Gamers remain torn over whether to consider themselves in euphoria or uneasy over Kojima Productions’ shipment of high-level facial animation tech for Death Stranding 2. Such hyper-realistic character model renders of the game, as revealed on Twitter, attracted a mixed bag of genuine admiration and some perverse comments that could have sent chills even down Hideo Kojima’s spine.
The instability rendering captures even skin pores bearing slight wrinkles, hair waxing natural with each movement, and micro-expressions that lend an almost too-real quality to digital faces: like staring at a wax figure for too long and you begin to question your reality. Uncanny valley, I tell you! Some said this is black magic, while others are mad simply for the lack of appeal of the designs.
An insane comment in all caps screamed, “HOLY GYATTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT,” which we take as an expression of awe. Meanwhile, another one said, “Still fake and gay,” because Twitter will be Twitter. In a flash, the conversation degenerated into whether the engine deserved praise (for the record, it’s Guerrilla Games’ Decima engine) or whether the game actually looks “boring as hell” despite technological wonders.
I’ve always been labeled as “breaking this barrier,” and reactions to this prove that he has: whether they love it or hate it, they just cannot stop talking about it. The man turned motion into a gameplay mechanic and made Norman Reedus cry for a digital baby, so this is just him making faces so real that people are feeling uneasy.
Some excerpts from the lunacy:
– “This video makes me really not want to play this game” (valid)
– “Praise is mis-directed, the engine is by Guerrilla Games” (technically correct)
– “They weren’t kidding when they said Kojima made a deal with the devil” (probably true)
– Multiple comments about feet (because of course)
Unbelievable in its realism of rendering, but will it come across as an engaging game? Death Stranding 1 had enough of a divide in appeal already between those who saw it as a delivery simulator and its sequel looks to tie every pore and strand of hair to the execution of in-game activity. Will players care about scientific-grade realistic faces when they’re busy just trying not to trip over some rocks? That’s the question, really.
What Kojima has never been able to do is let go of getting people to actually talk-about something. Through new tech or weird stuff that’s Breaking Twitter, the guy’s the hype master. Maybe Death Stranding 2 will not be for everyone, but you simply cannot deny the fact that it is trying to push boundaries that almost no AAA game would dare touch. Now excuse us while we gobble some popcorns and dissect some more footage frame-by-frame to spot some hidden Kojima-isms in those facial animations.
