Warning: Major Spoiler For Death Stranding 2: On The Beach Follow
Hideo Kojima returns us to a world of porters, BTs, BBs, Voidouts, and more with the release of Death Stranding 2: On the Beach. As you’d imagine, it’s a story filled with complex terminologies, philosophical concepts, metaphysics, and more, but we’re here to help you make sense of it all.
So, whether you finished the sequel and need help understanding the full picture of the ending, or just looking to see how Hideo Kojima’s newest adventure unfolds, here’s our full Ending Explained for Death Stranding 2: On the Beach.
Setting the scene
Death Stranding 2 picks up 11 months after the events of the first Death Stranding. Following the successful connection of the former United States to the Chiral Network (this world’s magical internet that is helping the world rebuild following the apocalyptic titular Death Stranding), defeating the terrorist leader Higgs, and preventing his sister Amelie from destroying the world, Sam Porter Bridges attempts to settle into a quiet life with his daughter, Lou. But that idea is quickly brought to a halt by the reappearance of former accomplice Fragile and her new company, Drawbridge, when she asks Sam to head south and get Mexico back on the grid.
Upon connecting Mexico to the Chiral Network, it’s discovered that linking together a country appears to open a Plate Gate (a giant teleportation portal) to other continents. This is vital because after the events of the Death Stranding, civilization is still largely separated from each other, and Plate Gates would go a long way towards making Earth one interconnected society again.
But as Sam completes his Mexican mission, tragedy strikes when a mysterious armed group in red invades Sam’s home and kills Lou and injures Fragile, sending Sam into a depressive spiral over the loss of his child. Lost, he agrees to join Drawbridge and the crew of its ship, the DHV Magellan, on a mission to connect Australia, the destination of the Mexican Plate Gate.
Who are the Armed Red Attackers?
Knowing who attacked Lou and Fragile is the first step to understanding the ending of Death Stranding 2. The group in Red are mechanical soldiers 3D printed by a reborn Higgs, who, after the events of the first game, killed himself on his Beach only to come back as a glam rock mercenary robot hellbent on getting revenge on Sam and Fragile. This is why he attacks her and Lou.
But Higgs didn’t just come back to life by himself. His soul was revived thanks to an entity known as APAS, a private corporation that manages the automated delivery robots transporting packages around the UCA. Their goal is to connect Mexico and later Australia to the Chiral Network to open even more Plate Gates and eventually link up the whole world.
But behind the scenes, APAS is actually run by a sentient entity known as APAS 4000, which is the fusion of the APAS AI system that manages deliveries and 4000 human souls from people who were killed in a massive Voidout. Their ultimate goal is to elevate all humans into souls, preventing humanity from evolving and instead keeping them trapped in the world of the dead, stopping them from triggering another Voidout ever again. A benevolent, but ultimately misguided attempt to try and contain humanity from once again exploring the world and making connections with one another. It would keep Earth’s population safe, but at the cost of what makes them human, changing people further into digital entities in the shape of their saviors.
How Sam Defeats APAS 4000
In a game of cat-and-mouse, APAS 4000 believes it is using Sam to further its goal of one day containing humanity from ever leaving their shelters ever again. But behind the scenes, Fragile’s Drawbridge knows about this plan and is working to stop APAS 4000. Fragile and Drawbridge’s benefactor, who is eventually revealed to be former President of the UCA, Die-Hardman, as well as the crew of the DHV Magellan, were in fact connecting various settlements in Australia using a new Q-Pid. This device would sever the connection between the world of the living and the dead, and by extension, cut off APAS 4000’s connection to the world due to it being an entity made up of dead souls.
By fully connecting Australia with the new Q-Pid, APAS 4000 is split from the world of the living, and its plan to trap humanity fails.
Wait, but what about Higgs?
While Higgs may have been brought back by APAS 4000 to try and push along its plans, Higgs is by no means a lackey. Instead, Higgs uses his newfound robot body to carry out a separate, more personally fuelled plan of revenge. It was he who attacked Fragile and Lou while Sam was busy reconnecting Mexico, and eventually it’s revealed that Higgs plans to finish what he started in the first Death Stranding game and bring about the end of the world via “The Last Stranding”.
Whereas in the first game, Higgs tried to use the Extinction Entity known as Amelie to trigger the earth-ending event, this time he tries to use Tomorrow, a young woman Sam recovers from the world of the dead, who has mysterious powers that allow her to use tar to speed up decay. By using Tomorrow as an Extinction Entity, Higgs’ plan is to once and for all end human life, killing Sam and Fragile in the process. While Sam manages to defeat Higgs and finally end his apocalyptic fantasy via a combo of samurai sword duelling, electric guitar battle, and good ol’ fashioned fistfight, Higgs does succeed in completing one of his goals…
Fragile Dies
For much of Death Stranding 2, we’re made to think thatFragile survived the attack by Higgs, but Lou died. In reality, Fragile used her trans-dimensional teleportation powers to send Lou to the world of the dead, while Fragile was the one killed by Higgs. Because time dilation and the distinction between life and death are all kinds of messed up in the world of Death Stranding, the Fragile that Sam and the DHV Magellan crew have been travelling with the entire game is actually Fragile’s soul that she temporarily left behind to help Sam and the crew defeat Higgs, stop APAS 4000, and reconnect the world.
Unfortunately, her time in the world of the living is only temporary, and she dies for real at the end of the game. But what about Lou?
BB-28/Lou/Tomorrow/Louise
As it turns out, Lou was spared in the attack by Higgs in Mexico as Fragile used her powers to send Lou to another beach, effectively another dimension. Sent away by Fragile, Lou grew up in the world of the dead as manifested by the soldier Neil Vanna (more on him later). Years later, Sam Porter Bridges will end up fighting Neil in this world and inadvertently rescue Lou, who is none other than Tomorrow.
That’s right, Tomorrow is in fact the same baby Lou that Fragile sent away at the start of the game. Lou, short for Louise, is also BB-28 that Sam traveled across the UCA with in Death Stranding, and more than that, is actually Sam’s biological daughter.
The Neil, Sam, and Lucy Love Triangle
Okay, now we explain the final puzzle that ties all of Death Stranding 2 together. So Louise survives Higgs’ initial attack in Mexico and grows up to become Tomorrow. But why did Higgs want Lou in the first place?
That’s because decades ago, Sam, who I should remind you is a Repatriate — someone who can resurrect themselves thanks to the effects of the Death Stranding — was in a relationship with a therapist named Lucy. Around this time, Lucy was seeing another patient, a man named Neil Vana, who was a smuggler working for Bridges to deliver illegally acquired brain-dead pregnant women whose stillborn babies would become the very first Bridge Babies. Wracked with guilt, Neil sought the help of Lucy, who, it turns out, saved Neil when they were both children from the same village under attack by BTs.
Reunited after all those years, Neil rekindles a relationship with Lucy that becomes romantic even though Lucy was in a relationship with Sam at the time. Despite Neil and Lucy’s close relationship, Lucy chose to stay with Sam, and together they conceived a child.
Unfortunately, a baby born from a Repatriate like Sam held high value for Bridges, who were still conducting their original experiments with BBs. Once they discovered Lucy’s pregnancy, Bridges sought to take the child from her.
To protect the unborn baby Louise, Lucy convinced Neil to pretend to be the father of the child, making the baby less valuable to Bridges. Together with the baby, they would escape the city and Bridges, but would sadly never make it that far as both Neil and Lucy are killed, but not before Louise is removed from Lucy’s dying body, thus saving the baby.
Louise becomes BB-28, but is thankfully hidden away by Sam’s adoptive mother and President of the United States, Bridget Strand, keeping her hidden long enough to be reunited with Sam decades later during the events of the original Death Stranding.
As for Neil, his final act of revenge against Bridges is for his body to necrotize, therefore causing a Voidout and destroying the city and everyone in it. Meanwhile, Neil’s soul wanders the earth, unable to find peace. Similar to Mads Mikkelsen’s Cliff in the first game, Neil’s mercenary soul haunts Sam until the two men face off in a destined duel that finally gives Neil peace and Sam closure with Lucy.
Post-credits scene, and will we get a Death Stranding 3?
But that isn’t quite the end of the revelations. Yes, Death Stranding 2 does have a post-credit scene, and it features a seemingly even more grown-up Tomorrow/Louise dressed up in full porter gear, as well as inheriting Fragile’s creepy second set of hands and her smoking habit. She’s faced with a Plate Gate, perhaps signalling that she’ll follow in her father’s steps and attempt to connect another new continent to the Chiral Network. Could Death Stranding 3 have us going to Europe, Asia, or Africa, for example? And could we be playing as Tomorrow in the sequel? We certainly wouldn’t say no to playing around with her unique tar-infused martial arts skillset.
And that’s the full ending of Death Stranding 2: On the Beach explained. Be sure to check out our review to read why we loved Hideo Kojima’s newest adventure and also check out our ranking of every Hideo Kojima game.
