The Breaking Bad comparison is pretty rich. Walter didn't go from being very good to very bad. He always had an ego and was repressing alot of resentment toward certain people in his life for having success and being able to be who they want to be. It's why he wanted to combine his crime life with his home life in the first place and couldn't just take the money and run once he didn't need to make meth anymore. Heisenberg was always hiding inside Walter White.
There was never a heisenberg, its always Been Walter on an ego trip blaming others on his own lack of incentive in life wich led him to become just a teacher despite his knowledge being on par with engineers.
@@yusukeelric yeah this made me almost cry idk why but there's so many people who take walter's side (the unintelligent fans not the regular and most fans of breaking bad) that it's finally nice to see something put so succinctly summing up walt's character so well. Or maybe it was because he reminds me of myself. The ego not the intelligence. I'm no engineering major.
Tbh from everything I saw on Breaking Bad, was that the show kind of relies on you being on Walters side. I never got into it, cause episode 1, I was like this dude is an ahole, why am I supposed to give a shit about him becoming an ahole that does illegal shit now? Oh but his wife is a bitch to him, his son doesnt appreciate him and he has a shitty job. Yeah, hes an ahole with an ego the size of the moon, so what?
"You shouldn't be so quick to kill the only immune person you know of, EVEN if it is for a vaccine." THANK YOU. My mother even brought this up but I haven't seen anyone else mention it. The decision to just cut Ellie's brains open and kill her without any second thought is so dumb on the Fireflies part. What if the vaccine doesn't work? Well, you just wasted your only test subject, so guess we can't try again. It makes them look so incompetent and only makes Joel's decision more justified.
I understand what you mean. However, In the beginning of the first game Joel made an agreement with the fireflies. I see how people think it’s wrong from an emotional standpoint, but from the fireflies view they were given an opportunity to end all the suffering & fighting.
@@InJeffWeTrustt Fuck em little bitches suffering. Killing an innocent child for the chance of a vaccine js the pussiest sht i ever heard. U like gambling no?
@@InJeffWeTrustt what a joke of a comment, Joel wasn't even given his payment for the 'agreement' and they took his bag and weapons and were presumably going to take him outside to execute him. There was no ambiguity in the original game, Joel made the right choice, until the second game came out and suddenly its painted as if the fireflies were competent
I believe in the first game they made it known that the probability of successfully getting the vaccine was incredibly low. But they thought they were justified in killing her. They were ruthless.
@@cnr-r8r The retconing was insane. In part 1 the operating room was a dingy and dirty, even if they got something useful it'd probably get contaminated right away. In part 2 however, all of a sudden the operating room is pristine. There is no reason to feel bad for the Fireflies, they are the villains of the story.
@@EzraBarry-mb2ss i understand both sides (side one: the ones who r mad that ellie didnt kill, and side two: the ones who think the ending is good). I agree with both sides. Yes, I was mad when ellie left abby alive and leave while abby also BIT one of her fingers, but now that I think about the ending more and more, I understand the message and do like the meaning of it now. The whole Joel’s death sequence is still awful tho imo
They could have gone another way with story, like having Ellie and Abby stories go parallel, instead of playing 10 or so hours for each character. I personally felt no sympathy for Abby, as I couldn’t get behind her killing Joel, but I think the story is still great
The the argument I hate the most is when they say Joel is soft because he play guitar. That like saying John Wick is soft for playing with a little doggy. Or Punisher is soft because he took in a dog and was sad because the bad guys threaten to hurt him. Or Wolverine soft because he care about a hurt bear in the woods. These defenders of these games are so dumb.
Something else that’s funny is that Ellie - who has the more stealth orientated gameplay style - loses to Abby… *in a stealth fight* I mean if I get it Abby got trained by the Fireflies and the WLF but Ellie literally uses this exact strategy against David. Sure Ellie’s blinded by rage and would maybe get sloppy but that wouldn’t make her stupid and she’s been pretty efficient throughout the game until the Abby fight where they turn her into an idiot
Thank you so much for mentioning the "Ellie is blinded by rage" excuse. I am so sick of hearing that dumbass explanation, as if Ellie is just going to forget a huge chunk of her survival experience just because she's pissed off, when she's literally taken out WAVES of fully grown men since she was 14.
@@zzodysseuszz l didn't thought it was a Masterpiece but l didn't thought it was the worst thing ever,people just got super pissed because of joel death which wasn't even as illogical as many people made it out to be
i’m still sad over that one south korean streamer that cut the game disc into pieces after he played through that one scene because his dad had just recently passed away
I hate that the game tries to portray Abby's dad as some kind of saint. We assumed it was Marlene that wanted to kill Ellie in the first one but it was him all along. Abby's dad would have done the same thing Joel did were the situation reversed. How the hell is a cure going to help anyway? The world is already fucked. People are still going to kill other people. I feel bad for Laura Bailey too. She got death threats because of Neil Druckmann's shitty writing of her character.
The people going on and on about a cure are talking nothing but nonsense. Anybody with more than two braincells to rub together knows that a literal terrorist organization like the Fireflies would have taken that cure and used it as a leverage for power. Anybody who didn't like the fireflies would suffer. Marlene was more than happy to sacrifice people for her goals.
Yeah, laura bailey is my favorite voice actor. I dont like how once ppl decided they hate a fictional character in the game they project it onto the voice or actor behind said character. She clearly deserved none of it. Id say shes done a good job portraying abby even tho abby herself was shit. Never liked death threats and all that but hey, those extreme haters could at least go for Neil instead of her. He is pretty much responsible for almost everything thats bad in this game.
I think it's ludicrous that a game tries to make me feel bad for killing cartoonishly evil characters when it places them in my way like a row of perfectly stacked cans I don't care if they give half their income to disabled kids, I'm pumping these fuckers with lead because I paid for an action game and damn well am getting one
Knowing I would never shoot a real person in the face helps me to enjoy violent games and understand that they don't create active shooters. That, and I'm not a typical mom in 1998.
I'm not even a fan of the game or played it and see no need for people to feel sorry for abby or even want to play as her after she kills a beloved character
@@donavonhoward1899 The story is contrived and destroys what made people connect to the first game and replaced it with something inferior. The story took risks that didn't pay off and made controversial decisions with reckless abandon. The writers gaslight you into forced empathy for a murderer. And turns its main protagonist into a hollow shell of her former self for an "gritty" morally dark ending. The story drains away any emotional investment in the characters and by the end of the second game its hard to find anything to care about. People don't like the story because the writers broke the illusion and fumbled the magic trick. The story gaslights you and uses emotional manipulation to make you feel bad. The game attempts to make you feel bad for having fun in the game. The game makes you feel anger and frustration for the writers and by the end apathy for the characters. "Hard to please" more like you have low standards.
This video is straight fire. Especially the part on Abby and her dad. Everybody knew that someone would want revenge on Joel, and somehow they still made those characters completely unlikeable. This game really should've just been Ellie's story.
"We decided to provide more feedback from the enemy AI like screaming for comrades as a way to make you think about who you're killing." "Well, what I THINK is that killing them is fun." "Wait, no, that's not what--" "LET'S PLAY THIS ENCOUNTER AGAIN!"
@@КГБКолДжорджКостанца story is a hit or miss. You might end up loving it or hating it. But everything else about the game is just great,specially the combat,it's so tense and satisfying so I recommend buying it.
@@КГБКолДжорджКостанца I think there’s other games that do a lot of the last of us stuff better, like red dead 2 has a pretty great story and cool combat that’s gritty and gory, the story gives you pretty good shooting gallery as well as other side activities you can spend time doing.
Imagine how awkward it would have been if she’d have caught the wrong Joel 😂 that shit would’ve been hilarious I wanna see that game where Ellie runs in and it’s the wrong guy getting beat to death with a golf club and Ellie doesn’t even care
I’ve played the last of us 7 times - all the way through. I’ve played TLOU2 once - tried a second playthrough but gave up an hour in. Game play was great but man that story really blows.
@@javierperezmerino9457 the story - it was just awful - by comparison. Character motivations were unclear or idiotic. Established characters were wildly different and poorly crafted. It just didn’t resonate with me like the first one.
@@javierperezmerino9457 EASY. the first game had Joel a RELATABLE EXCELLENT PROTAGONIST. this one makes you care about the sadistic bitch that kills him. This could of been a trilogy of Joel and ellie. But Neil cuckman to the rescue
@@Ntfshr objectively, Abby’s story is terrible - a sociopaths father dies trying to kill a young girl for a ‘potential’ cure, becomes friends with everyone except the man who saves her life, then goes on a killing spree to help a former religious fanatic She does help a zebra -
"Everything about how this game is written is meant to move along the plot no matter how little sense it makes" - you really hit the nail on the head with this video.
This video nicely sums up everybody's thoughts that were disappointed. The game is so at war with itself over what it wants to be. -It wants you to see both sides? Abby doesn't even know Ellie's name, let alone her perspective. -Revenge isn't worth it? It sure was for Abby, who's at peace with herself after rescuing Lev and is going off to re-up the Fireflies (even gets spared by Ellie despite fucking her more than Dina did). -Ellie's immunity is legit a non-factor etc. It just fails to deliver on all the fronts that it introduced and isn't a coherent fit with the 1st game. A trite revenge story that folds in on itself.
-Doesn't matter. Abby learned the futility of revenge the hard way. -No, it wasn't. Because of Abby's revenge, she was burdened with immense guilt and lost all of her friends from Salt Lake including the man she was in love with. -It comes up three times actually.
I think you're the only person I've come across that mentioned how all the black characters died in the first game, and I'm honestly amazed so few people have pointed that out
I know 1 person who legitimately likes this game and, as far as me and mutual friends can tell, it's because he thinks games with female protagonists can do no wrong. To the point and being salty at Ghost of Tsushima for "Stealing the limelight" at time of release
@@krasmasov6852 It is unsatisfying and doesn't offer closure for any character. Ellie slaughters hundreds to get to Abby, and lets her live. Abby has all her friends slaughtered by Ellie, yet doesn't even know her name by the end, or is even remotely curious who this girl her father got killed for even is. Ellie goes on a SECOND revenge quest at the end of the game, loses her family, and for what? A loss of two more fingers so now she can't play her guitar (boohoo). This 30 hour game was a colossal waste of time. The ending isn't disappointing just because Abby doesn't die, it's disappointing because NOTHING FUCKING HAPPENS IN THE END
@@SkandiTV It offers a tone of closure. What are you talking about? Ellie finally manages to let go of her hatred and face her guilt head on rather than projecting it onto others. Abby is concerned with Lev above all else and has already learned the futility of revenge the hard way. Both Ellie and Abby grew as people, and that's what the story was about. You know, just like the first game.
Almost 2 years later and still no Factions, no co-op mode, no alternate game mode, and no multiplayer at all. Meanwhile, Ghost of Tsushima already released a pretty fun Free 2 Play multiplayer mode called Legends. It’s been around for over a year and has gotten a few content updates as well as badass DLC for the main game and eventually a Director’s Cut and a PS5 remaster. I still cannot believe how TLOU2 released with a $60 price tag and still hasn’t received any DLC or a multiplayer game mode that was already in the first game. I don’t think it has a PS5 version with haptic feedback or anything. After all that bs…TLOU2 still received GOTY, Best Game Direction, Best Narrative, and is still getting praised by the most delusional fans I’ve ever encountered in video game fan base. TLOU2 is a disappointing joke just like The Last Jedi except vast majority of Star Wars fans have enough common sense to recognize bs when they see it
Well the reasons for the lack of development is everyone qualified either left or was forced out. The reason for the awards was that year really stepped up the graft behind the scenes. Like, it was so bad that child predators (Ars Technica) were brought on to the voting panel of the VGAs specifically to cast votes exclusively for TLOU2 in every category it was in. That doesn't happen without "Yes, you can tolerate the existence of these kid diddlers caught by the FBI" money.
@@crazyinsane500 holy shit, I knew that the voters for the The Game Awards were sell out journalists who blindly have 10/10s for TLOU2. I didn’t know that the voting panel involved child predators, you’re the first person who has mentioned that
@@christopheryanez I'm one of many people to have followed some drama with Ars Technica where they knowingly protected a child predator (Peter Bright, who went by the Twitter alias "Dr Pizza") until he caught caught in an FBI raid. So when the TGAs showed their voter panel and, lo and behold, Ars Technica was on it: Kinda easy to put 2 and 2 together considering hiring Peter Bright is Ars Technica's *only* notable quality.
So many great points, but you scored the knockout with Joel's early death, it kills the momentum in a big way with how lazy it is. It's lazy enough to know just what they're doing with their narrative. Great vid.
Great video, you nailed every single point, depressing how many people fail to see the obvious flaws but at least this game sums up the crazy dumb gaslighting times we live in perfectly.
i just don’t think an action video game is the best media to portray a “violence isn’t the answer” theme. also considering how gory and gruesome the combat is and how many npcs you kill just makes the whole thing contradictory
Violence is sometimes necessary to survive. It's violence for other reasons that's a problem. Also, you seem to be suggesting that everything you're asked to do in the game must necessarily be endorsed by the game, and that's a weird position to take.
@@krasmasov6852 i know that it’s to survive in the game but why does ellie not feel remorse for any of the npcs she kills but she spares abby, someone who literally killed her friend and tortured her father figure? it just doesn’t make sense and is lazy writing
@@hannahparker888 Because she killed those npcs to survive while she was murdering Abby for a different reason. How does that not make sense? How is that lazy at all? And more to the point, how do you know she doesn't feel remorse for them? We just know that it's not to a great enough degree to stop her from continuing on.
@@krasmasov6852 How do you not understand what he saying? You don't make any sense, mate. She literally slaughters through wave after wave of random people, killing in some of the most gruesome ways, but when you get to Abby you spare her at the last second because of flashback that would've pissed me off even more. It's a fuckin' insulting joke. By letting her go she made all the sacrifices (and our time) for fucking nothing. I was laughing my ass off when she got upset after noticing the woman was pregnant because you'd have to be a complete moron to not realise you've probably have done this already many times before, as well as leaving possibly many kids parent-less getting there.
Truth be told. And now Naughty Dog is trying to cash in with the The Last of Us Remake. Guys as much as we all loved the first game, don't support this clown Druckmann
almost every single one of your opinions is exactly how i felt, and it’s the first time i actually heard someone call it like it is in one of these TLOU 2 reviews
2 years later and still no factions. Apparently it’s gonna have a story of its own now but who knows when that will release. The whole Joel gives his name is the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen in a game. No way Joel, a survivor for over 20 years of the apocalypse would ever do that. He didn’t even wanna pull over to help people at the outbreak from lack of trust.
1. The whole premise is a generic, "revenge is bad" tale, except it also gets hijacked, as revenge seems to solely be negative if anyone other than Abby desires it. 2. Returning characters are either abolished or flandarized into killing machines. 3. Joel's demise should have been an exquisite catalyst for the events, yet it's randomly thrown in, as if the writers are merely hoping for the best reaction, without depositing much attention to receive that. For a game reminiscent of The Last Of Us, there shouldn't be a Mary Sue to whom everyone acts out-of-character towards. 4. Multitudes of attempts to replicate the dynamic between Joel and Ellie from the first instalment. Yet here, it doesn't suffice, since we scarcely know anything Dina, while Abby and Lev are ennuing at best, and actively despicable at worst. 5. Abby is one of the most poorly-written and incoherent characters. The game clearly favors her over others, and attempts to trick players into liking/sympathizing with her (with the cheapest and most immature tactics) yet it also exhibits that Abby is lesser pre-eminent than the character it tries to demonize. Examples include her backstabbing her faction for a single child, wrecking relationships, torturing others for pleasure, etc. I understand why she silenced Joel, I don't comprehend why she's a sadistic Mary Sue, nor do I sympathize with her. 6. Lev is a watered down version of Ellie from the first game, yet he is boring and bland to no end. Oh, and he's transgender. I suppose Neil wanted to label others transphobic for disliking a stale and uninteresting character, so Lev is an effective device for everything. 7. Too much LGBTQ content, which should be the very final aspect to be relevant in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. 8. The game is too lengthy, and the structure is all over the place. We start from scratch at about half of the game, because ✨ Abby ✨ 9. The infected are an afterthought, and are barely present. +1. The majority of the fandom approximately has the mind snd argumentative capabilities of a toddler. Peep at the comments under this video....
Nope, "trans friendly" isn't a thing and it's something entirely made up by people who were mad about the leaks. Also good representation in media is having characters be in a variety of roles including protagonists, antagonists, etc.
You were exactly right and thats really how I feel. Everything about the game is great except for the Story itself and Being a Story Driven Narrative game is the biggest Sin that Neil Drunkman and the Naughty Dog team could ever commit. I love the Gameplay, The Settings, The Graphics are AMAZING!!! but the Narrative and Story are just Shlt. I really like the change that Angry Joe came up for the story If they would've changed the story around. We Could've easily gotten 4 games out of this Story instead of Loving the first one and Hating the Second one.
Honestly the thing I’ve never liked about this game in my opinion is the fact they lied about it trailer cause the fact they needed to lie about Joel role in the game shows me that they had no faith in their story if they had to lie about it
They couldn’t give Abby any growth, learning everything Joel and Ellie had been through. Sympathizing with how much they’ve lost, and maybe not letting go of her anger… but learning to move past her physical retaliation tendencies. They couldn’t let Abby be a character… no she had to be a caricature for the usual “strong female lead”. She’s never wrong, and even when she is, she’s right in some way shape or form. Yeah she “suffers” towards the end of the game, but it’s surface level as she gets to walk away safely with her teammate. As for Ellie, she lost her father figure, her happiness, her ability to play a guitar which is one of the only things she has left from Joel. She ultimately ended up alone, which is exactly what she feared in the first game. How on earth would Neil Druckmann believe that’s a satisfactory conclusion?? Two characters the fans adore and sympathize with, due to us experiencing their harrowing journey along with them in the first game… now completely torn apart in the most unforgiving way possible. Joel ending up permanently and brutally unalived prematurely, Ellie losing everyone she cared about and ending up alone with nothing. It felt like they were trying too hard to be edgy, and forced us to play as some random the fans only see as Joel’s m*rderer, and Ellie’s tormenter. Like we’re expected to just accept Abby…? Just like that?? Neil forgot to read the room before he decided to fuck everything up… and he made it public knowledge, but he used this game as a way to stroke an evil old bat’s ego… not to tell a compelling and entertaining story… and for that, I cannot accept this game’s existence. To me, Ellie and Joel are still living happily with Tommy and Maria in Wyoming.
@@krasmasov6852 oh wow they hint that she sorta kinda maybe has a smidge of regret for killing him in a brief part of the game. It’s not even Joel that she regrets, it’s the fact that the killing distanced herself from Owen and Mel. She never apologizes to Ellie for anything. Regret my ass.
@@krasmasov6852 and this magically makes her a good person? A sorry at the end of it all, after Ellie spares her too, would have redeemed her character at least a little. To plainly show that she openly regrets giving into her anger, because it ultimately caused the deaths of way more people in her chase for revenge. It would have humanized Abby, showing she’s capable of feeling remorse for her own actions, but she hardly feels any regret outside of being separated from her friends before they died. Abby is a trashy character. You can like her all you’d like, I don’t give a damn. But she’s the one who condemned both our beloved heroes from the first game. One, to death. The other, to being alone with nothing and nobody… not even with enough fingers to play the damn instrument her father figure gave her before Abby brutally killed him.
@@buccaneercat Of course it doesn't make her a good person, but it makes her a sympathetic character. I don't know why you need characters in stories to spell everything out when it's already pretty apparent how they're feeling. But you are seemingly unable to see anything in a character that is even slightly subtle. Ellie 100% brought her lost fingers on herself. But yes, Abby is fully responsible for what she did to Joel. Good thing Abby regrets it or she'd be a pretty trashy character.
I want to know why Joel and Tommy left their weapons behind when entering the mansion with the strangers they just met. Like, they didn't even have pistols within reach. Sure, Abby and crew weren't infected, but "not infected" does not equal "not a threat", so it's odd that they would leave all gear out of sight and unattended, following a group of unknown people that outnumber them deeper into a building, then allowing themselves to be surrounded. Joel walking into the middle of the room, taking no precaution to carefully assess the situation until seconds before getting his knee obliterated via shotgun is so poorly contrived.... Tommy knows of this mansion - "that's the Baldwin place" he says.... meaning it was likely unoccupied until recently... so that didn't get him to question who this unusually large group of travelers in the middle of a harsh winter is??? How did Abby even know Joel's last name? How does she even equate what Joel did to what she's doing? Ellie's life was in imminent danger, and despite Abby telling her father that she would want him to do the surgery..... Anderson couldn't answer Marlene when she asked what he would do if it were Abby. Anderson was actively trying to kill a man's daughter.... to redeem himself under the notion of a POTENTIAL cure to "save the world".
Small correction needed in the beginning. They weren't wolves that attacked ellie at the workbench. They were just survivers that thought ellie was a wolf. They also just didn't randomly show up. They were inside the locked door next to the bathroom that was clearly open after you kill them all.
TLOU2 supporters can say whatever they want, but you know a game is terrible and straight up dangerous if it can completely drain you of all your emotions and energy with it's dark and depressing world. By the end of this game,I felt like an empty shell of a person, just not even focusing on anything going on, but wanting the game to be over
These are my three favourite stupid parts of the game: 1. Isaac let a huge group of his best soldiers (including a medic, who would be invaluable in an apocalyptic setting) trek across three clicker-infested states in the dead of winter, wasting resources, time, and possibly even human lives, to go on a pointless revenge quest to find an old man who MIGHT be in Jackson, all while his people were at war with the Seraphites. He literally weakened his army and defenses because of one woman's selfishness, instead of telling her to get over it and focus on more important things. 2. Abby, who knows better than anyone what the drive for revenge can do to someone, let Ellie live not only once, but TWICE. The plot obviously needed that to happen, but it's absolutely ridiculous, especially when she starts taking care of Lev. Ellie is a threat to Lev, yet Abby let her live. Hilarious. 3. Mel obviously hates her baby. It's the only logical explanation I can come up with as for why she kept putting herself in combat situations.
1. Isaac has a shitload of medics and soldiers, and he's smart enough to know that Abby would go with or without his say so. Best to let them go armed so they have a better chance of coming back. Also, you talk like 8 people is a significant chunk of the literal THOUSANDS of soldiers the WLF has. 2. Right. The first time was because Owen argued that they didn't do anything wrong. "If we kill them, we're no better than he was." If there's something Abby wouldn't want to be, it's anything like Joel. The second time is the culmination of her character arc. Instead of taking revenge, she made a different choice. She gave Ellie the chance to make a different choice too. And it paid off. Abby was rewarded. If Ellie never came for her in Santa Barbara, Abby and Lev would've died on the pillars. 3. She NEVER puts herself in a combat situation. Not a single time. She went to work as a medic on site at the FOB. The area between the stadium and the FOB is WLF-controlled territory. The only reason she saw combat at all was because Seraphites slipped past WLF lines and ambushed the truck. But let's assume that's not the case (it definitely is) for the sake of argument. Mel hates her baby. So what? Her relationship with Owen is failing, and she obviously knows that given how he's been acting ever since Jackson. In the ward of the stadium she's now living in, she sees these families all around her all the time while she's alone. "Owen hasn't even seen it yet." I wouldn't blame her for wanting an abortion in that scenario. So even with your false premise, your argument STILL fails.
@@krasmasov6852 1. Isaac _doesn't_ have a ton of medics, and in an apocalypse sparing even one is idiotic. Sure, Abby probably would've gone without his say so, but Abby had to convince her friends to tag along. If Isaac said no, they wouldn't have gone. It makes more sense to leave Abby to her own devices and risk ONE soldier over a whole group. Time, resources, supplies, manpower, all of it was wasted on a RUMOUR, and all to kill someone who wasn't even a threat. No commander in his right mind would allow that, especially when it could've started a war with Jackson. Why risk making more enemies when you're already at war with another faction? You're also wrong about how many soldiers the WLF has. You might've missed it, but Abby and Yara said that both the WLF and the Seraphites have a few thousand people, making them evenly matched, and that they're not all trained to fight. Not to mention Isaac let Abby's group leave when they'd just recently lost three battalions, according to collectibles. So no, I maintain that this plot point is just silly. Too big a risk with too little reward. 2. Abby _is_ like Joel, if not worse. At least Joel never killed anyone out of revenge, but rather to protect and save lives. Joel actually knew how to walk away from revenge (think about Tess). That said, Abby _knows_ what it's like to be driven by revenge. It consumed her for four years. Story-wise, if we look at her character arc, it doesn't make any sense that she let Ellie live the second time (barely makes sense the first time), because she'd grown attached to Lev. Letting Ellie, who swore to kill her out of revenge, walk away from yet another fight, could've potentially put Lev in danger. Which, ironically, it did. Remember, Ellie threated to slit his throat. It doesn't matter that it "paid off" when Ellie went there to _kill_ her, which is exactly what Abby should've foreseen. Not to mention Abby had no right to act so self-righteous. She's killed hundreds of people. Even tortured them for the WLF "for fun"--her words, not mine. We find that out along the way. So no, I maintain that the only reason Ellie was allowed to live so many times is merely because the plot needed her to. 3. By purposely going into known combat zones, Mel put herself and her baby at risk. Several members told her to stay behind (as you said, there were other medics) and to take care of herself, but she ignored them. And are you forgetting that she attacked Ellie? Ran right at her instead of running away or surrendering. No pregnant woman acts like that. I've seen brooms fall behind pregnant women, and when the sound startled them, they instinctively grabbed their stomach. Also, you're assuming Mel wants to murder her baby (it's not an abortion by that point, it's fully formed and viable) just because her relationship with Owen is strained? First of all, I'm not sure why you think that's an excuse. Second of all, Mel _does_ say/do things throughout the game that disproves your assertion. She literally wants her relationship with Owen to work _because_ of her baby. I don't _actually_ think Mel hates her baby, I was just being facetious. In reality, I think Neil Druckmann simply doesn't know how to write believable pregnant women. But for argument's sake, let's say you're right. Mel hates her baby. If that's the case, you literally just proved my premise _isn't_ false. XD I continue to believe TLoU2's story is a hilarious mess with way too many plot conveniences and contrivances. If you liked the game, that's fine, but I can only suspend my disbelief so much.
@@kirikakirikakirika 1. Yes, he does. You literally see a whole bunch of them working in the med tents. Abby had to convince Owen to tag along. All her other friends volunteered, Mel included. If Isaac said no, they all still would've gone. They all care about each other more than Isaac and the WLF. Isaac even knows this. "No secrets between the Salt Lake crew, huh?" And again, Abby would've gone regardless, so Isaac equipping them and letting them go was the best way for him to get his top soldier back alive. And no, you're wrong again. The WLF have more soldiers than the Seraphites, but non-combatants among the Seraphites still know how to fight, which is why the island invasion did not go well for the WLF. You're also wrong about the state of the war during the Jackson trip. things were going well for the WLF at the time according to collectibles. Isaac letting Abby go was in part a reward for her performance. So you're still wrong. 2. Protect and save lives? Is that what he was doing all those years as a hunter? But yes, Joel was never interested in revenge. How does that contradict what I said? Abby never tortured for fun. You're outright lying now. And again, Abby was rewarded for sparing Ellie the second time. If she did what you suggest, she would've died on the pillar. Lev would be dead too. My initial response here is a good enough reply to this. You just repeated yourself, and I already explained why you were wrong. 3. The area between the stadium and the FOB isn't a known combat zone. It's WLF territory. Pregnant women act all sorts of ways. They're people, not a monolith. She fully thought Ellie was going to kill her, and she just watched the man she was in love with get murdered. I saw my uncle accidentally startle my pregnant aunt, and she turned and slapped him then immediately apologized saying she just got scared. You don't mess with her. People are actually different from one another and react differently to situations. Don't know if you were aware. Also, I'm not assuming Mel wants to murder her baby. I was using that as a hypothetical to demonstrate that your argument fails in every conceivable way. That would still be an abortion by the way. It's an abortion until it's born. Also, the only excuse a person ever needs for an abortion is that they want one. But I know Mel doesn't hate her baby. Again, I was showing how your argument fails from every angle. You just don't understand that pregnant women are people and behave differently from one another. You continue to be wrong. Not a single convenience or contrivance.
@@krasmasov6852 1. We see a _hand full_ of medics. Doesn't change the fact that risking _any_ medic is idiotic, especially when he knows she's not at her top form. It's like sending a man with one leg to run a marathon. And no, Abby had to ask _all_ of her friends to tag along. If Isaac said no, they would've followed his order. If Abby had gone by herself, no great loss. I mean, look at how fast Isaac tried to kill her when she betrayed him. One soldier, top or not, obviously isn't worth risking a entire group and resources. Which, by the way, I'm right about, because Ellie figured out exactly who they were thanks to their clothing, lol. And I know the WLF have more soldiers, but they're still both pretty evenly matched, as literally told to us by Abby and Yara. And no, things were not "going well". The collectibles literally state that they lost three battalions are there was great unrest growing in the faction, which is why Isaac wanted to start capturing Seraphites for interrogation. He could sense they were up to something, he just didn't know what. And as I said, there's no reason to risk war with another faction (Jackson) over a _rumour._ No matter how you try to spin it, no leader would do this. Why make more enemies when you're already at war? I noticed you skipped over that part. Probably because you know it doesn't make any logical sense. 2. Yes, that's exactly what Joel was doing as a hunter. Did you forget the conversation between him and Tommy? Tommy literally thanked him for keeping him alive during those times, he just wasn't happy with what Joel had to become. That was during the worst point of the apocalypse, by the way. And yes, Abby _did_ torture for fun. I'm beginning to think you missed a lot of conversations. There's literally a conversation where she says she wants to beat prioners _for fun_ to "blow off some steam". She also tortured Joel because, well, she wanted to, and in front of his crying daughter. That takes a special type of psychopath. Even Joel never did that, least of all for fun/revenge. And I already explained why Abby's "reward" is inconsequential. Abby didn't know she'd be rewarded and neither did Ellie. She went there to _kill_ her, which Abby should've known since she understood the drive for revenge. And don't forget, Ellie threatened Lev. Your reply to this is contrived nonsense, just like the game. 3. It. Doesn't. Matter. Any area controlled by the WLF that was outside the compound was known to be open to attack, and therefore unsafe for a heavily pregnant woman. And sure, pregnant women aren't a monolith, but the vast majority share similar traits (when they care about their baby) and Mel shared none. Why? Because the plot demanded it. Your aunt knows your uncle, lol. And I very much doubt she would've run full force at someone holding a knife when she was 8.5 months pregnant. And again, you literally proved my argument. What aren't you understanding? And no, it wouldn't be an abortion. It would be an _induced delivery._ Fully formed, fully viable, past 32 weeks. But whatever helps you sleep at night. I'm not wrong, you just have low standards. And that's fine, that's your choice, but I don't like it when stories insult my intelligence. I was being perfectly civil, but TLoU2 fans always have to get all uppity and aggressive over this game when it's criticized. What a shame. "Not a single convenience or contrivance." Please. How many times was Ellie saved by sheer circumstance? Like Dina falling through a roof after the solider randomly decided not to shoot her. Things that make no sense happen only because the plot needs them to happen, characters are merely props, almost every decision people make is nonsensical, and a four year revenge quest is so unrelatable to most people. The game is nothing more than a divisive ego trip, made by one man who thinks he's always right. That said, I already said you're free to like the game, yet you're acting like I said otherwise. Am I free to dislike it without you resorting to ad hominems again?
@@kirikakirikakirika 1. Right, and that bunch of medics is just a fraction of all the people they had. Also, wouldn't Abby's group have a better chance of coming back okay if they had a medic on hand? It'd be dumb NOT to send a medic with them. Also, Isaac did not know Mel wasn't in top form. Even Abby didn't know Mel was pregnant until they were on the outskirts of Jackson. And again, no, you're just wrong. Abby's friends volunteered. Owen was the only one who had to be convinced. And again, Abby's friends all lost someone to Joel. They were all Fireflies in Salt Lake, and all knew people who Joel killed. They all knew that the vaccine they had been fighting for was destroyed because of him. Funny you mention how fast Isaac turned on her because it wasn't fast at all. He refused to relent on the plan to kill all Seraphites, but he gave Abby several chances to do what he saw as the right thing. You've got the lore completely wrong. The WLF were steadily winning by the time Abby went to Jackson. Isaac just realized that they would eventually bleed resources if things kept up like that, so he wanted to finish it all. You really need to think about the timelines in these collectibles you're misunderstanding. I didn't skip over anything. You're just illiterate. Isaac correctly thought a massive group wouldn't trek 800 miles to engage in full scale war. At worst, they'd send a few people that he would've believed wouldn't stand a chance against their thousands. 2. No, he didn't. Tommy outright says he still has nightmares from it and that it wasn't worth it. Abby did NOT ever torture for fun a single time. You are outright lying. I know people have to lie to criticize the story in this game, but rarely is it so egregious as yours. Abby has a warped retributive sense of justice and thinks Seraphites deserve it for getting her pregnant friend hurt. It's not fun. If there's one thing that's abundantly clear, it's that Abby doesn't enjoy hurting others at all. She always either feels empty or shameful, and she doesn't know why until she discovers a better way to deal with her own grief. Her discovering that revenge won't ever make her feel better is like the core of her arc. Abby showed compassion instead of cruelty and was rewarded for it. You can try to think of a million excuses to ignore that, but it doesn't change the fact. Abby spared Ellie, and because of that, Abby and Lev survived. 3. It matters. It's the core of what matters here. There's always a risk of attack, but it's not a high risk. Not a single character acts in a way due to plot demands a single time. Mel has ample reason to want to go out on rotation, and I've already explained it in detail. Sigh you're missing the point so hard. She reacted with fight instead of flight. And you get so many little things wrong too. Mel wasn't 8.5 months pregnant. If she was, her "another month and I wouldn't fit" comment doesn't make sense. Also, Jackson was a month before Seattle, and she wasn't even showing then. You believe she wasn't showing at 7.5 months? Also, Ellie wasn't armed with a knife. She was armed with a gun, and Mel successfully disarmed her. She just then took Mel's knife to end it. You are missing the point again. An abortion is the ending of a pregnancy before natural labor whether it's an induced early birth or sucking the fetus out of there in pieces. The method and whether or not the fetus survives is irrelevant to the fact that it's an abortion. Not only do I have high standards, but TLOU2 makes it abundantly clear that most other games outright fail to meet these standards. This story didn't insult your intelligence. It was too much for your intelligence. And you don't have to be some big brained nerd to get it either. You just have to have the emotional intelligence of more than a 12 year old boy. Jordan definitely shot at Dina when she was on the roof. He missed her, but the glass broke. With her down, he decided to subdue her for interrogation, you know, the thing he was literally arguing with Mike about. Also, you know coincidences in a story aren't a bad thing, right? Was it also bad when Ellie just happened to come across Joel just in time to save him from the hunter drowning him in the Pittsburgh hotel? Or was it bad when Joel just happened to fall on the only piece of upturned rebar in the entire university? You don't care about conicidences unless you're using them as ammunition against stories you don't like. Every single decision made by every single character is entirely in line with their personality, motivations, and the context of the situation. You're just upset that they made decisions you wouldn't as a rational outside observer rather than someone actually in extremely emotionally strenuous situations. A 4 year revenge quest is unrelatable? You have no fucking idea how hard it is to process grief, asshole. You're free to dislike the game as much as you like just as I'm free to tell you why your reasons are laughably stupid. If you don't like that, ignore my comments.
I think nothing says more about TLOU2's quality than *Naughty Dog themselves* removed all mentions of TLOU2 on their RUclips Channel besides one post of Neil Druckmann making excuses. Their videos went away six months after release. That's shame if I've ever seen it.
2:36 despite Abby being a well trained soldier. I prefer Joel’s old man strength. Having 20 years of being an ex hunter did gave him an edge to be as physical aggressive as he can be in the field of survival which also helped him stay in good shape even for a middle age man in his early 50s. He was a lot tougher and experienced then the survivors who were younger then him. Plus he had to read through a lot of training manuals to help him learn as many different survival techniques as he could to acquire a wide range of skills to utilize his versatility he’s build up. 8:13 that’s true, he was paranoid just to keep his guard up whenever he encounters hostile survivors who gets in his way to ensure his survivability. 10:1110:18 thoses are good point’s you’ve made.
Honestly I feel like if they had done more to show Abby regret her chocies realized she was not a good person and understand why Joel and Ellie did what they did and understand their side of the story then Abby when have been a more likable character cause I feel like In the end she never had to agree with what Joel did she could have at the very least understand why Joel did what he did
If your game is going to be so heavily narrative driven... then the characters' actions and motivations must make sense. It makes zero sense that thw two main characters would kill 1000 people between the two of them just to take turns sparing each others lives.
Yeah. I have a friend who's playing it for the first time. I told him about how Joel's trust in random armed people does not make sense for him but he was like "but he's been living in a community for years" but who in their right mind would relax knowing what you did to a whole military organization? Not a character like Joel, that's for sure! Also that freaking plot about a vetenarian trying to make a vaccine for a freaking fongus by killig a teenager without her consent bothers me so much. Abby's dad was an ahole and I hate how they try to make us think Joel is the ahole, like we know! We've always known, but he has reasons for his choices and they make sense! But for some reason in this game Abby's right and she goes on with her life and Ellie, who didn't do sh1t doesn't and she's a villain all of a sudden just because. This story would've been interesting if it were other characters but fo a sequel, it sucks.
It's so weird how people excuse Joel being so trusting to a random person with "he got soft living in Jackson for years". Ok. So how did Ellie turn out so savagely violent despite living in the same community where she even gets to socialize and smoke weed? She wasn't even on speaking terms with Joel for some of her stay there, so it wasn't her being influenced by him. She just magically turns super violent and goes for slitting throats and throwing molotovs at dogs. So if Jackson didn't soften Ellie up, it didn't soften Joel up, period.
If they wanted to end the cycle of violence, why did we have to leave the farm and risk losing the two people ellie had left, only to not kill the person that wronged her. The game should have just kept the flashbacks, erased the actual storyline, that would have been a better game delivering the message about forgiveness. Abby should have actually had the build up before meeting joel, finding clues to Joel's actual appearance. Hell I don't even have that much experience in writing and even I could come up with a more compelling story than this.
@@krasmasov6852 my argument is that why did she go after her if she knew that she wouldn't kill her. Mainly what I am saying is that the game should have ended at the farm with ellie, Dina, and the kid
Replayed it recently. Enjoyed it more than I did the first time, but some things still don’t work for me. The game has pacing issues, and I still don’t care about Abby. Went in with an open mind both times, and it just doesn’t click for me. I also found the newer characters to be dull. Love Ellie in this game though, and I also enjoy the gameplay. I respect that they tried something different. It took big balls to do it. Just a swing and a miss for me. Overall disappointing. It is what it is.
Man to be honest if Neil messed up everything and every character in Part 2. If Abby’s stories was a stand-alone with Lev I would have given more of a chance, but no he had to insert his POV in it. I know Joel wasn’t a good man but come on let the audience decide for themselves, instead of putting your pretentious Ideas in a beloved franchise. Dude, like even with the new characters you messed them up. Like how can you make a religious cult and a militia having a war not the main focus instead of a really contrived revenge tale. Shame on Neil for ruining Ellie’s chance of being happy. At least the flashbacks where good and would have been better if it was just the whole game, but I can only dream.
Your thing about them taking off their wolf patches is interesting, I just had a thought. The Wolves are a highly militarized society right? They might view the old world rules of engagement as sacred. For example, it’s a war crime to fight in combat without identification. It’s also a war crime to steal an enemy uniform, or disguise yourself as a civilian. Just food for thought
I can agree with you there man, does make a bit of sense. But at the same time they’re not to far out from being adults. Im curious who’s the oldest one in there group . Honest mistakes do happen which can lead to bigger fuck ups, I’ll see say that is one possibility. But if they were actually smart, no traces left behind in a suicide mission.
I have heard so many bad reviews , you are hardly alone . They better not make the same mistake with the show . I think they will just have Abby get killed by clickers at the beginning because they have to know NO ONE will watch it if they follow the game . I could write a way better story than that and 1 that makes sense . First would be to find a doctor that would run tests on Ellie and not kill her . Once you kill her it ruins the chance of finding a cure if you're wrong . They could have just done a little research and known that .
They could’ve made the message hit if they had let us kill Abby and get the same ending at the end where Ellie ends up alone. The cost of vengeance and whether or not it was worth it.
lol, instead you get punished for the 'choice' to end the cycle of violence - a choice that makes zero sense for Ellie's character. Great writing Duckman.
Wow and wow! I agree wholeheartedly with your view on TLOU 2. I played it twice but just like you I couldn't even play it all the way through because I was so upset at the direction the devs went after waiting all this time for this game to be released. I still have no love for Abby no matter how hard the devs tried to show her reasons. Very well put together opinion I enjoyed it so much I subscribed.
You Nailed It Man! Every Point you made was 100% on the Mark! If the Game gets ported to PC, I will only Buy It if It goes on Sale. The Points you make about the Weak Writing & Lack of Choice for the Player, are how the Game Ended Up being a Totally Unsatisfying, Frustrating & Depressing Finale!!
TLOU2 is constant cheap attempts of emotional manipulation. The """story""" is a pretentious dumpster fire of character assasinations and artificial cringey dialogue.
Ellie went through too much to not get her revenge because sometimes people are just too far gone and can't come back from this vengeance mindset and made zero sense for Ellie to give up millisecond away from accomplishing what she set out for
not only that but she went for revenge twice and still lost. well, she actually gave up on the last second, for no apparent reason. she is stupid as well. she in fact saved Abby that most likely would have died on that scavenger camp, tied up there on that long by the beach. overall, the story was pathetic. and the gameplay also simialt to the first game,.which isn't bad but nothing that exiting. glad I haven't played this game. not interested in woke nonsense in my video games.
@@LevisH21 yeah and I'm confused on the 10/10 and 100% is what getting from big sources but the general public seems to have hated it and that it did a disservice to it's characters and fans
@@RhinoNutts505 well, fans of any franchise are diverse. I'm pretty sure the woke fans liked this game and will defend it to the death. and it still made lots of money. but for me this franchise is over. I don't care about what happens further. a 3rd game is probably impossible at this point anyway. or I could be wrong. regardless. everything is over.
@@LevisH21 well people are wanting a remake of the first game which I fail to understand because normally remakes are for games that are pretty dated and have the potential to be modernized but in my opinion I think the first game has aged well and doesn't feel outdated so really the only thing a remake would do is have more pretty graphics which I think the old one still hold up
@@RhinoNutts505 a remake of the original? that's so strange. I think that game(especially the remastered version) still holds up pretty well to this today.
Not going to lie, I wish Neil Druckmann and Naughty Dog took a lesson from BioWare after the Mass Effect 3 ending debaucle and considered writing an epilogue scene similar to how BioWare made the extended cut DLC, that they released, for free to try and repair some of the damage, but no, Neil and Naughty Dog just left it alone. For the, let's call it extended cut DLC: Ellie's trip to Santa Barbara was a nightmare about how revenge is bad, she wakes up to Dina next to her and upon seeing what revenge will do to her, kisses Dina on the forehead and falls back asleep and maybe she has a dream of Joel smiling as if he approves of her giving up the cycle of violence. Sure, this is cheesy as hell, but I would like to hear what you would think to this.
Compared to what we got I prefer this low key. Lol. Cause the original ending was just time wasting nonsense. Tbh, I think the ending would be way better if they cut out the boss fight and had Ellie and Abby argue or something. The flip-flopping between wanting to kill Abby and not is what annoys me about it so much.
@@Nassit-Gnuoy The ending would have been better if Ellie left Abby hanging on the pole saying to her: "was your revenge on Joel worth it?", walks away and Abby is left there to think on her actions, possibly for the first time in her life. I do kind of like the ending I wrote in the prior comment (though it is a bit cheesy) since A) It wouldn't require changing anything about the game and B) it still ties together the concept of "revenge is bad".
The whole idea of a "revenge is bad" plot and a "break the cycle of violence" story bit does not fit in a zombie apocalypse game. People have more important things to worry about, like infected, than to worry about going after someone who wronged you. 🫤 This is a personal opinion, so please don't lose your mind over this, please
You know who agrees with you? *The writer of the first game.* The writer of the second game "agreed" but really was browbeaten by said better writer into also repeating this, but thought his "revenge bad" plot was so smart he just HAD to tell it. . . With the Last of Us franchise, that is, because he knows what happened the last time he tried to tell an original story.
@@donavonhoward1899 no I definitely didn’t miss the point. The first game has a very clear message whereas this game also has a very clear message. The game tries to make us sympathize with Abby and therefore make us like the character so that we don’t become trigger happy when we see her even though they make the mistake of trying to humanize the antagonist to the protagonist who is Ellie. Ellie has every right and the game confuses the player for the actual character as Ellie spares her out of one flashback about Joel. Don’t make the point about Joel not wanting Ellie to do that because he’s not even a morally righteous person. I didn’t miss the whole point I see how incorrectly the writers tried to implement that point into a game with a setting where nobody is morally correct. The gameplay loop tries to make you feel bad about murdering hundreds of people through different areas with them screaming when they are in the same moral compass as everyone else. The gameplay loop directly contradicts the point because ending the cycle of violence does not mean you bash someone’s head in with a bat or kill a pregnant woman.
Undertale integrated the "violence is bad" into the gameplay greatly. For start, the game is turn-based pixel art, so there is no actual combat skill to stimulate your desire for violence; second, the game the characters are charming and you genuinely feel abad about killing them, instead of hoping you give a f*ck just because they have names; third, the complete the "genocide run" you need to kill every enemy, and finding them all is boring and grind AF
@@riku528 I don't get how the flashback would make Ellie want to stop from killing Abby, Knowing Joel, he would have fully sent it if anyone touched Tommy or Ellie, we didn't see any build-up of Joel wanting to be a pacifist. We know he wasn't even remorseful for the hospital massacre and infact doubled down
@@riku528 If you think Abby is the antagonist alone, then you missed the point. The game isn’t about violence or forgiveness. It’s just about moving on. The gameplay shows horrible and brutal actions which didn’t have to happen. They live in a violent world, but Ellie didn’t have to leave Jackson and she could of avoided what was about to happen. The game is showing that what you are going to do isn’t going to be a triumphant story of justice. Ellie is the antagonist and so is Abby, but Ellie and Abby are both the protagonist. Abby is only the villain to Ellie’s story and Ellie is the villain to Abby’s story. In Ellie’s eyes, Abby came in and killed her father figure, the only person who would always care for her no matter what. But to Abby, she killed a monster who stopped humanity from getting a cure and then his psychopath daughter kills all her friends just to get back at her. The characters only ever change when they move. Ellie let’s Abby go because if she killed her she would only prove to herself how far gone she was. Abby didn’t get better killing Joel, it only got better when she found something to fight for like Joel did with Ellie.
I laughed hard af when you said you would kill Abby's dad all over again. I actually replayed the first one just for that myself. Seriously, fuck that guy
You're saying fuck that guy for absolutely no reason. If you actually paid attention he was an innocent man who did nothing EXCEPT TRY TO MAKE A FUCKING VACCINE FOR THE WORLD. JOEL KILLED HIM FOR NO REASON. And Abby had a reasonable reaction. Her dad was killed by a man for doing nothing except helping the world.
Dude actively pursued his own death. After this guy takes down an entire force by himself and only wants to take the kid, what makes you think *you* would fair better against him? If he stayed in the first game I wouldn't have minded but the added the context of the sequel just makes him look even dumber.
Typical commoner answer. Simple, predictable, in a box with a neat little bowtie. Same type of baboon brained person that goes to watch all the marvel movies with cookie cutter endings
I hate how Lev has one of the most interesting stories in this game but we never get to play as him. He is trying to save his brainwashed mother from a cult that wants to kill him for heresy, for god's sake thats fricking Shakespeare compared to the rest of the game.
Abby isn’t entirely a bad character but I would’ve liked an alternative that Ellie ended up in her spot with Lev, and Ellie becomes the Joel for Lev. Get call backs to the first game, and Ellie sharing Joel’s tactics and wisdom to Lev. That would’ve been an amazing story.
Honestly, my biggest problem with the game is that it is a revenge story but stops you from actually having your revenge right at the end and shoehorns in a "cycle of violence" message as if none of the random people you killed have family that want to avenge them. Nevermind the fact that you mowed through hundreds of enemies to get a shot at killing Abby and Ellie just gives up last second. They pulled every cheap trick in the book to make people sympathize with Abby and they still couldn't get people to like her.
Should play both Red Dead Redemption games if you haven't already, they also tackle the "cycle of revenge" in part, just much more well done while not trying to center the entire plot around it.
It felt so condescending how this game tried to preach about forgiveness while not offering that same mercy to Joel, a character we know very well. Hell, they even punished Ellie at the end.
@@krasmasov6852 I mean in terms of the whole game's focus in general. The cliff hanger in the first game left it open to the audience to decide whether the lawyer thought Joel was right or wrong for what he did. But in the sequel, it makes that decision for the audience: that Joel was completely wrong for what he did. There were even multiple characters in the sequel repeatedly calling Joel a monster for what he did, no matter the reason. The most sympathy I saw when it came to Joel's decision was when it came to Ellie's diary and when she would think if she understood why Joel did what he did or not. The best display of sympathy for Joel is in the ending, when Ellie offers to try to forgive him. But throughout the entire game, it almost felt like it was telling us that we should feel bad for caring about Joel, but not for Abby and her Dad. I hope I make sense somewhat, I don't wanna type an article
@@nimloc1670 No, it doesn't make that choice for the audience at all. In fact, the game shows Joel doubling down on what he did and getting rewarded for it. There were multiple characters in the sequel who called Joel a monster, yes. There were also multiple people who traveled hundreds of miles to avenge his death. There is nothing in the game whatsoever that even remotely implies that you should feel bad for caring about Joel. The story doesn't work unless you do care about Joel. I mean Abby's entire motivation in Seattle is trying to assuage her guilt for the atrocity she committed to Joel.
The game was a mess... It is sad that ppl defends paying money for a game that destroys its own characters when they tricked them with devious trailers
They just made him careless. Hes been living peacefully in jackson for years at this point. Plus meeting up with abbys group was his only choice because of the horde of zombies that was chasing him down
@@aydenhaze9015 living careless in the jackson confine does not change the outside world. The same merciless type of people still exist. You'd have to be really dumb to trust people from outside of your situation on the first meeting without vetting the outsiders.
@@jamarr27 well not only the carelessness but the fact that joel and tommy had no other choice. Their was a hoard of infected chasing them down. It even states in game their horses wouldn’t be able to make it back to jackson. As far as joel knew, abby was just some lost girl he had saved that was traveling with a group.
@@aydenhaze9015 those points are true but he still could have gave them a fake name because he has no idea what their intentions are. As far as we know people outside of Jackson are still cut throat and trying to survive and will kill to do it.
Abbey is way more psychotic than Joel. He killed for survival and saving a child's life. Abbey went on a cross-country trip through incredibly dangerous terrain just to kill for revenge.
Not even kill, torture. She took her jacket off because she got so heated up from repeated beating a helpless, injured dude who saved her life a minute ago. No idea how anyone can see her ever being even close to redeeamable.
@@Synthia17 that's a good point. And while playing as Abby was meant to make us connect with her, personally it solidified my disconnect. I wasn't playing as my enemy through her tragic backstory. I was inhabiting a blunt force plot device, a phony prop created to deliver a heavy-handed moral lesson. Immersive stories require sleight of hand, and the balance is more fragile than people know. When they forced us to kill a dog as Ellie, and never as Abby, the meta-implications were too obvious. That's why many felt LoU2 was manipulative.
@@kwk111 Definitely, we were being hit over the head with the messages and instead of carefuly shown, we were straight up told what we were supposed to feel and it's baffling. Then the awful pacing and jumbled mess of flashbacks within flashbacks destroys it further.
“Hey friends at naughty dog, what if we make The Last of Us 1.5!! Joel and Ellie specifically Joel were being hunted down but Abby and her friends but they were able to take them out!! ❤ after that they live a happy life in Jackson! The end!!!🌈🌈
This game sucks at trying to talk about forgiveness, Mercy or that violence is wrong. For example: *Abby kills Joel Abby Later: Wow, I slept so Good last night! 🤭 *Ellie kills Nora Ellie Later: I don't even recognize myself anymore... What am I doing? 😢
@@krasmasov6852 She only had 1 nightmare, even that was about Lev and Yara, where she feels compassionate for them. She didn't show any kind of remorse or regret after killing Joel
@@netrox0072 Owen mentions her recurring nightmares before she kills Joel. They are established both before and after. And her nightmare wasn't just about Lev and Yara. Consider the context. In the dream, where did she find them lynched? Right, her dad's operating room. Plus, there's also the part where Abby outright says that she's helping Lev out of guilt as a way to lighten the load. And there's the fact that the story doesn't make sense if she doesn't regret killing Joel.
Agreed on Joel's death. I have no problem with him dying but the way they did it will never sit right with me. I think it would have been better if, in that situation, they were atleast a little weary, a little more cautious and that either he or Tommy noticed at the last moment that something wasn't right. So they'd try to fight back, get overpowered and Joel would eventually be killed. If he died like that, died putting up some resistance, then atleast he'd die resembling the Joel i knew from the first game. Because as it is now, i can buy that Joel and Tommy could have gone soft, even if the writers didn't foreshadow it, but one thing i can't buy is that Neither Joel Nor Tommy would have their survivors instincts ,that they gained over 20 years, telling them that something's wrong here.
I also hate how the marketing was specifically designed to lie to the audience to make them believe Joel would live and have a role in the story. They straight up replaced characters with his. Also his death being so early just takes so much away from the story and leaves it just a depressing nightmare, which was Druckman's intention and its terrible. It's so thematically disconnected from the first one that it's hard to even see it as a sequel.
i read your comment but all i see is “still mad that joel died” and that’s it. Joel was living in the peaceful place of Jackson with family and friends now. Joel had found peace living with Ellie and finally found a sense of safety. This isn’t the same joel we see in last of us because he doesn’t have to be that kind of man anymore. we see that progression happen throughout the first game and now he’s a man more willing on trusting others instead of being this loner only worried for his own back. In the end, this would ultimately be his down fall
@@venomshake8187 I thought i made it clear that i'm only upset about *HOW* Joel died and not the fact that he died. There is a difference. Yes, Joel lived in relative comfort and did not have to fight everyday for survival but he did go out on Patrols very often to fight bandits, and infected. For all he knew, Abby's group could have been bandits too. Hence why i think he would have been a bit more cautious. Besides that, in the flash backs, the game established that Joel still had some caution and ruthlessness in him, at least when it concerns Ellie. Remember the scene when he cut down a Bloater alone with a machete? Or when he made sure Ellie kept her mask on to keep her immunity a secret, even though they knew no one was around? I saw those as hints that Joel is still a pretty cautious and dangerous man. Like i said, a few years living in relative safety may make a man more trusting but i don't see it overpowering the 20 years of survival experiences and instincts he had before.
agreed cause Joel and Tommy wouldn't trust random arm to teeth so easily close to their home, like bro that a big red flag right there and Joel never question why random peoples close to their home it arm up and don't try fight back and alot dumbass think we mad that Joel died no we mad how stupid he died, like if Joel got bitten cause of that bitch and Joel seal himself in and Elie come in and want to save him and she blame Abby for it that would been better
@@LFC_Fan23 I respect how they killed him off in terms of how ruthless it was but it felt way too rushed. Like let Joel and Tommy converse with them a little more, build tension, and then go all in. There was such good potential for a scene there that just wasn’t used. I’m assuming they did that because they wanted to shock the player and not give us enough time to process what was about to happen but it’s just dumb and wastes a strong moment. The ending of the game also just didn’t make any sense but that’s a can of worms in of itself
I still love how people used the argument of "you're upset Joel died" when the fandom, at least the majority from what I saw, accepted that he was going to die in TLoU2.
There's a billion legitimate issues, many of which are obvious and indefensible. Acknowledging those would mean this game isn't perfect. "You're just mad because Joel died" is the one point they latch onto because they think the fans being upset was the intent and that makes it smart. Subsequently, they think that makes them smart. It was never about the game. It's about how the game makes them feel: If it's perfect, they're smart. If it's not it's just one of a billion things in life that keeps telling them they aren't.
@@krasmasov6852 Oh, we can name several issues. The problem is whenever we do, TLOU2 apologist never listen and always go back to moving the goal post or outright repeat their own points like parrots.
"Stop trying to be movies so badly" thank you! It is a video GAME, not a VIDEO game. Imagine "improving" a movie by having a few static images and most of the story is told by just audio to mimic radio novelas.
Exactly! I don't know why developers would limit themselves so greatly when video games offer so much more exploring (/time to build characters and the world.) I don't think a Batman movie could tell a story on the same epic scale like the Arkham Knight. Joker in Batman's head was so very fun. Trying to congest all of it into movie time would not yield the same results. In short, you can't make a cake by following a pie recipe.
Character inconsistency is one of the biggest issues that current media has. Movies and games tend to take these fictional characters out of character to push the plot forward. Even if it's detrimental to the overall immersion of the viewer/player or to the story as a whole.
I find Druckmann's use of that Kurt Cobain quote to be really funny in hindsight. Kurt said that not because those kinds of people were critical of his music, but because he personally hated what they believed in and didn't want to be supported by awful people. Druckmann hates """"racists"""" and """"sexists"""" because they're easy scapegoats for why nobody likes his divisive sequel.
The thing that’s funny to me about his reaction to the backlash is the fact that he said before he knew people were gonna hate the game, but chose to stick with the story he wanted from the jump. Why get all extra about the reaction to the game then? It was just a lot of unnecessary drama around this game’s release.
The game turning into a trainwreck is almost entirely Neils fault, there is nothing wrong with the gameplay, or the acting, its all on the writing and the execution, And guess who directed this game execution and who was the lead writer. Your man mr Druckmann. And considering his defiant attitude, and the way the story is made in such a one sided note, id say the dude is too full of himself,
@@marcusmaire8197 Yeah, a lot of people like the new star wars trilogy, didnt stop it from selling less with each sequel. When we speak about millions, even 1% is a lot. And "a lot" stops meaning anything but a footnote at that point.
Haven't finished the video but I just wanna state a problem I have with the games message of 'revenge bad' Ellie is constantly demonized and made to look like a selfish prick for going on her revenge quest. She loses her girlfriend, her baby, almost all of her friends and even loses some fingers making her unable to play Joel's song essentially leaving her all alone all because she wanted revenge...which she didn't even get the satisfaction of getting because of BS. However Abby was constantly rewarded for getting her revenge. She found peace with herself, grew into a 'better' person, got her lover back, found a new family! She was rewarded at nearly every opportunity for what she did to Joel and if not for Ellie she would've gotten away with it. Hell even after Ellie killed her friends and she left Seattle things were going good for her up until being captured by the rattlers and even THEN she got away with everything! Getting on a boat and sailing away Scott free to recover and go back to normal. Abby was rewarded for revenge but Ellie was demonized sending horrible mixed messages. Also uh small side note but I find it hilarious how Ellie was basically called an evil psychopath for killing s pregnant woman in self defense because that same woman tried to kill her first and she didn't know about the woman being pregnant...and yet Abby was perfectly fine knowingly slitting a pregnant woman's throat even saying "good" when Ellie begged her not to. If not for her friend (who's name I've forgotten) she would've gleefully murdered a defenseless pregnant woman whereas Ellie had absolutely no choice in a kill or be killed situation with no prior knowledge.
No no, you see, Abby lost her friends so she TOTALLY suffered for her revenge. I mean, it's not like that just means *other people* suffered consequences for her actions. From the mind of the author of TLOU2, who doesn't understand responsibility, that's totally equal to Ellie suffering personally.
Lmao did you forget Abby literally didn’t find peace at the end? And lost almost everyone besides the one person that helped her become a human again? Abby wasn’t rewarded at all neither of them were at the end
@@imjaii Abby finds the fireflies and is saved by the person she tortured a loved one in front of. Did she get out completely clean? No but she most certainly got her peace in the end
People will say that Abby losing all her friends is her revenge coming back on her but what really can be surmised from it is her sparing Ellie and Tommy came back to hurt her. The message of Abby’s revenge is don’t spare anyone. Not a really hopeful message imo
@@Ryan-cs3uc and on top of that, they were not actually her friends, she never suffered for then or get sad for them, she never even mentioned them or care to were they are, because the only person that abby actually cared about is owen, the guy who cheated his pregnant wife mel with abby. Abby betrayed the WLF group that she lived with for years for 2 kids that she know for 2 days, and decided to killed people from WLF for those 2 strangers, The only lost abby had is a guy that banged her and her gains. Ellie lost friends, like jesse, her father figure that saved her multiple times ,her uncle tommy that hate ellie for not finishing the revenge after losing so much because of abby, lost dina, and Jesse baby. Ellie lost a whole lot in the game in comparison to abby losing a cheater and her gains.
Exactly why I couldn’t touch this game. After hearing all the bs from my friends and other RUclipsrs, I realized that naughty dog practically abandoned any characteristics they initially set up. I mean this was a good concept that was HORRIBLY executed. However, there are a million others scenarios they could have utilized to killed Joel that would have made sense and felt justified. SMH 🤦🏻♀️
same. I adore the first game. I went from having monumental anticipation to being so indifferent that I never even bought it and have no plans on playing.
How TLoU should have ended: Jerry gets his throat ripped open by the zebra, because zebras are fucking vicious even when they aren't WOUNDED (and that absolute idiot got handsy with one). Ellie and Joel arrive. Marlene: "Sorry, we can't do the procedure. Our surgeon got murdered by a zebra." Ellie: "...what?" Joel: "Well shit... I guess we'll head back to Jackson then." THE END
It's funny how this games story is so bad they're going back to remake the first game. Although considering what ND did to this game they'll probably find some way to ruin the first game now.
remake? I thought they are going to remaster it for new consoles, mainly PS5, remake would be any good for them right now, instead they could remake Uncharted
@@ExtremeMan10 Keep up with the news. They are pretty open about remaking TLOU 1 and altering story details. Because Cuntman hates TLOU 1, as it was a collaborative effort and not his own creation.
@@christianalexander579 no, it's literally being remade from the ground up. A remake doesn't mean they have to change the story. For example the PS4 version of the Last of Us is a remaster as it's the same as the PS3 version just with a resolution boost and runs at 60fps. You can't call the PS5 version a simple resolution boost.
Holy shit, this is the most well-put together critique of TLoU II that I've seen and it's a concise 42 and a half minutes. My dude was just dropping bombs left and right and addressing counterpoints with sound logic instead of dancing around points going "uhhh I don't think it's that bad." And that point about diversity is right on, if developer's actually cared about diversity they should be making those characters front and center, actually treat them with respect, and write them well. Otherwise, they really shouldn't bother if they're not gonna do that, no representation is better than terribly done representation.
It would’ve been way more ballsy of them to make Lev the other perspective character. Plus he’s a more interesting character than Abby IMO. Instead it feels like a lot of this diversity talk feels like they had a checklist to mark off. Appreciate you watching!
The spirit is okay but we gotta stop treating marginalized groups as people who don't exist unless they are to be used for something. Newsflash: queer and black people exist, there shouldn't need to be some grand justification for why a non-white or non straight character exists in a piece of media.
@@kaisolomon5187 I wholeheartedly agree, but I really dislike it when they are present but are represented poorly. Like if you're not even going to treat these people like regular human beings why bother trying to put them in? I think Star Trek Beyond did it right with Sulu, and even recently with Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, despite my problems with that movie, how representation was handled was not one of them.
yet some people àre still trying to be philosophers to defend Neil Druckmn for this story, trying to justify it ànd tell us it's deeper thàn Whàt We think !
Much like how the "fucking the hat on the sea ice" bit from Disco Elysium was a giveaway that it was never about the hat, "You just didn't understand it" from TLOU2 fans is a giveaway that it was never about the game.
@@crazyinsane500 why the hell àre you speàping this wày ? I didn't understànd à dàmn word you sàid ! càn't you just tàlk cleàrly ? I'm not thàt smàrt to understànd your deep shit ...
"If I had my hands on the throat of someone who killed a person I loved, and I had a flashback of that person in the middle of it, you best believe I'm tightening that grip!"- Lol Yea, I can f with this review. I agree that playing with Abby IS kinda fun, since she fulfills the brute role that Joel used to. But I never got attacked at a workbench, so I'm surprised to see that was a thing. I think the gameplay of TLOU2 is great (I even like the walking lol). My issues are all writing-based, and there are a lot of great points here. Some that always bothered me, like the MYRIAD of illogical character decisions, and some that I hadn't even thought about. Like Abby never really knowing who Ellie is, and how that kinda matters. I agree that the flashback narrative about forgiving Joel should have been the main story. Or how a choice-based game would have been better, since it constantly lectures your actions anyway. REALLY good point about Lev waking up and begging Ellie to stop, as a mirror of the beginning. I can't believe there are all these little ways that would have made a big difference. And the kicker is, the folks who love the game would have still loved it! All that changes is that the people who disliked the game would have liked it better! And that's what I see as the tragedy of TLOU2. The first game is almost universally beloved by it's fans. Now it's divisive.The first is considered one of the best examples of narratives in gaming. This is one of the worst. I never thought they should have made a sequel or messed with the open ending. The beauty of that last scene is leaving it to interpretation. Instead, the sequel directly lays out how the ending was supposed to be viewed, and punish the character for it, (because that's what a lot of RUclips Hot Takes had been asking for ever since it happened.) TLOU2 being a letdown is a tragedy because it sullies what was an unimpeachable IP. I still like TLOU2 from a technical standpoint. Graphics, performances, music, and the stealth are all dope. But if you were to tell me a new game would crap all over the legacy of the first, I'd tell you I'd rather that game not exist at all, and that's where I'm at with TLOU2.
This comment is pretty much what I think of this game. Maybe as a standalone game it wouldnt have been so bad, but a sequel to TLOU? Yeah I would rather this one didnt exist.
For a game that tells you that everyone has an ellie or joel, the game does its best to tell you that the only people that cant have eachother are ellie and joel
@@leonecartelreborn9628 parties are more fun when I’m not surrounded by entitled bozos that suk each other off to cookie cutter endings/stories. No they want fairytale life in an unforgiving world defined by pain, anguish, murder. They didn’t want a divisive game/story even tho the first game was meant to be as equally divisive. The kind of party where people cry like cnts is not the kind of party I want to be at
I think that if Joel had went missing with obvious signs of a struggle, and Ellie went across the country after him only to find him being tortured and then executed by Abby and crew. THEN they made us play as Abby leading up to the scene where they kidnap Joel, it would’ve been a more interesting game. Maybe Joel is willing to let Abby kill him when he realizes that her dad was the surgeon because he thinks it’ll keep Ellie safe and he accepts that what he did deserves consequences . Also, make her a big deal in the WLF, make the organization a threat to Jackson. Maybe she doesn’t bang Owen, she the leader guy’s side piece. Ellie wouldn’t know that Joel had let it happen and it would make the whole thing more absurd and tragic, but the character’s motivations would be better. Joel sacrifices himself for Ellie, Abby gets her revenge on the man who doomed the world and killed her dad, Ellie gets her motivation for revenge by witnessing Abby murder Joel. You can still throw in Yara and Lev, have Abby betray the WLF, and when Ellie spares Abby, it’ll be because she understands why she killed Joel and that Joel let it happen and ACTUALLY chooses to break the cycle of revenge.
It’s always someone sacrifices themselves for someone people die my boy they don’t always die as the sacrificial lamb because we love them I’m just saying tht could be changed if anything Joel’s death hit just right that shit hurted
I’m sorry but this wouldn’t work at all considering why tf would you take care of a man you are trying to kill spending months crossing the country it just doesn’t make sense from the beginning
Fair enough. I probably neglected to mention them there since I enjoyed that game more. But you’re right, they get annoying in any game if done too much.
@The Horny Vegan's Little Brother uh no. That’s not what it means. Fair enough means they’re not wrong for bringing it up but there’s a good reason why they didn’t care about it in the other game
@The Horny Vegan's Little Brother When people say fair enough, it means they just don't want to waste more time going back and forth with strangers on the internet
Depressing stories ultimately work when they focus on the endurance of the human spirit through those negative experiences. But this game doesn't really do that.
TLOU2 is not all depressing. It had just as many uplifting moments as the first game, though they were all still existing among a backdrop of darkness....just like the first game.
This game shits all over the characters they created and we fell in love with. Joel dies a horrible painful death, and Ellie descends into madness and succumbs to her greatest fear which is being alone. It's like naughty dog wanted to punish us for liking these characters.
Game: "You want to kill this torturer/murderer? Too bad! The torturer/murderer represents queerness, so you have to forgive, uh, him? Her? And the person this torturer/murdered tortured and murdered was a symbol of masculinity and fatherhood, _a terrible thing,_ so you should be happy he got tortured and murdered!" Player: "Everything you preach is wrong." Game: "If you don't like it, you're homophobic."
@@comicnerd420 And if you ignore this video and all the arguments and live in your own little fairy land, then I guess I can see how you came to that conclusion.
@@kelp7060 most people complaints I've see is. Bitching that Ellie is gay, or that she's smoking weed. Real strange shit to be complaining about just saying. You have to be clutching your pearls to hate the romance story or the characters. It's not like the characters are mary sues like master cheif or gears of war Characters. Those games are so boring because the main character is too perfect and boring.
The final straw that honestly took me out the game, was - during a damn apocalypse, where humans are slowly going extinct, everyone a was cool with sending a pregnant medic on a dangerous mission.
That never happened. She was being sent by truck through WLF-controlled territory to work at the FOB on site. The only reason she saw combat at all was because Seraphites slipped past WLF lines and ambushed their truck.
@@krasmasov6852She shouldnt have been out there at all. Sending a pregnant women out on a assignment in a post zombie infected world is just a dumb idea
I hate that so much. She was also super pregnant, like, the stress of the car wreck could've easily done something to her. It's so stupid to disregard logic just so you can brag about having a feminist video game.
Other things that drive me nuts 1. A tropical fungus surviving in a Wyoming Winter 2. Let's have a death cult of super emos who whistle as loud as possible in a city full of infected who can hear you if you walk too fast and pray to a dead hippie AND everyone on that island is either Andre the Giant or a 4'11 women who can somehow shoot better than Hawkeye and Legolas 3. Seattle is an enormous city but the WLFs are confined to a football stadium? You'd think after 20 years of fighting they'd manage to control more of their own city with more safe zones they've cleared the infected out of or there'd be MORE infected in a place like Seattle where fungus thrive in all that dark dampness? 5. How the heck do the Wolves control a hospital that was ground zero for the infected and never once bothered to go down into level one prepared to burn it all out to wipe out the infected? nor deal with infected trying to break out of the hospital especially with that Rat King lurking down there
Don't ask questions. Just consume product. Be happy with it then consume more product. Oh, and Niel Druckman didn't think about that as he was too busy sniffing his farts to think is writing was bad.
When I shot and killed a woman and later read in some journal that she was actually pregnant my only reaction was "good". My friends think it's fucked up for me to say that but look at it this way, Niel put that there to make you feel bad but I instead ended up having 0 sympathy for someone who puts themselves in the front lines knowing they're pregnant. The game just tried too hard with that and it made me roll my eyes when they repeat the "you killed a pregnant woman" 3 more times after the first one.
@@krasmasov6852 They made the choice to go into the front lines knowing they're pregnant. They are very very likely to have a miscarriage or getting killed by someone. They know the risks and they endangered the unborn child. Tell me in what world should I feel bad for people that are that irresponsible. If they went scavenging near areas that were already safe I 100% understand that but in the front lines that's pretty much where I don't feel bad for them.
not to mention that druckman is a massive narcisist,i cant believe how many people ignore the fact that he called himself a "misunderstood genius" in that card collection ellie has,no wonder the story is so bad if the writer himself thinks like this of himself
Well that's the problem: People don't know that aspect of Neil Druckmann. He's literally said in interviews that revenge plots don't work in the setting of The Last of Us, and people *genuinely* cannot mentally comprehend the author himself admitting the story makes no sense. I'm serious, try it, next time you see someone say "Oh, it's so profound and smart" point that out and they *can not acknowledge it.*
@@gaia7240 Most of them are interviews with gaming publications. Any time he talked about his "Tess hunts Joel" idea he mentions that's why it was scrapped. If you want a *video* of him saying that, that'd be in the Grounded 1 documentary.
This is definitely one of the best videos that has counter points to everything TLOU2 supporters have. They make every character an idiot just so that the plot can move forward. It doesn't matter that Joel has been surviving in this war-torn world for over 20 years, he's been living in peace for like 3 1/2 years, so that immediately erases all of his experience. We're just supposed to assume he got rusty instead of showing us that he did. Had they taken at least a portion of the beginning of the game to establish that, people probably wouldn't have gotten mad at how stupid his death is. But with the evidence we have, Joel is basically the same person up until he meets Abby and her friends in that cabin. Abby as a character sucks. Mel calls her a piece of shit, and she's right. She's a terrible person who suffers from little consequences for her actions. Her friends die sure, but honestly, I don't think she even cared about any of them besides Manny (sort of, I think he's just someone she got along fine with), and Owen but only because they used to fuck. She doesn't care about Mel in any way until she's pregnant and then dies like an idiot, and to me, her relationship with Yara and Lev felt kinda forced, as it just feels like they're trying to do the same thing Ellie and Joel did… which they were and it was obvious. The side characters are super weak, forget Abby's friends because I couldn't get into their characters from the start, because they helped kill Joel and I already knew they were all gonna die anyways. Yara and Lev were the first characters I actually started to like, but Yara dies, and Lev was kinda underutilized. Dina feels like a copy of Ellie, but significantly less interesting, Jesse after awhile I started like. Felt like he could've been Ellie best friend now that they're gonna have to be, because of Dina being pregnant, but then he dies and gets forgotten about, because I guess Neil didn't like him that much. I'm rambling longer than I should, but my point is that I agree with everything in the video. I also didn't even notice the minority stuff until you pointed it out. It is kinda weird how minorities die, but the white women survive even after moments where they definitely should have. Like, remember how Ellie got the wound after being hung from a tree? How didn't she bleed out? Then she kills Fat Geralt. That was the most unforgivable thing she did.
"her relationship with Yara and Lev felt kinda forced, as it just feels like they're trying to do the same thing Ellie and Joel did… which they were and it was obvious." Abby suddenly cares about Yara and Lev and goes through Joel's whole character arc in only 3 days, when just prior, Abby was just fine torturing Scars and killing Scar kids. She's THE top Scar killer in the WLF. Yara and Lev actually have no reason to trust Abby and Lev should've popped her with an arrow as soon as he heard her name, because Abby must have killed someone they cared about (like the father of the family who I'm pretty sure is never mentioned, since Lev's story focuses on convincing only his mom to get off the island).
@@ultimamage3 Abby's character arc is different from Joel's. Joel has an aversion to attachment that he reluctantly overcomes. Abby has a need to do good that she eagerly engages with. They're basically opposites in that regard.
No character is an idiot. They all make believeable choices based on their motivation and mindset at the time. Joel made all the right choices from a survivalist's perspective. He couldn't fight the horde or fight a blizzard. Going with Abby was his only option. Abby as a character is great. Mel is partially right, but Abby is actively trying to be better. That's what her entire story is about. Her consequences are harsh and severe too, and they're most impactful regarding the deaths of her friends, who she obviously cares deeply about. She was outright in love with Owen to the point that she still writes letters to him as a way to cope with his death. The player can find one in Abby and Lev's boat at the beginning of Ellie's Santa Barbara sequence. She used to be really close with Mel, but they drifted apart since Mel and Owen got together after Owen and Abby broke up. Nothing about her relationship with Yara and Lev is forced. She's actively trying to keep them safe because she's desperate to do some good. She explains this all but verbatim when Lev asks her why she's helping. Abby says she's doing it out of guilt and to lighten the load on her conscience. Characters like Owen, Dina, and Lev were all more developed than any side character from Part 1. Not sure how Lev was underutilized either. Dina is much different from Ellie, especially considering that she and Ellie literally have a conflict so bad that it destroys their family. Jesse doesn't get forgotten about after his death. He's mentioned three times afterwards. People of all kinds die in the story. Why would Ellie bleed out from that wound necessarily? And shooting the slaver is unforgiveable? He's a slaver.
@@ultimamage3she doesn’t suddenly care, see this is how I know ya’ll who dislike the game don’t even like think while playing it. She literally does not care for them but own manages to changer mind as well as her recent experience with the wolves and how she begins to see the cracks in the organization which she always saw but now that they are hunting Owen she is against them.
@cityrat3237 No, just, no. Abby does not suddenly "see the cracks of the WLF." Nothing is ever stated that she resents the WLF, and only goes after them because "she feels gulity". So, people save your life, and you feel a guilt for leaving them behind. Hmm, tell me where did this happen before? AT THE FUCKING BEGINNING OF THE GAME. Joel saves her life, yet she feels no second thoughts about killing him, at all. She also doesn't feel guilty about it. She doesn't show any signs of regret, and straight thinks she's the morally superior side in all of this.
Loooool a game that condemns hyper violence only best feature is the hyper violence combat Druvkman even fails at the main point of his game mechanically
The first Last Of Us is one of my favorite Playstation games ever probably in my top 15 games of all time, I just pretend that Last Of Us Part 2 never happened.
Last of Us part2? What is that? Ive never heard of it but I did like this game called the last of us. To my knowledge they did not and never will make a sequel.
About 3 years in, and the game still sucks. I won't hate on anyone liking the game, but the story itself is the real problem. I don't care much for gameplay mechanics or graphics, it's always the story that matters to me.
The Breaking Bad comparison is pretty rich. Walter didn't go from being very good to very bad. He always had an ego and was repressing alot of resentment toward certain people in his life for having success and being able to be who they want to be. It's why he wanted to combine his crime life with his home life in the first place and couldn't just take the money and run once he didn't need to make meth anymore. Heisenberg was always hiding inside Walter White.
in my opinion there was no heisenberg,he was walter white the whole time,but he didn't want to accept that
There was never a heisenberg, its always Been Walter on an ego trip blaming others on his own lack of incentive in life wich led him to become just a teacher despite his knowledge being on par with engineers.
@@yusukeelric yeah this made me almost cry idk why but there's so many people who take walter's side (the unintelligent fans not the regular and most fans of breaking bad) that it's finally nice to see something put so succinctly summing up walt's character so well. Or maybe it was because he reminds me of myself. The ego not the intelligence. I'm no engineering major.
Tbh from everything I saw on Breaking Bad, was that the show kind of relies on you being on Walters side. I never got into it, cause episode 1, I was like this dude is an ahole, why am I supposed to give a shit about him becoming an ahole that does illegal shit now? Oh but his wife is a bitch to him, his son doesnt appreciate him and he has a shitty job. Yeah, hes an ahole with an ego the size of the moon, so what?
Literally… the people who used that as an argument literally ignored the whole point of the story they were citing lol
"You shouldn't be so quick to kill the only immune person you know of, EVEN if it is for a vaccine."
THANK YOU. My mother even brought this up but I haven't seen anyone else mention it. The decision to just cut Ellie's brains open and kill her without any second thought is so dumb on the Fireflies part. What if the vaccine doesn't work? Well, you just wasted your only test subject, so guess we can't try again. It makes them look so incompetent and only makes Joel's decision more justified.
I understand what you mean. However, In the beginning of the first game Joel made an agreement with the fireflies. I see how people think it’s wrong from an emotional standpoint, but from the fireflies view they were given an opportunity to end all the suffering & fighting.
@@InJeffWeTrustt Fuck em little bitches suffering. Killing an innocent child for the chance of a vaccine js the pussiest sht i ever heard. U like gambling no?
@@InJeffWeTrustt what a joke of a comment, Joel wasn't even given his payment for the 'agreement' and they took his bag and weapons and were presumably going to take him outside to execute him. There was no ambiguity in the original game, Joel made the right choice, until the second game came out and suddenly its painted as if the fireflies were competent
I believe in the first game they made it known that the probability of successfully getting the vaccine was incredibly low.
But they thought they were justified in killing her.
They were ruthless.
@@cnr-r8r The retconing was insane. In part 1 the operating room was a dingy and dirty, even if they got something useful it'd probably get contaminated right away. In part 2 however, all of a sudden the operating room is pristine. There is no reason to feel bad for the Fireflies, they are the villains of the story.
The ending to this game was the equivalent to John Wick killing everyone but the guy who killed his dog
This really is the sequel ever made
Yeah, if the dog killed the guys only parent
Bro can not understand that if Ellie killed Abby lev would come after Ellie 🤯🤯🤯
@@EzraBarry-mb2ss i understand both sides (side one: the ones who r mad that ellie didnt kill, and side two: the ones who think the ending is good). I agree with both sides. Yes, I was mad when ellie left abby alive and leave while abby also BIT one of her fingers, but now that I think about the ending more and more, I understand the message and do like the meaning of it now. The whole Joel’s death sequence is still awful tho imo
They could have gone another way with story, like having Ellie and Abby stories go parallel, instead of playing 10 or so hours for each character. I personally felt no sympathy for Abby, as I couldn’t get behind her killing Joel, but I think the story is still great
The the argument I hate the most is when they say Joel is soft because he play guitar. That like saying John Wick is soft for playing with a little doggy. Or Punisher is soft because he took in a dog and was sad because the bad guys threaten to hurt him. Or Wolverine soft because he care about a hurt bear in the woods. These defenders of these games are so dumb.
Something else that’s funny is that Ellie - who has the more stealth orientated gameplay style - loses to Abby… *in a stealth fight* I mean if I get it Abby got trained by the Fireflies and the WLF but Ellie literally uses this exact strategy against David. Sure Ellie’s blinded by rage and would maybe get sloppy but that wouldn’t make her stupid and she’s been pretty efficient throughout the game until the Abby fight where they turn her into an idiot
Thank you so much for mentioning the "Ellie is blinded by rage" excuse. I am so sick of hearing that dumbass explanation, as if Ellie is just going to forget a huge chunk of her survival experience just because she's pissed off, when she's literally taken out WAVES of fully grown men since she was 14.
Then beats her in a fist fight at the end. 😆
@@私の名前を翻訳しないでください made joel blind too apparently
@@robogreek3157 god this game is insulting to the fans
@@zzodysseuszz l didn't thought it was a Masterpiece but l didn't thought it was the worst thing ever,people just got super pissed because of joel death which wasn't even as illogical as many people made it out to be
“Released the day before Father’s Day”
amazing 😂😂😂
YOOO MOX YOU'RE ALIVE WASSUP
i’m still sad over that one south korean streamer that cut the game disc into pieces after he played through that one scene because his dad had just recently passed away
@@andrewbui8295 Wokeism in action.
Damn....
considering one of the lead devs was nearly ARRESTED for conspiracy for murder of his step-dad and still denies responsibility, this is toxic irony.
I hate that the game tries to portray Abby's dad as some kind of saint. We assumed it was Marlene that wanted to kill Ellie in the first one but it was him all along. Abby's dad would have done the same thing Joel did were the situation reversed. How the hell is a cure going to help anyway? The world is already fucked. People are still going to kill other people. I feel bad for Laura Bailey too. She got death threats because of Neil Druckmann's shitty writing of her character.
No is a saint my dude in this game
The people going on and on about a cure are talking nothing but nonsense. Anybody with more than two braincells to rub together knows that a literal terrorist organization like the Fireflies would have taken that cure and used it as a leverage for power. Anybody who didn't like the fireflies would suffer. Marlene was more than happy to sacrifice people for her goals.
Yeah, laura bailey is my favorite voice actor. I dont like how once ppl decided they hate a fictional character in the game they project it onto the voice or actor behind said character. She clearly deserved none of it. Id say shes done a good job portraying abby even tho abby herself was shit.
Never liked death threats and all that but hey, those extreme haters could at least go for Neil instead of her. He is pretty much responsible for almost everything thats bad in this game.
@@lizzyleea i couldn't agree more
No one deserves a death threat for making a goddamn video game yk...
I think it's ludicrous that a game tries to make me feel bad for killing cartoonishly evil characters when it places them in my way like a row of perfectly stacked cans
I don't care if they give half their income to disabled kids, I'm pumping these fuckers with lead because I paid for an action game and damn well am getting one
Its as if the developers got off to ludonarrative dissonance.
Knowing I would never shoot a real person in the face helps me to enjoy violent games and understand that they don't create active shooters. That, and I'm not a typical mom in 1998.
I'm not even a fan of the game or played it and see no need for people to feel sorry for abby or even want to play as her after she kills a beloved character
@@donavonhoward1899 The story is contrived and destroys what made people connect to the first game and replaced it with something inferior.
The story took risks that didn't pay off and made controversial decisions with reckless abandon. The writers gaslight you into forced empathy for a murderer. And turns its main protagonist into a hollow shell of her former self for an "gritty" morally dark ending.
The story drains away any emotional investment in the characters and by the end of the second game its hard to find anything to care about.
People don't like the story because the writers broke the illusion and fumbled the magic trick. The story gaslights you and uses emotional manipulation to make you feel bad. The game attempts to make you feel bad for having fun in the game.
The game makes you feel anger and frustration for the writers and by the end apathy for the characters.
"Hard to please" more like you have low standards.
@@squidlytv That's what you feel from the game. Most players enjoyed the game because it was great.
This video is straight fire. Especially the part on Abby and her dad. Everybody knew that someone would want revenge on Joel, and somehow they still made those characters completely unlikeable. This game really should've just been Ellie's story.
I wish they did what they originally suggested on focusing on new characters to expand the world
@@liam6170 I'd prefer that to what we got. Honestly I just wish they'd left it at one. It ends perfectly.
"We decided to provide more feedback from the enemy AI like screaming for comrades as a way to make you think about who you're killing."
"Well, what I THINK is that killing them is fun."
"Wait, no, that's not what--"
"LET'S PLAY THIS ENCOUNTER AGAIN!"
"Lets throw molotov into that cover to flush them out"
*hears painful screams and havoc*
"heh nice"
If writing in games is going to be this poor, I'd rather see stories like the one in _Super Mario 64_ instead.
so should i not buy the game? just looking for an answer
@@КГБКолДжорджКостанца I'm not even sure I would rent it (if such an option still exists).
@@big_red01027 oh damn i mean i finished playing the first one and i got that post sad thing like when finishing a series
@@КГБКолДжорджКостанца story is a hit or miss. You might end up loving it or hating it. But everything else about the game is just great,specially the combat,it's so tense and satisfying so I recommend buying it.
@@КГБКолДжорджКостанца I think there’s other games that do a lot of the last of us stuff better, like red dead 2 has a pretty great story and cool combat that’s gritty and gory, the story gives you pretty good shooting gallery as well as other side activities you can spend time doing.
Imagine how awkward it would have been if she’d have caught the wrong Joel 😂 that shit would’ve been hilarious I wanna see that game where Ellie runs in and it’s the wrong guy getting beat to death with a golf club and Ellie doesn’t even care
She knew she had the right Joel though. This is directly explained.
@@krasmasov6852 that’s why I said imagine
@@ryzigg7187 So a completely fake scenario that doesn't make sense for the story at all. Great joke, dude.
@@krasmasov6852 thank you
@@krasmasov6852 how
I’ve played the last of us 7 times - all the way through. I’ve played TLOU2 once - tried a second playthrough but gave up an hour in. Game play was great but man that story really blows.
So... What was the difference between both?
@@javierperezmerino9457 the story - it was just awful - by comparison. Character motivations were unclear or idiotic. Established characters were wildly different and poorly crafted.
It just didn’t resonate with me like the first one.
@@javierperezmerino9457 EASY. the first game had Joel a RELATABLE EXCELLENT PROTAGONIST. this one makes you care about the sadistic bitch that kills him. This could of been a trilogy of Joel and ellie. But Neil cuckman to the rescue
Say what you want about Ellie’s story, but if you’re saying Abby’s story blows you just don’t have the comprehension skills for it
@@Ntfshr objectively, Abby’s story is terrible - a sociopaths father dies trying to kill a young girl for a ‘potential’ cure, becomes friends with everyone except the man who saves her life, then goes on a killing spree to help a former religious fanatic
She does help a zebra -
"Everything about how this game is written is meant to move along the plot no matter how little sense it makes" - you really hit the nail on the head with this video.
This video nicely sums up everybody's thoughts that were disappointed. The game is so at war with itself over what it wants to be.
-It wants you to see both sides? Abby doesn't even know Ellie's name, let alone her perspective.
-Revenge isn't worth it? It sure was for Abby, who's at peace with herself after rescuing Lev and is going off to re-up the Fireflies (even gets spared by Ellie despite fucking her more than Dina did).
-Ellie's immunity is legit a non-factor
etc.
It just fails to deliver on all the fronts that it introduced and isn't a coherent fit with the 1st game. A trite revenge story that folds in on itself.
-Doesn't matter. Abby learned the futility of revenge the hard way.
-No, it wasn't. Because of Abby's revenge, she was burdened with immense guilt and lost all of her friends from Salt Lake including the man she was in love with.
-It comes up three times actually.
I think you're the only person I've come across that mentioned how all the black characters died in the first game, and I'm honestly amazed so few people have pointed that out
The writers took a shit on the first game to drive the second game
How? What an insane comment.
@@krasmasov6852 they made joel a literal moron to drive the plot of this game
@@krasmasov6852 you delusional lol
@@Badookum How?
Funny joke.
I know 1 person who legitimately likes this game and, as far as me and mutual friends can tell, it's because he thinks games with female protagonists can do no wrong. To the point and being salty at Ghost of Tsushima for "Stealing the limelight" at time of release
You need better friends.
@@krasmasov6852 never said he was my friend
@@RetroWrathX13B No I'm talking about your mutual friends who share your dumb take on this game
I didn't mind playing Abby because I new she was going to die. Well the game backfired in my face. The ending is a joke.
The ending is good.
@@krasmasov6852 dude do u fucking live under this Videos comment section? The game is dogshit. Cope with it.
@@krasmasov6852 It is unsatisfying and doesn't offer closure for any character. Ellie slaughters hundreds to get to Abby, and lets her live. Abby has all her friends slaughtered by Ellie, yet doesn't even know her name by the end, or is even remotely curious who this girl her father got killed for even is. Ellie goes on a SECOND revenge quest at the end of the game, loses her family, and for what? A loss of two more fingers so now she can't play her guitar (boohoo).
This 30 hour game was a colossal waste of time. The ending isn't disappointing just because Abby doesn't die, it's disappointing because NOTHING FUCKING HAPPENS IN THE END
@@SkandiTV It offers a tone of closure. What are you talking about? Ellie finally manages to let go of her hatred and face her guilt head on rather than projecting it onto others. Abby is concerned with Lev above all else and has already learned the futility of revenge the hard way.
Both Ellie and Abby grew as people, and that's what the story was about. You know, just like the first game.
Almost 2 years later and still no Factions, no co-op mode, no alternate game mode, and no multiplayer at all. Meanwhile, Ghost of Tsushima already released a pretty fun Free 2 Play multiplayer mode called Legends. It’s been around for over a year and has gotten a few content updates as well as badass DLC for the main game and eventually a Director’s Cut and a PS5 remaster. I still cannot believe how TLOU2 released with a $60 price tag and still hasn’t received any DLC or a multiplayer game mode that was already in the first game. I don’t think it has a PS5 version with haptic feedback or anything. After all that bs…TLOU2 still received GOTY, Best Game Direction, Best Narrative, and is still getting praised by the most delusional fans I’ve ever encountered in video game fan base. TLOU2 is a disappointing joke just like The Last Jedi except vast majority of Star Wars fans have enough common sense to recognize bs when they see it
Well the reasons for the lack of development is everyone qualified either left or was forced out.
The reason for the awards was that year really stepped up the graft behind the scenes. Like, it was so bad that child predators (Ars Technica) were brought on to the voting panel of the VGAs specifically to cast votes exclusively for TLOU2 in every category it was in.
That doesn't happen without "Yes, you can tolerate the existence of these kid diddlers caught by the FBI" money.
@@crazyinsane500 holy shit, I knew that the voters for the The Game Awards were sell out journalists who blindly have 10/10s for TLOU2. I didn’t know that the voting panel involved child predators, you’re the first person who has mentioned that
@@crazyinsane500 lol dude I think your comment is hidden now
@@christopheryanez I'm one of many people to have followed some drama with Ars Technica where they knowingly protected a child predator (Peter Bright, who went by the Twitter alias "Dr Pizza") until he caught caught in an FBI raid.
So when the TGAs showed their voter panel and, lo and behold, Ars Technica was on it: Kinda easy to put 2 and 2 together considering hiring Peter Bright is Ars Technica's *only* notable quality.
@@christopheryanez Yup, RUclips tends to censor comments regarding diddlers.
So many great points, but you scored the knockout with Joel's early death, it kills the momentum in a big way with how lazy it is. It's lazy enough to know just what they're doing with their narrative. Great vid.
Abby:
“Joel Miller.”
Joel:
“No, Joel H. Bartholomew Jr.”
(cue end credits)
They know what he looks like
Great video, you nailed every single point, depressing how many people fail to see the obvious flaws but at least this game sums up the crazy dumb gaslighting times we live in perfectly.
This video is so good! You're such a compelling writer and I am so drawn in to hear ur opinion the entire time
i just don’t think an action video game is the best media to portray a “violence isn’t the answer” theme. also considering how gory and gruesome the combat is and how many npcs you kill just makes the whole thing contradictory
Violence is sometimes necessary to survive. It's violence for other reasons that's a problem. Also, you seem to be suggesting that everything you're asked to do in the game must necessarily be endorsed by the game, and that's a weird position to take.
@@krasmasov6852 i know that it’s to survive in the game but why does ellie not feel remorse for any of the npcs she kills but she spares abby, someone who literally killed her friend and tortured her father figure? it just doesn’t make sense and is lazy writing
@@hannahparker888 Because she killed those npcs to survive while she was murdering Abby for a different reason. How does that not make sense? How is that lazy at all?
And more to the point, how do you know she doesn't feel remorse for them? We just know that it's not to a great enough degree to stop her from continuing on.
@@krasmasov6852 How do you not understand what he saying? You don't make any sense, mate. She literally slaughters through wave after wave of random people, killing in some of the most gruesome ways, but when you get to Abby you spare her at the last second because of flashback that would've pissed me off even more. It's a fuckin' insulting joke. By letting her go she made all the sacrifices (and our time) for fucking nothing.
I was laughing my ass off when she got upset after noticing the woman was pregnant because you'd have to be a complete moron to not realise you've probably have done this already many times before, as well as leaving possibly many kids parent-less getting there.
Truth be told. And now Naughty Dog is trying to cash in with the The Last of Us Remake. Guys as much as we all loved the first game, don't support this clown Druckmann
almost every single one of your opinions is exactly how i felt, and it’s the first time i actually heard someone call it like it is in one of these TLOU 2 reviews
Little did he know, the factions multiplayer was never going to come...
3 years still hate this piece of garbage
2 years later and still no factions. Apparently it’s gonna have a story of its own now but who knows when that will release. The whole Joel gives his name is the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen in a game. No way Joel, a survivor for over 20 years of the apocalypse would ever do that. He didn’t even wanna pull over to help people at the outbreak from lack of trust.
Factions is all but cancelled
1. The whole premise is a generic, "revenge is bad" tale, except it also gets hijacked, as revenge seems to solely be negative if anyone other than Abby desires it.
2. Returning characters are either abolished or flandarized into killing machines.
3. Joel's demise should have been an exquisite catalyst for the events, yet it's randomly thrown in, as if the writers are merely hoping for the best reaction, without depositing much attention to receive that. For a game reminiscent of The Last Of Us, there shouldn't be a Mary Sue to whom everyone acts out-of-character towards.
4. Multitudes of attempts to replicate the dynamic between Joel and Ellie from the first instalment. Yet here, it doesn't suffice, since we scarcely know anything Dina, while Abby and Lev are ennuing at best, and actively despicable at worst.
5. Abby is one of the most poorly-written and incoherent characters. The game clearly favors her over others, and attempts to trick players into liking/sympathizing with her (with the cheapest and most immature tactics) yet it also exhibits that Abby is lesser pre-eminent than the character it tries to demonize. Examples include her backstabbing her faction for a single child, wrecking relationships, torturing others for pleasure, etc. I understand why she silenced Joel, I don't comprehend why she's a sadistic Mary Sue, nor do I sympathize with her.
6. Lev is a watered down version of Ellie from the first game, yet he is boring and bland to no end. Oh, and he's transgender. I suppose Neil wanted to label others transphobic for disliking a stale and uninteresting character, so Lev is an effective device for everything.
7. Too much LGBTQ content, which should be the very final aspect to be relevant in a post-apocalyptic wasteland.
8. The game is too lengthy, and the structure is all over the place. We start from scratch at about half of the game, because ✨ Abby ✨
9. The infected are an afterthought, and are barely present.
+1. The majority of the fandom approximately has the mind snd argumentative capabilities of a toddler. Peep at the comments under this video....
Abby, the character NaughtyDog created to be “Trans Friendly” (yes, that’s a true statement) Beats up Lesbians…
Oh the irony
Nope, "trans friendly" isn't a thing and it's something entirely made up by people who were mad about the leaks.
Also good representation in media is having characters be in a variety of roles including protagonists, antagonists, etc.
What are you even trying to say
You were exactly right and thats really how I feel. Everything about the game is great except for the Story itself and Being a Story Driven Narrative game is the biggest Sin that Neil Drunkman and the Naughty Dog team could ever commit. I love the Gameplay, The Settings, The Graphics are AMAZING!!! but the Narrative and Story are just Shlt. I really like the change that Angry Joe came up for the story If they would've changed the story around. We Could've easily gotten 4 games out of this Story instead of Loving the first one and Hating the Second one.
Honestly the thing I’ve never liked about this game in my opinion is the fact they lied about it trailer cause the fact they needed to lie about Joel role in the game shows me that they had no faith in their story if they had to lie about it
They couldn’t give Abby any growth, learning everything Joel and Ellie had been through. Sympathizing with how much they’ve lost, and maybe not letting go of her anger… but learning to move past her physical retaliation tendencies.
They couldn’t let Abby be a character… no she had to be a caricature for the usual “strong female lead”. She’s never wrong, and even when she is, she’s right in some way shape or form. Yeah she “suffers” towards the end of the game, but it’s surface level as she gets to walk away safely with her teammate.
As for Ellie, she lost her father figure, her happiness, her ability to play a guitar which is one of the only things she has left from Joel. She ultimately ended up alone, which is exactly what she feared in the first game.
How on earth would Neil Druckmann believe that’s a satisfactory conclusion?? Two characters the fans adore and sympathize with, due to us experiencing their harrowing journey along with them in the first game… now completely torn apart in the most unforgiving way possible. Joel ending up permanently and brutally unalived prematurely, Ellie losing everyone she cared about and ending up alone with nothing.
It felt like they were trying too hard to be edgy, and forced us to play as some random the fans only see as Joel’s m*rderer, and Ellie’s tormenter. Like we’re expected to just accept Abby…? Just like that?? Neil forgot to read the room before he decided to fuck everything up… and he made it public knowledge, but he used this game as a way to stroke an evil old bat’s ego… not to tell a compelling and entertaining story… and for that, I cannot accept this game’s existence. To me, Ellie and Joel are still living happily with Tommy and Maria in Wyoming.
Abby's entire arc is founded on her regret for what she did to Joel. What in the world do you mean she's never wrong?
@@krasmasov6852 oh wow they hint that she sorta kinda maybe has a smidge of regret for killing him in a brief part of the game. It’s not even Joel that she regrets, it’s the fact that the killing distanced herself from Owen and Mel. She never apologizes to Ellie for anything. Regret my ass.
@@buccaneercat She spared Ellie when she could have killed her. She did this fresh off the murder of Owen and Mel. A sorry would be less impactful.
@@krasmasov6852 and this magically makes her a good person? A sorry at the end of it all, after Ellie spares her too, would have redeemed her character at least a little. To plainly show that she openly regrets giving into her anger, because it ultimately caused the deaths of way more people in her chase for revenge. It would have humanized Abby, showing she’s capable of feeling remorse for her own actions, but she hardly feels any regret outside of being separated from her friends before they died.
Abby is a trashy character. You can like her all you’d like, I don’t give a damn. But she’s the one who condemned both our beloved heroes from the first game. One, to death. The other, to being alone with nothing and nobody… not even with enough fingers to play the damn instrument her father figure gave her before Abby brutally killed him.
@@buccaneercat Of course it doesn't make her a good person, but it makes her a sympathetic character. I don't know why you need characters in stories to spell everything out when it's already pretty apparent how they're feeling. But you are seemingly unable to see anything in a character that is even slightly subtle.
Ellie 100% brought her lost fingers on herself. But yes, Abby is fully responsible for what she did to Joel. Good thing Abby regrets it or she'd be a pretty trashy character.
I want to know why Joel and Tommy left their weapons behind when entering the mansion with the strangers they just met. Like, they didn't even have pistols within reach. Sure, Abby and crew weren't infected, but "not infected" does not equal "not a threat", so it's odd that they would leave all gear out of sight and unattended, following a group of unknown people that outnumber them deeper into a building, then allowing themselves to be surrounded. Joel walking into the middle of the room, taking no precaution to carefully assess the situation until seconds before getting his knee obliterated via shotgun is so poorly contrived.... Tommy knows of this mansion - "that's the Baldwin place" he says.... meaning it was likely unoccupied until recently... so that didn't get him to question who this unusually large group of travelers in the middle of a harsh winter is??? How did Abby even know Joel's last name? How does she even equate what Joel did to what she's doing? Ellie's life was in imminent danger, and despite Abby telling her father that she would want him to do the surgery..... Anderson couldn't answer Marlene when she asked what he would do if it were Abby. Anderson was actively trying to kill a man's daughter.... to redeem himself under the notion of a POTENTIAL cure to "save the world".
Small correction needed in the beginning. They weren't wolves that attacked ellie at the workbench. They were just survivers that thought ellie was a wolf. They also just didn't randomly show up. They were inside the locked door next to the bathroom that was clearly open after you kill them all.
TLOU2 supporters can say whatever they want, but you know a game is terrible and straight up dangerous if it can completely drain you of all your emotions and energy with it's dark and depressing world. By the end of this game,I felt like an empty shell of a person, just not even focusing on anything going on, but wanting the game to be over
On the contrary! I think that's the sign of a great game. Any piece of media that can invoke an extreme feeling like that is doing something right.
@@johnhenry1190 After reading a handfull of your comments I am convinced you are a shill and revoke any rights to speak on this subject.
@@Jmcelwain17 You are an idiot
@@johnhenry1190look at the mirror first.
These are my three favourite stupid parts of the game:
1. Isaac let a huge group of his best soldiers (including a medic, who would be invaluable in an apocalyptic setting) trek across three clicker-infested states in the dead of winter, wasting resources, time, and possibly even human lives, to go on a pointless revenge quest to find an old man who MIGHT be in Jackson, all while his people were at war with the Seraphites. He literally weakened his army and defenses because of one woman's selfishness, instead of telling her to get over it and focus on more important things.
2. Abby, who knows better than anyone what the drive for revenge can do to someone, let Ellie live not only once, but TWICE. The plot obviously needed that to happen, but it's absolutely ridiculous, especially when she starts taking care of Lev. Ellie is a threat to Lev, yet Abby let her live. Hilarious.
3. Mel obviously hates her baby. It's the only logical explanation I can come up with as for why she kept putting herself in combat situations.
1. Isaac has a shitload of medics and soldiers, and he's smart enough to know that Abby would go with or without his say so. Best to let them go armed so they have a better chance of coming back. Also, you talk like 8 people is a significant chunk of the literal THOUSANDS of soldiers the WLF has.
2. Right. The first time was because Owen argued that they didn't do anything wrong. "If we kill them, we're no better than he was." If there's something Abby wouldn't want to be, it's anything like Joel. The second time is the culmination of her character arc. Instead of taking revenge, she made a different choice. She gave Ellie the chance to make a different choice too. And it paid off. Abby was rewarded. If Ellie never came for her in Santa Barbara, Abby and Lev would've died on the pillars.
3. She NEVER puts herself in a combat situation. Not a single time. She went to work as a medic on site at the FOB. The area between the stadium and the FOB is WLF-controlled territory. The only reason she saw combat at all was because Seraphites slipped past WLF lines and ambushed the truck. But let's assume that's not the case (it definitely is) for the sake of argument. Mel hates her baby. So what? Her relationship with Owen is failing, and she obviously knows that given how he's been acting ever since Jackson. In the ward of the stadium she's now living in, she sees these families all around her all the time while she's alone. "Owen hasn't even seen it yet." I wouldn't blame her for wanting an abortion in that scenario. So even with your false premise, your argument STILL fails.
@@krasmasov6852
1. Isaac _doesn't_ have a ton of medics, and in an apocalypse sparing even one is idiotic. Sure, Abby probably would've gone without his say so, but Abby had to convince her friends to tag along. If Isaac said no, they wouldn't have gone. It makes more sense to leave Abby to her own devices and risk ONE soldier over a whole group. Time, resources, supplies, manpower, all of it was wasted on a RUMOUR, and all to kill someone who wasn't even a threat. No commander in his right mind would allow that, especially when it could've started a war with Jackson. Why risk making more enemies when you're already at war with another faction? You're also wrong about how many soldiers the WLF has. You might've missed it, but Abby and Yara said that both the WLF and the Seraphites have a few thousand people, making them evenly matched, and that they're not all trained to fight. Not to mention Isaac let Abby's group leave when they'd just recently lost three battalions, according to collectibles. So no, I maintain that this plot point is just silly. Too big a risk with too little reward.
2. Abby _is_ like Joel, if not worse. At least Joel never killed anyone out of revenge, but rather to protect and save lives. Joel actually knew how to walk away from revenge (think about Tess). That said, Abby _knows_ what it's like to be driven by revenge. It consumed her for four years. Story-wise, if we look at her character arc, it doesn't make any sense that she let Ellie live the second time (barely makes sense the first time), because she'd grown attached to Lev. Letting Ellie, who swore to kill her out of revenge, walk away from yet another fight, could've potentially put Lev in danger. Which, ironically, it did. Remember, Ellie threated to slit his throat. It doesn't matter that it "paid off" when Ellie went there to _kill_ her, which is exactly what Abby should've foreseen. Not to mention Abby had no right to act so self-righteous. She's killed hundreds of people. Even tortured them for the WLF "for fun"--her words, not mine. We find that out along the way. So no, I maintain that the only reason Ellie was allowed to live so many times is merely because the plot needed her to.
3. By purposely going into known combat zones, Mel put herself and her baby at risk. Several members told her to stay behind (as you said, there were other medics) and to take care of herself, but she ignored them. And are you forgetting that she attacked Ellie? Ran right at her instead of running away or surrendering. No pregnant woman acts like that. I've seen brooms fall behind pregnant women, and when the sound startled them, they instinctively grabbed their stomach. Also, you're assuming Mel wants to murder her baby (it's not an abortion by that point, it's fully formed and viable) just because her relationship with Owen is strained? First of all, I'm not sure why you think that's an excuse. Second of all, Mel _does_ say/do things throughout the game that disproves your assertion. She literally wants her relationship with Owen to work _because_ of her baby. I don't _actually_ think Mel hates her baby, I was just being facetious. In reality, I think Neil Druckmann simply doesn't know how to write believable pregnant women. But for argument's sake, let's say you're right. Mel hates her baby. If that's the case, you literally just proved my premise _isn't_ false. XD
I continue to believe TLoU2's story is a hilarious mess with way too many plot conveniences and contrivances. If you liked the game, that's fine, but I can only suspend my disbelief so much.
@@kirikakirikakirika 1. Yes, he does. You literally see a whole bunch of them working in the med tents. Abby had to convince Owen to tag along. All her other friends volunteered, Mel included. If Isaac said no, they all still would've gone. They all care about each other more than Isaac and the WLF. Isaac even knows this. "No secrets between the Salt Lake crew, huh?" And again, Abby would've gone regardless, so Isaac equipping them and letting them go was the best way for him to get his top soldier back alive. And no, you're wrong again. The WLF have more soldiers than the Seraphites, but non-combatants among the Seraphites still know how to fight, which is why the island invasion did not go well for the WLF. You're also wrong about the state of the war during the Jackson trip. things were going well for the WLF at the time according to collectibles. Isaac letting Abby go was in part a reward for her performance. So you're still wrong.
2. Protect and save lives? Is that what he was doing all those years as a hunter? But yes, Joel was never interested in revenge. How does that contradict what I said? Abby never tortured for fun. You're outright lying now. And again, Abby was rewarded for sparing Ellie the second time. If she did what you suggest, she would've died on the pillar. Lev would be dead too. My initial response here is a good enough reply to this. You just repeated yourself, and I already explained why you were wrong.
3. The area between the stadium and the FOB isn't a known combat zone. It's WLF territory. Pregnant women act all sorts of ways. They're people, not a monolith. She fully thought Ellie was going to kill her, and she just watched the man she was in love with get murdered. I saw my uncle accidentally startle my pregnant aunt, and she turned and slapped him then immediately apologized saying she just got scared. You don't mess with her. People are actually different from one another and react differently to situations. Don't know if you were aware. Also, I'm not assuming Mel wants to murder her baby. I was using that as a hypothetical to demonstrate that your argument fails in every conceivable way. That would still be an abortion by the way. It's an abortion until it's born. Also, the only excuse a person ever needs for an abortion is that they want one. But I know Mel doesn't hate her baby. Again, I was showing how your argument fails from every angle. You just don't understand that pregnant women are people and behave differently from one another.
You continue to be wrong. Not a single convenience or contrivance.
@@krasmasov6852
1. We see a _hand full_ of medics. Doesn't change the fact that risking _any_ medic is idiotic, especially when he knows she's not at her top form. It's like sending a man with one leg to run a marathon. And no, Abby had to ask _all_ of her friends to tag along. If Isaac said no, they would've followed his order. If Abby had gone by herself, no great loss. I mean, look at how fast Isaac tried to kill her when she betrayed him. One soldier, top or not, obviously isn't worth risking a entire group and resources. Which, by the way, I'm right about, because Ellie figured out exactly who they were thanks to their clothing, lol. And I know the WLF have more soldiers, but they're still both pretty evenly matched, as literally told to us by Abby and Yara. And no, things were not "going well". The collectibles literally state that they lost three battalions are there was great unrest growing in the faction, which is why Isaac wanted to start capturing Seraphites for interrogation. He could sense they were up to something, he just didn't know what. And as I said, there's no reason to risk war with another faction (Jackson) over a _rumour._ No matter how you try to spin it, no leader would do this. Why make more enemies when you're already at war? I noticed you skipped over that part. Probably because you know it doesn't make any logical sense.
2. Yes, that's exactly what Joel was doing as a hunter. Did you forget the conversation between him and Tommy? Tommy literally thanked him for keeping him alive during those times, he just wasn't happy with what Joel had to become. That was during the worst point of the apocalypse, by the way. And yes, Abby _did_ torture for fun. I'm beginning to think you missed a lot of conversations. There's literally a conversation where she says she wants to beat prioners _for fun_ to "blow off some steam". She also tortured Joel because, well, she wanted to, and in front of his crying daughter. That takes a special type of psychopath. Even Joel never did that, least of all for fun/revenge. And I already explained why Abby's "reward" is inconsequential. Abby didn't know she'd be rewarded and neither did Ellie. She went there to _kill_ her, which Abby should've known since she understood the drive for revenge. And don't forget, Ellie threatened Lev. Your reply to this is contrived nonsense, just like the game.
3. It. Doesn't. Matter. Any area controlled by the WLF that was outside the compound was known to be open to attack, and therefore unsafe for a heavily pregnant woman. And sure, pregnant women aren't a monolith, but the vast majority share similar traits (when they care about their baby) and Mel shared none. Why? Because the plot demanded it. Your aunt knows your uncle, lol. And I very much doubt she would've run full force at someone holding a knife when she was 8.5 months pregnant. And again, you literally proved my argument. What aren't you understanding? And no, it wouldn't be an abortion. It would be an _induced delivery._ Fully formed, fully viable, past 32 weeks. But whatever helps you sleep at night.
I'm not wrong, you just have low standards. And that's fine, that's your choice, but I don't like it when stories insult my intelligence. I was being perfectly civil, but TLoU2 fans always have to get all uppity and aggressive over this game when it's criticized. What a shame.
"Not a single convenience or contrivance." Please. How many times was Ellie saved by sheer circumstance? Like Dina falling through a roof after the solider randomly decided not to shoot her. Things that make no sense happen only because the plot needs them to happen, characters are merely props, almost every decision people make is nonsensical, and a four year revenge quest is so unrelatable to most people. The game is nothing more than a divisive ego trip, made by one man who thinks he's always right. That said, I already said you're free to like the game, yet you're acting like I said otherwise. Am I free to dislike it without you resorting to ad hominems again?
@@kirikakirikakirika 1. Right, and that bunch of medics is just a fraction of all the people they had. Also, wouldn't Abby's group have a better chance of coming back okay if they had a medic on hand? It'd be dumb NOT to send a medic with them. Also, Isaac did not know Mel wasn't in top form. Even Abby didn't know Mel was pregnant until they were on the outskirts of Jackson. And again, no, you're just wrong. Abby's friends volunteered. Owen was the only one who had to be convinced. And again, Abby's friends all lost someone to Joel. They were all Fireflies in Salt Lake, and all knew people who Joel killed. They all knew that the vaccine they had been fighting for was destroyed because of him. Funny you mention how fast Isaac turned on her because it wasn't fast at all. He refused to relent on the plan to kill all Seraphites, but he gave Abby several chances to do what he saw as the right thing. You've got the lore completely wrong. The WLF were steadily winning by the time Abby went to Jackson. Isaac just realized that they would eventually bleed resources if things kept up like that, so he wanted to finish it all. You really need to think about the timelines in these collectibles you're misunderstanding. I didn't skip over anything. You're just illiterate. Isaac correctly thought a massive group wouldn't trek 800 miles to engage in full scale war. At worst, they'd send a few people that he would've believed wouldn't stand a chance against their thousands.
2. No, he didn't. Tommy outright says he still has nightmares from it and that it wasn't worth it. Abby did NOT ever torture for fun a single time. You are outright lying. I know people have to lie to criticize the story in this game, but rarely is it so egregious as yours. Abby has a warped retributive sense of justice and thinks Seraphites deserve it for getting her pregnant friend hurt. It's not fun. If there's one thing that's abundantly clear, it's that Abby doesn't enjoy hurting others at all. She always either feels empty or shameful, and she doesn't know why until she discovers a better way to deal with her own grief. Her discovering that revenge won't ever make her feel better is like the core of her arc. Abby showed compassion instead of cruelty and was rewarded for it. You can try to think of a million excuses to ignore that, but it doesn't change the fact. Abby spared Ellie, and because of that, Abby and Lev survived.
3. It matters. It's the core of what matters here. There's always a risk of attack, but it's not a high risk. Not a single character acts in a way due to plot demands a single time. Mel has ample reason to want to go out on rotation, and I've already explained it in detail. Sigh you're missing the point so hard. She reacted with fight instead of flight. And you get so many little things wrong too. Mel wasn't 8.5 months pregnant. If she was, her "another month and I wouldn't fit" comment doesn't make sense. Also, Jackson was a month before Seattle, and she wasn't even showing then. You believe she wasn't showing at 7.5 months? Also, Ellie wasn't armed with a knife. She was armed with a gun, and Mel successfully disarmed her. She just then took Mel's knife to end it. You are missing the point again. An abortion is the ending of a pregnancy before natural labor whether it's an induced early birth or sucking the fetus out of there in pieces. The method and whether or not the fetus survives is irrelevant to the fact that it's an abortion.
Not only do I have high standards, but TLOU2 makes it abundantly clear that most other games outright fail to meet these standards. This story didn't insult your intelligence. It was too much for your intelligence. And you don't have to be some big brained nerd to get it either. You just have to have the emotional intelligence of more than a 12 year old boy. Jordan definitely shot at Dina when she was on the roof. He missed her, but the glass broke. With her down, he decided to subdue her for interrogation, you know, the thing he was literally arguing with Mike about. Also, you know coincidences in a story aren't a bad thing, right? Was it also bad when Ellie just happened to come across Joel just in time to save him from the hunter drowning him in the Pittsburgh hotel? Or was it bad when Joel just happened to fall on the only piece of upturned rebar in the entire university? You don't care about conicidences unless you're using them as ammunition against stories you don't like. Every single decision made by every single character is entirely in line with their personality, motivations, and the context of the situation. You're just upset that they made decisions you wouldn't as a rational outside observer rather than someone actually in extremely emotionally strenuous situations. A 4 year revenge quest is unrelatable? You have no fucking idea how hard it is to process grief, asshole. You're free to dislike the game as much as you like just as I'm free to tell you why your reasons are laughably stupid. If you don't like that, ignore my comments.
I think nothing says more about TLOU2's quality than *Naughty Dog themselves* removed all mentions of TLOU2 on their RUclips Channel besides one post of Neil Druckmann making excuses. Their videos went away six months after release.
That's shame if I've ever seen it.
Even naughty dogs ashamed of this game? That's just embarrassing.
2:36 despite Abby being a well trained soldier. I prefer Joel’s old man strength. Having 20 years of being an ex hunter did gave him an edge to be as physical aggressive as he can be in the field of survival which also helped him stay in good shape even for a middle age man in his early 50s. He was a lot tougher and experienced then the survivors who were younger then him. Plus he had to read through a lot of training manuals to help him learn as many different survival techniques as he could to acquire a wide range of skills to utilize his versatility he’s build up. 8:13 that’s true, he was paranoid just to keep his guard up whenever he encounters hostile survivors who gets in his way to ensure his survivability. 10:11 10:18 thoses are good point’s you’ve made.
Dude walked across a post pandemic USA protecting a child and took out a chunk of the 2 most powerful military. Joel should of destroyed abby
@@robogreek3157 considering how well he trained him physically and mentally. He would have if he didn’t chose to change himself.
This is a great Breakdown man. You hit everything I felt precisely.
Honestly I feel like if they had done more to show Abby regret her chocies realized she was not a good person and understand why Joel and Ellie did what they did and understand their side of the story then Abby when have been a more likable character cause I feel like In the end she never had to agree with what Joel did she could have at the very least understand why Joel did what he did
If your game is going to be so heavily narrative driven... then the characters' actions and motivations must make sense.
It makes zero sense that thw two main characters would kill 1000 people between the two of them just to take turns sparing each others lives.
Yeah. I have a friend who's playing it for the first time. I told him about how Joel's trust in random armed people does not make sense for him but he was like "but he's been living in a community for years" but who in their right mind would relax knowing what you did to a whole military organization? Not a character like Joel, that's for sure! Also that freaking plot about a vetenarian trying to make a vaccine for a freaking fongus by killig a teenager without her consent bothers me so much. Abby's dad was an ahole and I hate how they try to make us think Joel is the ahole, like we know! We've always known, but he has reasons for his choices and they make sense! But for some reason in this game Abby's right and she goes on with her life and Ellie, who didn't do sh1t doesn't and she's a villain all of a sudden just because. This story would've been interesting if it were other characters but fo a sequel, it sucks.
It's so weird how people excuse Joel being so trusting to a random person with "he got soft living in Jackson for years". Ok. So how did Ellie turn out so savagely violent despite living in the same community where she even gets to socialize and smoke weed? She wasn't even on speaking terms with Joel for some of her stay there, so it wasn't her being influenced by him. She just magically turns super violent and goes for slitting throats and throwing molotovs at dogs. So if Jackson didn't soften Ellie up, it didn't soften Joel up, period.
@@ultimamage3 bro are u dumb Ellie got soft in Jackson too it wasn’t until Abby killed Joel that she began killing people out of vengeance
@@ultimamage3 good point!
If they wanted to end the cycle of violence, why did we have to leave the farm and risk losing the two people ellie had left, only to not kill the person that wronged her. The game should have just kept the flashbacks, erased the actual storyline, that would have been a better game delivering the message about forgiveness. Abby should have actually had the build up before meeting joel, finding clues to Joel's actual appearance.
Hell I don't even have that much experience in writing and even I could come up with a more compelling story than this.
I don't understand your argument. Ellie was pretty obviously wrong to go after Abby again. The game makes that clear.
@@krasmasov6852 my argument is that why did she go after her if she knew that she wouldn't kill her. Mainly what I am saying is that the game should have ended at the farm with ellie, Dina, and the kid
@@camdencrear2654 She didn't know that when she set out.
@@krasmasov6852 then finish the job and fucking killer her
Brooo you said “man I wish get stake sandwich’s every time I called a racial slur 20” got me laughing 😂
Replayed it recently. Enjoyed it more than I did the first time, but some things still don’t work for me. The game has pacing issues, and I still don’t care about Abby. Went in with an open mind both times, and it just doesn’t click for me. I also found the newer characters to be dull. Love Ellie in this game though, and I also enjoy the gameplay. I respect that they tried something different. It took big balls to do it. Just a swing and a miss for me. Overall disappointing. It is what it is.
Man to be honest if Neil messed up everything and every character in Part 2. If Abby’s stories was a stand-alone with Lev I would have given more of a chance, but no he had to insert his POV in it. I know Joel wasn’t a good man but come on let the audience decide for themselves, instead of putting your pretentious Ideas in a beloved franchise. Dude, like even with the new characters you messed them up. Like how can you make a religious cult and a militia having a war not the main focus instead of a really contrived revenge tale. Shame on Neil for ruining Ellie’s chance of being happy. At least the flashbacks where good and would have been better if it was just the whole game, but I can only dream.
Your thing about them taking off their wolf patches is interesting, I just had a thought. The Wolves are a highly militarized society right? They might view the old world rules of engagement as sacred. For example, it’s a war crime to fight in combat without identification. It’s also a war crime to steal an enemy uniform, or disguise yourself as a civilian. Just food for thought
I can agree with you there man, does make a bit of sense. But at the same time they’re not to far out from being adults. Im curious who’s the oldest one in there group . Honest mistakes do happen which can lead to bigger fuck ups, I’ll see say that is one possibility. But if they were actually smart, no traces left behind in a suicide mission.
I have heard so many bad reviews , you are hardly alone . They better not make the same mistake with the show . I think they will just have Abby get killed by clickers at the beginning because they have to know NO ONE will watch it if they follow the game . I could write a way better story than that and 1 that makes sense . First would be to find a doctor that would run tests on Ellie and not kill her . Once you kill her it ruins the chance of finding a cure if you're wrong . They could have just done a little research and known that .
"They could have done a little research" and you think they're going to start *now?*
They could’ve made the message hit if they had let us kill Abby and get the same ending at the end where Ellie ends up alone. The cost of vengeance and whether or not it was worth it.
lol, instead you get punished for the 'choice' to end the cycle of violence - a choice that makes zero sense for Ellie's character. Great writing Duckman.
Wow and wow! I agree wholeheartedly with your view on TLOU 2. I played it twice but just like you I couldn't even play it all the way through because I was so upset at the direction the devs went after waiting all this time for this game to be released. I still have no love for Abby no matter how hard the devs tried to show her reasons. Very well put together opinion I enjoyed it so much I subscribed.
You Nailed It Man! Every Point you made was 100% on the Mark! If the Game gets ported to PC, I will only Buy It if It goes on Sale. The Points you make about the Weak Writing & Lack of Choice for the Player, are how the Game Ended Up being a Totally Unsatisfying, Frustrating & Depressing Finale!!
Also when I Play I'm going to let the Multi-Headed Bloater Kill Abby!!
Don't buy it at all. Find a way to pirate it don't give the woke of us more cash
14:11 - 14:51 bro did not stop spitting straight FACTS. (as well as the rest of this video tbh💀)
TLOU2 is constant cheap attempts of emotional manipulation.
The """story""" is a pretentious dumpster fire of character assasinations and artificial cringey dialogue.
Gameplay is incredible, story is trash
Fat Geralt is the most interesting character in this game.
Ellie went through too much to not get her revenge because sometimes people are just too far gone and can't come back from this vengeance mindset and made zero sense for Ellie to give up millisecond away from accomplishing what she set out for
not only that but she went for revenge twice and still lost.
well, she actually gave up on the last second, for no apparent reason.
she is stupid as well. she in fact saved Abby that most likely would have died on that scavenger camp, tied up there on that long by the beach.
overall, the story was pathetic. and the gameplay also simialt to the first game,.which isn't bad but nothing that exiting.
glad I haven't played this game. not interested in woke nonsense in my video games.
@@LevisH21 yeah and I'm confused on the 10/10 and 100% is what getting from big sources but the general public seems to have hated it and that it did a disservice to it's characters and fans
@@RhinoNutts505 well, fans of any franchise are diverse.
I'm pretty sure the woke fans liked this game and will defend it to the death. and it still made lots of money.
but for me this franchise is over. I don't care about what happens further. a 3rd game is probably impossible at this point anyway. or I could be wrong.
regardless. everything is over.
@@LevisH21 well people are wanting a remake of the first game which I fail to understand because normally remakes are for games that are pretty dated and have the potential to be modernized but in my opinion I think the first game has aged well and doesn't feel outdated so really the only thing a remake would do is have more pretty graphics which I think the old one still hold up
@@RhinoNutts505 a remake of the original?
that's so strange.
I think that game(especially the remastered version) still holds up pretty well to this today.
Not going to lie, I wish Neil Druckmann and Naughty Dog took a lesson from BioWare after the Mass Effect 3 ending debaucle and considered writing an epilogue scene similar to how BioWare made the extended cut DLC, that they released, for free to try and repair some of the damage, but no, Neil and Naughty Dog just left it alone.
For the, let's call it extended cut DLC: Ellie's trip to Santa Barbara was a nightmare about how revenge is bad, she wakes up to Dina next to her and upon seeing what revenge will do to her, kisses Dina on the forehead and falls back asleep and maybe she has a dream of Joel smiling as if he approves of her giving up the cycle of violence.
Sure, this is cheesy as hell, but I would like to hear what you would think to this.
Compared to what we got I prefer this low key. Lol. Cause the original ending was just time wasting nonsense. Tbh, I think the ending would be way better if they cut out the boss fight and had Ellie and Abby argue or something. The flip-flopping between wanting to kill Abby and not is what annoys me about it so much.
@@Nassit-Gnuoy The ending would have been better if Ellie left Abby hanging on the pole saying to her: "was your revenge on Joel worth it?", walks away and Abby is left there to think on her actions, possibly for the first time in her life.
I do kind of like the ending I wrote in the prior comment (though it is a bit cheesy) since A) It wouldn't require changing anything about the game and B) it still ties together the concept of "revenge is bad".
I love the game (when we play as Ellie). But i hate the Story, Characters and how badly written it is.
It's not badly written at all though.
@@krasmasov6852 of course it is. Why do you ignore all the complains that people have?
@@BenSlashes I'm not. Give me what you think is the strongest one, and I'll explain why it doesn't work.
The whole idea of a "revenge is bad" plot and a "break the cycle of violence" story bit does not fit in a zombie apocalypse game. People have more important things to worry about, like infected, than to worry about going after someone who wronged you. 🫤
This is a personal opinion, so please don't lose your mind over this, please
You know who agrees with you? *The writer of the first game.* The writer of the second game "agreed" but really was browbeaten by said better writer into also repeating this, but thought his "revenge bad" plot was so smart he just HAD to tell it. . . With the Last of Us franchise, that is, because he knows what happened the last time he tried to tell an original story.
The game's message is that violence isn't the answer yet the combat loop is just triple-A quality violence
@@donavonhoward1899 no I definitely didn’t miss the point. The first game has a very clear message whereas this game also has a very clear message. The game tries to make us sympathize with Abby and therefore make us like the character so that we don’t become trigger happy when we see her even though they make the mistake of trying to humanize the antagonist to the protagonist who is Ellie. Ellie has every right and the game confuses the player for the actual character as Ellie spares her out of one flashback about Joel. Don’t make the point about Joel not wanting Ellie to do that because he’s not even a morally righteous person. I didn’t miss the whole point I see how incorrectly the writers tried to implement that point into a game with a setting where nobody is morally correct. The gameplay loop tries to make you feel bad about murdering hundreds of people through different areas with them screaming when they are in the same moral compass as everyone else. The gameplay loop directly contradicts the point because ending the cycle of violence does not mean you bash someone’s head in with a bat or kill a pregnant woman.
Undertale integrated the "violence is bad" into the gameplay greatly. For start, the game is turn-based pixel art, so there is no actual combat skill to stimulate your desire for violence; second, the game the characters are charming and you genuinely feel abad about killing them, instead of hoping you give a f*ck just because they have names; third, the complete the "genocide run" you need to kill every enemy, and finding them all is boring and grind AF
@@Noperare And that is a completely great example of how to do it
@@riku528 I don't get how the flashback would make Ellie want to stop from killing Abby, Knowing Joel, he would have fully sent it if anyone touched Tommy or Ellie, we didn't see any build-up of Joel wanting to be a pacifist. We know he wasn't even remorseful for the hospital massacre and infact doubled down
@@riku528 If you think Abby is the antagonist alone, then you missed the point. The game isn’t about violence or forgiveness. It’s just about moving on. The gameplay shows horrible and brutal actions which didn’t have to happen. They live in a violent world, but Ellie didn’t have to leave Jackson and she could of avoided what was about to happen. The game is showing that what you are going to do isn’t going to be a triumphant story of justice. Ellie is the antagonist and so is Abby, but Ellie and Abby are both the protagonist. Abby is only the villain to Ellie’s story and Ellie is the villain to Abby’s story. In Ellie’s eyes, Abby came in and killed her father figure, the only person who would always care for her no matter what. But to Abby, she killed a monster who stopped humanity from getting a cure and then his psychopath daughter kills all her friends just to get back at her.
The characters only ever change when they move. Ellie let’s Abby go because if she killed her she would only prove to herself how far gone she was. Abby didn’t get better killing Joel, it only got better when she found something to fight for like Joel did with Ellie.
The part about Abby never trying to learn about Ellie’s side of the story but the player is forced to learn about Abby’s
Abby already knows Ellie's story.
@@krasmasov6852 maybe but she never had like a convo about it to fully understand
@@krasmasov6852 Really? She knows all about her, her pain and suffering, her regrets, her hopes, her complicated relationship with Joel? Bullshit.
@@BWMagus Of course not, but that's not what I said, doofus.
@@krasmasov6852 so then… what is your point?
I laughed hard af when you said you would kill Abby's dad all over again. I actually replayed the first one just for that myself. Seriously, fuck that guy
Just had to waste all my ammo on that damn doctor last week for all the crap that happened
You're saying fuck that guy for absolutely no reason. If you actually paid attention he was an innocent man who did nothing EXCEPT TRY TO MAKE A FUCKING VACCINE FOR THE WORLD. JOEL KILLED HIM FOR NO REASON. And Abby had a reasonable reaction. Her dad was killed by a man for doing nothing except helping the world.
@@Salieri01 same here, all the ammo on that mf
I went through the whole hospital section stealthily just so I could unload all my remaining ammo into him, totally worth it
Dude actively pursued his own death. After this guy takes down an entire force by himself and only wants to take the kid, what makes you think *you* would fair better against him? If he stayed in the first game I wouldn't have minded but the added the context of the sequel just makes him look even dumber.
*kills a thousand thugs to get to the final boss*
"I'm going to let you live because I'm a good person"
It actually gives me chills when I think of what this game would be like if Joel had lost Ellie to Abby and we got to see him absolutely waste her.
Typical commoner answer. Simple, predictable, in a box with a neat little bowtie. Same type of baboon brained person that goes to watch all the marvel movies with cookie cutter endings
That would be amazing
I don't think I'd want to play that
@@snailart9214 Why
Oh without hesistation, immediately waste her.
I hate how Lev has one of the most interesting stories in this game but we never get to play as him. He is trying to save his brainwashed mother from a cult that wants to kill him for heresy, for god's sake thats fricking Shakespeare compared to the rest of the game.
Abby isn’t entirely a bad character but I would’ve liked an alternative that Ellie ended up in her spot with Lev, and Ellie becomes the Joel for Lev. Get call backs to the first game, and Ellie sharing Joel’s tactics and wisdom to Lev. That would’ve been an amazing story.
@@hue.main1 That's just going full Clementine and AJ
@@ceecue5367 You’re so right, lol. Wouldn’t have realized that correlation. I guess I unknowingly really like that sort of trope
@@ceecue5367 And that's not necessarily a problem. It's better than the trasheap we got lmao.
I always wanted to play as Lev. Interesting character. Hopefully they make a part 3
Honestly, my biggest problem with the game is that it is a revenge story but stops you from actually having your revenge right at the end and shoehorns in a "cycle of violence" message as if none of the random people you killed have family that want to avenge them. Nevermind the fact that you mowed through hundreds of enemies to get a shot at killing Abby and Ellie just gives up last second. They pulled every cheap trick in the book to make people sympathize with Abby and they still couldn't get people to like her.
Should play both Red Dead Redemption games if you haven't already, they also tackle the "cycle of revenge" in part, just much more well done while not trying to center the entire plot around it.
Assassin's Creed and God of War did that revenge plot better. Hell, Assassin's Creed nailed it multiple games in a row.
Yeah And God of War did it in a truly meaningful way but still kill the bad guy at the end.
@@hardway410 "The cycle ends here, we must be better than this." Hits harder than anything TLOU2 had, which is incredibly unfortunate.
sloppy writers lead to sloppy characters, simple as
It felt so condescending how this game tried to preach about forgiveness while not offering that same mercy to Joel, a character we know very well. Hell, they even punished Ellie at the end.
What do you mean not offering that same mercy to Joel? His portrayal was incredibly sympathetic.
@@krasmasov6852 I mean in terms of the whole game's focus in general. The cliff hanger in the first game left it open to the audience to decide whether the lawyer thought Joel was right or wrong for what he did. But in the sequel, it makes that decision for the audience: that Joel was completely wrong for what he did. There were even multiple characters in the sequel repeatedly calling Joel a monster for what he did, no matter the reason. The most sympathy I saw when it came to Joel's decision was when it came to Ellie's diary and when she would think if she understood why Joel did what he did or not. The best display of sympathy for Joel is in the ending, when Ellie offers to try to forgive him. But throughout the entire game, it almost felt like it was telling us that we should feel bad for caring about Joel, but not for Abby and her Dad. I hope I make sense somewhat, I don't wanna type an article
@@nimloc1670 No, it doesn't make that choice for the audience at all. In fact, the game shows Joel doubling down on what he did and getting rewarded for it. There were multiple characters in the sequel who called Joel a monster, yes. There were also multiple people who traveled hundreds of miles to avenge his death. There is nothing in the game whatsoever that even remotely implies that you should feel bad for caring about Joel. The story doesn't work unless you do care about Joel. I mean Abby's entire motivation in Seattle is trying to assuage her guilt for the atrocity she committed to Joel.
The game was a mess... It is sad that ppl defends paying money for a game that destroys its own characters when they tricked them with devious trailers
@@ricardolujan5571I hope that season 2 of the last of us completely changes the absolute horrible story we got on part 2
I said the same thing about Joel. They made Joel an idiot for plots sake
No u
They just made him careless. Hes been living peacefully in jackson for years at this point. Plus meeting up with abbys group was his only choice because of the horde of zombies that was chasing him down
@@aydenhaze9015 living careless in the jackson confine does not change the outside world. The same merciless type of people still exist. You'd have to be really dumb to trust people from outside of your situation on the first meeting without vetting the outsiders.
@@jamarr27 well not only the carelessness but the fact that joel and tommy had no other choice. Their was a hoard of infected chasing them down. It even states in game their horses wouldn’t be able to make it back to jackson. As far as joel knew, abby was just some lost girl he had saved that was traveling with a group.
@@aydenhaze9015 those points are true but he still could have gave them a fake name because he has no idea what their intentions are. As far as we know people outside of Jackson are still cut throat and trying to survive and will kill to do it.
Abbey is way more psychotic than Joel. He killed for survival and saving a child's life. Abbey went on a cross-country trip through incredibly dangerous terrain just to kill for revenge.
Not even kill, torture. She took her jacket off because she got so heated up from repeated beating a helpless, injured dude who saved her life a minute ago. No idea how anyone can see her ever being even close to redeeamable.
@@Synthia17 that's a good point. And while playing as Abby was meant to make us connect with her, personally it solidified my disconnect. I wasn't playing as my enemy through her tragic backstory. I was inhabiting a blunt force plot device, a phony prop created to deliver a heavy-handed moral lesson. Immersive stories require sleight of hand, and the balance is more fragile than people know. When they forced us to kill a dog as Ellie, and never as Abby, the meta-implications were too obvious. That's why many felt LoU2 was manipulative.
@@kwk111 Definitely, we were being hit over the head with the messages and instead of carefuly shown, we were straight up told what we were supposed to feel and it's baffling. Then the awful pacing and jumbled mess of flashbacks within flashbacks destroys it further.
@@Synthia17I don’t even get how can she torture him by repeatedly bashing his head. He shoulda already been dead by the time Ellie arrived.
@@spideyfan1278 she was hitting his body after hitting his head
Why does everyone have waaaaaaayyy better ideas then the writers and director?
They don't. I've yet to hear a single better idea.
@@SlimKim3 I don't see how this is a useful comment towards the discussion, no offense. Well, I wish you all the best.
@@benkenobi3364 it was actually a backwards comment thanks for pointing it out hun LOL
@@SlimKim3 I don't remember what you wrote but anyway have a nice day.
“Hey friends at naughty dog, what if we make The Last of Us 1.5!! Joel and Ellie specifically Joel were being hunted down but Abby and her friends but they were able to take them out!! ❤ after that they live a happy life in Jackson! The end!!!🌈🌈
This game sucks at trying to talk about forgiveness, Mercy or that violence is wrong. For example:
*Abby kills Joel
Abby Later: Wow, I slept so Good last night! 🤭
*Ellie kills Nora
Ellie Later: I don't even recognize myself anymore... What am I doing? 😢
The game makes it clear that Abby continues to suffer from nightmares even after she kills Joel. She only sleeps good after she saves Lev and Yara.
@@krasmasov6852 She only had 1 nightmare, even that was about Lev and Yara, where she feels compassionate for them. She didn't show any kind of remorse or regret after killing Joel
@@netrox0072 Owen mentions her recurring nightmares before she kills Joel. They are established both before and after. And her nightmare wasn't just about Lev and Yara. Consider the context. In the dream, where did she find them lynched? Right, her dad's operating room.
Plus, there's also the part where Abby outright says that she's helping Lev out of guilt as a way to lighten the load. And there's the fact that the story doesn't make sense if she doesn't regret killing Joel.
Agreed on Joel's death. I have no problem with him dying but the way they did it will never sit right with me. I think it would have been better if, in that situation, they were atleast a little weary, a little more cautious and that either he or Tommy noticed at the last moment that something wasn't right. So they'd try to fight back, get overpowered and Joel would eventually be killed. If he died like that, died putting up some resistance, then atleast he'd die resembling the Joel i knew from the first game.
Because as it is now, i can buy that Joel and Tommy could have gone soft, even if the writers didn't foreshadow it, but one thing i can't buy is that Neither Joel Nor Tommy would have their survivors instincts ,that they gained over 20 years, telling them that something's wrong here.
I also hate how the marketing was specifically designed to lie to the audience to make them believe Joel would live and have a role in the story. They straight up replaced characters with his.
Also his death being so early just takes so much away from the story and leaves it just a depressing nightmare, which was Druckman's intention and its terrible. It's so thematically disconnected from the first one that it's hard to even see it as a sequel.
i read your comment but all i see is “still mad that joel died” and that’s it. Joel was living in the peaceful place of Jackson with family and friends now. Joel had found peace living with Ellie and finally found a sense of safety. This isn’t the same joel we see in last of us because he doesn’t have to be that kind of man anymore. we see that progression happen throughout the first game and now he’s a man more willing on trusting others instead of being this loner only worried for his own back. In the end, this would ultimately be his down fall
@@venomshake8187 I thought i made it clear that i'm only upset about *HOW* Joel died and not the fact that he died. There is a difference. Yes, Joel lived in relative comfort and did not have to fight everyday for survival but he did go out on Patrols very often to fight bandits, and infected. For all he knew, Abby's group could have been bandits too. Hence why i think he would have been a bit more cautious.
Besides that, in the flash backs, the game established that Joel still had some caution and ruthlessness in him, at least when it concerns Ellie. Remember the scene when he cut down a Bloater alone with a machete? Or when he made sure Ellie kept her mask on to keep her immunity a secret, even though they knew no one was around? I saw those as hints that Joel is still a pretty cautious and dangerous man. Like i said, a few years living in relative safety may make a man more trusting but i don't see it overpowering the 20 years of survival experiences and instincts he had before.
agreed cause Joel and Tommy wouldn't trust random arm to teeth so easily close to their home, like bro that a big red flag right there and Joel never question why random peoples close to their home it arm up and don't try fight back and alot dumbass think we mad that Joel died no we mad how stupid he died, like if Joel got bitten cause of that bitch and Joel seal himself in and Elie come in and want to save him and she blame Abby for it that would been better
@@LFC_Fan23 I respect how they killed him off in terms of how ruthless it was but it felt way too rushed. Like let Joel and Tommy converse with them a little more, build tension, and then go all in. There was such good potential for a scene there that just wasn’t used. I’m assuming they did that because they wanted to shock the player and not give us enough time to process what was about to happen but it’s just dumb and wastes a strong moment. The ending of the game also just didn’t make any sense but that’s a can of worms in of itself
I still love how people used the argument of "you're upset Joel died" when the fandom, at least the majority from what I saw, accepted that he was going to die in TLoU2.
There's a billion legitimate issues, many of which are obvious and indefensible. Acknowledging those would mean this game isn't perfect.
"You're just mad because Joel died" is the one point they latch onto because they think the fans being upset was the intent and that makes it smart. Subsequently, they think that makes them smart.
It was never about the game. It's about how the game makes them feel: If it's perfect, they're smart. If it's not it's just one of a billion things in life that keeps telling them they aren't.
@@crazyinsane500 It always traces back to people being mad Joel died. You can't name a single legitimate issue.
@@krasmasov6852 Oh, we can name several issues. The problem is whenever we do, TLOU2 apologist never listen and always go back to moving the goal post or outright repeat their own points like parrots.
@@CEnow No, you cant. Feel free to try though.
@@krasmasov6852 It makes no sense that Ellie doesnt kill Abby.
"Stop trying to be movies so badly" thank you! It is a video GAME, not a VIDEO game. Imagine "improving" a movie by having a few static images and most of the story is told by just audio to mimic radio novelas.
The first game too then
Exactly! I don't know why developers would limit themselves so greatly when video games offer so much more exploring (/time to build characters and the world.)
I don't think a Batman movie could tell a story on the same epic scale like the Arkham Knight. Joker in Batman's head was so very fun. Trying to congest all of it into movie time would not yield the same results.
In short, you can't make a cake by following a pie recipe.
Why are you so mad? Can't he have a different opinion than you?
@@nicolaschannel8787 Are you replying to me?
@@billcipher3946 no my friend i replied to 《m a》
Character inconsistency is one of the biggest issues that current media has. Movies and games tend to take these fictional characters out of character to push the plot forward. Even if it's detrimental to the overall immersion of the viewer/player or to the story as a whole.
There is no character inconsistency in TLOU2. At least not in the sense you mean. They do change over time of course.
@@krasmasov6852there is ALOT of inconsistancy dude.
Exactly what Spider-Man 2 just did! Great point here
I find Druckmann's use of that Kurt Cobain quote to be really funny in hindsight. Kurt said that not because those kinds of people were critical of his music, but because he personally hated what they believed in and didn't want to be supported by awful people. Druckmann hates """"racists"""" and """"sexists"""" because they're easy scapegoats for why nobody likes his divisive sequel.
The thing that’s funny to me about his reaction to the backlash is the fact that he said before he knew people were gonna hate the game, but chose to stick with the story he wanted from the jump. Why get all extra about the reaction to the game then? It was just a lot of unnecessary drama around this game’s release.
The game turning into a trainwreck is almost entirely Neils fault, there is nothing wrong with the gameplay, or the acting, its all on the writing and the execution, And guess who directed this game execution and who was the lead writer. Your man mr Druckmann. And considering his defiant attitude, and the way the story is made in such a one sided note, id say the dude is too full of himself,
@@marcusmaire8197 Yeah, a lot of people like the new star wars trilogy, didnt stop it from selling less with each sequel. When we speak about millions, even 1% is a lot. And "a lot" stops meaning anything but a footnote at that point.
@@datiger39 I'm new to the drama. What are the major plotholes & inconsistencies people have discovered?
@@Nassit-Gnuoy BINGO. i said the same. He said he knew people would hate ... Yet makes fun of them and blocks meta reviews unless its Beta males
Haven't finished the video but I just wanna state a problem I have with the games message of 'revenge bad'
Ellie is constantly demonized and made to look like a selfish prick for going on her revenge quest. She loses her girlfriend, her baby, almost all of her friends and even loses some fingers making her unable to play Joel's song essentially leaving her all alone all because she wanted revenge...which she didn't even get the satisfaction of getting because of BS.
However Abby was constantly rewarded for getting her revenge. She found peace with herself, grew into a 'better' person, got her lover back, found a new family! She was rewarded at nearly every opportunity for what she did to Joel and if not for Ellie she would've gotten away with it. Hell even after Ellie killed her friends and she left Seattle things were going good for her up until being captured by the rattlers and even THEN she got away with everything! Getting on a boat and sailing away Scott free to recover and go back to normal.
Abby was rewarded for revenge but Ellie was demonized sending horrible mixed messages.
Also uh small side note but I find it hilarious how Ellie was basically called an evil psychopath for killing s pregnant woman in self defense because that same woman tried to kill her first and she didn't know about the woman being pregnant...and yet Abby was perfectly fine knowingly slitting a pregnant woman's throat even saying "good" when Ellie begged her not to. If not for her friend (who's name I've forgotten) she would've gleefully murdered a defenseless pregnant woman whereas Ellie had absolutely no choice in a kill or be killed situation with no prior knowledge.
No no, you see, Abby lost her friends so she TOTALLY suffered for her revenge.
I mean, it's not like that just means *other people* suffered consequences for her actions. From the mind of the author of TLOU2, who doesn't understand responsibility, that's totally equal to Ellie suffering personally.
Lmao did you forget Abby literally didn’t find peace at the end? And lost almost everyone besides the one person that helped her become a human again? Abby wasn’t rewarded at all neither of them were at the end
@@imjaii Abby finds the fireflies and is saved by the person she tortured a loved one in front of. Did she get out completely clean? No but she most certainly got her peace in the end
People will say that Abby losing all her friends is her revenge coming back on her but what really can be surmised from it is her sparing Ellie and Tommy came back to hurt her. The message of Abby’s revenge is don’t spare anyone. Not a really hopeful message imo
@@Ryan-cs3uc and on top of that, they were not actually her friends, she never suffered for then or get sad for them, she never even mentioned them or care to were they are, because the only person that abby actually cared about is owen, the guy who cheated his pregnant wife mel with abby. Abby betrayed the WLF group that she lived with for years for 2 kids that she know for 2 days, and decided to killed people from WLF for those 2 strangers, The only lost abby had is a guy that banged her and her gains. Ellie lost friends, like jesse, her father figure that saved her multiple times ,her uncle tommy that hate ellie for not finishing the revenge after losing so much because of abby, lost dina, and Jesse baby. Ellie lost a whole lot in the game in comparison to abby losing a cheater and her gains.
Exactly why I couldn’t touch this game. After hearing all the bs from my friends and other RUclipsrs, I realized that naughty dog practically abandoned any characteristics they initially set up. I mean this was a good concept that was HORRIBLY executed. However, there are a million others scenarios they could have utilized to killed Joel that would have made sense and felt justified. SMH 🤦🏻♀️
same. I adore the first game. I went from having monumental anticipation to being so indifferent that I never even bought it and have no plans on playing.
How TLoU should have ended:
Jerry gets his throat ripped open by the zebra, because zebras are fucking vicious even when they aren't WOUNDED (and that absolute idiot got handsy with one).
Ellie and Joel arrive.
Marlene: "Sorry, we can't do the procedure. Our surgeon got murdered by a zebra."
Ellie: "...what?"
Joel: "Well shit... I guess we'll head back to Jackson then."
THE END
Zebras are nasty Mofos fo sho sho, I mean they got to deal with lion prides so
Lol 😂 This is canon.
I can hear their voices saying those lines lol
That firefly that Joel shot in the nuts in the cutscene still gets shot in the nuts too for whatever reason.
Abbey goes on a revenge quest to kill every Zebra on the planet.
It's funny how this games story is so bad they're going back to remake the first game. Although considering what ND did to this game they'll probably find some way to ruin the first game now.
remake? I thought they are going to remaster it for new consoles, mainly PS5, remake would be any good for them right now, instead they could remake Uncharted
@@ExtremeMan10 Keep up with the news. They are pretty open about remaking TLOU 1 and altering story details. Because Cuntman hates TLOU 1, as it was a collaborative effort and not his own creation.
@@ExtremeMan10 nope, it’s gonna be a remake lmao. I guarantee you they’re remaking OG TLOU to justify the bs that is smeared across TLOU2.
It's not a remake it's literally the same game from 2013 a remake means a whole new story
@@christianalexander579 no, it's literally being remade from the ground up. A remake doesn't mean they have to change the story. For example the PS4 version of the Last of Us is a remaster as it's the same as the PS3 version just with a resolution boost and runs at 60fps. You can't call the PS5 version a simple resolution boost.
Holy shit, this is the most well-put together critique of TLoU II that I've seen and it's a concise 42 and a half minutes. My dude was just dropping bombs left and right and addressing counterpoints with sound logic instead of dancing around points going "uhhh I don't think it's that bad." And that point about diversity is right on, if developer's actually cared about diversity they should be making those characters front and center, actually treat them with respect, and write them well. Otherwise, they really shouldn't bother if they're not gonna do that, no representation is better than terribly done representation.
It would’ve been way more ballsy of them to make Lev the other perspective character. Plus he’s a more interesting character than Abby IMO. Instead it feels like a lot of this diversity talk feels like they had a checklist to mark off. Appreciate you watching!
Nakey jakey had a good one to
The spirit is okay but we gotta stop treating marginalized groups as people who don't exist unless they are to be used for something. Newsflash: queer and black people exist, there shouldn't need to be some grand justification for why a non-white or non straight character exists in a piece of media.
@@datiger39 upper echelon games is a shit page. The funnel and feed the anti sjw pipeline which leads into the alt right pipeline.
@@kaisolomon5187 I wholeheartedly agree, but I really dislike it when they are present but are represented poorly. Like if you're not even going to treat these people like regular human beings why bother trying to put them in? I think Star Trek Beyond did it right with Sulu, and even recently with Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, despite my problems with that movie, how representation was handled was not one of them.
yet some people àre still trying to be philosophers to defend Neil Druckmn for this story, trying to justify it ànd tell us it's deeper thàn Whàt We think !
Much like how the "fucking the hat on the sea ice" bit from Disco Elysium was a giveaway that it was never about the hat, "You just didn't understand it" from TLOU2 fans is a giveaway that it was never about the game.
@@crazyinsane500 why the hell àre you speàping this wày ? I didn't understànd à dàmn word you sàid ! càn't you just tàlk cleàrly ? I'm not thàt smàrt to understànd your deep shit ...
@@crazyinsane500 disco elysium was a good ass game, I just finished it a week ago.
Studying the nature of extinct cultures and dead philosophies is fascinating.
"If I had my hands on the throat of someone who killed a person I loved, and I had a flashback of that person in the middle of it, you best believe I'm tightening that grip!"-
Lol
Yea, I can f with this review. I agree that playing with Abby IS kinda fun, since she fulfills the brute role that Joel used to. But I never got attacked at a workbench, so I'm surprised to see that was a thing. I think the gameplay of TLOU2 is great (I even like the walking lol). My issues are all writing-based, and there are a lot of great points here. Some that always bothered me, like the MYRIAD of illogical character decisions, and some that I hadn't even thought about. Like Abby never really knowing who Ellie is, and how that kinda matters. I agree that the flashback narrative about forgiving Joel should have been the main story. Or how a choice-based game would have been better, since it constantly lectures your actions anyway. REALLY good point about Lev waking up and begging Ellie to stop, as a mirror of the beginning. I can't believe there are all these little ways that would have made a big difference. And the kicker is, the folks who love the game would have still loved it! All that changes is that the people who disliked the game would have liked it better!
And that's what I see as the tragedy of TLOU2. The first game is almost universally beloved by it's fans. Now it's divisive.The first is considered one of the best examples of narratives in gaming. This is one of the worst. I never thought they should have made a sequel or messed with the open ending. The beauty of that last scene is leaving it to interpretation. Instead, the sequel directly lays out how the ending was supposed to be viewed, and punish the character for it, (because that's what a lot of RUclips Hot Takes had been asking for ever since it happened.) TLOU2 being a letdown is a tragedy because it sullies what was an unimpeachable IP. I still like TLOU2 from a technical standpoint. Graphics, performances, music, and the stealth are all dope. But if you were to tell me a new game would crap all over the legacy of the first, I'd tell you I'd rather that game not exist at all, and that's where I'm at with TLOU2.
This comment is pretty much what I think of this game. Maybe as a standalone game it wouldnt have been so bad, but a sequel to TLOU? Yeah I would rather this one didnt exist.
For a game that tells you that everyone has an ellie or joel, the game does its best to tell you that the only people that cant have eachother are ellie and joel
Oh the irony.
Makes it especially shitty when you consider the game was falsely advertised as another JOEL and ELLIE adventure.
Yeah well life isn’t fair KIDDO. Not everything deserves a happy ending.
@@solidsnake7167 You must be fun at parties.
@@leonecartelreborn9628 parties are more fun when I’m not surrounded by entitled bozos that suk each other off to cookie cutter endings/stories. No they want fairytale life in an unforgiving world defined by pain, anguish, murder. They didn’t want a divisive game/story even tho the first game was meant to be as equally divisive. The kind of party where people cry like cnts is not the kind of party I want to be at
I think that if Joel had went missing with obvious signs of a struggle, and Ellie went across the country after him only to find him being tortured and then executed by Abby and crew. THEN they made us play as Abby leading up to the scene where they kidnap Joel, it would’ve been a more interesting game. Maybe Joel is willing to let Abby kill him when he realizes that her dad was the surgeon because he thinks it’ll keep Ellie safe and he accepts that what he did deserves consequences . Also, make her a big deal in the WLF, make the organization a threat to Jackson. Maybe she doesn’t bang Owen, she the leader guy’s side piece. Ellie wouldn’t know that Joel had let it happen and it would make the whole thing more absurd and tragic, but the character’s motivations would be better. Joel sacrifices himself for Ellie, Abby gets her revenge on the man who doomed the world and killed her dad, Ellie gets her motivation for revenge by witnessing Abby murder Joel. You can still throw in Yara and Lev, have Abby betray the WLF, and when Ellie spares Abby, it’ll be because she understands why she killed Joel and that Joel let it happen and ACTUALLY chooses to break the cycle of revenge.
This...... Would have been iconic.. OMG 😍 YASSSS
It’s always someone sacrifices themselves for someone people die my boy they don’t always die as the sacrificial lamb because we love them I’m just saying tht could be changed if anything Joel’s death hit just right that shit hurted
Dude, I would’ve thrown money at this like it was my job. This is a perfect rewrite.
I’m sorry but this wouldn’t work at all considering why tf would you take care of a man you are trying to kill spending months crossing the country it just doesn’t make sense from the beginning
I totally agree about the walking segments but u didnt mention that when you reviewed Spider-Man miles morales which had way too many of those :-)
Fair enough. I probably neglected to mention them there since I enjoyed that game more. But you’re right, they get annoying in any game if done too much.
@@Nassit-Gnuoy yeah especially red dead 2 so lower your points for them too
@The Horny Vegan's Little Brother Took you 2 months for that
@The Horny Vegan's Little Brother uh no. That’s not what it means. Fair enough means they’re not wrong for bringing it up but there’s a good reason why they didn’t care about it in the other game
@The Horny Vegan's Little Brother When people say fair enough, it means they just don't want to waste more time going back and forth with strangers on the internet
IMAGINE the only comeback for a person that likes this dogshit game is
“You only hate the game because joel died”
They really made TLOU 2 needlessly depressing, like the first one had depressing moments but 2 is all depressing
Depressing stories ultimately work when they focus on the endurance of the human spirit through those negative experiences. But this game doesn't really do that.
TLOU2 is not all depressing. It had just as many uplifting moments as the first game, though they were all still existing among a backdrop of darkness....just like the first game.
@@krasmasov6852 then explain the ending for Ellie in this game. Go ahead.
@@sleepchasers08 he can't, just like any fanboy he just expects you to take his words as facts.
@@sleepchasers08 Ellie was able to move on and forgive Joel for what he did. She was still sad but she started to get better.
This game shits all over the characters they created and we fell in love with. Joel dies a horrible painful death, and Ellie descends into madness and succumbs to her greatest fear which is being alone. It's like naughty dog wanted to punish us for liking these characters.
Game: "You want to kill this torturer/murderer? Too bad! The torturer/murderer represents queerness, so you have to forgive, uh, him? Her? And the person this torturer/murdered tortured and murdered was a symbol of masculinity and fatherhood, _a terrible thing,_ so you should be happy he got tortured and murdered!"
Player: "Everything you preach is wrong."
Game: "If you don't like it, you're homophobic."
Cuckydog
The game has amazing production value and you can tell the devs took care and put passion into making the game, too bad the story is utter crap.
Well if you hate weed, gay romance, and survival vengence i guess it's bad.
@@comicnerd420 And if you ignore this video and all the arguments and live in your own little fairy land, then I guess I can see how you came to that conclusion.
@@kelp7060 most people complaints I've see is. Bitching that Ellie is gay, or that she's smoking weed. Real strange shit to be complaining about just saying. You have to be clutching your pearls to hate the romance story or the characters. It's not like the characters are mary sues like master cheif or gears of war Characters. Those games are so boring because the main character is too perfect and boring.
@@kelp7060 This video didn't have any good arguments.
@@comicnerd420 I find it hilarious how this is one of the only games that, if criticized, then someone is automatically labeled a homophobe.
The final straw that honestly took me out the game, was - during a damn apocalypse, where humans are slowly going extinct, everyone a was cool with sending a pregnant medic on a dangerous mission.
That never happened. She was being sent by truck through WLF-controlled territory to work at the FOB on site. The only reason she saw combat at all was because Seraphites slipped past WLF lines and ambushed their truck.
@@krasmasov6852She shouldnt have been out there at all. Sending a pregnant women out on a assignment in a post zombie infected world is just a dumb idea
I hate that so much. She was also super pregnant, like, the stress of the car wreck could've easily done something to her. It's so stupid to disregard logic just so you can brag about having a feminist video game.
Other things that drive me nuts
1. A tropical fungus surviving in a Wyoming Winter
2. Let's have a death cult of super emos who whistle as loud as possible in a city full of infected who can hear you if you walk too fast and pray to a dead hippie AND everyone on that island is either Andre the Giant or a 4'11 women who can somehow shoot better than Hawkeye and Legolas
3. Seattle is an enormous city but the WLFs are confined to a football stadium? You'd think after 20 years of fighting they'd manage to control more of their own city with more safe zones they've cleared the infected out of or there'd be MORE infected in a place like Seattle where fungus thrive in all that dark dampness?
5. How the heck do the Wolves control a hospital that was ground zero for the infected and never once bothered to go down into level one prepared to burn it all out to wipe out the infected? nor deal with infected trying to break out of the hospital especially with that Rat King lurking down there
Don't ask questions. Just consume product. Be happy with it then consume more product.
Oh, and Niel Druckman didn't think about that as he was too busy sniffing his farts to think is writing was bad.
My friend called that Asian dude "Sperm donor dude" and I agree 100%
Your friend wouldn’t be the only person to echo that sentiment either. Lol.
When I shot and killed a woman and later read in some journal that she was actually pregnant my only reaction was "good". My friends think it's fucked up for me to say that but look at it this way, Niel put that there to make you feel bad but I instead ended up having 0 sympathy for someone who puts themselves in the front lines knowing they're pregnant. The game just tried too hard with that and it made me roll my eyes when they repeat the "you killed a pregnant woman" 3 more times after the first one.
It's incredibly fucked up for you to think that way. Seriously, get therapy or something.
@@krasmasov6852 They made the choice to go into the front lines knowing they're pregnant. They are very very likely to have a miscarriage or getting killed by someone. They know the risks and they endangered the unborn child. Tell me in what world should I feel bad for people that are that irresponsible. If they went scavenging near areas that were already safe I 100% understand that but in the front lines that's pretty much where I don't feel bad for them.
@@AgentNibbles Genuine psycho. Jesus
@@krasmasov6852 Bro they were pregnant, do you understand how stupid that is knowing this information and deliberately going into the FRONT LINES?
@@krasmasov6852 why? So its fucked up and sich to break a stick too? Because its not a real human
not to mention that druckman is a massive narcisist,i cant believe how many people ignore the fact that he called himself a "misunderstood genius" in that card collection ellie has,no wonder the story is so bad if the writer himself thinks like this of himself
Well that's the problem: People don't know that aspect of Neil Druckmann.
He's literally said in interviews that revenge plots don't work in the setting of The Last of Us, and people *genuinely* cannot mentally comprehend the author himself admitting the story makes no sense. I'm serious, try it, next time you see someone say "Oh, it's so profound and smart" point that out and they *can not acknowledge it.*
@@crazyinsane500 do you know if I can find the video where he said that?
@@gaia7240 Most of them are interviews with gaming publications. Any time he talked about his "Tess hunts Joel" idea he mentions that's why it was scrapped. If you want a *video* of him saying that, that'd be in the Grounded 1 documentary.
@@crazyinsane500 thank you👍
This is definitely one of the best videos that has counter points to everything TLOU2 supporters have. They make every character an idiot just so that the plot can move forward. It doesn't matter that Joel has been surviving in this war-torn world for over 20 years, he's been living in peace for like 3 1/2 years, so that immediately erases all of his experience. We're just supposed to assume he got rusty instead of showing us that he did. Had they taken at least a portion of the beginning of the game to establish that, people probably wouldn't have gotten mad at how stupid his death is. But with the evidence we have, Joel is basically the same person up until he meets Abby and her friends in that cabin. Abby as a character sucks. Mel calls her a piece of shit, and she's right. She's a terrible person who suffers from little consequences for her actions. Her friends die sure, but honestly, I don't think she even cared about any of them besides Manny (sort of, I think he's just someone she got along fine with), and Owen but only because they used to fuck. She doesn't care about Mel in any way until she's pregnant and then dies like an idiot, and to me, her relationship with Yara and Lev felt kinda forced, as it just feels like they're trying to do the same thing Ellie and Joel did… which they were and it was obvious. The side characters are super weak, forget Abby's friends because I couldn't get into their characters from the start, because they helped kill Joel and I already knew they were all gonna die anyways. Yara and Lev were the first characters I actually started to like, but Yara dies, and Lev was kinda underutilized. Dina feels like a copy of Ellie, but significantly less interesting, Jesse after awhile I started like. Felt like he could've been Ellie best friend now that they're gonna have to be, because of Dina being pregnant, but then he dies and gets forgotten about, because I guess Neil didn't like him that much. I'm rambling longer than I should, but my point is that I agree with everything in the video. I also didn't even notice the minority stuff until you pointed it out. It is kinda weird how minorities die, but the white women survive even after moments where they definitely should have. Like, remember how Ellie got the wound after being hung from a tree? How didn't she bleed out? Then she kills Fat Geralt. That was the most unforgivable thing she did.
"her relationship with Yara and Lev felt kinda forced, as it just feels like they're trying to do the same thing Ellie and Joel did… which they were and it was obvious."
Abby suddenly cares about Yara and Lev and goes through Joel's whole character arc in only 3 days, when just prior, Abby was just fine torturing Scars and killing Scar kids. She's THE top Scar killer in the WLF. Yara and Lev actually have no reason to trust Abby and Lev should've popped her with an arrow as soon as he heard her name, because Abby must have killed someone they cared about (like the father of the family who I'm pretty sure is never mentioned, since Lev's story focuses on convincing only his mom to get off the island).
@@ultimamage3 Abby's character arc is different from Joel's. Joel has an aversion to attachment that he reluctantly overcomes. Abby has a need to do good that she eagerly engages with. They're basically opposites in that regard.
No character is an idiot. They all make believeable choices based on their motivation and mindset at the time. Joel made all the right choices from a survivalist's perspective. He couldn't fight the horde or fight a blizzard. Going with Abby was his only option.
Abby as a character is great. Mel is partially right, but Abby is actively trying to be better. That's what her entire story is about. Her consequences are harsh and severe too, and they're most impactful regarding the deaths of her friends, who she obviously cares deeply about. She was outright in love with Owen to the point that she still writes letters to him as a way to cope with his death. The player can find one in Abby and Lev's boat at the beginning of Ellie's Santa Barbara sequence. She used to be really close with Mel, but they drifted apart since Mel and Owen got together after Owen and Abby broke up.
Nothing about her relationship with Yara and Lev is forced. She's actively trying to keep them safe because she's desperate to do some good. She explains this all but verbatim when Lev asks her why she's helping. Abby says she's doing it out of guilt and to lighten the load on her conscience.
Characters like Owen, Dina, and Lev were all more developed than any side character from Part 1. Not sure how Lev was underutilized either. Dina is much different from Ellie, especially considering that she and Ellie literally have a conflict so bad that it destroys their family. Jesse doesn't get forgotten about after his death. He's mentioned three times afterwards.
People of all kinds die in the story. Why would Ellie bleed out from that wound necessarily? And shooting the slaver is unforgiveable? He's a slaver.
@@ultimamage3she doesn’t suddenly care, see this is how I know ya’ll who dislike the game don’t even like think while playing it. She literally does not care for them but own manages to changer mind as well as her recent experience with the wolves and how she begins to see the cracks in the organization which she always saw but now that they are hunting Owen she is against them.
@cityrat3237 No, just, no. Abby does not suddenly "see the cracks of the WLF." Nothing is ever stated that she resents the WLF, and only goes after them because "she feels gulity". So, people save your life, and you feel a guilt for leaving them behind. Hmm, tell me where did this happen before? AT THE FUCKING BEGINNING OF THE GAME. Joel saves her life, yet she feels no second thoughts about killing him, at all. She also doesn't feel guilty about it. She doesn't show any signs of regret, and straight thinks she's the morally superior side in all of this.
Loooool a game that condemns hyper violence only best feature is the hyper violence combat
Druvkman even fails at the main point of his game mechanically
The first Last Of Us is one of my favorite Playstation games ever probably in my top 15 games of all time, I just pretend that Last Of Us Part 2 never happened.
Last of Us part2? What is that? Ive never heard of it but I did like this game called the last of us. To my knowledge they did not and never will make a sequel.
I try to do the same with Metroid: Other M
There’s a sequel to Part 1??? When???? Or did they have a collab with The Walking Dead? 😂
About 3 years in, and the game still sucks. I won't hate on anyone liking the game, but the story itself is the real problem. I don't care much for gameplay mechanics or graphics, it's always the story that matters to me.
What a baby!
@@darkninja9135"wHaT a BaBy"-🤓
@@karenwillreallyexposeyou8531 I mean he is a big baby and he cries a lot.
@@darkninja9135 idk you kinda seem like you're crying rn lol
@@Jmcelwain17 And you kinda seem like a butthurt snowflake.