With Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, Hideo Kojima seems more dedicated than ever to referencing his previous work. The DHV Magellan ship that appears to serve as the game's home base looks a whole lot like the head of Metal Gear Rex. The latest trailer revealed Luca Marinelli's role as Neil, who's the "splitting image of Solid Snake." On top of all that, the newly revealed cover art bears a striking resemblance to Metal Gear Solid 2's bizarre, Japan-only box art.
Death Stranding 2's cover features Norman Reedus's Sam in profile on the right side of the image, holding baby Lou who is on the left in front of a white background. As was pretty much immediately noted on places like Bluesky and Reddit, this is very similar to the image on a promotional slipcover for Metal Gear Solid 2's Japanese release, featuring a man in profile on the right holding a baby on a pure white background.
The man in the Metal Gear Solid 2 image is Japanese pop superstar Gackt, who weebs of a certain age will likely recall for his involvement in Final Fantasy 7 spin-offs Dirge of Cerberus and Crisis Core. Gackt was also all over the Japanese marketing for MGS2, appearing in numerous commercials for the game, including one featuring the same imagery as that slipcover.
Back in 2013, Kojima tweeted that the "reason I asked GACKT to be on MGS2's TVCM is 'MGS1' was about DNA & 'MGS2' MEME. DNA consists 'AGTC', adding 'K' of KOJIMA becomes 'GACKT'." (Yes, I also had to reread that quote a few times to understand it.) Kojima has a downright infamous love for drawing these kinds of strange connections which, for me, puts to rest the idea the similarity between DS2's box and the Gackt image is purely coincidental.
Death Stranding fans have actually been referencing the Gackt promo for years since, well, "man caring for baby" is pretty central to the open-world game's whole visual identity. With Lou having escaped the confines of that weird little jar from the first game, those themes are likely only growing stronger in Death Stranding 2.
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