TLOU2 review. *SPOILERS DUH*
DISCLAIMER: These are my opinions and do not have to cross with anyone's. Everyone with their own and I respect them, I hope you do with mine. I will try to keep it short even though the thoughts will be all over the place and I might go off tangents sometimes. Also SPOILERS!!
This game had me go through a lot mentally, I cried, I laughed, I was angry, but mostly I was upset a lot of the time. And I will explain why later on.
The Last of Us part II was one of the most, if not THE most, anticipated game for me. And I was over the moon when my best friend got it for me. I was happy that I would get to see and play as my favorite characters. But that happiness didn’t last long as the story progressed. But before I delve into the story and talk about the cons I want to talk about the goods and pros of the game.
I wanna start with the graphics, and the visuals of the game. This game has one of the most beautiful visuals and environment details I've seen in a current gen console. Also me having PS4 slim and saying this doesn’t do justice, imagine the game in PS4 Pro with maximum settings. The character models were amazingly crafted, I can’t say this enough but just look how amazing Joel looks here;
Also Maria, Tommy, Ellie, they all looked amazing! God help me because I still can’t get over how beautiful and amazing they all look. And I will keep saying amazing because it is true.
The mocap and voice acting; it is only fair to say that the actors did a perfect job to bring these characters to life and I respect them so much for it, and the animation that came with it was just fantastic. I applaud the animation team for the amount of work they’ve put into this game and I will never get over the fact that it was all made in a computer. It didn’t feel like mo capped at all, it felt legit and real, it felt like I was watching a movie not playing a video game.
That brings me to the point; this game felt more like an interactive movie than a video game. 60% of the time I was just sitting there bored out of my mind, either because of this reason or that the game gets dragged too long because of the unnecessary gameplay or encounters. Yes it might be a bit too easy to just let the player walk into what they’re supposed to walk to but an encounter every 5-7 minutes? It just gets repetitive and annoying at one point.
It really felt like an interactive movie with so many cutscenes and unnecessary story telling, it was just plain bad. Sometimes I would be tempted to just skip the cutscenes because of how bored I was getting but then again it was my first play through and I don’t like missing anything (although in this game I would’ve like to miss a lot). I think they forgot what made the first game so good.
The game play was exactly the same as the previous one, plus you are able to crawl, swim and dodge. To think these were innovative is a bit dumb on their part. Before the game came out, or when the gameplay trailer released they were boasting how much better the game play is from the first one, showing off the new workbench. Which btw was very annoying to use, unlike the first game this game took most of the time because of the damn animation. “Oh we want to make the game better, how do we do that? I know let’s add sick animation on the workbench to drag the gameplay time.” I know they were trying to make it realistic but it’s just another one of the unnecessary elements.
I think we’ve started with the Cons already so might as well continue. The game tries and forces you to see each character’s perspective that you end up playing, which are Ellie and Gabby. I still don’t understand why they were trying to force us to like Krabby Patty. She killed Joel and so she’s the bad guy for me, end of the story. NOTHING she did had changed my mind about her, literally nothing.
The game was supposed to be Joel and Ellie’s story, about Joel’s redemption, about how fractured their relationship gets after the truth was out, and about how they bond all over again when Ellie starts forgiving him. But all of that was sent out of the window when Debby and her gang were brought into the picture. Ever since they were introduced, nothing made me care about a single one of them, on the contrary every character died made me a little happy inside. They wanted to introduce a new character but they introduced ONE TOO MANY The only characters I cared about besides Ellie and Joel were, Tommy, Jesse and Dina. Jesse didn’t have that much screen time but I liked his character because he wasn’t a bullshit one like Debby gang and wasn’t forced for me to like him.
The fucking sex scene didn’t have to be there, noone wanted or needed to see it and I feel so bad for the actors who had to participate in it all.
The whole Gebb arc was so forced. It made me angrier the more I played as her. Her arc was supposed to be some sort of redemption road for her because of her actions, but it made me hate her more and more. I swear I tried to understand her, like her, see what she saw and why she did what she did but no, nothing could change my mind about her. She couldn’t let go of her anger because she didn’t grieve, she dragged her friends across the country to take her revenge. Not all of her friends agreed with her, because they knew deep down she was wrong, even one of her friends later on said something similar to Gabey at the end of her arc.
The ending: It was so bad. At first I thought of it as a bittersweet ending, because they gave us that scene where Ellie talks to Joel and she says she wants to try and forgive him. They almost made us think the game was good and the ending was justified, but it wasn’t one bit. Ellie didn’t get her revenge, Gebby didn’t die, and Ellie just lost everything and everyone while Abby didn’t. And in the end, Geb didn’t even matter in the story. What was the point of inserting her in the story if she didn’t matter anymore, they just ended her arc there (and I hope for their fucking sake they keep it that way). The more I go through the ending the more I hate it. It wasn’t justified at all for Joel sake, but then again it was Ellie who had to come to terms with his death and grieve on her own. In conclusion it sucked.
The game advertisement was so bad. They made us think that Joel was alive the whole game, they made us think that Joel will be our companion the whole game. And the whole time Neil Druckmann was laughing at us in the background. Its false advertisement for the players to buy the game because they know if they exposed even a little bit of the story people will boycott ND and not gonna buy TLOU2, and honestly can you fucking blame anyone?. A scummy move them ND tbh and I will never forgive them for it.
I wonder what the writers were on to write this shitty narrative story killing off one of the most beloved characters in the game like that. They wanted to make an example out of Joel with death. I get it, but this wasn't the way to do it. the more I think about it the more I think it’s so stupid and the shittiest narrative any game has had so far. And for the sake of the fans I just hope to god they don’t make another game or a dlc for the series after how they ended it.
My conclusion: I was upset most of the time playing this game and didn’t have a good experience for more than 18 hours of it because of what I stated above. it was a grindy experience for me, and my head hurt most of the time because I felt the game like a chore rather than a game, because of how much they kept on stretching it from unnecessary encounters with the enemy to unnecessary amount of cut scenes. Also playing as Dabby made everything 300 times worse for me and I hate her. :)
My rating is 3.5/5, would not recommend buying it full price.
