OFFICIAL THREAD: The Last of Us 2

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
5,713
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It's been a long time since we have had an official game thread on these dying forums but I figured I'd start one since this is one of the most anticipated games of this gen. I thought the first one was great and I am not even really excited for this one but I know once I dig into it I'm going to probably think it's awesome. I just ordered it from Best Buy for curbside pickup and going to snag it once I get the email saying it's ready.

Other than that initial showing of it at E3 a couple years ago I have pretty much not seen any footage of this game or read anything about it. So I'm going in pretty blind at this point.

And please use spoiler tags if you are going to be talking about the story and spoiling anything so that you don't ruin it for anyone else.
 

quikah

Diamond Member
Apr 7, 2003
4,068
649
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Looking at the metacritic user reviews all I can say is "Yikes!", seems seriously brigaded though. Will be interesting to see where it lands in 6 months or so.
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
5,713
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Metacritic user reviews after the game has been out for 12 hours mean something to you?

Hell, metacritic user reviews in general mean something to you lol?
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
5,713
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Oh well this is fun.

I go to play TLOU2 and open it up and see it's 2 discs. One is labeled "play disc" and one labeled "data disc" or some bs.

So I put the one in first it tells me to put in and now I have to wait for 30 minutes whlie it installs 24 gigs of crap.

Then I'm sure the "play disc" will also have to install some more bs.

Then probably a day 1 patch.

This is why modern day gaming sucks ass on these consoles. If I wanted to play like a PC I would buy a damn PC and play PC games.

This is yet another reason Switch gets way more play time than my PS4 Pro or X1X. You turn it on with any game and you are playing immediately.

Switch > ****
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
5,713
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No idea wtf all the TLOU2 drama was prior to launch but I just put about 4 hours into it tonight and it's probably the best game this gen on PS4 not counting PSVR games. Holy shit it's so good. It might knock God of War off the perch for me.
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
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Man oh man I do not want this game to end.

I am probably 8 hours into it.

It's the most cinematic game I've ever played and it just keeps getting better and better.
 

SteveGrabowski

Diamond Member
Oct 20, 2014
6,805
5,759
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Oh well this is fun.

I go to play TLOU2 and open it up and see it's 2 discs. One is labeled "play disc" and one labeled "data disc" or some bs.

So I put the one in first it tells me to put in and now I have to wait for 30 minutes whlie it installs 24 gigs of crap.

Then I'm sure the "play disc" will also have to install some more bs.

Then probably a day 1 patch.

This is why modern day gaming sucks ass on these consoles. If I wanted to play like a PC I would buy a damn PC and play PC games.

This is yet another reason Switch gets way more play time than my PS4 Pro or X1X. You turn it on with any game and you are playing immediately.

Switch > ****

It's a big and ambitious game at the end of a console generation, of course it's going to be a huge install. If you want to play it the first second it's available you can always buy it digitally and preload and then jump on it immediately at 12AM EST launch morning. Otherwise I don't want to see MSRP jump to $70 - $80 just so I can get 128GB cartridges and not worry about a one-time install. Discs are too slow to play off and cartridges or USB flash would be expensive. I don't miss the sky high prices of N64 games in the slightest. Feels like a golden age in gaming when I can get so many high quality PS4 games for $20 to $30 all the time honestly. Not looking for anything to disrupt that.
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
5,713
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It's a big and ambitious game at the end of a console generation, of course it's going to be a huge install. If you want to play it the first second it's available you can always buy it digitally and preload and then jump on it immediately at 12AM EST launch morning. Otherwise I don't want to see MSRP jump to $70 - $80 just so I can get 128GB cartridges and not worry about a one-time install. Discs are too slow to play off and cartridges or USB flash would be expensive. I don't miss the sky high prices of N64 games in the slightest. Feels like a golden age in gaming when I can get so many high quality PS4 games for $20 to $30 all the time honestly. Not looking for anything to disrupt that.
It's just annoying when you want to play a game then you have to wait 45 minutes to actually play it.

Just put 2 more hours into it.

God damn this game is incredible. PS4 is going out with a bang. And we have Ghost of Tsushima next month.
 

EXCellR8

Diamond Member
Sep 1, 2010
3,979
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Yea i meant to grab this Friday but got busy; definitely planning to play it soon though. I didn't end up playing the remastered version of the first game on PS4--but I did play it on PS3 and it was awesome.

God of War gonna be tough to top, but certainly not impossible.
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
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Yea i meant to grab this Friday but got busy; definitely planning to play it soon though. I didn't end up playing the remastered version of the first game on PS4--but I did play it on PS3 and it was awesome.

God of War gonna be tough to top, but certainly not impossible.
Yeah I think it might be topping it for me. It's definitely more cinematic and intense. God of War is more badass in that "i will kick your ass" way though. And I'm more a fan of the linear games than open world games. God of War is one of the few exceptions to me with open world games. It is one of the very few open world games I loved.

I think TLOU2 may be more brutal and GoW though lol.
 

Sam25

Golden Member
Mar 29, 2008
1,717
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Just reached Seattle and my God this game looks so amazing! The entire experience so far has been riveting. Clickers in this game, specially in the sequences where you can't sneak and the game forces you to battle it out against them are so visceral. Loving it so far...
 

EXCellR8

Diamond Member
Sep 1, 2010
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Yeah I think it might be topping it for me. It's definitely more cinematic and intense. God of War is more badass in that "i will kick your ass" way though. And I'm more a fan of the linear games than open world games. God of War is one of the few exceptions to me with open world games. It is one of the very few open world games I loved.

I'm not sure I'd consider God of War open world, as the game was still pretty linear. But I hear you, I don't typically bother with most open world games either--not even the highly praised ones.

I caved and watched the first few hours of Last of Us II and, while I definitely want to play it at some point, there doesn't really seem to be a ton of actual game play; it's mostly just cut scenes and walking around smaller areas in between scenes. God of War, on the other hand, had a lot more actual player interaction and it was a treat to play. And yes TLOU2 is heavily story-driven, which I think is cool because ND are such good storytellers, but we kind of already had an idea of how grim it was going to be.

And from what I've witnessed so far, grim is putting it mildly.
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
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I'm not sure I'd consider God of War open world, as the game was still pretty linear. But I hear you, I don't typically bother with most open world games either--not even the highly praised ones.

I caved and watched the first few hours of Last of Us II and, while I definitely want to play it at some point, there doesn't really seem to be a ton of actual game play; it's mostly just cut scenes and walking around smaller areas in between scenes. God of War, on the other hand, had a lot more actual player interaction and it was a treat to play. And yes TLOU2 is heavily story-driven, which I think is cool because ND are such good storytellers, but we kind of already had an idea of how grim it was going to be.

And from what I've witnessed so far, grim is putting it mildly.
The gameplay picks up big time in TLOU2. The first like 1-2 hours it's slow just like the first one but then it kicks into gear and never stops. The pacing in the game is perfect IMO. It has the perfect amount of tense action and then you get a breather for a bit. I actually ran into 2 intense action parts of the game back to back today and thought "what the hell I just had one of these?!?" because i was so low on resources for the second one. Even Ellie was like "where are all of these people coming from?" lol.

God of War is 100% open world if we're referring to the newest one on PS4. The prior ones weren't but the new one surely is. It's pretty much the definition of open world with all of the side quests and exploration you can do outside of the main missions. Sure parts of the world are blocked off at first, but that has been the case with most of the open world games I have played.
 

Sam25

Golden Member
Mar 29, 2008
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Just got through the TV Station and boy what a level it was! The place was swarming with enemies and had fun sneaking and stealth kills. The last bit where the game pretty much forces you to use your weapons is very intense.

Also, Prone in this game is a blessing. Practically makes you invisible to enemies.

Has anyone taken a look at the Accessibility Options Menu in this game? It's one of the most layered and detailed I have seen in any game till date (console and PC combined)! It's riddled with stuff you can try out.
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
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I thought I was close to the end of the game yesterday before I started my session and I was at 15:45 total time Then after about an hour I realized that I am probably only about 50% done or a little bit more.

This game is long. And I'm happy about that.
 

purbeast0

No Lifer
Sep 13, 2001
52,834
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Just finished TLOU2. Total play through was 27h4m on default difficulty. For a super linear game I'd say that is a pretty damn long game.

Perfect 10/10 in my book. It's the best game this gen with God of War being a close second in my eyes.

Thoughts below in spoilers.

I really hope that ND makes part 3 on PS5. I can't even imagine how good it would look graphically.

Initially when you "start over" as Abby I was a bit apprehensive and like 'ugh gotta upgrade all this crap again?' but that quickly fell off. I liked her character from the get go when you played as her in the beginning parts so it was cool to play through her and see her side of the story. I thought that concept in story telling in general was really awesome. It reminded me a bit of that ZeroZeroZero show in how it story told. And I was anticipating parts that I knew were going to come in story wise. When she saw her dog dead at the aquarium, that part I was like 'oh know this gonna be bad' and then it was, but like in a good way.

I can see how some people didn't like the second half though. It was a gamble they took IMO making half the game playing as someone else, but I liked it as mentioned above. It also makes you feel for the villain and how her story tied into the first one I thought was awesome. You could see Abby fighting her demons in those dream sequences which I thought was pretty cool. I do think that her "change of heart" to go saving the scars was kind of abrupt and felt a bit forced, and when she told the boy after the sister died "you are now my people" as they are fighting the wolf's, I thought that was also a bit too quick. But I just took it as she saw Owen stating a family and she was just having very mixed feelings about where she is in her life and wanting to have more purpose, and the woman/motherly instincts just called her to do that. And then we saw it at the end when all she wanted to do was save the little boy and put him on the boat.

I also felt very conflicted when you get to the part with Abby where she fights Ellie. It just felt wrong lol. Like this girl you are playing as in part 1 and first half of part 2 is all of a sudden now the villain and you are trying to kill her. I thought she was going to kill Ellie there too. And then she doesn't. I thought that was going to be the climactic ending there and then there is like 3-4 more hours after that lol. Again, I wasn't mad at that at all.

Overall the pacing and everything about the game is phenomenal. My only gripe with the game would just be the controls when I was low on ammo and trying to switch weapons in the heat of battle, and it just felt clunky and I felt like I died multiple times because of that. But, that was also probably just me trying to do stuff quickly because I'm in the heat of battle and messing stuff up. It makes me feel like that is what the character would be going through though which was cool.

As for a sequel, they mentioned that Abby was infected. I am wondering if they could play into how she bit off Ellie's fingers and ingested her blood, and since she is immune, it somehow cures Abby and/or makes her immune too. I know that it would kind of completely go against the whole "she has to die to make a vaccine" thing, but then again it's not just a vaccine, it would have literally been her ingesting her blood.

Glad I finished it though as I'm driving to the beach in NC tomorrow and won't have it with me lol.
 
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shortylickens

No Lifer
Jul 15, 2003
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Makes me wonder......

Anyway, I did not like the first one. Gameplay was WAY too clunky and awkward. To me its the kind of game thats not much of a game and should probably just be viewed on Youtube for free instead of played for money.
 

Saylick

Diamond Member
Sep 10, 2012
3,084
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Just beat the game after getting hooked on the first few hours of gameplay. The whole story is just WOW. Simply WOW. I am still trying to emotionally process everything that's happened but I think this game, for all the controversy surrounding the plot and how there were alleged leaks before launch, single handed deserves it's place as part of the Top 5, if not Top 3, PS4 games overall. It's not everyone's cup of tea and it seems to be getting a "hate it or love it" reaction from players, but as a man who absolutely adores good storytelling with complex, multi-faceted, flawed but relatable characters, I must say that Naughty Dog delivers. The game was marketed as a story about revenge and rage, but upon seeing the ending, there's unsurprisingly more nuance and substance to it than meets the eye, and it is this depth in perspective that will always make this game, along with the first TLOU, a cherished part of my games collection. The games are like a well-told movie where on every re-watch you learn something new or see a new side of things, except you the player interacts with the medium directly. I would not hesitate to champion this game or the whole TLOU series as the crowning jewel of what video games as a story-telling medium has to offer.

My score: Easily 9.5/10, a MUST PLAY.
 
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cmdrdredd

Lifer
Dec 12, 2001
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I no longer own a PS4 so I'm waiting until I have a PS5 to play this lol. I got rid of my consoles since they started collecting dust and I was out of gaming for a long time. Started working on car upgrades which is more expensive a hobby haha
 

JPB

Diamond Member
Jul 4, 2005
4,064
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I don't buy used copies. I never did...just something odd about it to me. But anyway...I havnt picked it up yet either. So its safe to say...Ill pick it up when a new copy isnt $59.99. Been checking Ebay...none in my price range im willing to pay just yet. Probably be a few months probably.
 

Dranoche

Senior member
Jul 6, 2009
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Finished a couple days ago. Definitely one of my favorites from this console generation. Mechanically feels refined over the first. Looks amazing. Overall pleased with the story.

The cliffhanger theater scene had me on edge. Also wasn't so sure about the switch to Abby at first but didn't take long before I was all in. Once I got back to the theater and the scene played out a little more I felt better. Then you go into the fight and I was getting anxious again. The first Santa Barbara sequence seemed hopeful until it's end, and the second had me dreading how things would ultimately go down. The game really messes with you, and can have you thinking it's at the end at several points. The final end is sad. Ellie's pursuit of revenge, an attempt to get closure on the memories of Joel that are tormenting her, robs her of the ability to remember him through playing the guitar.

I've read some complaints about Abby's sequence in Seattle, arguing that beyond the initial flashbacks to the Firefly hospital it was a waste of time and provides unnecessary context, or that it just went too long. I can kind of see that for Ellie's story for getting to the point where Ellie and Dina are on the farm, but it helps to flesh out the world and people, and gives Abby's dedication to Lev the necessary context. It also would have felt incomplete and sloppy if they had truncated it to speed it up, so it's kind of an all or nothing deal, and I think it's better in the end being in. I thought a little about possibly alternating between Ellie and Abby each day, but that would risk eroding the player's drive for revenge on Ellie's sequences. Might have been feasible to pull it all out and release it later as a DLC, but I think I'm more satisfied with it all being complete from the start. I also enjoyed the gameplay enough that I didn't mind the extra time.

I think a little bit of the clunkiness in combat is intentional. Gotta check your loadout before and after every encounter, make every shot count, and run and hide when you need to regroup.
 
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EXCellR8

Diamond Member
Sep 1, 2010
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I've got some GS credit so unless Ghost of Tsushima flops, which it probably won't, then I'll probably pick it up.

The internet seriously needs to cut the crap with the biased reviews though; the cry baby "the writing is bad" stuff. The grittiness is part of the package you signed up for.
 
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quikah

Diamond Member
Apr 7, 2003
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The internet seriously needs to cut the crap with the biased reviews though; the cry baby "the writing is bad" stuff. The grittiness is part of the package you signed up for.

Thinking the writing is bad is being a cry baby? OK...

People have different opinions on things...