The thing you are not understanding now, is that those cryptic teaser/videos he released before; and all that weird, but good marketing; was about a well established franchise, in which people already knew the core mechanics of the game.  So right now Kojima is being crptic as fu(K; BUT on a new IP, so people dont know what the game is, nor how it played since there have not been any other game in that franchise.

That is why people cant take into a context much greater what they saw on the video, for most people the whole context is the video; in which the character just walked.   Kojima should have explained after the video ended that he just showed the "stealth" in the game since you can fight those creatures too.   But I guess the weird Sony format of the conferece did not allow it.

They said in an interview Ellie is the only playable character.  If by the end they decide to include him it will be for a 10% or even less, considering you are most likely also playing as the mother of Ellie (the manly woman in the previous trailer), because they said that the story will have "some time swaps" or something like that, making clear you will play in different time periods.  I wanted to play most of the game as Joel, just like in the first part.

For me the core of the franchise was the journey of how Joel from being just a psychopath begins recovering  his human nature through the curse of the game; and Ellie was just a tool to make that happen.  Ellie was a sidekick and nothing more.

I simply just dont care about the game anymore.

The Last of Us 2 gameplay was so perfectly scripted I can't imagine that's how the game actually plays. Still, if it's a repeat of stealth action, improvisational gunplay, and on-the-fly-crafting, then I'm on board.

As for Death Stranding, it's essentially the black and white ad from the "Mr. Plow" episode of The Simpsons:

I just think Kojima is being annoying. I don't think anyone is really saying Death Stranding will definitely be bad. Just that it's disappointing to have this pretentious circle jerk. Sure it's to "stir up discussion". But you know what stirs up discussion? A fucking good trailer.

Nah. Bad trailers and good ones can stir up discussion easily. It's quite easy to do that actually (see: Battlefield 5 and Call of Duty)

You know exactly where and how that's happening Just because you don't agree doesn't mean you can't understand that perspective. C'mon, this is like if someone came up to me and said David Lynch is pretentious. I might disagree, but I can understand how they came to that conclusion.

...This doesn't even need an explanation. If you can't see it you just can't. 

My point is that I definitely think this marketing scheme is annoying .. but not because the game is bad or because Kojima is bad. It will probably be a great game. It's just because the smoke and mirrors is annoying, we get it already, move on to the content. 

The dude has made three or four trailers now that are just as cryptic as each other and instead of selling a game at this point he's just trying to sell a narrative of a game being really weird. Kojima games have always been weird, but it's getting to the point where it's annoying. Not because of how the game is being depicted or because it's out of my ballpark, it's because as a marketing gimmick it has run it's course. Sure it has started a lot of discussion, but this trailer in particular has seen more backlash than the others because of this repetition. It's just getting tiring at this point. For me in particular it's mostly because I know he wants it to be weird, to be something "deep", or maybe to be some meta-narrative (I'm betting on the latter, although the trailer will obviously look more deep in the context of the full game, that is usually the case). So because I know what he's going for, it doesn't really affect me anymore. It's just there at this point. 

Anyways I think Kojima got most of his following from his games. Metal Gear was very weird but it was at least something tangible. This game isn't something tangible thus far, which is why I find it a bit frustrating that we're just sweeping this under the rug as "Kojima being Kojima". Honestly if Kojima did stuff like this from the beginning of his career I'm not sure he would have the following he has now, it's a bit disingenuous to act like Metal Gear had this level of complacency in it's advertising stage. 

I still think the game will be great, but that's exactly why this is so frustrating. 

Uhh ... what? First of all, that isn't your original point. You never made one, you just expected me to explain everything . Second of all, no, that isn't true. Anything can be classified as pretentious, provided there is legitimate reasoning to back up that classification. Saying that someone is known for doing something is certainly a good counter-point, but it isn't the end all be all of discussion. It doesn't instantly stop something from being pretentious, in fact, it's often the biggest proponents of certain ideals that end up getting stuck in them to the point of pretentiousness.  There is such a thing as mindless self-indulgence. 

As much as Kojima is known for adding weird, experimental parts of his games, you know what else he is known for? Action, bombast, titillating female characters, spy intrigue, etc. I could go on and on, but again the point isn't that i'm expecting any of that (it would be really boring if he just made the same game over and over) - the point is that your "he's known for this so it's okay" doesn't really hold up. He isn't just known for this, he has many equalizers that have made his previous products successful. 

Of course, it will probably be great. Doesn't really change the discussion though. 

Yeah, took a while, didn't it!

...Hm... I'm sure that is what pretentious means ... but I mean more so this definition : "attempting to impress by affecting greater importance, talent, culture, etc., than is actually possessed"

I guess you could argue that, that is a form of "acting like something you aren't", since you're acting of greater importance than you are, but that really isn't the same thing in a literal definition. In any case, now you know which definition I'm using.