If I learned anything from my days as a cinephile, it's that you should
respect your audience's time. As a game development studio,
Naughty Dog borrows heavily from cinema to draw you in, and should be
held to the same level of scrutiny. Before I proceed with the review, I want
to make one thing clear: The Last of Us Part II is too damned long. This fact
affects every aspect of the game, except the groundbreaking visuals and sound
design, which are brilliant up to an almost timeless level.
The first title in the series, The Last of Us (2013), succeeded in
boiling a year's worth of events into a jarring, exquisitely paced 13-16 hour
horror game about surviving and finding hope in a post-apocalyptic world.
Juxtapose that to the major part of The Last of Us Part II, which takes
place over only three in-game days, that ends up becoming a 30-35 hour descent
into deranged psychopathy. By the end I felt nothing but fatigue, disconnect
and a relief to finally be done and move on to greener pastures.
The Last of Us Part II is split right down the middle by a seemingly
unbridgeable divide. On one side is the fun gameplay, improved from the first
game, with good stealth and combat mechanics animated close to the detailed
perfection of a cutscene. On the other side is the story; a complete mess in
both structure and theme, albeit exquisitely presented with facial animations
on a level never before seen in a video game. No wonder I feel so torn up
about it.
A PATCHWORK STORY
Let's begin with the pretentious and overwritten story. I can sense the will to get a point across every step of the way,
and whenever Naughty Dog runs into problems, "How do we explain this? How do
we convey that better?", instead of cutting stuff out, they add to it: A
flashback here, a shift in perspective there, a romantic subplot... How about
a dream sequence, we all love those, right? The narration constantly
interrupts the natural flow of the story. All the while that chain of events
you're trying to recreate in your mind gets muddled and impossible to process.
The story, or what little of it I can tell without spoiling the impact, starts
out in the happy, snowy settlement of Jackson, in a post-apocalyptic United
States. Four years have passed since the first game. Ellie (Ashley Johnson) lives a quiet, happy life there, and goes on guard patrols with
her friends to keep the zombified "Infected" away. In her spare time she likes
to draw, write poems, play the guitar and fire up her Playstation (if you look
closely, you'll notice she owns a copy of Jak & Daxter). For
reasons yet unclear her relationship with foster-father Joel (Troy Baker) is strained. On the other hand she's about to start a romance with her
friend Dina (Shannon Woodward).
Out of the blue, on one of her routine patrols, tragedy strikes. I cannot
spoil the details behind it, although you might already know them. These
events take a distraught, vengeful Ellie all the way to Seattle, where she
goes on a three-day killing spree, looking for the perpetrators. And then,
after a substantial amount of playing time (12-14 hours), we get to witness
the same three days play out from the point of view of a different character.
It's a very brutal revenge tale as old as the Bible, presented through a
script so overwrought you'd think the writers had some groundbreaking new
insight into the matter. That is not the case. I get the feeling Naughty Dog's
previous games have been praised for their writing so much, the studio let its
storytellers get final cut. If these writers suddenly decide they need an
added five-minute scene in a music store, the world design team had better
come in for some crunch over the weekend and create that store.
Not all the storytelling here is bad, but much of it is both unnecessary and
undesired. Every scene is superbly acted and animated. A few scenes are very
well-written and touching. Some of them work fine at the moment, but in
hindsight you question their place in the script. But the worst of them are
not only downright boring, they feel completely out of place in this game.
Whatever those couple of romantic subplots bring, for instance, is it worth
it?
The worst part occurs halfway through. A whole 10-hour section of the game is
an absurd offshoot, starting at the worst possible moment, to change your
views on one single character. This segment is impossible to care for. The new
characters introduced are dull, their chemistry is non-existent and they are
all interchangeable. Remember all those profound character moments from the
first game? This entire sequel has one single moment of such raw power. It
happens in the prologue.
This offshoot is also where the game starts to hammer home its message by
all-too-apparent manipulative narration. We are force-fed moral lessons that
have already echoed since times immemorial. Violence begets violence,
intolerance breeds hate and killing people is bad. There is good in everyone.
Every villain is shaped by their life's path, and so forth. Are these really
the insights people call "brave"?
And even so, The Last of Us Part II doesn't come to much of a conclusion,
since it apparently judges its characters by completely arbitrary moral
standards. For some, violence is justified as long as it isn't revenge. For
others, even revenge works just fine. Okay, so be it. But why then do we need
this story - and why does it have to be so damned bloated and self-serious
about it? Why not fully embrace the nihilism instead of making Ellie suddenly
feel so bad for her actions?
STEALTH AND COMBAT
The core stealth-and-action gameplay is so good and exciting, however, that it
makes me forget about the surrounding mess for entire gameplay sessions.
Controlling Ellie, you now know a few new moves, like going prone and dodging
incoming melee attacks. The sheer size of the maps add great possibilities to
act as an unseen, avenging angel. Taking enemies out one-by-one and striking
fear into their hearts is at least a little intoxicating.
Your playstyle can be as flexible as you'd like, suddenly getting out of cover
to shoot someone, and then go back into hiding in the waist-high grass and
crawl away. Remaining enemies call out in fear and anger in lament of their
dead companions. They know where the shooter was, but not where you might have
gone since. The A.I. isn't great, but advanced enough to co-operate a
little. You need to display some inventiveness to survive. A few unavoidable
quick-time events and horrifying boss battles add the flavor of action movie
as well, and is a welcome change of pace.
As for the Infected, they have evolved into a couple of new species - one
stealthy and one hulking - that add extra layers of fear into the darker areas
of the game. I like the way their design reflect the design of the two
controllable protagonists, even echoing in the way they lurk in the darkness
or intimidate you by their sheer size. I guess these creatures might be
interpretated as manifestations of Ellie's, and the other one's, monstrous
desires.
EXPLORATION AND WORLD-BUILDING
Once every enemy is dealt with and the excitement dies down, however, the map
size gets annoying. Finding resources for the next fight takes too long, but
you need to do it. You won't get far without ammo, homemade bombs or alcohol
for a first-aid kit. You spend minutes on end meticulously scouring through
every building and fallen corpse. When you finally move on to the next section
it plays out roughly the same, sometimes interspersed with a cutscene or a
deep character moment. Once you've passed a few of these areas you grow
restless.
If this is supposed to depict a downward spiral into psychotic rage, it moves
at a pace so sluggish it more resembles a circle. This lurking boredom is
somewhat relieved by the world-building. Even though every location is so
huge, it's unique and beautiful in its own sense, with nature gaining hold
over the city. Roots protrude through the asphalt. Old pathways are blocked by
thick bushes or debris, forcing you to create new ones by smashing windows,
crawling around or throwing ropes. The urban decay adds a sense of
hopelessness. The world is too far gone. Soon there will be no way forward.
Some locations get their own personal touch through documents, diaries or
audio recordings of former residents. They tell intriguing stories about
ill-fated people I'd much rather have followed than the dullards occupying
this storyline. And ever so often you find a few run-of-the-mill weapon and
character upgrades, which turns exploration into a sort of mini-game, giving
you some gameplay rewards for looking around a little. It is much appreciated.
In these interludes Naughty Dog shows that they've still got it. The big irony
is this: The main story itself would be so much better if you just cut out
this major chunk (all the gameplay-heavy Seattle episodes) that constitutes
the main game and only kept the prologue and epilogue, which take place
elsewhere. But where would that leave the gameplay? Where would that leave the
world-building?
This is the ultimate divide, the one that makes the game feel so disjointed.
It's gameplay versus story, instead of one supporting the other.
THEME VERSUS GAMEPLAY
Most of the Seattle bits add so little real plot development, and is so poorly
told, you'd not miss it if it was cut. Granted, these levels are dedicated to
the cycle of violence, gore and disgust, which in itself seems to be the
point. It's a downward spiral meant to be broken, but again - it goes on for
too long, is too repetitive, and once you think it's about to be over, it
restarts and shows those three days yet again from another perspective.
But this new perspective hardly shines any light on previous events. Instead
it tells a completely different, contrived story of violence, gore and disgust
that is impossible to care about. And here, killing and vengeance seems to be
just fine and dandy, which casts a huge question mark on what the game is
really about.
No matter where it all ends up, you've killed hundreds of people and a few
dogs to get there. No matter what your conclusions, there'll be an army of
vengeful loved ones and a few puppies with a burning desire to murder both of
these protagonists, if they survive to see the next sequel. The gameplay and
the cinematics seem to tell two completely different stories. Sometimes they
even actively contradict each other.
In one sense I like The Last of Us Part II, and in one sense I hate it. I like
the world, its presentation, running around in it and soaking up its
atmosphere through its subtle changes in sound design. And I like the
excitement of the stealth and combat, the terrifying boss encounters and the
anticipation of the moment-to-moment gameplay. I like that it makes you feel
so bad for the horrible things that happen early on.
But I hate the constant interruptions of the narration, never allowing you to
think for yourself, always finding depth in the cheap gimmick of presenting
things out of order. I hate the endless cinematic lessons about humanity I
learned long ago, and how Naughty Dog ruin these once-great characters to get
it across. I hate spending so much time in a sideplot that goes nowhere and
back again. I hate that I ended up feeling totally indifferent about
everything.
I like that The Last of Us Part II causes heated debate because of its
writing, with good points on both sides, which is rare in this medium. But I
hate the conceited way it does it. Like it or hate it - love is out of the question. I keep going back and forth.
It seems impossible for me to harbor both of these feelings simultaneously,
because it never really attempts to bridge this divide. I find that hard to
forgive. But I'd like to try.
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