Hideo Kojima, the director of the Metal Gear series and master of the baffling teaser, has unveiled a new trailer for his upcoming game Death Stranding. This new trailer introduces a new character, The Man in the Golden Mask, who is voiced by veteran games actor Troy Baker.
Kojima Productions, which Kojima reformed as an independent studio after leaving Konami, debuted the new trailer at the Tokyo Games Show today. Kojima tweeted it shortly afterwards.
The trailer opens with Norman Reedus’ character trekking with a companion across the ruined, soot-covered landscape we’ve seen in past Death Stranding trailers. The pair are accosted by a familiar voice.
“Well, shit,” Baker’s drawl booms over what sounds like a loudspeaker. “I had a special surprise prepped and everything. But it looks to me like your hands are full.”
His character is standing just over a nearby rise, and he’s equipped with a similar kind of sensor attached to a moving armature that Reedus’ character and others have worn in Death Stranding trailers.
The camera moves to this new character, who is draped in a poncho or rain slicker, and wearing a golden skull mask. He removes his mask, but nothing is revealed – the face is still obscured by another covering.
He plunges the gold mask into a pool of black sludge, which swirls and agitates, with human figures rising up and grasping at him. The mask crackles with energy. What happens next, well… why don’t you just have a look?
トロイさんバージョン👍🦀😅🐟 pic.twitter.com/i8LVPhwMHb
— 小島秀夫 (@Kojima_Hideo) September 23, 2018
This seems like a preview of a pretty intense combat encounter, perhaps a boss fight. But there’s really no telling with Kojima’s stuff, and we honestly don’t have any firm idea on what Death Stranding really is at this point. But whatever it is, it’s certainly interesting.
That said, another thing we don’t know is when Death Stranding is expected to come out, or if it will ever show up on PC. It’s confirmed for PlayStation, and PC hasn’t been ruled out. Given that Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain came to PC, there’s reason to hold out hope that Death Stranding will as well.
As far as a release date goes, the best we have right now is that Kojima has said that it’ll be out before 2019, the year in which Akira is set. Rumor has it that a PC release will come some time after the PlayStation release, if at all.