Between Ghost of Tsushima and Death Stranding, Sony’s recent trend has been to update and rerelease first-party games in “Director’s Cut” versions. However, Death Stranding director (and known cinephile) Hideo Kojima does not appear to have agreed with that specific phrase.
Over the weekend, the legendary game director turned to Twitter to provide an unexpectedly public reaction against his own game’s marketing. A director’s cut, in his opinion, does not include creating anything new, but rather remixing what is already there or restoring information that was deleted during creation. In his opinion, adding a completely new racing minigame does not qualify for a director’s cut.
“A director’s cut in a movie is an additional edit to a shortened version that was either released reluctantly because the director did not have the right to edit it, or because the running time had to be shortened,” said Kojima.
“In the game, it is not what was cut, but what was additionally produced that was included. Director’s Plus? So, in my opinion, I don’t like to call ‘director’s cut’.”
Of course, Death Stranding’s “Director’s Cut” is nothing new in the world of video games. It’s the “Game of the Year Edition,” as filtered via Sony’s preoccupation with cinematic presentation (fittingly, we did name Death Stranding our game of the year for 2020). In a world when Zack Snyder can spend over $70 million on Justice League reshoots, Kojima’s definition may also need to be updated.
We don’t know whether or when Death Stranding: Director’s Cut will be released on PC. When it arrives, it will include entirely new story objectives, a slew of new weaponry and battles, and a freight catapult for yeeting your packages across America. How’s that for quick service?
