In Defense of 'The Last of Us: Part II'...

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I think a Japanese reviewer (idk the source) had the best description about TLOU 2's narrative; "It's about what's right and wrong, from the people who think that they're always right."

The game Luke is describing around 1:00 is basically Papers, Please and a lot of other indie games. There's a surprising amount of people who enjoy that kind of stuffs.

'the franchise would be easier to be invested in and enjoy if this part was never made" is a statement you should never ever want to hear as a studio

Honestly, the same death scene could have been received a million times better if they actually built up Abby to have you care about her BEFORE that scene. I still wouldn't have liked it, but at least I would have felt torn on the situation. The way it's currently set up made me want to let Abby die at all encounters and actively cheer for her downfall. Like in the fight against Ellie.

For me, so many of this games issues come from its structure. In the first game everything flows so naturally and logically with their journey from east to west. Here, like you said characters are fast traveling all over the country and timelines are shifting constantly, which really kills a lot of momentum from chapter to chapter. The whole California epilogue really felt forced or out of place, and it was sad to see Ellie learn nothing from the previous events up to that point. I think they did an excellent job of making you feel the loss of Joel, and his absence from the game is so noticeable and it makes you connect with Ellie that much more. The problem is if you’re gonna take out your beloved main character in the first hour of the game, whatever is replacing him (Abby) has to be that much more engaging instead. And for myself, there just wasn’t enough time spent making that genuine connection with her like they did with Ellie in the first game. None of her friends are particularly likable, and even if you disagree it doesn’t matter as they’re often killed almost immediately after getting any screen time. Unfortunate that a game with so much potential and such fun gameplay and really cool set-pieces (the hospital boss comes to mind) ended up becoming such a disappointment. I feel like somewhere in there, there’s a 10/10 sequel if they had just fixed the structure/pacing and spent more time exploring Joel and Ellie’s relationship after he made that choice to save her.

I was one the people who never saw the leaks, but knew Joel was going to die. There are many complaints I have with the game, however the most serious offender to me is the way the game consistently failed to make me care. I didn't find the need to make things darker a problem, rather the way I could never immerse myself because I could see the story's intention and constant attempt at manipulating me, and in my head I just thought how pretentious it all seemed as the game kept failing to make me feel anything but disappointment.

It's so heavy handed with its themes that you can't help but roll your eyes at a lot of the story beats as they unfold. Abby also has a father and they both save a zebra. She totally would have sacrificed herself if she was immune. Oh, her father figure also dies. She's a piece of shit in a brutal faction that is killing other people. Oh, she finds and saves a group of kids and ends up changing for the better. Lev is Abby's Ellie and Abby is Lev's Joel. Two sides of the same coin. We have come full circle from the first game. Which is why Abby's section is the strongest part of the game because it follows the rough template of the first game. It just ends up feeling bloated and over stays its welcome. It suffers from the whole sequel has to be bigger than the first game thing. It messes with the pacing and has too many characters that it wants you to care about in a short amount of time because of the character switches. If anything the HBO series will probably make better work of the story it wanted to tell. I feel like it would work better as a season of TV than it does as a video game.

My biggest gripe with the game was that they tried to retroactively make the fireflies the good guys favction to make Joels action seem as evil as possible, when in reality there are no good factions in this setting. The Fireflies of TLOU 1 are like the WLF in TLOU 2, just that one is the "science"-faction and the other is the "military"-faction. You have a few good people in it, but alot of them (especially at the top) are assholes. First remember that the Fireflies had a deal with Joel and Tess to bring Ellie to Boston for weapons. A deal they never planned to abide by. Second the first thing one of their "Soldiers" did after finding Joel trying to do CPR on Ellie is hitting him over the head with his rifle. Third from the voice logs especially from Marleen we know, that they left her no choice but to accept that they kill Ellie for the brain probes. They didn´t care for either Ellie or any other of their former "patients". They also planned to kill Joel, and it was Marlene, that would have let him go, but we don´t know what orders the soldier had who was with Joel afterwards. And from what we know from the Word of TLOU, most of it has turned to shit so even if they would have found the cure, there would have been no practical way to give it to all of what´s left of humanity. But point 1 and 2 are enough to reason in universe for Joel to not trust them with Ellie, because they didn´t gave him any reason to. On a meta level everything in the first game for me pointed to that they would have used the cure as a means to gain more power, like Immortan Joe in Fury Road used water to keep control over his territory. But then again, I was probabely one of a few couple of people who were not really hyped after the anouncement of a sequel, because I found that TLOU never needed one because it had the perfect ending, like I don´t need a sequel to FFXVI. And to be hones TLOU 2 didn´t change MY mind.

Narrative wise, it’s not even like part 2 is super original in the sense where we focus on the antagonist for a major amount of time. I like to compare it to things like Captain America: Civil War with cap and tony, Revenge Of The Sith with Anakin and Obi Wan, or even MGS where you even play as the villain. Stories can work where you understand the antagonists perspective, but it needs to be earned. I feel like if Part 2’s narrative was just tweaked slightly and rearranged , it could have gone from polarizing to maybe even universally loved.

yara and lev are incredible characters, genuinely. i loved every second of them on screen and wanted to learn so much more

The gameplay, voice acting, graphics etc are great, but the story and characters are bad. 1. Abby conveniently finding Joel. 2. Joel standing in the middle of a room of armed strangers, putting himself in the most vulnerable position possible. He may have softened a little, but he’s not dumb, and still regularly goes out into danger. 3. Abby’s crew letting Tommy and Ellie live despite the fact one is Joel’s brother, and the other clearly cares a lot about him and threatened you all. 4. Abby’s crew wearing their WLF patches so they can be identified. 5. Maria picking Ellie and Dina, two inexperienced teenagers to travel across the country to get Tommy, rather than older and more experienced people. Plus Ellie is the most emotionally compromised person in Jackson, making Maria’s decision even more idiotic. 6. Ellie conveniently finding pictures, including names, of all the people she’s looking for. 7. Mel conveniently hiding her belly when Ellie finds her, not to mention neither she or Owen tell Ellie that she’s pregnant when that’s something I think any parent or sane person would do. 8. Abby finding Ellie’s map she conveniently drops that leads Abby right to her. The story was full of moronic situations, and I personally didn’t like like any of the characters except Owen. And a final note, I don’t wanna play as a killer of a beloved character, let alone for nearly half the game.

The guy really sounds like Bob Odenkirk, I was shocked how his voice sound almost like Saul :)

I've always said if Naughty Dog wanted the player to sympathize with abby and see both sides of the story then we needed to play abby before we play the events with Joel. We needed to see her human side and then drop the bombshell of the relationship between the characters. The way Naughty Dog introduces Abby in an irredeemable moment then asks the player to see her side was was almost narratively impossible given the emotions the player would have already experienced

A lot of the media tends to follow similar narrative tropes and tend to air on the safe side, especially if it involves a popular IP that can make a ton of money. While it's not the most unique or groundbreaking story ever, I respect that naughty dog at least tried to take a swing at something like that. I also really like that the game was emotionally intense. Whether I was angry or sad, the game at least made me feel something. The same cannot be said for most stories in video games, TV, movies, etc.

This game hits hard if you’re an Apocalypse Now fan. One of the best moments in gaming I’ve ever had was leaving the arcade bloater fight feeling EXHAUSTED from surviving Seattle (grounded mode). As I drove my boat into the ocean it hit me Neil Druckman was referencing Apocalypse Now. It’s a movie based on the book, The Heart of Darkness that deals with the horrors of war, colonialism (cough cough* Scars I mean Seraphites) & how men deal with these things psychologically. Captain Willard, a vietnam soldier is sailing into the heart of darkness….deeper into the metaphorical & literal jungle of the mind. A place where no one wants to go. When I riding those waves as Ellie, seeing the silhouette of the ferris wheel in front of the lightning as the weather became demented nearly sent me. I was like omfg Ellie is sailing into the heart of darkness. I could feel her frenzy build because I wanted Abbey gone just as much as she did. If I was a Youtuber I would make a video on it breaking down the film & Part 2 because no one talks about it. My fav part about the film community is it invites a certain type of person. Someone who’s calm, reflective & willing to look inbetween the lines of art. My least fav part about the gaming community is it invites the opposite of that type of person. That’s why you see so many kids shit on this game because Joel dead me no likey Abby muscle bad. This game deserves the respect cinema gets. If you got this far….go watch an Apocalypse Now breakdown video with the knowledge of the game in the back of your mind. Connect the dots & have your mind blown. Replay the game with that new perspective if you want. One of the best video games of all time. It’s up there with GTA4, Ocarina of Time, ICO etc.

I love Part 2. Honestly, there are some pacing issues but it's still an amazing game.

The issue with Joel's Death is not that Abbey killed him or even that he was tortured in it. It's the fact THERE IS NO WAY Joel would EVER have let down his guard and dropped his weapon when outnumbered by Abbey and her crew. The death does not feel earned; it instead feels like the only reason Joel dies is because the writers decided he needed to die. There are any number of ways the death of Joel could have played out that would have made sense. Instead of choosing any of them, we get this garbage scene just to be shocked and provide the false narrative for the rest of the game.

lol the game you described around a minute in is totally “Papers Please”

Luke milks this topic as often as Naughty Dog milks these 2 games.