It has been nearly a year since I wrote what I consider to be one super-informative and well-respected review for Death Stranding 2. Okay, only one of those is true. You can guess.
Anyway! I am back again, thanks to Death Stranding finding its way to the PC this past Friday. While my opinion of the game hasn’t waivered one bit, the experience has improved thanks to powerful PC capabilities. And this game is proof that the PC elitist in the world have something they can show off to their console friends.
So, let’s dive into the wonderful world of Sam Bridges again and see what has exactly changed since last June.
The story is the same.
The sequel to the gritty yet narrative-rich first game, Death Stranding, which connected with this reviewer on a very emotional level, is different from its predecessor. Death Stranding 2: On the Beach. This time around, the sequel is more intentional, more focused, less mysterious, and, surprisingly, a less urgent tale. The story is a more relaxed journey for Sam, certainly more than the first, as the end of the world isn’t sitting and staring at the cast of characters tapping on their wristwatch. It’s a welcome change of pace that makes sense considering the situation that Sam gets into during the sequel’s narrative.
So, what is the story focused on if not the potential death of the world? The story is more central to Sam’s life, his emotions, and how he is processing them. His shift to fatherhood at the end of the first game changed him and put him on a different path. The sequel is about his journey with Lou and how connected he feels to her. You get that from the opening scene in the game until the end. It is squarely more focused on Sam and his friends than on a larger-scale conflict.
Of course, the personal journey of Sam doesn’t mean there aren’t harsh twists and turns, or mysteries to uncover to explain more about the world’s situation. There are quite a few plot points that add more context to an already complex world. The story will certainly hook you early, keep you engaged, and more importantly, keep you pining for the next go around with the game. You always want a game’s story to connect with its gamer like that. On that note, I will seal my lips so as not to spoil this game for anyone. I am purposely being general with the information because the first gut-punch goes hard and early, and it carries the story the rest of the way.
Overall, it was difficult to top the potential for a world-ending event in the first game, as its intensity and overbearingness during the entire journey were at the forefront all the way until the end. This time around, the rollercoaster is far more intense, as Sam is not going to have the greatest of times, nor can he take it or leave it, an attitude his character carried with him last time out. He has to face some personal and harsh truths in his life, and there is no end-of-the-world escape for him. In the end, the journey is different but equally good, as well as appropriate for Sam’s next step after saving the entire planet.
Learning some lessons
The gameplay in the 2019 title focused on Sam’s survival and how he traversed the landscape. The land he walked across was flush with BTs, or souls who wanted to drag people into certain death, and the journey was also a constant fight against nature. For those who labeled Death Stranding a walking simulator, they weren’t too far from the truth, as that was, at a core level, its gameplay construct. You walked around, you ran into BTs, you either dealt with them or avoided them, you had to keep an eye out for your goods being delivered, as the environment and BTs could damage them, and then you delivered packages to your next bit of story. Whether you enjoyed that type of gameplay or not, that is what you were served with, as it progressed the storyline through each connection made.
Death Stranding 2: On the Beach is less of that struggle. The sequel features far fewer BT interactions, while toting the same package delivering gameplay, though more meaningful this time around, with every delivery that Sam completes. This game focuses more on the antagonists in the story, one that comes in a variety of flavors, which helps keep the game focused on its goals. That shift in gameplay means that you aren’t getting impeded upon by stop-and-go BT interactions, which, at times, dragged the original gameplay down, especially at the beginning of Sam’s original journey. With this sequel, you deliver packages, you acquire another piece of the story for Sam, and then you go to the next spot. The gameplay is not at all dragged down by unnecessary and random interactions.
Honestly, we don’t need the hindrance of BTs as much as we did with the first game, as we now know why they exist and what they are trying to do. Don’t get me wrong, they’re still present in more than several places during gameplay, and can be equally terrifying, but you will find less stopping and going, which only stands to progress the journey in a more positive light and a bit faster. Because of this gameplay tonal shift, Kojima and his crew had to fill in more blanks with more story, which only benefited what was trying to be accomplished. If you want to hook people, then you throw in moments that seem like they go nowhere, only to find that they went somewhere meaningful and were worth mentioning. Most of those breadcrumbs that Kojima Productions scatters in Death Stranding 2: On the Beach lend well to that type of gameplay, as you will willingly, and not exhaustively, want to go from point to point trying to uncover what is trying to happen with pieces and parts of the story.
Anyway, as I stated before, the story is central to this game, smaller, and more personal, which translates seamlessly to the gameplay. Having any disruptions to hinder that journey means that there is a possibility of narrative disconnect with players. Kojima crafted and catered to this gameplay to ensure that the story never dips or drops and doesn’t start any tension between the player and the story. And he and his team did a masterful job of crafting those seamless connections that don’t get interrupted.
Now, as for the actual gameplay, it feels more sewn up than the first game. You will go into the game more prepared because you understand how the original played. The game still has you cross through lands with packages on your back and still throws decision-making of what to carry and what not into the mix. You still must be thoughtful of your essentials versus your excesses and be prepared for the environmental elements when they crop up. On the surface, nothing changed with gameplay control or how Sam works, other than he feels far less loosey-goosey to control.
That lack of looseness is caused by landscape change, as your journey takes you into a different set of countries that contain new environments to impede your progress. For example, there is a country in the game that features dunes. While grass and rocks presented a variety of obstacles for Sam in the first game, and whatever vehicle Sam was using to get around (including his legs), environments with dunes prevent Sam’s journey from being an easy one because of the collapse and slide elements he’ll have to deal with while traveling on the sand. Riding a truck through sand, especially one that isn’t prepared to handle that texture, creates a different type of obstacle for Sam to traverse. Instead of damaging the truck, Sam simply cannot get around fast enough in it. This affects how he deals with rogue soldiers and/or BTs, as he cannot outrun them in this type of environment and while using the wrong transportation.
Kojima and the crew took the environment heavily into consideration as it relates to how Sam travels and what issues he must think about when planning a journey for his next delivery. The devs perfected and deepened the environmental elements in this sequel and expanded the various types of environments that Sam runs into. This made the world feel bigger, a little bit more dangerous, and gave a good variety of obstacles that were beyond hills and rocks. For that detail and effort, the game will have you thinking more about preparation and what type of journey you’re going to go through with each delivery.
Related, and thankfully unlike the first game, you quickly obtain blueprints for basic vehicles and weaponry as you deliver packages and connect more people to the network. Weaponry is expanded quite a bit with DS2, offering different types of non-lethal guns to take enemies out with, as well as new weapons to take down BTs. Machine guns, large tar guns, shotguns, and a wide array of goodies to arm yourself with are available in the sequel, and you will see the girth of that stockpile early on in the gameplay.
In addition, the game’s mechanics with how you point and shoot are simplified, if not perfected. Aiming is easier, connecting with your target feels less like Metal Gear Solid, and doesn’t get in the way of any potential action. The same expectations of ammo and the finite use of weaponry are still present in the sequel, but, again, it doesn’t impede the story or action of the game. I’m not saying being well-armed will have you going and picking fights, but I am saying that you won’t feel panicked about opening a gun of your choice, pointing and shooting, and then continuing your journey. It’s well built for Death Stranding 2: On the Beach.
Shifting gears to the above-mentioned targets, the game does a good job of populating baddies and giving you more of a 1v1 (or many) challenge than the first. With BTs, you’ll have to scope them out and use specific weapons on them. They’re far tougher to locate, and it requires accuracy to take them down safely. Should you bump into them and not take the proper precautions to dispose of them, you’ll still get that mini-boss fight, though the mini-bosses are of a bigger variety and scale, so it won’t feel like the same old stuff each time.
With rogue soldiers, there are a lot more of them; they’re smarter this time, and they have a large variety of weaponry that will take you out quickly. For example, during the journey, Sam eventually runs into a large camp of soldiers. These soldiers have guns, electric javelins, grenades, rockets, and sometimes magnetic mines (the worst). They do a great job of taking advantage of Sam’s disadvantages, as well as making sure they can get Sam from all sides. They are far more dangerous than before and relentless when they have you on the ropes. They offer good challenges and will do their best to impede Sam’s journey every step of the way. They don’t feel like options or afterthoughts this time that you can easily run away from or dispose of without much effort; rather, they feel like honest-to-God obstacles.
As the game progresses with its story, you will occasionally run into boss fights and super-boss fights. The former is mainly what you’ve seen before with BTs, as you will be dragged into tar, a large creature of some sort will appear, and you must take them down. The boss fights are more difficult, as you must decide on the right weapon that gets the most damage, as well as look for obvious weak points. It’s more methodical with how bosses work and how they react to you, as they truly are not beautiful throwaways. They are challenging as you get deeper into the story, and downright sinister at times. When you get to the more story-focused bosses, those fights will present their own sets of difficulties and challenges, but also not be as intense because story trumps gameplay with those fights. The devs want you to conquer those bosses so you can progress to the next part of the narrative. Anyway, sometimes the bosses are patterned, but most of the time they’re far more brutal and come in three-stage sets. Regardless, they’re a step up and seemed far more pointed and connected with the narrative. They work well, and ultimately, Kojima wants you to see how they affect the story, so they won’t feel impossible to overcome.
Now, when you’re not violently connecting with enemies, you will connect with friends. The game introduces a new set of faces to the mix, each with their own journey to complete and ghosts to overcome. The gameplay has a connected strand between Sam and these new faces, though some strands feel stronger than others. Regardless, the strands are there, and they are well-thought-through. One strand connection is with Tarman, played by George Miller, who has developed a ship that can go from place to place via tar pits, and who carries his burden with that ship in hopes of putting it to rest at some point. As with the original game, which brought in a variety of personalities that came back together to connect with Sam in some way, this time around, Kojima has turned the connections in the opposite direction, as Sam connects with the newbies in some way. Again, the journey is personal, so a lot of focus on gameplay and narrative all come back to Sam. It’s an interesting decision to shrink the world through this method, even though the world is much bigger in scope than the first game.
When you’re not dealing with NPC-friendly interactions, you will still have other connections with other players. Much like the first game, you won’t see them, which is sad because it would be badass to play along with someone, but what you do in your world affects theirs still. Building bridges and structures in the middle of nowhere still helps other players, as they have access to your constructs. The game still encourages you to help others out that you can’t see, and returns the favor quite often on your server. I love this portion of the game, as it still feels relevant to the real world’s situation at this moment of political insanity in an unstable world. Making connections and helping each other out through tough situations should be a mantra that every human lives by. Seeing that being honored in a game only stands to benefit said game, and helps push its narrative. In the end, this simple gameplay construct will make you feel like a better person, even when the world is going to shit.
Staying with that construct and helping others out, collecting material to make those structures happen, is a bit more of an uphill battle in the sequel. While the first game explored the U.S., which seemed lush with everything the player needed to build roads, chargers, and timefall protection, this time out, it feels a bit more restricted and difficult. Finding leftover enemy residue and other materials isn’t as lush, especially when it comes to specific areas. Sometimes you must travel further to acquire materials, and sometimes they may be on the other side of a map. This portion of the game has become more difficult, even if the result is worth the amount of effort put into it. I wish this were a tad bit easier in the game, maybe not as easy as the first, but more accessible. Speaking of accessible, let’s talk about the living world for a bit.
An additional feature of the frontend gameplay during my time with Death Stranding 2: On the Beach was the inclusion of wildlife. I guess Kojima took a page from Horizon Zero Dawn by including interactions with wildlife. Some of those interactions could be positive, such as rescuing animals to return them safely to a shelter, while others were more malevolent and aggressive, as is the case with squirmy eels and dangerous birds affected by the changing landscape of the world. They will impede your progress when you run into them. Adding these to the gameplay helped make the world bigger and more realistic. While humans may not survive an impending doom, nature and other lifeforms generally find a way to keep going, and that is well represented with DS2’s gameplay design, with wildlife’s inclusion in the experience. While you won’t find a ton of animals in the environment, you’ll find the right amount to give you purpose and to give you more of a challenge when you’re tired of taking out the dead or giant tar monsters.
Before we move to visuals, let me give some special kudos to Kojima’s team for creating a more accessible backend journey system. While everything feels tighter, from fighting to exploring, the biggest overhaul between Sam and his world is how he can access quests, upgrade special abilities, and see places on his map. The sequel replaced his handcuffs with a ring, which can be accessed by pressing the option button on the controller. From here, you can get cargo management, orders, a variety of goodies (such as the music player), and access enhancements. The latter of the bunch is an interesting addition to the gameplay and solid motivation to keep the game going long after it has concluded.
What was also added to the gameplay were buffs and upgrades called APAS Enhancements. These enhancements allow Sam to perform different gameplay mechanics. If you ever wanted to improve bullets or have an additional battery for your vehicles, then these enhancements help with that, and I won’t go into specifics to ruin them for you, but just know they’re relevant to the gameplay experience. The enhancements are acquired through XP, which is gathered by completing orders. Let me tell you, some of these enhancements are highly useful, especially some of the more XP-expensive ones. They shift the gameplay to new levels without compromising it. Anyway, you can choose these enhancements in a non-linear fashion, though unlocking some enhancements is the only way to unlock others. It’s a welcome addition to the new game and something that does improve gameplay considerably, though not required to finish the game.
Pulling back a bit, let’s discuss the map. I’m not sure if you felt this way playing the first game, but having to go back and forth onto the map to see what direction I was taking when delivering an order was so disruptive. To circumvent that issue, pressing the PS5 controller’s control pad down will send out a pulse that reveals where you should be heading. This avoids stop-and-go disruptions when accessing the map. It’s a small change, but a welcome one, as it just keeps the gameplay flowing. Also, if you have a PS5 controller or access to one, I highly recommend it during the PC journey. It adds some nice haptic feedback and a seamless control scheme from the console release.
Overall, the gameplay is tighter, easier, and more direct with its intentions, and emulates the story being told beautifully. It has all been thoroughly improved mechanically and through other methods. While I’m not in love with the gathering material aspect of the gameplay, as it seems more restrictive, the rest is pure gold. It exceeds expectations when compared to the first game.
PC difference
When I first launched Death Stranding 2: On the Beach on the PlayStation 5, I was absolutely blown away by that opening scene and how positively gorgeous the depth and detail of the environment were. It set a tone that never wavered in style and execution. It was one of the prettiest, if not the prettiest, games I saw in 2025.
Now, take that sentiment and throw in no hardware restrictions, and a 50xx NVIDIA card to drive it all. It is beyond breathtaking. This is visually the best version of Death Stranding 2: On the Beach. I am a huge proponent of the PS5, but there isn’t a doubt in my mind that the PC Elitist will be and should be crowing loudly about how visually remarkable this game is on release. It sets a new bar for Kojima’s group, the Decima engine, and what to expect from future titles that come from console to PC. It’s a stunning release that is unrivaled visually.
On that sweet note, let’s wrap up this review.
Conclusion
Death Stranding 2: On the Beach on the PC brings the same epic story, fantastic gameplay, and unrivaled visuals. It’s quite an achievement for PC gaming.
