Just Finished "The Last Of Us"

[2HF]

The last 4 hours or so were an emotional roller coaster, to the point where I was pleading for the game to end already because my nerves were shot and I couldn't handle another encounter with the infected. I soldiered on and played much longer than I should have because I couldn't stop until it was done.

I'd fallen in love with Ellie pretty early on but the moment that cemented her as a character I'll never forget was in game and it blew me away.

Another character is chastised by his older brother for picking up a toy when their inventory space is limited and he then drops it on the ground. I, having learned a little about Ellie, expected her to pick it up and secretly carry it until she could give it to him. I waited and waited for her to pick the toy up but she didn't, then I realized why. I was looking at her. I turned my back for a second and turned back to her and the toy had vanished. Sure enough, she pulls it from her pack later on and gives it to the other character.

For the most part I felt like Joel, protecting Ellie and having her save my ass on occasion. There was only one part where I felt a gap between he and I, at the dam, some of you may know it. I won't spoil it.

I've never been a fan of Naughty Dog, finding the Uncharted series thoroughly boring and having grown up with Mario instead of Crash, but this was above and beyond what I've ever expected from a game when it comes to relating to a character. I've never felt this way before. I didn't shed a tear like so many of you when Aeris died, despite FF7 being my favorite game of all time. I found her to be rather useless and never had her in my party.

I didn't care about any of the characters in Fallout 3 except for Dogmeat, and that was more me wanting to care about something in the world and projecting that onto that crazy mutt (I called him that affectionately).

I bought this game on launch and only just recently decided to actually play it. I hate that I waited this long.

Don't you wait any longer. Play it now. If you don't love it that's fine, but if it resonates with you it will resonate hard. It's absolutely worth finding out which side you land on.

I was kind of wishing the last scene would turn out to be a choice, for those of you who've been there you know what 2 options Joel had. I'd still have chosen the same option Joel did but actually making the decision myself would have carried more weight than any decision I've ever made in a game. It would have been glorious.

Please, discuss games that have impacted you as deeply as this one has impacted me. Maybe I'll know what to play next as a replay of this game would be too much right now.

 

[Zhukov]

Welcome to the club.

I was also kinda 'meh' about Naughty Dog. But I was curious to see what they could do with something a little more serious in tone. As it turned out, I was not disappointed.

 

[Casual Shinji]

No man, a choice ending would've got in the way of how pitch perfect the ending is. It also would've gone against Joel's character arc, since at that point he really doesn't have a choice anymore. It's either do what he did or blow his brains out. I will say that some sort of timer might have benefited in that last section to add to the urgency.

I always liked Naughty Dog, but I got severely burned out on the Uncharted games after the third one. Now though it's like they made those 3 games in preperation for The Last of Us.

 

[GoaThief]

Just Finished "The Last Of Us"

Okay.

;-)

Thought the ending was pretty great, there wasn't a need for a grand choice but there are minor ones such as

Spoiler

where you don't have to slaughter the doctors who are about to operate

I have only tried the first Uncharted and wondered just what the fuck people praise Naughty Dog for. This seemed different from the start however and I wasn't disappointed to say the least. Shame that I find Drake most disagreeable and grating, plus the whole poor man's Tomb Raider thing going on as I'd love some more in a similar vein as TLoU.

 

[Nonomori]

Some months ago, Naughty Dog was nothing more than a seal of "really pretty game" for me. With the exception of some Nintendo ones, I can't find much fun in 3D platformers. The Uncharted trilogy is a enjoyable way of spending some hours, I guess, but I didn't look back once. I seriously can't remember the name of most characters.

The Last of Us really impressed me. The copy wasn't even mine. Zero expectations. It was a one of a kind experience that I would recommend to anybody who is willing to ignore the happening of another zombie apocalypse.

I turned my back for a second and turned back to her and the toy had vanished.

I did exactly that in my second playthrough. The game is full of these little amazing details. By the way, I'm not a fan of collectibles/hidden things in linear games, but The Last of Us made it worth my time. For the most part. Those damn pendants...

 

[Joseph Harrison]

Last of Us is such a great game definitely gonna be in my top 10 for the year.

Concerning an endgame choice

Spoiler

I agree that a choice at the end of the game would have ruined the ending as there is no chance that Joel would make any decision than the one he did. What I did like was how the game did not force you to kill the doctors in the operating room but you could. In my game I hesitated after killing the first doctor and then just slaughtered the rest without much more thought.

 

[Drummodino]

It truly is a wonderful game isn't it? My personal GOTY I've decided (sorry Bioshock Infinite).

TLoU and The Walking Dead are probably the two best stories from all of the Western video games I've played. Funnily enough they're both zombie games - a genre not noted for it's storytelling.

 

[2HF]

During the scene that 2 posters have placed in spoiler tags I was rabid, I didn't care about anyone or anything but Ellie and I perceived everyone and everything as a threat to my end goal. I was not merciful, and I was without remorse.

I was a wreck.

 

[Mylinkay Asdara]

There were several aspects of the game - the gameplay, the conceptualization of the "zombies" as a more legitimate biological threat than the standard "zombie," etc. - that I enjoyed throughly, but I did not connect with Joel enough to agree with the story arcs or the situations. The end made the game virtually un-replayable for me actually, and a few of my friends reached similar conclusions.

I'm glad you had such a positive and impacting experience, but I didn't myself. I'm interested in the polarizing nature of this game - people seem to either love it wholeheartedly or give it a "could have been so much more/didn't care for it" response - I'm curious on what the determining factors of those two reactions are.

 

[kenu12345]

I totally agree with you man. I loved this game. Just how they made you attached to your companion character was brialliant. It reminded me of how Infamous 2 made me feel

 

[Zeke17]

I loved this game too, and what's weird is that this thread, with the exception of a few isolated posts here and there, has the most positivity I've seen when discussing this game. Really seemed that in most discussions many people just wanted to hate on it for silly little issues they had with the game. I wonder how many of them actually played it? I'm glad to see at least a few people giving it the praise it deserves. (Keep in mind, I'm not saying people can't have legitimate reasons not to like it, but I've seen some really vicious and ridiculous things said about it that made me wonder it the people saying these things are just Xbox fanboys or trolls.)

 

[Casual Shinji]

I loved this game too, and what's weird is that this thread, with the exception of a few isolated posts here and there, has the most positivity I've seen when discussing this game. Really seemed that in most discussions many people just wanted to hate on it for silly little issues they had with the game. I wonder how many of them actually played it? I'm glad to see at least a few people giving it the praise it deserves. (Keep in mind, I'm not saying people can't have legitimate reasons not to like it, but I've seen some really vicious and ridiculous things said about it that made me wonder it the people saying these things are just Xbox fanboys or trolls.)

That's just the inevitable backlash that occurs with anything that's popular. The first two weeks after it was released there were a lot of positive threads.

But I'm actually kinda surprised too that I haven't seen any "Oscar bait" comments here yet.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

I seem to be the only person with even a FRACTION of restraint in that spoilered scene. 0_o

Spoiler

When I kicked down the door to the surgery ward just in the nick of time, my reaction was to take out my flamethrower, fire it once in the air as a warning and then point it at the guy threatening my with a scalpel.

I gave him 3 seconds. He didn't budge. I lit him up, watched him burn to death and said "That's your last warning to everyone in this room. Anyone else wanna be a !@#$ing jackass?!" out loud in my room.

The other docs whined about me being a monster, but they were no further threat. I grabbed Ellie and left the last 2 alive.

As great as my fury was, I refused to stoop to the monster level. You're a threat? You die. You keep your head down and let me go? Congrats, you get to live another day to regret your life.

 

[Fox12]

I grew up with Naughty Dog, but they lost me with Uncharted. The characters never seemed to progress in those games, and I hated the gameplay. TLoU though... that was a masterpiece. They need to drop the Uncharted franchise and make more stand alone titles like that. A Last of Us sequel could be good, if they do it right. They just need to make sure they don't make four of them.

 

[00slash00]

I'm a little jealous of the people who loved this game. I didn't hate the game but I only found the last 30% of the game to be good. The rest of the game just felt predictable and frustrating and while I felt Ellie was a very well written character, I never felt particularly attached to anyone or moved in any way. The only part that really bothered me was the game play though. When you were only using stealth, the game play was great. The minute you had to use guns, the game play just fell apart for me. I know they didn't want to make your character great with guns because they didn't want him to be a warrior (though I kinda feel like that's an excuse for Naughty Dog being bad at doing shooting controls), but if that's the case then why force me to use them? Guns should have been something to fall back on when you screw up, they should not have been forced on you time and time again. I'm glad I played the game, I just wish I had waited for a price drop.

 

[Arslan Aladeen]

I wish I was in your shoes. I enjoyed it the first time I played it. When I tried replaying it however, I had a much less pleasant time playing it and couldn't bring myself to continue it.

 

[Drummodino]

I seem to be the only person with even a FRACTION of restraint in that spoilered scene. 0_o

Spoiler

When I kicked down the door to the surgery ward just in the nick of time, my reaction was to take out my flamethrower, fire it once in the air as a warning and then point it at the guy threatening my with a scalpel.

I gave him 3 seconds. He didn't budge. I lit him up, watched him burn to death and said "That's your last warning to everyone in this room. Anyone else wanna be a !@#$ing jackass?!" out loud in my room.

The other docs whined about me being a monster, but they were no further threat. I grabbed Ellie and left the last 2 alive.

As great as my fury was, I refused to stoop to the monster level. You're a threat? You die. You keep your head down and let me go? Congrats, you get to live another day to regret your life.

You had more mercy than me. I burst through the door with my shotgun ready, saw the doctors standing over Ellie and didn't hesitate, I just blew them away. No one was taking her from me!

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Jeez, I seem to have had more restraint than anyone else in this thread.

Spoiler

When I burst into the room with the doctors I didn't immediately kill anyone, I gave all the doctors a chance to cower in fear of me. Then one of the dickheads made the mistake of trying to cut me with a scalpel, which I promptly took from him, killed him with it, and proceeded to give everyone else in the room a dirty look as I picked up Ellie and exited. I didn't really want to kill the doctors, they were only doing what they thought was right, trying to save humanity. Just because I wasn't going to let Ellie get dissected like a frog it didn't mean I had to harbor ill will toward the doctors.

 

[thejackyl]

I know Naughty Dog is capable of some great set piece pieces. (A few times in Uncharted 2 and 3 were pretty good), but the gameplay was pretty 'meh' to be honest. Perhaps I was spoiled from several other good 3D platformers (Price of Persia Sands of Time Trilogy, and such.), In fact I only got to the part with the flesh eating beetles in 3 before I gave up because I was uninterested.

The Last of Us played a LOT like Uncharted (mainly the stiff gun play), which is probably why I won't pick it back up. But it was a hell of a ride. The beginning with Sarah and the end of the Winter arc were big moments for me.

That being said I thoroughly enjoyed the story, but the gameplay is holding me back from picking it up again, which is a shame.