The Last of Us II - 60 fps PS5 patch out now

Last edited by Tafdolphin on Fri Apr 16, 2021 1:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.

OrangeRKN wrote:From a gameplay perspective there are very few encounters/areas that don't do something to differentiate themselves from the rest so it's hard for me to find any part of the game that could be cut without losing something worthwhile - although it's certainly possible not to always engage with the aspects that make each encounter different.

As for the story pacing, I think if you frame it in comparison to a TV series it works better than in comparison to a film. I've said before but I think the appearance of approaching the end of the game at the halfway point lends impact to the midpoint "twist", and the epilogue continuing past the Seattle finale feeling exhaustive is a good mirror to Ellie's headspace and the very explicitly exhausting ending.

eeeeeeeehhhhhhhhh

ND make cinematic games. It's their explicit raison d'etre. Their entire style is cinematic, not televisual. TLoUII follows this, and is deliberately filmic in its initial pacing and narrative. To say "it works if you think of it as a TV show" is, I think, redundant as it's explicitly aping cinema.

The problem lies in its failure to translate the cinematic structure to a game while remaining engaging, which is bizarre as this is usually their strongpoint. I'm no expert on this, but I know a failure of editing when I see it. It's obviously someone's passion project that grew fat with love.

Just because the gameplay remains interesting doesn't mean you can include every idea you have without ruining the pace.

The main problem with it building to several clear endings, and then faking out on them, is that it then expects you to return to the same gameplay groove and carry on. Pace has been built to an ending, don't expect me to then go straight back to scavenging to craft endless stuff and walk in to yet another big area for another totally surprising and unexpected encounter with yet another gang of bad guys.

It was that last chunk where I'd really had enough because that was twice that I'd been prepared for an ending. To then go LOL surprise now do that from another perspective for 6 hours! Was tiresome.

Exactly.

An easy fix would have just been to have a numbered chapter system and make it obvious from the start how many chapters there were.

They wouldn't have even needed to change the story.

Pretty much all I can remember about the story is the new girl being a bit on the chunky side.
There was something about the new kids on the block, and a level set in an aquarium with kids pictures in other than that it's just all vanished into the mists of my shithouse memory :fp:

.

Oh, and there was a skyscraper.

They managed to not mention Luton which I'm sure was the place the entire world was most depressed about falling to the infected.

The story is dull, the gameplay is great.

An extra 5, 10, 15 hours on the story doesn't make it any better. But at the same time it doesn't make the gameplay any worse. So with that in mind and the story as it is then I was glad for the game to continue as long as it wanted.

Having a chapter 1/20, system would have been really dumb.

Dull

As dumb as most games having a percentage complete statistic?

I'm sorry but this game felt like reading a book and then being told to read another book, and then being told to read a short story. Any indication to the player about how far through the story they were would have only been a benefit to the pacing.

Not sure how you can call it dumb with a straight face. There's literally zero downsides to it, especially if it's just displayed on the save data.

Honestly can't remember the last time I saw a percentage complete statistic

Fade wrote:Not sure how you can call it dumb with a straight face. There's literally zero downsides to it, especially if it's just displayed on the save data.

I really enjoyed not knowing abby's route was coming and that being a surprise, with an expectation because of skill unlocks and the like that I was coming to the end of the game. If I'd known I wasn't that would have lessened the surprise so that would be a definite downside to me.

Finding out there was more of a game I was really enjoying wasn't a bad thing for me, especially as I think if anything it got better in both story and gameplay.

Yeah, going in to the halfway point I was thinking “this game is brilliant. I don’t want it to end now at all”, so when I realised what they were doing with it for the second half I was delighted.

The final chapter felt more like the end of Aliens to me. You’re safe, it’s over, then cathartic final encounter and final closure. Giving Ellie the fully automatic rifle, putting her up against the Rattlers (a 1 dimensional group of “100% bad” people, taking moral ambiguity off the table) and the setup of being able to use infected against them, was essentially Ripley busting out the cargo loader to fight the Queen.

I personally would have not had the final showdown with Abby in there, but characters making the objectively “wrong” decisions because of their own humanity and selfish needs, well that’s the whole thing with the series, innit? The story is ultimately richer for it being in there, if less pleasant.

One thing I don't think helps the bloated feeling is how long the game spends in Seattle. Playing the final chapter now and one thing I'm really enjoying is the change in location.

It's interesting to me how the location variety point comes up a lot with negative comparisons against the first game despite I think on inspection TLOU2 having probably a comparable variety, it just isn't structured as a "road trip" and doesn't quite have the same seasonal variety. I can't pinpoint what the exact cause is! Only the Seattle section being repeated must be part of it (but even then you have the island, so maybe its also to do with how you return there too). There is location variety through flashbacks but maybe them being flashbacks seperates them out mentally in a way?

Just finished it. The gameplay and level environment in SB was absolutely fantastic but I dont think I liked a single thing about the story from after the farm.

Also, jesus crist, the violence in this game is off the charts. That final fight made me feel really uneasy. I can still remember Manhunt causing controversy and that had nothing on this.

Tomous wrote:Just finished it. The gameplay and level environment in SB was absolutely fantastic but I dont think I liked a single thing about the story from after the farm.

Also, jesus crist, the violence in this game is off the charts. That final fight made me feel really uneasy. I can still remember Manhunt causing controversy and that had nothing on this.

These were pretty much my thoughts coming out of it. The plot is massively overblown and runs out of things to say a few hours in, but the gameplay is great and actually deserved a better context to exist in.

They've got a story outline for Part 3 but it isn't in development.

https://www.ign.com/articles/the-last-o ... g-made-yet

I honestly don't want another Last of Us, the first game works really well as it's own game, but the sequel just flet bloated and soap-like in it's story telling.

Captain Kinopio wrote:The story is dull, the gameplay is great.

An extra 5, 10, 15 hours on the story doesn't make it any better. But at the same time it doesn't make the gameplay any worse. So with that in mind and the story as it is then I was glad for the game to continue as long as it wanted.

I disagree with this, in regards to the last of us. For me, I couldn't play the gameplay devoid of story. And I don't think I could just sit and watch the story devoid of gameplay (for all the game tries to ape cinema, in my eyes the plot alone doesn't reach the standards of even an average film). The two aspects inform and elevate each other.

The gameplay is good, but I couldn't just pick it up and play "challenge rooms", just clearing an area of zombies, over and over again. If I was feeling particularly biting I would say that was basically what the game was - moving from fairly obvious "combat" areas, punctuated with more corridor-y, linear exposition parts.

What drives the player on is the story, in my eyes. I didn't play it thinking, "Christ, I absolutely cannot wait to twat a zombie with a plank of wood again", desperate for another combat section. I played it to see where the story was going next, both in a character sense and also in a locale sense, given how great the game looks. I don't think the story is astounding like a lot of people, but I did want to see what happened to them and where the plot went.

The gameplay is good, and you enjoy encounters, but it's less about enjoying playing them and more enjoying *surviving* them, so the character can progress to the next bit of their story.

Not really surprising they have an outline given the sequel setup in the ending. I'm not sure where Abby rejoining the Fireflies would really go though.

Last edited by jiggles on Wed Apr 28, 2021 2:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I think the exciting bit here is that it isn’t in development. With ND apparently done with Uncharted, and whatever remake of TLoU that was moved to them likely not needing a full staff, this means they’re working on something brand new. They have apparently had a sci-fi project on the back burner for a while, so I’d really love them to take a run at a Mass Effect style space opera.

Sony may well be feeling that they need to offer their customers an alternative to StarField.

I presume and hope they have been working on TLOUII standalone multiplayer, as has at least previously been reported

I'd take a new Jak and Daxter though :datass:

(lol I wish)

OrangeRKN wrote:I presume and hope they have been working on TLOUII standalone multiplayer, as has at least previously been reported

I'd take a new Jak and Daxter though (lol I wish)

The MP unit in Naughty Dog has typically been a separate team.

The Last of Us II - 60 fps PS5 patch out now

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