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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 0:44 
Filthy Junkie Bitch

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Christ. Now I know what hearthly bats off to it all makes sense.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 10:08 
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Satsuma wrote:
TLOU2 has a simple but effective plot with decent dialogue, exemplary voice acting and mo cap.

Deaths Stranding has a terrible convoluted plot by a guy who has no filter and no one to say no to him or edit down his rubbish, has amateurish ambitions to be a director and can’t write dialogue to save his life.

There’s nothing in TLOU2 as shockingly awful and cringeworthy as “Like Mario and Princess Beach” and that run along the beach.

Gameplay wise, one is a linear stealth horror shooter and the other an open world deliverathon. I like both games a lot but they’re entirely different.

If it came down to laughing out loud at one over the other Death Stranding would win that shit no fucking contest whatsoever. I mean, come on... Jesus Christ.


I cheerfully described aspects of Death Stranding as 'hokum' in its thread, so I'm not blind to its flaws, of which there are many. (Other things I flagged up were the overly extended Heartman mountain section, pointless inventory complications with multiple grades of the same things, vehicle behaviour in certain environments and so on.)

Death Stranding gets more latitude because it made such an incredible effort to be something fundamentally new and different, IMO it genuinely redefined what it can feel like to play a videogame, whilst telling a compelling, if somewhat batshit crazy story that had huge ideas and astonishing ambition. (An ambition that, overall, I felt it did enough to realise.)

TLOU2's basic story is as old as time, I mean, Wuthering Heights was doing it in 1847, so if TLOU2 wants to tell the same story again it needs to do a damn good job of it, especially if it's going to drag it out over 25-30 hours.

And I don't think it does a particularly impressive job of it, and it definitely goes on far too long, and it hangs all of this onto the framework of a videogame that has workmanlike mechanics that aren't a million miles removed from the previous game (released in 2013), and even then they weren't exactly revolutionary.

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
I completely get what they going for with the Abby stuff, (Druckmann explicitly and clearly points it out in interviews), but I'm simply not convinced it really adds much, or at least, enough. The pacing is all over the place, the structure of the narrative detracts from the experience rather than adding to it, I've already detailed my issues with character choices and motivations, and whilst the voice acting is indeed superb, the lines they're actually acting out, far less so.

It's a boilerplate revenge morality tale that spends far too long sniffing its own farts. I think there's a much better videogame in there that runs at least ten hours shorter, and gives the narrative a more cohesive structure in the process.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 11:17 
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Satsuma wrote:
There’s nothing in TLOU2 as shockingly awful and cringeworthy as “Like Mario and Princess Beach” and that run along the beach.

Love the way her eyes basically don't move at all in that scene - gives it a real uncanny valley feel ;)


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 11:35 
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Quote:

... that spends far too long sniffing its own farts. I think there's a much better videogame in there that runs at least ten hours shorter, and gives the narrative a more cohesive structure in the process.



You must be entirely oblivious to the fact that these complaints can levelled entirely at Deaths Stranding.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 12:40 
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Soopah red DS

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GazChap wrote:
Satsuma wrote:
There’s nothing in TLOU2 as shockingly awful and cringeworthy as “Like Mario and Princess Beach” and that run along the beach.

Love the way her eyes basically don't move at all in that scene - gives it a real uncanny valley feel ;)


I thought the heels would be an encumbrance in the water. But they just skim over the top of it. Magic stuff.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 13:33 
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Satsuma wrote:
You must be entirely oblivious to the fact that these complaints can levelled entirely at Deaths Stranding.


Yes but like I said a few posts back, Death Stranding gets extra latitude because it's trying to do, and be, so much more than TLOU2.

TLOU2 is a decent enough videogame that'll keep me playing to the end, but it hasn't captivated me like Death Stranding did.

I dunno, maybe I'm just not the target audience for TLOU2, or maybe a videogame is the wrong medium for what it's trying to do, it's the sort of story that could be better told in a two hour film, I think.

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
Or rather, maybe it's the wrong genre of videogame for a preachy morality tale about breaking the cycle of revenge and violence, whilst inviting the player to participate in endless waves of well constructed carnage using a variety of lethal weapons, and then expecting us to get all thoughtful and sad about it because Ellie suddenly feels bad about a particular action or kill.


It's a bit like the disconnect between the entertaining mayhem of GTAIV, and then the sombre and shocking backstory of Niko and the emotional damage his past inflicted upon him.

I can't help but think that there's a much braver, more honest game that could be made about this sort of stuff, but they gotta put all the explosions and killing in there to make the game fun.....

Well actually, such a game already exists of course, Spec Ops: The Line.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 13:52 
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Or you could accept that your opinion has been coloured, tainted and influenced by all the YouTube videos, interviews, reviews and online comments you’ve read, watched and consumed before experiencing the game for yourself.

To me, TLOU2 is best compared to Resident Evil 4, another 20+ hour game survival horror game. It does everything the other games did but now looks amazing and improves the mechanics. You’re enjoying the game and thinking you’re about done and then BAAM you’ve got to put the second disc in and now you’re on another island and have many more hours to play. The island’s great of course and has much more action but it’s missing some of the character of the start of the game because you’ve already spent more time there and you spent it there first. But when you settle in, you’ve got tons more enjoyment on offer and then you’ve got a big boss to fire rockets at. The perfect analogy.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 16:15 
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Err on the side of caution when posting things that can be considered spoilers, folks. Not everyone wants to ruin the game for themselves before they play it ;)

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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 16:15 
SupaMod
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Err on the side of caution when posting things that can be considered spoilers, folks. Not everyone wants to ruin the game for themselves before they play it ;)

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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 18:07 
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Here's a non-spoiler, and a good thing about TLOU2.

https://twitter.com/BlondeHistorian/sta ... 5805222919




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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 20:06 
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Grim... wrote:
Err on the side of caution when posting things that can be considered spoilers, folks. Not everyone wants to ruin the game for themselves before they play it ;)


Sorry I didn't consider the bits you've spoilered out as spoilers when I wrote them, (I have been using spoiler tags frequently in this thread), but reading them back they do give away some thematic stuff and whatnot that folks might not want to know upfront, apologies and I will be more careful going forward.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 06, 2020 20:10 
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JBR wrote:
Here's a non-spoiler, and a good thing about TLOU2.

https://twitter.com/BlondeHistorian/sta ... 5805222919




The game is absolutely peerless in that regard and Naughty Dog deserve all the credit they're getting in regard of options when it comes to controls, difficulty and particularly accessibility.

This is the first game I can think of that is so incredibly configurable that I'd honestly feel completely comfortable recommending it to someone who was nervous in any or all of the above regards, as every single aspect of the game can be tweaked to make it playable.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sat Jul 11, 2020 19:49 
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All done, game completed, linear runtime just shy of 30 hours according to the save file, but a lot more than that overall due to my propensity for going back and trying bits again.

I watched every cutscene, read every note I found, read every single one of Ellie's journal entries, experienced as much of the game as I possibly good.

NON-SPOILER THOUGHTS.

It's a good videogame. If you buy it purely on the premise of wanting to enjoy a very well made videogame, with peerless production values, solid game mechanics, astonishing visuals, some incredible showpiece and setpiece moments, fantastic voice and mocap work, a handful of thrilling boss fights, and more than its fair share of ZOMG moments - TLOU2 has you covered.

Drop the cash on it purely on that basis, I promise you won't be disappointed.

It definitely runs too long, even taken purely as a videogame and discounting the story (I'll get to that in the spoiler bit), there's a good 5-10 hours of fat on this thing that could have been trimmed to make a better experience. (This is not a controversial opinion, you'd be hard pushed to find even a positive review that doesn't think this game has pacing and bloat issues.)

The story is....... meh. I'll do that in the spoiler bit.

I can't bring myself to go more than 7.5/10 for this one, as a single player narrative driven game, it's just not worth it, and the story drags this one down, as such the final mark for TLOU2 is:

750/1000

EDIT - Oh god and the narrative structure they went for, so many really solid suggestions out there as to how the story could have been better told from a timeline and character perspective.

EDIT 2 - And I use a proper score scale, so 500/1000 would be 'average', as such I'm rating TLOU2 as well above average.

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
I've done a lot of this earlier in the thread, so I'll try and keep it brief.

To repeat a handful of key points though, I don't mind that they killed Joel, I never thought he was a good guy or a hero, I didn't mind that I had to play as Abby, I didn't think it was pushing 'an agenda'.

The entire Ellie story makes no sense to me, and if anything makes less sense the farther through the game we get. You know where TLOU2 finishes in my head? After Joel gets killed. Ellie goes back to Jackson, she mourns, and she deals with her grief there, as her relationship with Dina blossoms. She simply isn't the psychopathic monster the game wants her to be, and it never, ever, rang true to me for the game's entire duration.

Abby's story I liked, even though the game smacks you about the head in a slightly embarrassing fashion in terms of LOOK SHE'S A HUMAN BEING TOO and THEY'RE NOT ALL EVIL BADDIES etc. She's a well written character in the main, she gets the best gameplay, weapons, attacks, guns, even the best levels, so in pure videogame terms she beats Ellie. (I'm sure this was intentional.)

So yeah, I get that everyone's the good guy in their own story.

And ultimately the message of the game is really basic, it's a simple story and it's not massively well told either, especially when there are a ridiculous number of stupid contrivances to make it happen.

On more than one occasion it all started to feel like torture/misery porn, and it's hugely manipulative throughout.

And then when Ellie leaves Dina and their son to seek vengeance against Abby again, after all that's happened, and Abby has spared her twice, I was properly rolling my eyes.

So the story fell totally flat for me, it had its moments, mostly when it flashed back to Joel and Ellie, a story that would have been far more interesting to experience than what we were actually given.

The ending of the game, like much of the narrative itself, is hollow, and mean, and so in your face that it simply becomes grating.

A shame, because I think TLOU2 'the videogame' deserved far better than TLOU2 'the story'.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sat Jul 11, 2020 19:55 
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A couple of well rounded reviews of the game that also come in around the 7/10 mark, I honestly think 7-ish out of 10 is about right for this game overall.

It ain't a 10, but it ain't a 5 either.





Or Zero Punctuation gets it done in 6m10s



This one was quite good too:



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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 8:40 
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When are you doing your RDR2 review?


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 11:39 
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I may actually give RDR2 a go.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 12:37 
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This is a good one. His ideas for fixing the story in a single game are great, but particularly the suggestion that TLOU2 should have been split out into TLOU2 and TLOU3. (Which at a stroke also fixes the problem with TLOU2 being far too long.)

As he also says, pacing is totally whacked in this game, as is the chronology of the story as it's told.

IMO this is yet another measured, balanced review of the game and its flaws, whilst also acknowledged the (many!) things it excels at.

Note the first 1m45s are him plugging his sponsor so best to skip that.



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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 13:13 
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Bad Girl

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“Too long” and should have been “TLOU2 & 3” is such a daft criticism. The whole story they wanted to tell us is right here right now and thank fuck they didn’t try and milk it by splitting the story up. I appreciate the consumer friendly approach. There’s always problems with splitting your story up (see Hunger Games, Potter etc) but with video games they’d probably be more inclined to start adding mechanics to prevent 3 being a rehash of 2’s mechanics and people moaning it’s too much like 2 waah waah etc. Resi 4 is a masterpiece at 20+ hours for the first play through and I’d have been fucking annoyed if it ended on a cliffhanger before Nintendo sold me the second disc 12 months later.

It’s a brilliant game as it is and a magnificent achievement. I couldn’t give a flying fuck that it’s not the story some small moaning YouTube shits wanted - it’s the story Druckmann wanted to tell and he saw it through from start to finish without compromise.

You’re in the minority here and looking to reenforce an opinion you’d formed before you even played the game by looking at “reviews” that say the same things you’d already read.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 13:17 
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Is there a school somewhere for people who want to be famous on YouTube where they tell them all to talk with their hands? It looks so fucking idiotic and forced.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 14:13 
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Satsuma wrote:
“Too long” and should have been “TLOU2 & 3” is such a daft criticism. The whole story they wanted to tell us is right here right now and thank fuck they didn’t try and milk it by splitting the story up. I appreciate the consumer friendly approach. There’s always problems with splitting your story up (see Hunger Games, Potter etc) but with video games they’d probably be more inclined to start adding mechanics to prevent 3 being a rehash of 2’s mechanics and people moaning it’s too much like 2 waah waah etc. Resi 4 is a masterpiece at 20+ hours for the first play through and I’d have been fucking annoyed if it ended on a cliffhanger before Nintendo sold me the second disc 12 months later.

It’s a brilliant game as it is and a magnificent achievement. I couldn’t give a flying fuck that it’s not the story some small moaning YouTube shits wanted - it’s the story Druckmann wanted to tell and he saw it through from start to finish without compromise.

You’re in the minority here and looking to reenforce an opinion you’d formed before you even played the game by looking at “reviews” that say the same things you’d already read.


How can a criticism be 'daft' if it's an opinion that someone genuinely holds and gives a rational explanation for?

TLOU2 drags in my honest opinion, there were moments in the campaign:

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
both of them


where I was honestly getting bored and just wanting the actual story to progress. It is a simple statement of fact that there are chunks of this game where neither the story or the characters change or progress in any way whatsoever, I was reminded of an episode of Luke Cage (Season 1) where the credits rolled on an episode and I was like, 'Dafuq, literally nothing happened! The plot synopsis for this episode could be left blank and no one would miss anything.'

The gameplay loop is solid but it's not spectacular, and at times it's stretched too thin. On at least two occasions I got to the point where I just cheesed the encounter, dashing forward through a route that seemed to allow me to escape relatively unmolested, just to trigger the next checkpoint.

As a one player narrative driven game I think the pacing is badly off, the ordering of it from a chronological perspective hurts the actual story, and I know exactly what Druckmann was going for because I've taken the time to read and watch multiple interviews with him about it. They've made some bold choices, no doubt about it, but for the story it is, IMO there's a better way to tell it, and a leaner, more coherent way to tell it.

I don't know why there's such obvious anger creeping into your post, why try to belittle people by calling them 'small moaning YouTube shits' just because they have a different opinion to you about a videogame?


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 15:55 
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Lord, couldn’t agree more about Luke Cage but TV and video games are different mediums. Being bored of the game and wanting to progress the story so you can play more game is an odd observation, mind. But having a “great idea” - two games! is daft for a singular vision. Splitting the narrative across multiple games wouldn’t work for TLOU2 and it’s not consumer friendly either. If you’ve had enough of playing the game because it’s long then, I’ve a “great idea”, just put it down for a bit. No one is forcing anyone to continue. Wouldn’t it be great if Death Stranding split its narrative across two games with years between each release? That’s a 50 hour+ game so it’s clearly too long. No, obviously not. Stop moaning about more game. If you don’t want more game then you’ve got the choice to stop or come back later.

Plus, we’ve all cheesed encounters to get to the next bit in literally every game ever. I’m sure I cheesed some encounters too where it become a slog to repeat the same difficult sections (mind you, I was playing on survivor). I’d rather have an out for a difficult situation than being hindered in my ability to progress.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 16:01 
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Quote:

I don't know why there's such obvious anger creeping into your post, why try to belittle people by calling them 'small moaning YouTube sweet' just because they have a different opinion to you about a videogame?



Hey look, just because it’s on YouTube doesn’t mean it’s gospel. No way I’m going to sit through 4 more videos of people endlessly waffling on about TLOU2. I’m certainly going to take ZP with a pinch of salt. YouTubers aren’t all created equal, they’re not journalists and don’t all have insightful opinions. Look at Angry Joe, his video of the first big twist is disgusting and pathetic. This guy used to work for the Nostalgia Critic and look at the complaints about sexism in that camp.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 16:42 
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FWIW I completely agree about the Angry Joe review, it was embarrassing to watch a grown man throw a genuine shouty strop because he didn't get the game or the story he wanted, all that:

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
'Fuck Abby I don't want to play as Abby'


nonsense and leaving the room at one point too.

I generally enjoy his content but he was way off beam on that one.

The guy to watch in their videos IMO is Alex, he's far more measured and seems to think his way around stuff in a much more mature fashion. The Angry Joe extended spoiler discussion of TLOU2 is substantially better than the main review, and Alex's comments in particular are fairly insightful, and he gives Druckmann due credit for making some bold choices.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sun Jul 12, 2020 17:13 
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Satsuma wrote:
Lord, couldn’t agree more about Luke Cage but TV and video games are different mediums. Being bored of the game and wanting to progress the story so you can play more game is an odd observation, mind. But having a “great idea” - two games! is daft for a singular vision. Splitting the narrative across multiple games wouldn’t work for TLOU2 and it’s not consumer friendly either. If you’ve had enough of playing the game because it’s long then, I’ve a “great idea”, just put it down for a bit. No one is forcing anyone to continue. Wouldn’t it be great if Death Stranding split its narrative across two games with years between each release? That’s a 50 hour+ game so it’s clearly too long. No, obviously not. Stop moaning about more game. If you don’t want more game then you’ve got the choice to stop or come back later.


Well yes that's what I did, hence it took me two weeks to complete it. I've said all along the game is good enough to deserve seeing out to the end, and as I said in my review above, when the game is spectacular, it really is spectacular.

'I think the game is too long for reasons x, y and z' and 'I want to finish the game' can both be true at the same time.

As for splitting it out into two games, the way that chap suggested it works well to my mind, and the idea would be they'd be released fairly close together, not years apart. The other option would be to simply do the 'two games' as one game with the same 25 hour runtime, it'd still make the story work better when structured in that regard IMO.

One of TLOU2's biggest problems is that its inciting incident feels stunningly contrived and forced, it makes the characters do things that don't make sense so the story can happen, and then spends its runtime trying to fix a problem that it created in the first place.

I fully understand that this is the story Druckmann wanted to tell, and this is the way he wanted to tell it, and I respect that, I knew what I was getting into when I bought the game, and at the end of it all I gave the game a lot of praise for what I like about it.

That said, the way I feel about it is the way I feel about it, and I've tried to explain why that is.

The closing stages of TLOU1 were stunningly haunting and oppressive, the game had worked to that point so masterfully that even as I was controlling Joel through the horrendous massacre he undertakes at the end, then the cold-blooded murder of both the surgeon (which you control) and Marlene (which you do not), I understood it, I understood his actions, and then the final, crushing lie that he has to deliver to Ellie, and the look on her face as she 'accepts' the lie with the word 'OK' but her face says she knows she is being lied to, cut to black, music plays - it's hands down one of the best endings in the history of videogames.

TLOU2 had glimmers of that power from time to time, but it failed for me as a story because there was so much I simply didn't accept on the basic level of 'The characters wouldn't be doing this' or 'The characters wouldn't be in this place'. To a greater or lesser extent, in the main, I didn't buy their motivations, and for that reason it was hard to feel emotionally invested in what was going on.

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
I actually think Abby and her story was the best bit of the game, I liked her as a character and she came the closest to believable motivations, but even there I don't buy she'd have tortured Joel to death, I think she'd have just shot him. Revenge taken. Job done. I mean, that's the Abby the game goes to such great lengths to build for us in her half of the game, so why introduce her as a wild-eyed sadistic torturer? Except she had to torture Joel to death to make us hate her so the story could happen, except I didn't hate her. I mean, fuck, even Joel knew he had it coming, 'Just say whatever speech it is you've got rehearsed and let's get this over with'.


Add in the jumbled chronology of the narrative that I've made multiple references to already and, gah - you know what the most frustrating thing about this game is? They had the ingredients to make something incredible, and they fluffed it on the construction of the narrative. Even the story as is would have been fine if it'd been told in a different order and had some of the filler taken out.

TL:DR version, TLOU1 stayed with me in a way that TLOU2 absolutely will not, when the credits rolled on TLOU1 I sat there in awe, when the credits rolled on TLOU2 I was kind of like, 'Well at least that's over with now'.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2020 17:08 
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Satsuma wrote:
The only opinion I actually give a shit about is out and it’s a behemoth 2 hours long. Ouch.



I have now watched all of this video (yes all two hours plus of it), the chap makes a strong case and explains his reasoning in a clear and compelling fashion.

TBH there's not a huge amount I disagree with, and in fairness many of the criticisms he's addressing are criticisms I haven't made - (but rather criticisms made by the wider 'community') - and indeed explicitly stated are aspects of the game I have no problem with, or indeed even like.

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
For example we both got on fine with Abby as a character, found her likeable, and thought she got the best bits of the game by a long chalk.


In fact, if you bring it down to absolute brass tacks the only major element of the game we have a fundamental difference of opinion about is the point at which:

ZOMG Spoiler! Click here to view!
Ellie realises that the cycle of revenge will continue to not only hurt her, but the people around her, and indeed will consume her to the point of her death unless she lets it go.

For me, it happened after Joel was killed, Ellie never set off to kill Abby, I simply never bought it. I don't think the game makes it work, and whilst I respect the opinion the creator of this video expresses in that the game does justify its character motivation choices, I don't agree with that opinion.

He also states quite clearly that the game could, and aruably should end on the farm after Abby spares Ellie for a second time. He goes through some contortions IMO to justify Ellie's choice to pursue Abby once again, and once again, I disagree with his opinion but I understand his personal reasoning.

We're in total agreement about the climactic fight between Ellie and Abby, he describes it as awful and the biggest misstep across both full games and the DLC for TLOU1, this is one of the things I was referring to when I described bits of TLOU2 crossing the line into torture/misery porn.

I agree with him that the game would have been a lot better without the final fight, and Ellie simply allows Abby to leave with Lev.


It's a good video and justifies its runtime, and I enjoyed listening to his point of view, even if I didn't agree with everything he said.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2020 17:15 
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I don't see how it's possible that anyone can have complaints about a game overstaying its welcome but still be willing to watch a two hour video on the subject.

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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2020 17:33 
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At a rough estimate I've watched about 25-30 hours of TLOU2 reviews and analysis.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2020 17:34 
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But that's not overly unusual for me, I often find the analysis of something far more interesting than the thing itself.

Like, I haven't even watched any of the new Stars Wars films but I've watched tens of hours of videos about them.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2020 17:56 
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Hearthly wrote:
At a rough estimate I've watched about 25-30 hours of TLOU2 reviews and analysis.

Longer than the game :DD


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Mon Jul 13, 2020 18:52 
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Yes, I'm fully aware of that.


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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Sat Oct 03, 2020 12:48 
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Excellent video from the always entertaining NakeyJakey.

Deconstructs the problems with The Last Of Us 2 very effectively (whilst not hating on it), and also discusses problems with Naughty Dog's game design in general, including the Ludonarrative Dissonance that affects the Uncharted games which I described in the Uncharted 4 thread without knowing the correct term for it. (Uncharted 4, as an aside, I got bored with around 2/3 of the way through and stopped playing.)

Do note that his problems with The Last Of Us 2 have nothing whatsoever to do with THEY KILLED MY HERO JOEL, or SJW AGENDA PUSHERS or any of that shite.



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 Post subject: Re: The Last of Us 2
PostPosted: Fri Jan 19, 2024 10:01 
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Somewhat entertainingly, the 'remaster' of this has just been released on PS5 (because three and a half years is enough time to need a remaster), although in fairness if you already own it then the PS5 remaster is only a tenner.

I'm genuinely conflicted as to whether or not I have a replay of this game in me, on the one hand I'd quite like to return to the amazing world Naughty Dog created, in gorgeous 60FPS PS5-o-vision, but on the other hand I remember everything that was wrong with it and I didn't like.

For a tenner I guess I could give it a punt, not the end of the world if I decide to bail out.


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