20 Gaming Moments That Insulted Your Intelligence

3. Neil Is Cliff 2.0 - Death Stranding 2: On the Beach

Death Stranding 2 Neil
Kojima Productions

Death Stranding 2 sure had a lot to live up to where its secondary villain was concerned, considering how instantly iconic Mads Mikkelsen's Clifford Unger was in the original.

The sequel's equivalent, a Solid Snake-looking soldier by the name of Neil Vana, certainly had promise on paper, though ultimately Kojima went way too far in having Neil more-or-less repeat the same beats as Cliff.

That is to say, Neil is also a recurring boss throughout the game who shows up with a group of spectral soldiers to hunt the player across a number of surreal battlefields.

And if that's not samey enough, Neil is also a haunted figure with ties to protagonist Sam's past, just as Cliff was in the first game.

Ultimately for all of Hideo Kojima's efforts to make Death Stranding 2 a bigger, better sequel, pretty much everything about Neil felt like a lazy copy-paste of what he did with Cliff in the first game.

Needless to say, if Death Stranding 3 does happen, there will be many eye-rolls if Kojima rehashes the Cliff formula once again.

 
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Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.