Topic: The Last Of Us Part II - OT (No Spoilers)

I had to log off after the boss fight I guess? Against Ellie in the theatre and just walk away for the night. Come back to the game fresh when I am not so irritated.

Maybe it is just the fresh rage I am feeling, and I will soften on it over time, but on the whole I kinda hated Abby’s stretch of the game if I am being honest.

There were a couple of nice sequences, cool set pieces and upgrades, but it all sorta felt like this was done as like a cheap way of making the audience care about Abby, and there was almost no narrative reason why all this stuff couldn't have been given to Ellie.

This is the more terminal issue with this stretch of game for me, is just that it feels so narratively lost. Like I've already said, I am happy I wasn't gaslit, but the game never did anything at all to justify why the character change even happens in the first place.

The whole Yara/Lev tangent we go on feels like it takes place in a different videogame. Any attempt to endear us to the antagonists through this section (if that is even what it is trying to do?) fail. Abby being a WLF has remarkable little bearing on any of this. I mean basically none at all, and could have created some unique gameplay moments that may have justified the character change had they used her role in the organization more.

And again, this is all mostly centred around a conflict which basically exists outside of Ellie’s story that we came here for, and really has no bearing on Ellie at all, the character we actually care about. Oh and it also includes multiple really frustrating difficulty spikes. Like I can't think of another game I've played where it goes off for like ten hours and just tells a completely disconnected story for seemingly its own amusement and then just returns back to the game you were playing before.

I feel like you could easily cut most of this entirely and the only result you get is a better paced game, with a lot less bad writing (as this includes some of the worst writing outside of the opening couple of hours), bloat and filler.

Any parts of this you leave in, would also make far more sense if you just played as Ellie all the way through. You could have used Yara and Lev as ways for Ellie and the audience to learn more about the conflict between the Scars and the WLF if you think this is even relevant which I kinda argue it isn’t really? Like I guess it is some nice world building, but it sorta distracts from what the core of this story is for no real meaningful gain. But it feels like has even less of a purpose when you are playing as Abby.

Like what was the point of all of this? Part 1 was already long over by the time this tangent comes to a close, and yet I feel like so much more happened in Part 1.

@Pizzamorg The game was like what I would have imagined a PS5 game would be at the time. It was a truly remarkable achievement on the PS4 Pro, and that combined with the enjoyment of the actual gameplay and encounters themselves is what kept me going. I genuinely enjoyed the game whenever the storytelling didn’t get in the way, which became a huge problem once you flipped over to playing as Abby. Sure, what happened to her father obviously really sucked for her and I get her wanting revenge, but at the same time she’s really no better than Ellie but the game sure makes it seem like you should think Ellie is worse most of the time. That’s BS, and goes back to why I was playing the game in the first place. I nearly didn’t finish the game because of stuff like that, but I did.

The theatre sequence you just brought up was the near breaking point for me. I already didn't want to be playing as Abby, although I had warmed up to it a bit until it kept dragging on and on. Forcing me to fight Ellie, even though there couldn't be fatal consequences because it's a flashback, was nearly the last straw for me. Like I've said many times already, I was playing the game for Ellie, not to fight against her. It was one of the few sequences I've ever experienced where I literally had to force myself to actually play through the sequence and not just take the game out and call it.

I don’t regret playing the game. It is a technical masterpiece in more ways than one, especially for the hardware it was released on. I just hate the things it did with the storytelling, effectively cursing the character the whole first game built us up to love basically, and for me nearly ruining what could have been the absolute masterpiece people claim it to be.

So I rolled credits. Beat it in around 20 hours. Online it seems to suggest the game should take you anywhere between 25 to 40, but I got achievements for things like all weapons etc, so I can't have missed anything major, so I dunno why my playthrough ran so short. I don't really care though, I am pretty glad this is over.

I thought the ending was a total mess, I guess I missed the flashcard, so for the longest time I thought I was in some kind of dream sequence as Ellie lay unconscious on the Theatre floor, dreaming about her ideal future. It really took me a while to register... oh no, this is really happening.

I know I wrote a perhaps overlong, rambly, review of Part 1 (although I appreciate the kind words people said about that review) but I am going to have a harder time doing that with Part 2.

I like to take notes when I play a game, and then sort those notes at the end. Looking at something as a whole, then working my way inwards in a more detailed way. However, I took remarkably few notes during Part 2, possibly because I was sharing my experience on this forum along the way, rather than privately in a Google doc but I also just don't really know how I feel about the game as a whole well enough, to really create a core of thought to build any commentary out of.

It seems like very few people are 'meh' on this game and this cloud has sorta hung over me the whole time playing it. I do not hate this game, but I do dislike it. Do I dislike it in a genuine way, or would I too be one of the self proclaimed haters if I hadn't had my expectations set so low by all the hatred I'd heard for this over the years? I can't ever know.

I will say I genuinely hated the bookends of this game, I thought the Abby section of the game is borderline totally pointless, but otherwise everything else was just kinda... eh to me. There are no moments I love in this to counter balance the moments I hated which is why I say I dislike it overall, but I dunno, those moments I hated create just sort of a blackhole of apathy for me.

It is a technological marvel for sure, it is generally more fun to play than Part 1 just purely looking at it mechanically as a game, while still staying mostly true to the gameplay experience of Part 1 (mechanically). Only with more encounters that feel like cinematic set pieces, which I enjoyed.

I guess the most damning thing I can say, is while I am sure I will play Part 1 again in the coming years, I sorta have no desire to ever play Part 2 again. This playthrough has felt like enough for me. Honestly beyond any discussions we may have out of this post, I think I'll honestly be happy to never think about this again and just pretend I am still living in a world where I hadn't played this yet.

I suffer through some really miserable gameplay in Part 1 at times, because the heights of that game surrounding Joel and Ellie's story are worth experiencing over and over again. It is also a near perfectly paced package, tightly telling its narrative and getting out of there, which prompts me to want to reexperience it again and again.

As fun as some of the set pieces and encounters are in Part 2, that is more in the context of how generally not fun Part 1 is to play, not that I think they are these masterfully designed engagements in all videogaming, that are of such a high standard they are worth experiencing over and over again. The gameplay improvements are just not enough in isolation, even if they improve this experience during your one time playing through it.

And also now knowing how flabby this is (despite my apparently shorter than average run time), knowing now that whole stretches of the game and almost the entire game itself honestly is all just kinda one massive exercise of futility, and knowing that it is going to deliver some true narrative low points that absolutely spit in the face of characters, and a game, I truly adore, with absolutely zero high point moments to counter balance these lows...

Yeah, there is nothing here to make me think I ever want to experience this ever again.

My pleasure... I think?

I was thinking next I'd tie a plastic bag around my head and scream into it for four hours while I throw projections on my wall of images of my family just to chase one last feeling that mirrors that of playing Part 2 before I go play Mario Kart or something and eat some ice cream.

That might not be a joke.

@Pizzamorg Genuinely sorry that it ended up such a colossal waste for you. Not necessarily because I felt differently, but well… because it’s just always better to enjoy the games we play rather than extract misery. 😅 That sucks.

Ah well, beyond my guilt for recommending a game which ended so poorly, I am glad for you that it’s over. You played through it at a quick pace so at least the suffering was short-lived.

I’ll share a few more details thoughts and responses on the other spoilery thread.

So I have become quite excited about the Last of Us again after the announcement of the Last of Us 2 Remake. I should maybe wait to replay the game until the remake arrives but its honestly a little bit hard to do so. The announcement of the remake was actually little shocking to me in a sense (had no idea that it would happen). Now January 17 cant come fast enough.

Started playing the game yesterday and I've played it for 9 hours thus far. Absolutely insane to me how engrossing this game is as I wasn't expecting to get as addicted as I am with it now. This is actually the first Naughty Dog game that I'm genuinely enjoying. It could be because games like this appeal to me more now that I'm older. I played the first The Last of Us on PS4 back in 2015 and that was 9 years ago. In other words, I was a teenager back then. I remember liking the gameplay but it wasn't that captivating and I didn't care much for the story. With Part II, I'm absolutely loving the gameplay and the story is good, although it has slowed down a bit now. Not much is happening and I haven't met any new characters. But hopefully that will change soon.

I do have to mention how great the (first?) semi open-world area was. I feel like that was a trend with most first-party games on PS4, i.e. even though it's mostly a linear game, there are still some open-world areas here and there. And it was really fun to explore it! It wasn't overwhelming at all and it was very rewarding, both in terms of new equipment but also story moments.

My personal problem with the game is that I have to explore everywhere and loot everything, lol. I have to stop myself because I can't carry any more ammo/resources so there's no point in spending that much time exploring. It's fun looking for stuff but I'm at a point now where resources don't feel as scarce anymore.

It's great how much emphasis there is on stealth but I also feel like there should be more mandatory shooting sections. Otherwise you'll get rusty with your shooting once you find yourself in such a situation.

One final thing I have to mention is the fantastic checkpoint system. It feels like the game saves every ten seconds, which is super useful as mistakes can occur every now and then and I don't want to restart entire sections because of that.