104 - Death Stranding (ft. Drew Toothpaste)
Drew Toothpaste (@drewtoothpaste) and the lads gulp down some cryptobiotes with a Monster energy chaser as they strap on their packages and unite the United Cities of America in Hideo Kojima’s 2019 mail-delivery simulator: Death Stranding. Topics include the wonders of nature, the terrors of the afterlife, and what it means to build community in a post-apocalyptic world inhabited by malevolent ghost babies.
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Drew Toothpaste - Twitter // Bluesky // Patreon // Instagram
Everything is Real - In Everything Is Real, Natalie Dee & Drew Toothpaste investigate the conspiracies and strange happenings that peel back the edge of reality. Join Drew (a research chemist) and Natalie (a Ph.D in Metaphysics) as they study the fringes of society.
Media Referenced in this Episode:
Death Stranding Available on PS4, PS5, and PC.
P.T. by 7780s Studios
Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes
Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
TWOAPW theme by Brendan Dalton: Patreon // brendan-dalton.com // brendandalton.bandcamp.com
Commercial: “Graham Sorter Brücken: A Life of Great Import(er)”
Comments (7)
3 years late to this but as a longtime death stranding lover the piano interlude was beautiful
I know I’m way late to this one but hearing Drew say that he turned off the online portion was upsetting to hear. I cannot imagine playing this game with half of it missing.
I see this game as in conversation with games like Hardspace Shipbreaker and Viscera Cleanup Detail and Harvest Moon/Animal Crossing/Stardew life sims - these games that aren't really job simulators but are very much about work, about labor. Games that make you feel kinda weird about why you put off doing the dishes for virtual chores, or relax after your gig economy app job by roleplaying a haggard contractor. There's something really chewy to me about the fact that Death Stranding is almost too close to life in 2023, the way Paranoia also is now, yet still has an appeal. I think it combines elements of both the Viscera Cleanup Detail/Shipbreaker approach of provoking you to think about which and why systems put people in these meat grinders, and the life sim approach of there being a certain escapism to observing your chores do meaningful good in the world around you, something we of course don't get much of in late capitalism.
Opening up my Trapper Keeper, labeled "Voltaire Lore" in puffy paint, to jot down "AJ likes feet."
you know to really settle in when the interstitial starts with "is this thing on?"
I will always love Kojima for making a game where Mads gives me flowers on my birthday
Hell yes drew toothpaste. I Don't Do Shit is my personal anthem.