App Store Editors’ Notes
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Such a beautiful, but slow-paced game
Thu Feb 01 2024 NineSevenZeroThis game is unlike any other game I've ever played. For perspective, I enjoy the loneliness of games like Fallout. I even enjoy the slower pace of those games, but this takes slower pace to a new level. Most of that is due to the long cut scenes, which you can skip, but I feel like you're missing out on the artistry of the game if you do that. At one point I'd been sitting still for so long that my wife said, "Are you watching a movie? I thought you were playing a game." The gameplay itself is great! I'm playing with a controller on my iPad and Mac. The graphic details are amazing, and the sound effects and music are spot-on. This I've had some crashing issues on my 11" M1 iPad Pro. My M1 Mac Mini does fine. I've tried propping up my iPad so it has good airflow around the back with no case, and that seems to be better. When the iPad is in the Magic Keyboard, it seems to crash more frequently. More T&E needed to solve that unless they release an update that addresses that.
I don't know if I should thank Tim Cook or thank Hideo Kojima.
Sun Feb 18 2024 François WuDeath Stranding is so much fun! Just before I finish the game (the power went out outside, otherwise I would have finished it already), I want to praise this game and my MacBook Pro (2021, 16-inch). This is the first time in two and a half years since I bought it that I have felt that this is a device that can get hot, has a fan, and uses a battery (it offers the same experience as the daily use Intel MacBook Pro without gaming, haha.). The gaming experience it brings is perfect: the mini-LED backlight allows for a large amount of sky and light sources to be presented in HDR in the game; although it is only equipped with the M1 Pro 16GB of unified memory, its graphics processing power can maintain almost 120Hz stably ((it seems to me is.) , at 2560*1440 with "very high" quality), w/ or w/o power connected. This also means that I can play a 3A wherever and whenever I want (on the other hand, game saves can also be continued on iPhone, which is really great). Next, I will continue playing Death Stranding without plugging in, hoping to completely drain my battery until it's below 80% health (currently at 87%) before the AC three-year warranty expires. This MBP has been the most powerful and favorite among all the Macs and PCs I have used so far. I don't know if I should thank Tim Cook or thank Hideo Kojima, but playing Death Stranding on my MBP has been the first happy event of my 2024.
Wow!
Sun Feb 04 2024 Thegoob95This game is a 5 star that’s a 3 for reasons which should easily be fixed. I’m anticipating these being addressed but it’d be nice to have some communication from the devs.
I’m shocked this is on an iPhone. Some people have reviewed this and said it doesn’t look good. That’s untrue. Generally it runs and looks great! Here’s what it needs: 1. Crashing must be addressed. I have to save the game every 2-3 minutes because the game goes through areas where it crashes a lot, then moments where it’s fine. Auto save every few minutes would help. The game needs graphics settings. I prefer lower graphics without metal fx because I don’t like upscaling blur. Please provide us these options similar to how resident evil did. TLDR: looks great plays great, those clowning on it are wrong. -Crashing is an issue, goes through waves of crashing, then none, then crash again putting you way back to a previous save/location. -need auto save -need graphics options, not all like metal fx upscaling. Opinion: If those needs are met this is 5 star. If not, and crashing doesn’t get fixed, it’s a cool demo of a17, and fundamentally unplayable in the long term, all while being disappointing to us who want mobile AAA to take off NOW :) Please devs, fulfill its potential.
Very well made game
Tue Feb 06 2024 BanemanisIf you would have told me 5 years ago that and iPhone and/or iPad would be able to run AAA games like this, I would have laughed and walked away. Here we are in 2024 with one of the best titles available for exactly those devices. I’m blown away at how smooth my M2 iPad pro 12.9 inch runs this game. I hear many complaints about the clarity of the game on both iPhone and iPad but lets get really people, this game is running on devices with nothing but passive cooling to keep your devices from vaporizing. Sacrifices must be made to achieve this goal and I must say Kojima Productions have done a beautiful job. I really hope this game starts the trend for more AAA releases on IOS and Mac OS.
The one complaint I do have is with the virtual controller, I find it very hard to use so I use a PS4 controller instead, which I prefer anyway. That said, I’m really not sure how you can do the virtual controller better without making it harder to select the correct action you want.
Keep up the great work and I look forward to future titles landing on IOS and Mac OS.
The game is good. Everything mac is the weird part.
Fri Feb 02 2024 ShinyMachineIn a strange turn of events apple is the user experience problem here. Most of the problems with the game are due to the mac and not the game itself. You'll have to activate apples "game center" registration. Otherwise the icon just displays in the lower app tray. Nothing happens. You'll have to force quit and then activate game center for it to work. Also, be advised that it's not intuitive playing this on a home TV. I use the xbox controller and it works fine but it's clunky getting the console experience on a tv with your laptop. Sometimes the game has the white app top bar other times the screen just goes black and I have to touch the mac mouse pad to "wake" it up. This might be due to my energy saving/screen settings. Basically I sit with the laptop half open and the screen blacked out connected to an hdmi to my 4k tv ready to stirr the laptop when the screen goes black. I want games on mac to work but I'm coming from consoles not PC's. It's a little more fuss than I'd like right now but the game seems to be worth all that. I'm sure apple could make the game vibe right it they tried.
Beautiful & Cinematic
Fri Nov 08 2024 Curtis R. ShidelerI’ve somehow kept myself from knowing much about this game until now. And with the rain falling outside, this beautiful and eerie adventure seems a perfect vibe for right now. So far the story is very compelling and the way it’s told is stunning and cinematic, even on my iPhone 15 Pro Max. The music and score fit the mood perfectly. And the challenge of traversing the landscape is the exact slow pace I’m in the mood for. Plus, when moments of tension arise, the juxtaposition feels even more intense.
My only issues so far have been when installing. It kept pausing saying I was out of memory despite having 135 free GB before installing. Thankfully when I just hit A a few times and continued installing a few times, it eventually finished. Having the prologue be free might entice more people to try this and persevere through the game’s huge download/install. Glad I kept at it overnight. This is going to be a story that stays with me, I can tell. Especially, right now as America faces an unknown future.
Needs a Apple Arcade Game Store Treatment
Fri Feb 02 2024 WheeillThis game truly shows what Apple Silicon is capable of! It's a technical marvel to see it run on everything including an iPhone. But where Apple has let us down is presenting it on the weekest digital market place avaiable, which employs no supportive features for gaming what so ever. It's time to break Apple Arcade off as a stand alone app, give it it's own store and make it a true gaming platfrom akin to Valve's Steam game store with features gamers need to manage our games and connect with other players. I bought this game simply to show that there is bourgeoning interest in gaming on the Mac, but until Apple is able to create a gaming platform and store seperate of the abismal Mac Store I'd rather continue buying my games on Steam. I'm sincerely hoping that these relationships with AAA developers is also driving a new game platform in the background and that we'll see something this year at WWDC. That will be when Apple has truely turned a corner. Great work on this game! The future is bright!
Game Saving Bug Ruins The Fun
Fri May 09 2025 vangelicoAmazing game that I’ve finished multiple times elsewhere, attempting a playthrough on iPhone and it runs well enough but haven’t been playing often or progressing much due to the bug where if the network switches (common on a mobile device) or has any issues, the game can’t reconnect to online services and is then unable to save for some reason, freezing the game completely while attempting to manually save, and breaking autosave so you can be playing for a long while only to lose all of that progress.
This bug has existed since the game first dropped for Apple devices. It also existed on the much more recent Xbox release (due to network syncing issues caused by the quick resume feature on that console) until it was very quickly fixed there. So I hope the same fix can be done here so that regardless of online syncing being interrupted, saving won’t be.
505 Games support directly says to simply play in offline mode and isn’t promising a fix but a major component of the game is the strand system working with other players to help reconnect the world together, so that isn’t good enough. 1-star and not recommended until it’s fixed.
