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All The Last of Us 2 leaks/spoilers in here and nowhere else.

Jon Neu

Banned
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Jon Neu

Banned
This is actually my most fundamental criticism of the game's structure. It is condescendingly obvious that the people you are murdering are people too, and to then spend a dozen hours backstopping that point is an error that absolutely shatters the momentum of the game...for nothing. It's CW level storytelling that can't even get out of it's own way (the implication of Abby's plotline is, of course, that she, Owen (and to some extent, Mel) have been made into better people through their revenge, for instance).

It's a narrative mess, and requires the characters to jump between binary revenge/no revenge states seemingly at random.



Nothing in the plot of TLOU2 makes any sense, the constant contradictions, the characters acting out of character, the boring token characters...

Cuckmann, like Rian Johnson, simply has put the subverting of expectations as the most important part of the narrative. So just like The Last Jedi, the narrative has no substance and it’s void of anything resembling a good story with charismatic characters. You just have your token SJW approved characters, like Holdo or Abby, Dina, Lev or Nu Ellie (which is a totally different character than the original Ellie).
 

Cleared_Hot

Member
Nothing in the plot of TLOU2 makes any sense, the constant contradictions, the characters acting out of character, the boring token characters...

Cuckmann, like Rian Johnson, simply has put the subverting of expectations as the most important part of the narrative. So just like The Last Jedi, the narrative has no substance and it’s void of anything resembling a good story with charismatic characters. You just have your token SJW approved characters, like Holdo or Abby, Dina, Lev or Nu Ellie (which is a totally different character than the original Ellie).


Currently playing through, just made it to the weird jungle people stuff...

And yeah I gotta say the story it's widely inconsistent and the characters are just so unrealistic it's destracting. And when I have my wife who doesn't really game watch me play it, it's painfully cheesy to sit through at times. It's one omg-so-powerful-touchy-feely-moment... Okay writers, there was a few well earned moments like that in the first game... Nobody asked for it this many times (unearned) in this one. So like as soon as Abby is introduced I'm sitting there like cringing like immediately my wife's like wait that a man or? Oh okay it's a girl but like. What the heck. Lol okay. (My wife is far from any "phobic" btw). And then yeah Joel saves her life totally selflessly and this fucking MANIAC still brutally murders him... Really? How are we supposed to believe she loved her dad and has a heart after that horseshit. And again, when the game just stops playing and you have to sit through an absolute chore of a romance scene between the two female leads I'm just like cringing my ass off not because it's lesbian but because it's a fucking videogames trying WAY too hard to be some mature r rated Indy film. And it's not even written well, and their "romance" isn't earned at all not do they really seem to have actual chemistry. It just feels forced. And also it's a videogame so it just looks ridiculous.
At least the part with the museum was actually effective, albeit a bit long. Humor is the best way to help make everything work and it sorely lacks in any scene with the two girls.

Also, when the Asian dude shows up in Hillcrest by borderline suffocating.... Dude this has to be the laziest writing imaginable. They forgot how to bring him back into the fold in order to keep pressing with a... Fucking love triangle? Jesus h man. I commend the writers, I do, but what the fuck man. Ya'll put toooooo much into this.
 

Cleared_Hot

Member
Bottom line: If you force something into your narrative and as a result the charachters, setting and story suffer you already fucked up.

You still let story and charachters flow naturally, not bend shit to your will.
Damnit my long incoherent rant was a waste. You said it perfectly.

And fuck any defense force losers slapping homphobe/transphobe on any critic. The game is overrated (I still enjoying it a lot, just disappointed!) and the story is absolutely ridiculous.

Like they forgot they were making a horror game. The graphics are beautiful, but the entire zombie thing is really an after thought and it doesn't feel like a horror game to me. The moments where it gets back to the first game and tries being scary actually make me so happy, but the game straight up did not do enough to reinforce the absolutely horrific situation. I had to explain everything to my wife about the first game... Which means this story doesn't stand on its own . You don't understand what the fuck is happening or what the fuck the monsters are without researching on your own. That's story telling 101. If your sequel can't be enjoyed without knowing all about the original you have seriously dropped the ball
 
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Guilty_AI

Member
This.
The game uses so many cheap tricks to try and paint Abby->good / Ellie->evil, and still manages to stumble onto itself by just thinking about it a little. Its really poor storytelling, and the kind of stuff i usually expect from an amauter webnovel written by some teenager.

With that said, watching a walkthrough i did thought the game looks fun to play. And its kinda of ironic that 'fun' ends up being the best reason to get it when Druckmann says they don't use the word 'fun'.
 

ZZZZ

Member
What other options did they have?
Sorry for not answering you, it's just i have answered this so many times already.
The problem with this is that it starts with where Joel state of mind is at the moment, here's what the game tells about Joel current situation.
I maybe forgetting something so you can remind me:

Joel is part of the patrol group that happens frequently, they look for signs of danger from either infected or humans.

Joel still knows how to fight and kill as seen in the scene where they save Abby.

Joel is paranoid of Ellie going in patrols and try to control it as much as possible (where she goes and when).

Joel has been living in a safer location than what he's used to for the past 30 years give or take.

Last time Joel trusted strangers like this it was just a man and a child and he still was suspicious at first but in the end he let his guard down after a while, it was with Henry and Sam and that almost cost him his life and Ellie's.

Now in your opinion because of your life experience (what you seen, read and listened) you come to the decision that he's mellowed enough that he's immediately friendly with these armed strangers, enough to offer his name, info and let himself be surrounded, and again, armed strangers with patches that are in the middle of nowhere overlooking his city, this is exactly the type of stuff they are watching for when they do patrols.

In my opinion acting like this goes against everything we know about the man, but still this is just my opinion. The devs can come out and say, yeah this is who Joel is right now, he's chummy with anyone he sees and i still would think that's bad writing on their part, because to me a guy that went through what he went through in his life would never do something like this.

Now we decide on what they could have done, the first thing i thought would happen is that Joel after seeing the company he was in right at the gate would signal Tommy so they could talk in private, that's the first thing in my opinion that should have happened.
Here's 2 choices after that:
They could have stayed in a different place of the house. (this is the best choice in my opinion)
Leave and go towards a different lookout, they have been patrolling these routes for years now, they have backups for situations like this, and they still got their horses.

What's more insulting is that Ellie gets from her patrol checkpoint to the house without a problem and you don't see a single zombie anywhere what's stopping Joel and Tommy from going to a different place as well?

Anyway this is my 2 cents on the opening, even though i think this chapter is probably the least of the game problems i think it was well executed if only Joel (and Tommy to some extent) didn't go completely out of character at the end.
 

thegame983

Member
I thinks it's about execution.

Does a game need to be fun? Well kind of, I guess.

Does a movie need to be entertaining? Well kind of, I guess.

I'd compare TLOU2 to a Movie like 'Martyrs' - 2008.

Is Martyrs entertaining? No, at least not in a conventional sense. It is a brutal, disturbing revenge story that is genuinely horrifying to watch and will make you feel sick to your stomach.

But it is executed perfectly. It is an outstanding movie. That is where you find the 'entertainment'.

Does TLOU" execute well? It seems like it hasn't? But that is up to each individual to decide for themselves.

NOTE: SJW themes do not help. They make people automatically suspicious of the content that is being produced and make it difficult to give the creator 'the benefit of the doubt' that what they are producing is in good faith.
 
Getting killed with a gold club for a cheap revenge plot with no substance by a character that has no real development or exposition isnt exactly getting his punishment. He doesn't even know who Abby was or why she was acting the way she did.

"no substance" "no development" dude, seriously whatever.
 

ZZZZ

Member
I thinks it's about execution.

Does a game need to be fun? Well kind of, I guess.

Does a movie need to be entertaining? Well kind of, I guess.

I'd compare TLOU2 to a Movie like 'Martyrs' - 2008.

Is Martyrs entertaining? No, at least not in a conventional sense. It is a brutal, disturbing revenge story that is genuinely horrifying to watch and will make you feel sick to your stomach.

But it is executed perfectly. It is an outstanding movie. That is where you find the 'entertainment'.

Does TLOU" execute well? It seems like it hasn't? But that is up to each individual to decide for themselves.

NOTE: SJW themes do not help. They make people automatically suspicious of the content that is being produced and make it difficult to give the creator 'the benefit of the doubt' that what they are producing is in good faith.
Don't forget false marketing.
 

Nikana

Go Go Neo Rangers!
Yours wasn't so why should mine be? You're using flagrantly false claims to prop up the original claim I disagreed with, you're asking me to dive ever deeper into dealing with bad faith arguments and I'm not interested.

Plenty of things to argue there. I called out the part of your argument that i disagreed with and gave context to my argument that I believe is true. Not a single that that is flagrant. Sorry my opinion isn't yours.
 
Plenty of things to argue there. I called out the part of your argument that i disagreed with and gave context to my argument that I believe is true. Not a single that that is flagrant. Sorry my opinion isn't yours.

You can have not like her character development or not like the substantive elements of the plot but saying those qualities don't exist isn't an opinion, it's simply factually untrue.
 

rofif

Banned
Don't forget false marketing.
Exactly. All the trailers made it seem like the game is about joel and ellie. Even had scenes which were changed from joel to other character in final game like this:
2:10 This exact scene is in final game but Joel is replaced with Jeese. Like... they make You feel You will be traveling with Joel the whole game
 

Nikana

Go Go Neo Rangers!
You can have not like her character development or not like the substantive elements of the plot but saying those qualities don't exist isn't an opinion, it's simply factually untrue.

Its not factually untrue. Development of a character is not defined by time and effort. Its subjective. You can spend 10 hours of time on a character and in this case its around 6 hours of game play depending on the player and in that time I found nothing of substance to explain her actions to why she killed Joel other than "He deserved it." (because Joel killed her father) Thats not development of a character and gave me zero substance to her as a person.
 
Its not factually untrue. Development of a character is not defined by time and effort. Its subjective. You can spend 10 hours of time on a character and in this case its around 6 hours of game play depending on the player and in that time I found nothing of substance to explain her actions to why she killed Joel other than "He deserved it." (because Joel killed her father) Thats not development of a character and gave me zero substance to her as a person.

Wait, you needed more justification for killing Joel than Joel killing her father? Am I reading this right? The game didn't even have to show her and her father together bonding, the concept of avenging a loved one is so damn universal, that the game went to any lengths is admirable.
 
Fuckin critics comparing TLOU2 to Schindler's list, and Neil coming to their defense when people took a huge dump all over it.
I think he believes himself the next Steven Spielberg.

Steven Spielberg hasn't made a good movie since the '80s, I hope Druckmann has more in him than that. Schrier coming at someone over a Schindler's List comparison was real weaksauce considering he compared video game audio diaries to the diary of Anne Frank. That said, Druckmann specifically said he doesn't believe he's at Spielberg's/Schindler's List level, he's humbler than that.
 
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Nikana

Go Go Neo Rangers!
Wait, you needed more justification for killing Joel than Joel killing her father? Am I reading this right? The game didn't even have to show her and her father together bonding, the concept of avenging a loved one is so damn universal, that the game went to any lengths is admirable.

Which is why its so boring and unearned. I have seen that story told many times and with much better depth and character development. The game forces me to play as this new character for hours on end and I am supposed to somehow feel for her at the end because she saved a few scars after murdering thousands of people, being a home wrecker, and killed a character I knew because of "revenge."

Joel was simply doing what he thought was right and saved Ellie's life. The doctor in question didn't give Ellie a choice or Joel. It had to be done and Joel reacted. By your argument and previously saying people idolized joel as a hero and elevated him is taking away the wrong message from TLOU, then Abby killing Joel for the simple art of revenge means I shouldn't side with her at all.
 
Which is why its so boring and unearned. I have seen that story told many times and with much better depth and character development. The game forces me to play as this new character for hours on end and I am supposed to somehow feel for her at the end because she saved a few scars after murdering thousands of people, being a home wrecker, and killed a character I knew because of "revenge."

Joel was simply doing what he thought was right and saved Ellie's life. The doctor in question didn't give Ellie a choice or Joel. It had to be done and Joel reacted. By your argument and previously saying people idolized joel as a hero and elevated him is taking away the wrong message from TLOU, then Abby killing Joel for the simple art of revenge means I shouldn't side with her at all.

Yeah, this is kinda just boring me dude. The idea was never "Joel did mean things, so I no like him". It was because of Joel's actions he's a flawed and nuanced character that can be loved, empathized with and sympathized with but we realize he's not perfect or an icon. The game is getting you to see the pointlessness of revenge by showing you the good qualities of the people that are targets of that revenge. Chosing a side is the problem.
 

Nikana

Go Go Neo Rangers!
Yeah, this is kinda just boring me dude. The idea was never "Joel did mean things, so I no like him". It was because of Joel's actions he's a flawed and nuanced character that can be loved, empathized with and sympathized with but we realize he's not perfect or an icon. The game is getting you to see the pointlessness of revenge by showing you the good qualities of the people that are targets of that revenge. Chosing a side is the problem.

If you're gonna call an argument boring then why even reply? Just because someone had a different opinion than you doesnt make your opinion fact.

But whatever. You bore me.
 

ZZZZ

Member
CohhCarnage initially defended the game early on, but by the time he finished the game, he has numerous problems with the story. Every streamer I've seen has lukewarm to very negative feedback.
No way...
What?
CohhCarnage didn't like it?
I'm actually shocked, Cohh literally is the nicest guy that i have seen in streaming, he loves 99% of his games, i was sure he was going to give this a 10/10.
 

ZZZZ

Member
Holy shit, he said "I'm so glad i'm done with that game". Never thought i would hear this words coming from him in a AAA game like this.
 
What if... Abby killed Joel. Than you play the rest of the game as Ellie seeking revenge. Remove all the boring parts. Rework some of Abby's setpieces to Ellie. Redesign Abby so she doesn't look stupid. Make the game 10 hours shorter. Keep lgbt pandering to a minimum. And only in the end Ellie finds out why Abby killed Joel. But now it's too late to go back. She already left a trail of bodies to get to Abby. Then either kill Abby or not. Revenge is bad. The end.
 

JimiNutz

Banned
What if... Abby killed Joel. Than you play the rest of the game as Ellie seeking revenge. Remove all the boring parts. Rework some of Abby's setpieces to Ellie. Redesign Abby so she doesn't look stupid. Make the game 10 hours shorter. Keep lgbt pandering to a minimum. And only in the end Ellie finds out why Abby killed Joel. But now it's too late to go back. She already left a trail of bodies to get to Abby. Then either kill Abby or not. Revenge is bad. The end.

I really liked the game but still agree with most of this.

I had no problem with Abby as a character and some of her setpieces are the best in the game, but I'd rather have been playing those with Ellie.
The game could certainly have had some of its fat trimmed off to make it leaner and less convoluted.
 

zapiks44

Member
Games should strive to be good games instead of trying to be pretentious movies.

I think this is the root cause of many of the recent problems regarding "cinematic" games. There's an inferiority complex toward movies among many video game developers, so they think that making their games more like movies would lead to them being more accepted as "a true form of art" or something like that. But as we've seen with TLoU2 and shallow "Walking Simulators" and the like, that just ends up taking the "game" out of "video game".

Video games need to stand on their own pedestal. They don't have to be compared to movies or any other type of media for validation.
 
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