The Last of Us: Part II

Domingo said:
I wish I had more time to play...damned work and family :p
I'm finally getting pretty close to the hospital (after a couple detours) and I think I'm pretty comfortable saying this might be my favorite Naughty Dog game ever. I'm not sure about the 10/10 thing, but it's no worse than Uncharted 2 and it's already around twice as long.
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It's a looooong campaign, I have to go double check but I know it was more than 30 hours for me. Granted a lot of that time was restarting combat sections if I wasted ammo or got hit too many times, or retreading through areas to be absolutely sure I didn't miss something. But setting that aside, it's just straight up lengthy. You will definitely get your money's worth and then some. :D
 
The Last Of Us Part II - Through The Slime & The Mud (Jimpressions)

The Last of Us Part 2 is a grimy, nasty, and lurid game...what it isn't is anywhere near as accomplished as its marketing and reviews (same thing in this case) claimed it was...it's a fun action-horror game, which is perfectly fine... save for the excessive promises that would make Peter Molyneux seemed restrained

also, one has to wonder if so much extraneous detail is justified as Naughty Dog faces allegations of abusive crunch practices...also, this game would have been about twice as effective if it had been put in a better order...the story struggles desperately enough as it is, it doesn't need to be fighting the poor structure on top of things...

**review contains spoilers**

 
The upcoming Marvel's Avengers game due for release in September will have a "free upgrade" to the PS5 version, if you get a PS5.
https://blog.playstation.com/2020/06/22/marvels-avengers-confirmed-as-free-upgrade-to-ps5/

I'm hoping more games will allow that, such as The Last of Us 2.

It already looks great, and, if they can make it look better, that'd make a 3rd play through worth it.

Still on my first play through, I am currently going through the museum with Joel. I'll probably do another before I get the PS5.
 
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polonyc2 said:
The Last Of Us Part II - Through The Slime & The Mud (Jimpressions)

The Last of Us Part 2 is a grimy, nasty, and lurid game...what it isn't is anywhere near as accomplished as its marketing and reviews (same thing in this case) claimed it was...it's a fun action-horror game, which is perfectly fine... save for the excessive promises that would make Peter Molyneux seemed restrained

also, one has to wonder if so much extraneous detail is justified as Naughty Dog faces allegations of abusive crunch practices...also, this game would have been about twice as effective if it had been put in a better order...the story struggles desperately enough as it is, it doesn't need to be fighting the poor structure on top of things...

**review contains spoilers**
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Is that your take on the game or is that a quote from the video?

I agree with the grimy nasty and lurid bit, but not with the rest. Overall the game is better than TLOU1, I think I'll play through it again eventually.
I don't understand how the detail can be unjustified. I watched segments of the game again just to double check if what I saw was real. I mean the facial animations are insanely good. Jawdroppingly even.
 
I was actually thinking of picking up the collectors edition, just to confirm my seal of approval, but it's sold out everywhere except for Germany, I don't want the German version of the artbook.

Oh, another question to anyone who has a physical copy of the game. There was a key on the packaging, what is it for? Can I unlock some additional content with it?
 
Colonel Sanders said:
As we discussed earlier in the thread, Joel's death wasn't unexpected. I liked how it was treated with suddenness and no melodrama with Joel telling Ellie to look away while getting beat to death etc. Just quick and brutal so you're left to deal with it yourself. The story then opens up slowly explaining the rift that formed between them after the first game while also showing their bond growing (albeit over the top of a festering wound.) The museum section was really sweet and with the knowledge of Joel's death laid over the top of everything... it was very emotional. Loved loved loved the space capsule part (a nice nod to the arcade machine part in Left Behind.)

The perspective switch to Abbie's side of the story was well done and I felt they did a good job making me warm up to her despite what happened. It was maybe a little hamfisted with how similar her side of the story was compared to Ellie's, with another love triangle where the other girl gets pregnant... There were also moments where I felt the side character dialogues during gameplay where they would say things like "are you sure this is right? Aren't they just doing what we would do in their situation?" were a little on the nose, but I'm nitpicking. The point was that the people Ellie and Abbie loved were trying to steer a hurricane of anger, vengeance and violence.

The final act in Seattle.. jesus christ I thought they were really going to make the player kill Ellie. I almost stopped playing right then and there, but I was relieved it didn't happen. The continuation of the story from that point was totally unexpected, in a good way, and I loved it straight through to the end. The entire thing is a tragedy but that's the point. The final scene with Ellie trying to play that tune Joel taught her... one of the saddest moments I've ever seen in a game. The moment I realized she'd never be able to play again (at least not the same) with two missing fingers my heart sank. I think a lot of the dissatisfaction I've read about the ending is the natural reaction to seeing a tragedy unfold and a lot of people weren't prepared for that in a game that is as focused on realistic characters as this. It's super easy to turn those feelings of sadness and regret into "wow that really sucked, not sure I liked that." Of course anyone can have legitimate criticisms also, but I just feel that a lot of gamers aren't used to seeing it and they're just going to have a negative emotional response and translate it to "I didn't like the way it was written."

I'm gonna play through the first game again because I think it's going to feel a lot different now.
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I felt exactly the same at the ending except about 90% of the sadness I felt was for Abby. I really hope we will see her again in another sequel where she is back to her former self.
This was the moment I knew I cannot do anything but like her:
 
Graphically, I'm not really sure they can improve on much as far as details and fidelity go. I'd love to see a way to remove the film grain and motion blur completely, but it's otherwise about as good as games get right now. Detroit: Become Human is probably the only game that looks better, but only in certain very small environments or pseudo cut scenes. It the larger areas, Detroit looks basically looks the same if not a little more sparse.
The key to a PS5 version is the framerate. A 60fps version of this (as well as Uncharted 4 and Lost Legacy) would be wonderful. Hell, I'd even pay a little extra for the functionality...but I'm NOT going to re-buy games from this generation at full price.
 
Domingo said:
Graphically, I'm not really sure they can improve on much as far as details and fidelity go. I'd love to see a way to remove the film grain and motion blur completely, but it's otherwise about as good as games get right now. Detroit: Become Human is probably the only game that looks better, but only in certain very small environments or pseudo cut scenes. It the larger areas, Detroit looks basically looks the same if not a little more sparse.
The key to a PS5 version is the framerate. A 60fps version of this (as well as Uncharted 4 and Lost Legacy) would be wonderful. Hell, I'd even pay a little extra for the functionality...but I'm NOT going to re-buy games from this generation at full price.
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I thought at the 0 setting it was actually off.
motion.jpg
 
M76 said:
I thought at the 0 setting it was actually off.
View attachment 256263
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Nah, was the first setting I messed around with and could still see blur at 0 on my TV at least. But I didn't mind the blur and left it at 5 actually. I really wished there was a way to lower or disable the film grain as well though. This is the first game I've played where that was an issue, but it's also the first game I've played so close to my 65" TV too, so I noticed all the details on screen. I'm not sure if it's the checkerboard rendering or just lower res shadows, but I saw a lot of screen-door effect lighting on characters and other surfaces too, but that's really nitpicking and I thought the game looked phenomenal overall, as expected from a ND title and their showing on Uncharted 4. I'm sure they'll offer a 60 FPS mode on PS5 like they did the TLoU Remaster, the question is; will they make us re-buy the game. I don't think they will and they'll patch it for PS5, but I wouldn't be surprised either if Sony tried to cash in on it as well.
 
M76 said:
I thought at the 0 setting it was actually off.
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After playing UC4 then practically straight to this, there is a noticeable difference between motion blur 0 on that vs this.

If you have UC4 or TLL, turn The motion blur off.
Now do it on TLoU2.
It's subtle at 0 on TLoU2
It's off on UC4.
 
M76 said:
Is that your take on the game or is that a quote from the video?

I agree with the grimy nasty and lurid bit, but not with the rest. Overall the game is better than TLOU1, I think I'll play through it again eventually.
I don't understand how the detail can be unjustified. I watched segments of the game again just to double check if what I saw was real. I mean the facial animations are insanely good. Jawdroppingly even.
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that quote is from the Jimpressions video summary at the bottom of the page...
 
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scojer said:
After playing UC4 then practically straight to this, there is a noticeable difference between motion blur 0 on that vs this.

If you have UC4 or TLL, turn The motion blur off.
Now do it on TLoU2.
It's subtle at 0 on TLoU2
It's off on UC4.
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I thought what I was seeing as blur was actually the checkerboard rendering at times. As sometimes I'd catch blurry bits when there was little to no movement. Also my TV has motion interpolation maybe that helped to mask the blur. But I really didn't notice the motion blur. Actually I'm not even sure if that is active in game mode.
 
I'm one of those people that dislike motion blur, so I found it noticeable. It's isn't horrible or anything at 0, but it's still there. To me, it makes games feel slower than they actually are...in spite of it supposedly doing the opposite. It's like watching a cartoon on an first gen LCD display to me.
 
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I love the motion blur as implemented in games like TLoU2. It's a high quality object-based blur so it works in conjunction with the excellent animations to make extremely fluid and cinematic looking gameplay.

Come at me, motion blur haters. :p
 
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Is there a secret to beating the section with Yara and Liv. Like there's dudes everywhere and nowhere to run. I simply cannot get past this.
 
Verge said:
Is there a secret to beating the section with Yara and Liv. Like there's dudes everywhere and nowhere to run. I simply cannot get past this.
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Oh i figured it out, this dude has is freaking gamma up so high he doesn't even need a flashlight. Wow it's much easier.

 
Verge said:
Is there a secret to beating the section with Yara and Liv. Like there's dudes everywhere and nowhere to run. I simply cannot get past this.
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It's not complicated, you follow Yara, the one holding the flaming torch that shines like a freaking beacon.. lol
 
Colonel Sanders said:
It's not complicated, you follow Yara, the one holding the flaming torch that shines like a freaking beacon.. lol
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Na it was the part after that, while they unlock door. I had HDR settings cranked i guess, so that when my light was on that's all you could see. Upped the brightness a bit and turned off HDR and it was so much easier.
 
Verge said:
Na it was the part after that, while they unlock door. I had HDR settings cranked i guess, so that when my light was on that's all you could see. Upped the brightness a bit and turned off HDR and it was so much easier.
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Yeah that was a hard encounter. But the hardest is by far the uberbloater boss later on.
 
I just had an epiphany. I know how they should've done the Story with a very small change, so more people would've liked it.

When Joel and Tommy saves Abby, Joel and Abby would be separated from Tommy during the convolution, and Joel would die to the horde or fall to his death or something accidental, but when Tommy and Ellie realizes why Abby came to town, they'd not believe that Joel had an accidental death, so the rest of the story would play out exactly the same
Oh that would've been so much better. I bet 90% of the backlash would've been averted. I think just as I did with ME3 and the indoctrination theory, this will be my canon story for TLOU2.
 
M76 said:
I just had an epiphany. I know how they should've done the Story with a very small change, so more people would've liked it.

When Joel and Tommy saves Abby, Joel and Abby would be separated from Tommy during the convolution, and Joel would die to the horde or fall to his death or something accidental, but when Tommy and Ellie realizes why Abby came to town, they'd not believe that Joel had an accidental death, so the rest of the story would play out exactly the same
Oh that would've been so much better. I bet 90% of the backlash would've been averted. I think just as I did with ME3 and the indoctrination theory, this will be my canon story for TLOU2.
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I don't think so.

People have really powerful reactions when characters they love die. Doesn't matter if they had a heroic send-off or were killed by a horrific villain, people just really fucking hate when the characters they love and have spent dozens of hours with die. I do think it is a huge part of the reason ME3 was such a controversy. I also think it's a massive, massive part of why The Last Jedi was so controversial. Note that I'm not saying those stories were flawless - but it's undeniable that people develop irrational attachments that have no easy way of being undone (via death of a character or any other means.)

Long story short, you kill a beloved character, you're gonna get shit. Doesn't matter how wonderfully written the death might be or how much meaning it may have been given, people just go "fuck you I really liked that character. BAD WRITING."
 
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Colonel Sanders said:
I don't think so.
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Of course not all, there are always those who can't handle something they didn't expect, or would still think it is a feminist conspiracy against white men. But surely it would've been more elegant and more open to individual interpretation that way.
What's best is that this way it becomes irrelevant whether Abby would've still gone through with the kill or not
 
M76 said:
Of course not all, there are always those who can't handle something they didn't expect, or would still think it is a feminist conspiracy against white men. But surely it would've been more elegant and more open to individual interpretation that way.
What's best is that this way it becomes irrelevant whether Abby would've still gone through with the kill or not
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I agree with you to some extent, but then you'd just have people enraged that Joel not only died, but died to some random infected or getting crushed under a collapsing building or falling under ice and drowning. Damned if you do, damned if you don't IMHO.
 
Colonel Sanders said:
I agree with you to some extent, but then you'd just have people enraged that Joel not only died, but died to some random infected or getting crushed under a collapsing building or falling under ice and drowning. Damned if you do, damned if you don't IMHO.
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Guess you're right, you can't please everyone, definitely those who decided your product is bad without seeing it.
 
After a few days of reflection and level headed thinking I've almost completely re-written my story analysis. No I didn't have a change of heart about the game, but tried to better explain things, and add some things I've missed the first time.

Of course it is full of spoilers.

http://madblog.shacknet.us/tlou2-story/
 
M76 said:
After a few days of reflection and level headed thinking I've almost completely re-written my story analysis. No I didn't have a change of heart about the game, but tried to better explain things, and add some things I've missed the first time.

Of course it is full of spoilers.

http://madblog.shacknet.us/tlou2-story/
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I feel you on having to keep an open mind for Abby getting killed in the first couple hours of the next game :ROFLMAO:

But yeah, totally agree on the "haziness" between protagonist and antagonist. In the classic breakdowns of story between "man vs man" / "man vs himself"/ "man vs nature" etc, I'd describe it as "man vs himself" except we're seeing two protagonists fighting a similar internal battle (against their overwhelming desire for vengeance,) while also facing off against each other in a literal sense.

Also I think the moment Ellie thinks of Joel where she decides to let Abby go, it's literally the very last interaction she ever has with Joel before he gets killed (remember, the next day after that scene is where game picks up with Ellie waking up in the morning and having to go on patrol.) It's the moment where we see that Ellie finally decided to work towards forgiving Joel for what happened at the hospital in the first game (which btw, was the final suckerpunch for me, to see that had things played out differently the following day, they probably could have patched things up.)
 
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Colonel Sanders said:
I feel you on having to keep an open mind for Abby getting killed in the first couple hours of the next game :ROFLMAO:

But yeah, totally agree on the "haziness" between protagonist and antagonist. In the classic breakdowns of story between "man vs man" / "man vs himself"/ "man vs nature" etc, I'd describe it as "man vs himself" except we're seeing two protagonists fighting a similar internal battle (against their overwhelming desire for vengeance,) while also facing off against each other in a literal sense.

Also I think the moment Ellie thinks of Joel where she decides to let Abby go, it's literally the very last interaction she ever has with Joel before he gets killed (remember, the next day after that scene is where game picks up with Ellie waking up in the morning and having to go on patrol.) It's the moment where we see that Ellie finally decided to work towards forgiving Joel for what happened at the hospital in the first game (which btw, was the final suckerpunch for me, to see that had things played out differently the following day, they probably could have patched things up.)
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Hopefully there isn't a next game. Don't get me wrong, it's fantastic. But i don't see how a 3rd installment without some major changes wouldn't get very long in the tooth. Hopefully they don't turn this into that walking dead trash.
 
Verge said:
Hopefully there isn't a next game. Don't get me wrong, it's fantastic. But i don't see how a 3rd installment without some major changes wouldn't get very long in the tooth. Hopefully they don't turn this into that walking dead trash.
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Can't say I disagree with you there.

Also, stop reading spoilers. :D Aren't you playing through the game right now?
 
I'll take an expansion to tie off the story on a high note instead of this depressive ending.
 
It's finally almost the weekend. Have only had a few hours to play this week and am avoiding spoilers like it's my job :p
Something that has to be mentioned - why did Ellie forget how to throw nail bombs? They were way more useful in the first game because they worked like a grenade OR a trap.
 
Lol, people made a change.org petition to change the story of the game.

You know a game/story is doing something right when you have this much of a divide on its story. It seems that despite Druckmann warning everyone that they might not like the game, most people are surprised that they didn't like the game. He was going for full controversy with this story and he succeeded greatly in that aspect.

Do I wish it had a happy ending and Joel didn't have to die? Sure, but I don't think it would have been as powerful, or at least as divisive had it played out and ended anything like the first game. I absolutely loved the first game too and also Joel's character, but they paid him a fair service throughout the game still in the flashbacks, esp. at the end in that final flashback before Ellie decides to let Abby go.

If they do any DLC for the game, would be hilarious if they had Ellie hunt Abby down a 3rd time. But I more realistically and interesting would def be to follow Tommy when he left Jackson, given you see the warpath he was on as you discover the trial of corpses as you're trying to catch up to him as Ellie. But either way, no DLC is planned for the game, so I don't see anything like that happening if they haven't already started on it.

If I had to do the story differently, I think it would have been interesting if it was Tommy who was being hunted and killed for killing someone's friend/family before, then Joel and Ellie would have hunted them down together, probably with Joel still dying towards the end and Ellie still becoming obsessed with vengeance for both Joel and Tommy.
 
lol you know a game is doing something wrong when its designed to be so divisive.
" "Some of [the fans of the original game] are not going to like this game, and not like where it goes, and not like what it says or the fate of characters that they love," Druckmann said. "I'd rather have people passionately hate it than just be like, 'Yeah, it was OK.'" "
having people hate it, shouldnt be a goal.
 
pendragon1 said:
lol you know a game is doing something wrong when its designed to be so divisive.
" "Some of [the fans of the original game] are not going to like this game, and not like where it goes, and not like what it says or the fate of characters that they love," Druckmann said. "I'd rather have people passionately hate it than just be like, 'Yeah, it was OK.'" "
having people hate it, shouldnt be a goal.
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as long as they paid full price for it Druckmann is happy :D
 
polonyc2 said:
as long as they paid full price for it Druckmann is happy :D
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Well it was going to sell regardless and it's prolly still gonna get GOTY from many publishers because of the controversy and the same people who hate the game either because they played it or they would rather complain about something because other people are on YouTube.

Can't see or respond you your quoted message, because that dude went full-retard in the soapbox thread trying to compare Abby to some body builder that's like 3 times her size, clearly indicating he's incapable of rational conversation about the game and is in the latter group of people mentioned in the previous paragraph.
 
Domingo said:
It's finally almost the weekend. Have only had a few hours to play this week and am avoiding spoilers like it's my job :p
Something that has to be mentioned - why did Ellie forget how to throw nail bombs? They were way more useful in the first game because they worked like a grenade OR a trap.
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They don't seem to do damage worth a crap either. Like maybe 1 shotgun's worth... yo it's a bomb! I rarely used them.
 
T4rd said:
Can't see or respond you your quoted message, because that dude went full-retard in the soapbox thread trying to compare Abby to some body builder that's like 3 times her size, clearly indicating he's incapable of rational conversation about the game and is in the latter group of people mentioned in the previous paragraph.
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he mentioned a quote from Druckmann where he stated that he'd rather have people passionately hate the game rather then think it's just an OK game...@pendragon1 then said that having people hate the game shouldn't be a goal
 
polonyc2 said:
he mentioned a quote from Druckmann where he stated that he'd rather have people passionately hate the game rather then think it's just an OK game...@pendragon1 then said that having people hate the game shouldn't be a goal
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Meh, doesn't matter. I'm sure his intent wasn't for people to hate the game, but expected people to just for killing or not killing certain characters. The SJW stuff is hilarious though, and you can even see myself skeptical of that very issue early in the thread since I was the one that posted videos about it and started the conversation concerning it. Fortunately it turned out to be nothing, but people are still clinging to that issue from the leaks for some reason.
 
polonyc2 said:
he mentioned a quote from Druckmann where he stated that he'd rather have people passionately hate the game rather then think it's just an OK game...@pendragon1 then said that having people hate the game shouldn't be a goal
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I'm an outsider to this because everything I expected and wanted from the game I got.
 
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