The Last of Us Part II Is Overrated and Doesn’t Deserve All the Praise
The Last of Us Part II Is Overrated and Doesn’t Deserve All the Praise
"The Last of Us Part II" is not the masterpiece everyone claims it to be. Yeah, I said it. Sure, the graphics are incredible, and Naughty Dog knows how to make you feel things, but emotional manipulation and a well-polished game don’t make up for its glaring narrative flaws.
The story's pacing is all over the place. You're forced into caring about characters that, quite frankly, don’t deserve the screen time they get. The constant switching between Ellie and Abby—look, I get what they were going for, but it just ends up feeling disjointed. Abby's redemption arc? I wasn’t buying it. And let’s not even talk about the massive character assassination of Joel. What they did to him in the first two hours is unforgivable. It’s like the writers were hell-bent on making the player feel guilty for liking him in the first place.
And don’t even get me started on the ending. It’s like the game wanted to punish you for playing. You fight tooth and nail, lose beloved characters, and for what? Ellie ends up alone, broken, and with literally nothing to show for it. It’s not deep—it’s depressing for the sake of being depressing. A bold narrative choice doesn’t automatically mean it’s a good narrative choice.
Look, I’m not saying it’s a bad game. Mechanically, it’s a beast. But the story? That’s where it falls apart. There, I said it. It’s overrated. Fight me.
I don't think I've heard anyone praise it. Most people seem to have the same issues with it as you do.
I haven't played it because thankfully I was spoiled early on that Joel is getting killed violently and you then play that character. Why would I want that? Joel is one of the best characters made in gaming and people who dislike him and believe he deserved this, are in my eyes lacking empathy and situational awareness on why Joel killed people or why he does everything to save Ellie. Joel is exactly how a father would react and is a very relatable character despite me not being a parent. Also they somehow ignore that the Fireflies were not giving Ellie a choice, did lie to Joel while simultaneously trying to murder Ellie. This in combination with some wannabe doctors, who don't show any confidence that the killing of Ellie would've resulted in a cure to save mankind. Doctors who then attack Joel. Ellie not siding with Joel is also Hollywood style of writing, to redcon Joel as the evil guy.
I dislike media who tries to awake emotions by being disrespectful. I had the same feeling by watching game of thrones and that's why I also dropped it. "Oh you liked that character? Too bad. They are dead now. How do you feel?" it's a fools writing, everyone can write a character dead. But GoT is another topic, I just felt the need to name it, as it seams to have created a tipping point where we get more and more stories trying to copy that fools twist writing style as apparently a lot of people like that.
Thankfully for TLoU2 a lot of people also agree with you.