in some comments online. Or does the game still update when you're back online and not in the game playing? i mean game is off.

@Jtheripper I honestly don't know - I wouldn't think the game was still heavily populated online at this point in time. I don't think it would make much difference either way. I could easily be wrong, though!

@LN78 i see yeah, good point.

@Jtheripper I think all you need to do is be offline when you’re playing the game. I’m fairly certain that the world will not be populated when you’re online otherwise.
I mean, Kojima is a tricky little rascal, but I don’t think he’s that tricky.

Honestly the online asynchronous multiplayer stuff in the world is some of my favorite aspects of it. You’ll have random structures populate your world from other players, but as you rate and assign other players into your favorite group (I forget what the in-game term for this list of favorites is), then the game will preferentially give you their structures. It’s a neat mechanic and sometimes a real lifesaver if someone built a bridge for you or left a ladder or changing station in a rough spot.

Also, the game does a good job of not giving you online structures until after you’ve made the journey to the next major story point on your own. So it’s mainly useful for tracking back through areas you’ve already done once on your own. Also, you won’t get high level structures and vehicles before certain game points, so it will gatekeep the really overpowered items for you until after you have unlocked them

@Th3solution i see, i might try it online 1st then, thanks for the good info, appreciate it.
Im curious to try it out.
I wonder if you just see the online stuff only if you set on some kind of device or setting.