2nd play through have been having fun with the slow motion aiming from the accessibility options.
Loving all the crazy little details ND are good at, and keep getting more and more impressed with them. After friend pointed out the way pooling blood behaves differently depending on the surface its on, I've been on a mission to view this on as many different surfaces as I can.
The first TLOU isn’t bad at all so far. I have rather a few niggles with the gameplay but that’s to be expected from a PS3 game. The graphics are great though, I think it might be 4K on my Pro. Some of the movable objects’ models look kinda bad but the lighting is great, especially the dust particles in the air. It actually reminds me a lot of Metro 2033, you move along a mostly linear path from A to B while avoiding post-apocalyptic monsters and managing scarce ammo. I’m enjoying the game a lot more than I expected although I do think it’s just not really my kind of game. I can see why some people would see it as a masterpiece when it was first released but I don’t think it has the same staying power as other games of that standing such as Ocarina of Time, Half-Life 2 and Metal Gear Solid 1/2/3 solely due to Naughty Dog’s direction style. They tend to emulate Hollywood movies therefore I think they age slightly worse, they don’t take full advantage of gaming as a medium. I’m also not a big fan of Joel, he definitely falls into ‘gruff man who gets new outlook on life due to child/black person/Autistic Dustin Hoffman’. I’m currently just about to get out of Pittsburgh so I think I have a lot more to do but I am enjoying the game, the shooting’s a whole lot better than Uncharted. Overall, it’s probably a high 7/low 8 so far but I expect my feelings to change as it goes on.
Okay, I just found out you can use slow motion during cutscenes and it's the most surreal, hilarious and relaxing thing. Mild spoilers for the end/start of Seattle Day 2/3 (can't remember which).
It's also really cool going through the game again and tackling things in funny ways now you know what to expect. Behold, a very efficient way of dealing with that workbench part (you'll know what I mean if you've got there).
@Matroska Yeah, I thought about setting traps after that encounter. But lol the whole room is a puddle of blood.
Apparently the Japanese version has been heavily censored, I've watched some clips online and there's no dismemberment, less blood, no pieces of flesh and meat flying around. There are a couple of clickers without legs in the game that crawl towards you, but in the Japanese version they still have their legs lol. And any nudity is removed; even the note that had a bunch of d***s and tits doodled on it.
I somehow managed to beat TLOU1. Wow, the last couple of hours are insanely rushed. It was literally 2 hours from the Winter section to the end credits, and I was taking my time! Not a big fan of the ending, I understand the extremely obvious subtext about Joel’s dead daughter and I actually agree with saving Ellie, there were no guarantees that a vaccine could even be made but they tried way way too hard to justify Joel’s actions. The game basically chucked notes at you that emphasised in big capital letters that saving Ellie was the right choice, thereby taking away from the moral ambiguity that they were forcing down your throat the entire game. Considering it was a Naughty Dog game, I actually enjoyed the gameplay more than the story which is pretty hilarious. I really enjoyed the survival horror influences but Joel’s tiny pockets that could hold a flamethrower but apparently not more than 20 bullets did my head in. It was definitely a good game and I can’t believe it was on PS3 but there were too many little issues for me to really say I fully enjoyed it. Probably a high 7 to low 8 for me, depending on my mood. I’ll play the 2nd game when I can get it for cheap.
So I finished it last night. I might post some more detailed thoughts at a later date but overall it's an excellent game that probably could have been a bit shorter. Some of the best sequences were in the second half with my favourites being the descent through the hotel and the hospital car-park.
Going to see if I can mop up some remaining trophies before Friday.
@LN78 That’s the thing, I have no problem with the whole moral ambiguity angle but don’t do it half arsed, either say Joel was in the right or don’t bother having all those notes specifically engineered to justify his actions. I think I’d enjoy Part 2 for the gameplay to be honest, I really did like the first one’s gameplay loop and the improvements should do nicely. My absolute least favourite thing was the cuts to each season. It made sense the first time due to the whole Henry and Sam thing but they just kept skipping ahead a month or two in a rush to finish the story. I liked being able to see where I was heading in the distance, it really felt like a journey but by skipping ahead a few hundred miles every cutscene, I lost that sense of progression. Like I said, it’s not a bad game by any stretch of the matter but it’s not a masterpiece either and I don’t feel strongly enough about the characters for the second one to annoy me that way. Like, I don’t understand how anybody who played the first one could be outraged over Joel, it pretty much sets it up right at the end and he admits over the course of the game that he’s done terrible things. If he didn’t get his comeuppance, it would be a miracle!
@BearsEatBeets That whole journey to the hospital with Lev was probably my favourite part of the whole game. The trip through the hotel was brilliantly tense.
@LN78@nessisonett I've no time for those that criticise the story just because they didn't get the one they wanted or saying the game is disrespectful to fans. But for many I think as much as they loved the characters they accepted there could be consequences for their actions in the first game. But it's the sadistic manner those consequences played out to engender a high level of hate. Then to have the player not just to question those feelings but feel bad about them is what I think riled lots of people up. I'll give ND the artistic licence to communicate their theme's. But I don't blame anyone if they feel it's cheap.
Life is more fun when you help people succeed, instead of wishing them to fail.
Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.
@LN78 With this game being focused on story, sometimes they use tactics that invoke emotion, this is done everywhere, in TV and in pretty much every book i've read, their techniques simply differ in the way they do it. I think they actually took a common trope and made it a bit different and truthfully I appreciated what they did. I would not say its perfect as there are things I would still say could be improved but I really believe the storyline was well-written.
It is interesting to read a contrasting take on the game, but at times it does feel like I've played a completely different game. Like most of your criticisms are totally alien to me. But hey ho, opinions and all that.
I've just finished replaying The Last of Us 1 and I have even more appreciation for the sequel now, Joel is even more of a prick then I remembered to be honest and a lot of the complaints I see around make even less sense to me now, as some could be labelled at the first but never are. Mechanically I feel the 2nd is a big step up and the AI on the first is insanely stupid, I've just go through on survivor+ and it never felt like a challenge.
I did play it back when it was first released and can see why it was praised then, I don't think it holds up as well today purely from a gameplay standpoint. I think they've improved everything in the sequel from the gameplay to the world building and I cared about all of the characters more, the story is more interesting, I mean without that ending in part 1 really holds it all together. Still a good game but Part 2 is incredible for me
Older than I care to remember but have been gaming since owning a wooden Atari 2600 and played pretty much everything inbetween.
@carlos82 Yeah, I thought Joel was pretty damn selfish to be honest, I don’t even think it was about Ellie as a person, he was more trying to make up for the death of his daughter. I still would have done the same thing but perhaps let the people go that were just doing their jobs.
For my money the storytelling (and technical prowess on display) in "Red Dead Redemption 2" was leaps and bounds better. But as you say - opinions and all that. 🤷♂️.
Indeed. I thought the story in RDR2 was clichéd and predictable.
TLOU2 plotline isn't particularly original, but it is an exercise in empathy that can exist in no other medium.
They both land in my top 5 games I've ever played. But I especially like dark, nihilistic, and dystopian themes in narrative entertainment. Which certainly not everyone does. Also 3rd person stealth action games are my favourite genre, which again helps a lot.
It feels like a lot of games that try something different from the status quo get labeled as pretentious. Same thing happened with Death Stranding, and I ended up enjoying that as well, and partly because it was unlike most games out there.
Ghost of Tsushima looks good, but at the same time there's a chance it'll fall in the ''Ubisoft open world'' category. Because I haven't seen a lot that convinces me it isn't. Maybe it'll surprise me, and it does look pretty, but that gets you only so far.
So I rather have another ''pretentious game'' if that means another TLOU2 or Death Stranding
Well after playing TLOU 2 for the past few days i can safely say WTF is up with all the hate? This game is awesome! Okay yeah the first hour was rough and by that i don't mean the difficulty and there's definitely some come uppins due to a certain character. Can't wait for that! I usually tend to like darker story lines in games and movies too so it's not surprising i would enjoy this. I'm reminded of another time a darker sequel was hated by most that i also liked. Prince of persia warrior within. Now that one got some hate!
Anyway TLOU 2 is right up there on my sequels done right list! I may not agree with some stuff but hey it's not my story to tell. That's up to the creators and if that's how they wanted it i support that. Anyway I'm having a good time so whatever. I'll just see how the rest of this game goes and then decide what i think.
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Topic: The Last Of Us Part II - OT (No Spoilers)
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