Watching and writing about this show has made me feel very vindicated in my opinion of the game.
"What is revenge was bad and we showed that over and over and over again in graphic, toture porn levels of detail and every character was an idiot and learned nothing?" ain't that impressive.
the suffering was already bad enough WITH a wafer-thin gameplay context, here it's just misery for the sake of it, a series shot like a daytime soap that for 4 seconds an episodes wishes it was game of thrones
I need to replay that game to reevaluate my feelings on it. When I first played it, mechanically speaking, I thought the game was very solid. From a story and character perspective though, I remember it being very vile, gross, and depressing.
In the midst of all the madness caused by this game, I missed a lot of good reads like this. I just finished the game and moved on. Although I enjoyed the gameplay, there was a disconnect from Ellie's half. The brief bits of humanity in Abby's are what stuck with me from the game. Thanks for sharing
oh I couldn’t sympathize with that impulse more! unfortunately, it was mostly the madness crowd that found this article back then, so i’m very glad it can finally find the right readers 🙏 not all TLOU2 haters are trash 😭✊ there are dozens of us with legitimate critiques
Great read! This encapsulates nearly every issue I had with the game. In my experience I just couldn’t sympathize with Abby then topped with the game trying to make me hate Ellie, it was too much of a narrative stretch for me.
the whole thing is just the most emotionally convoluted experience imaginable! like why does the narrative have to twist this way and that just to ensure I dislike or misunderstand every single character? for what? nothing compelling to be gained from it. just forced brutality.
Exactly! Joel’s death was a lot and I wanted to move on. See how Ellie lives in this world without him and explore other relationships. Rather it was this never-ending torture fest.
I enjoyed reading this perspective. I have a lot of issues with TLOU2 and now I have a better understanding of why I felt like Ellie seemed like a completely unrecognizable character to me. She isn’t really allowed a single good choice in the game.
Yeah. What's really frustrating is that Uncharted: Lost Legacy came from the same place. smh. Curious about your thoughts on the Horizon titles as actual daughter games.
thank you! the fantastic writer of that article (@emanuelmaiberg.bsky.social ) is unsurprisingly one of the very best editors I ever got to work with too 🙏
I’ll admit I did not notice how goofy and thin the factions were in part 2 until seeing it in the show. Everyone looks like they’re cosplaying The Last of Us.
I don't game but I remember watching a friend play pt 2 and I have always thought people being obsessed with revenge and only revenge in a world that's over is kinda stupid
I cannot get down with the torture porn of it. Its a very very basic plot that tries so hard to appear deeper than what it is which is a human misery machine to say nothing of the absolutely shitty real world politics that undergirds the whole thing (Neil druckman is a zionist)
Those are good reasons. I hadn't really considered the torture porn angle (though I definitely felt there were sequences that felt like I was being desensitized by attrition). Thanks for the thoughtful reply; I'm going to think on it some more.
I mean, it's true though. The game tries to evoke feelings by essentially gaslighting you about feeling bad about the people and dogs it forces you to kill. Guess the show cannot quite replicate that at least.
Part II wore out its welcome like, half way through at best. Really bizarre experience to be seeing such heights of technical achievement and just being generally bored with the whole formula
Comments
"What is revenge was bad and we showed that over and over and over again in graphic, toture porn levels of detail and every character was an idiot and learned nothing?" ain't that impressive.
oh hey Ash fancy meeting you in the back of this black van
the vice article on tlou2 feels like a strong compliment to this one in understanding why the game was written this way:
https://www.vice.com/en/article/the-not-so-hidden-israeli-politics-of-the-last-of-us-part-ii/
(I loved it.)
The season, so far, is not as strong as S1, but benefits most (as S1 did) the further it drifts from the game script, IMO.