u/Happy_Ad_9976

*long rant incoming*

For me video games are supposed to be something that relieves stress, not contributes to even more stress. They are supposed to be fun, so when people like Neil say "we don't use the word fun here", what the hell is the point? Video games are supposed to be FUN, that's the whole point, that is why we play games in the first place. And for me, the first time I played the Last of Us pt II, will be the last time. I am currently in college, but after a really stressful day (which happens a lot), I look to play story games that can relieve my stress like Witcher 3, Uncharted, Last of Us, etc. And now, now, now, I'm not saying I want a happy sunflowers and daisies game, no I don't want that. I'm okay with dark themes, characters dying. But Last of Us had dark themes, but balanced it out with one of the best moments I have ever seen in video games. The cabin scene in pt I, after I got through that I was like "That is cinema", and the jokes Ellie tells Joel, especially the funny comics and trying to ragebait Joel, that was funny. And Ellie's beef with Bill, I found that super funny too. And when Ellie saves Joel getting the medications, and staying by his side and where Joel calls Ellie "baby girl" and hugs her, that melted my heart. So yes, there were moments of sadness, like Sarah's death, Sam and Henry's death, Tess's death, etc, but it balanced it out with these well written characters, the bond they formed with each other, something I can empathize with, and that relieves my stress. That makes the game "fun".

Well, there is NONE OF THAT SHIT IN THE SEQUEL. We had a good opening of Joel telling Tommy what happened, and Joel playing guitar to Ellie, and then the musuem flashbacks, but THAT's IT. I come back from a stressful day to see Joel being treated like garbage, and then he dies in the most contrived way possible. Ellie does something Ellie would never do, and it's just straight miserable to watch. WTF is this sadistic shit, Neil? Oh you think it gets better from here, no TF IT DOES NOT. I am already feeling more stressful than my stressful day at school and that is really saying something (when I played TLOU2 I was in high school). I have to play as Abby for 12 hours, and I am like HELL NO. There is nothing, I repeat, nothing they can do to make me like Abby. The same person who brutually tortured the person that saved you, and doesn't show any remorse. It's like they are shoving something I don't want, like they are trying to make Abby a protaganist, when she is NOT. There are so many better antagonists written better than Abby. Like David who says "get this, a crazy man traveling with a little girl. See, everything happens for a reason." This guy gave me literal chills. The main villain Wild Hunt in Witcher 3 is also way better written. Darth Vader in Star Wars. Voldemort in HP. The Joker from The Dark Knight. Shall I go on? Thing is I could not give a shit about Abby. And you know the one character I kinda liked? Jesse. He was such a good friend to Ellie, but Ellie doesn't treat her like a friend? He dies in shot in the face, BRUH. Like that??? And then Ellie is like "whatever, he died". Oh no, no, no, you'd think the misery ends there. No, Neil wants the player to SUFFER as much as possible. You have to beat up Ellie as Abby, oh fuck off. I had to drop the controller, and I swear tg I was going to punch something, because I was so pissed off. And not to mention the stress I was feeling as well.

Oh and Tommy gets shot in the head, and somehow doesn't die and everybody just teleports to Jackson. Ok so we are at the farmhouse, and I am thinking finally this misery is ending, this is so far a piece of shit game, and then we get a glimpse of Ellie being happy and living a normal life, basically the first time in the game where it isn't just straight depression in misery porn (other than flashbacks). I was thinking, ok we can end here, because I want this to be over, RIGHT. RIGHT????? Well, nope. Because you have to suffer more, more and more. So ellie gets this PTSD dream, then Tommy goes over, and then Ellie goes off for "revenge" again. *sighs of stress, dissapointment, agony*. Okay and we get to the Santa Barbara section, where gameplay was I guess the most fun, because you had an assault rifle and one of the best guns in the game, and then we see Abby at the stake? Shoot her, Ellie, shoot her???? No, we can't shoot her. Why? Because Neil needs to protect his "golden character". So we let her go, watch her free Lev, and then we force Abby to fight us because she shows remorse in killing Joel, when Ellie confronts her. NOW? at THE END OF THE GAME? AW HELL NO. Then we get to this boss fight okay, Ellie loses her two fingers, and then she lets her live because of a flashback she got of Joel? yeah we killed like 300+ people and now, its RIGHT THERE and you won't kill Abby. John Wick wouldn't have hesitated. Now I am telling myself to breathe in and out, don't destroy your controller, don't destroy your TV, and I swear tg I was going to slap everyone who contributed to this TOTAL DUMPSTER FIRE OF A STORY. Yeah and abby gets the brighter ending, of course you get the brighter ending if you are the golden child of Neil. Oh yeah (for the third time), you think you are suffering enough from the total destruction and massacre of Joel and Ellie? Nah, neil says you have to SUFFER EVEN MORE for "rEvEngE Is BaD", when we again teleport to Jackson, Ellie can't even relive the memory of Joel, and leaves his guitar behind. Then we get to the porch scene, where she says "I'll try to forgive you?" And Ellie wouldn't wait for 2 GOD DAMN YEARS to forgive Joel, they were so close that it would have been 2 months maximum. Perhaps the cringiest line was back in the hospital where she says "don't touch me", and I got totally pissed when she says "I don't need your fucking help" at the dance.

So in summary this game was just straight sadistic, and a miserable game to play. I was too emotionally tired at the end, and caused me more stress than studying for a midterm or final that is worth like 60% of my grade and that means there is something severely wrong. Games are meant to be fun and relieve stress, and this game brings more stress into my life. Where's the hopeful and charismatic Ellie? nowhere to be seen. You know what this feels like? To anyone who watched back to the future, this is like falling into a darker alternate universe. I waited multiple years to reconnect with these characters, and they are not themselves, they are darker, and broken. In fact, I still have PTSD with this game. And I was so sick of Ellie this game, because Joel loved her, and she never returned the favor in this game, she didn't act like she returned the unconditional love Joel gave her. And what makes it worse, is the absolute shitty reviews by journalists (who have been getting that money from ND to glaze the shit out of the game), and say its the best game of the century and is a masterpiece. Except Polygon and Forbes, you guys are good. It's not a masterpiece if it divides the fanbase in half and shits on the most beloved characters in gaming. It's more like a "mastershitpiece". I've effectively wasted almost 30 hours of my time and there was no point in this game. Neil ruined this experience fully, and he doesn't give a shit about The Last of Us franchise, and it is evident when they keep making remasters of remasters. The true heroes are the leakers, and maybe I should have listened to them. You know your game is ass when your own employees seek to expose you. And that is when I realized, Neil never knew how to write the bond between Joel and Ellie, it was Bruce Straley. The stark difference in writing quality is laughable. And yes grapics was excellent, although gameplay wasn't that innovative. I'd rather play something with a great story and decent gameplay/graphics rather than play a shitty story with excellent graphics and visuals. This quote perfectly explains this game "it's something about right and wrong, written by people who think they are always right". I just wish Ellie showed more love and treated Joel better in this game, but yeah whatever. Fuck Neil and ND. Just fuck this game as a whole. As Jeff Goldblum from Jurrasic Park says, "That is one big pile of shit". This sequel was probabaly THE WORST GAME I HAVE EVER PLAYED PERIOD. We never got to even watch Ellie and Joel watch a movie together. That is the end of my rant.

Why does abby get the happier ending? She cheated with her friends baby daddy, who happened to be her ex. She betrayed people who had known her for years, people who probably called her their friend. Yet she switches sides and kills them with zero remorse at the drop of a hat to save two random kids she has known for 5 minutes. She is a flip flopping psychopath with no consistent morals. The only person she was mad about dying is Owen, the rest she simply did not care at all. She is a villain who somehow gets the happy ending, riding off into the sunset to reunite with her firefly friends, lev by her side, and she suffers no permanent injury or consequences of her revenge or her betrayal. She has next level plot armor the whole game.

Meanwhile, Ellie never gets her revenge, and yet is completely forsaken. Broken mentally and physically, nobody left by her side, and as one last middle finger to her character she loses her fingers and can no longer play guitar, her last connection to Joel now gone.

Tommy never gets his revenge, yet he now has a permanent limp, blinded in one eye, his wife left him, and he is now a bitter lonely man.

So, let me ask you this, why does Ellie and Tommy lose more in pursuit of revenge than Abby loses after getting revenge AND betraying her former group? What message is that supposed to send? If the message is that revenge is bad, then why does Abby more or less get away with no consequences, besides her ex-boyfriend dying, and losing her unrealistically big muscles. She still has the more hopeful ending. She is a villain propped up as a hero by a game writer that doesn't understand how to make relatable characters.

There is a blatant and giant narrative bias against every character except Abby. The game pulls extremely emotionally manipulative methods out to try and make you like her. Ellie is shown doing countless horrible things on her way to get revenge, killing dogs, random people, etc. The game never shows all the horrible things Abby probably did on her way to get revenge, instead the game only shows Abby at her best, and Ellie at her worst. It's unbelievably biased storytelling. Abby is seen petting dogs, playing fetch with dogs, saving some random kids, etc. Ellie bad cause Ellie kill dogs and never plays fetch with them! How people fall for this blatant manipulation and bias is beyond me.

It took Joel and Ellie a year to bond, they travelled across the country together, and by the end you understand why Joel did what he did to save her, whether it was right or wrong. Abby has zero justification to do what she did, she saved those kids out of her own selfish guilt and nothing else. Imagine if Joel had only known Ellie for one day, and then proceeded to wipe out the fireflies to save her, it would make no sense and feel rushed. Which is exactly how they wrote Abbys sorry excuse for a story, they tried desperately to make her a parallel to Joel by showing her saving some kids and standing against a group to do so, but they rushed it so hard it felt unearned and not genuine at all. If anything, it makes her look even worse as a person who acts without thought or remorse.

And this isn't even taking into account the countless actions and decisions that the characters make that nobody with half a brain would ever make. These characters do things that make no sense, stuff the characters would never do. The plot relies on the characters making consistent wrong choices, and convenient coincidences to drive the plot forward. Druckman forced them to do last minute rewrites, and it's painfully obvious at some parts in the plot that barely make sense if at all.
The last minute rewrites to make the game more "inclusive" as Druckman was self admittedly inspired by anita sarkesian and wanted to make changes to reflect her views. Sarkesian believes all games are sexist, racist, and not inclusive enough.

Because in the zombie apocalypse the truly important thing is two lesbians, gender confused children, biology defying muscular women, pregnant women fighting frontline combat, and a male character whose only purpose in the story was to be a sperm donor and then was killed off because his usefulness as a male character was gone. All father figures are killed or taken out of the picture like Jesse, and Joel. The game released on fathers day weekend. Surely just a coincidence right?

You know a game is bad when their own employees leak the plot changes before release in an effort to warn actual fans.

Ellie comes up to Joel one night and says "Hey Joel. I know you lied to me about the vaccine and I understand why because of what happened with Sarah but please tell me what happened at the hospital. I am mad at you, but I know you love me, so I know there has to be more to this story, so please tell me what happened.

Joel sighs and after a moment of struggle, he speaks. You were unconscious and I tried to save you, but next thing I know I was knocked out and woke up on a bed in the hospital. I was told by Marlene that they could make a vaccine and that they were going to harvest your brain while you were still unconscious. She was talking about the "sacrifice for the greater good" and ordered a soldier to march me out without my gear, no weapons, nothing. They were going to kill you, without asking you, so I made a choice. I stopped them, and saved you.

There is a long moment of silence, as Ellie is heartbroken and then Ellie finally speaks, "Marlene was there, and she didn't wake me up? She didn't even let me know or let me say goodbye to you? Did she just see me as a resource? Did she just see me as a package? Did she ever truly care about me?

Ellie breaks down, crying. Joel comes to comfort her, and hugs her but Ellie pushes Joel away and then they don't say anything else for the rest of the evening. She kept thinking she would have given her life for the cure, but with Marlene not waking her up and she kept questioning whether the Fireflies intentions were good or not. Ellie walks off, and for a month she is just silent. Doesn't really talk much to Joel, actually avoiding him a lot.

But then during this month, she goes into deep reflection. She thinks about the pain Joel felt losing Sarah, the good times they had on their adventure together, and back to what happened in the cabin where she said "everybody else that ever cared about her has either died or left her, everyone except for Joel". She reflected on this fear of "being alone" in this world, and thought of the oppurtunities that Joel gave her. She has a life in Jackson, a safe life, with a job she likes, friends, and overall a safe community, and starts to think to herself "maybe this was better than dying for the cure". Ellie goes to sleep later that night, but has a nightmare where she was pinned down and had to watch Joel die, and all of her friends die, and she lost everything and the fear of being alone became true. Ellie then violently woke up and planned on confronting Joel the next night.

She walked up to his porch, finding Joel play the guitar. He looked a bit down, sad and depressed. Once Joel noticed Ellie come up, he became a little more hopeful and said "Hey, kiddo." Ellie starts her conversation by saying she understood fully now, with the fireflies and the fireflies not waking her up, and Marlene selling her out. She says, "Hey Joel, I now understand fully why you did it. I would have done the same, and I am still mad at you, but I'm more mad at what Marlene did and her betrayal."

Ellie continues by saying, "I've just had so much trauma over the years, and you gave me purpose, to live a better life and I had this nightmare last night where I lost you, and I couldn't do anything, and I was so hopeless. Thing is Joel, I don't think I can avoid you any longer, I want to spend as much time with you while you are still here. You're the one who cared for me for who I are, not just because of my immunity. I can't be alone again, it would destroy me..." And before Ellie can go on, Joel hugs Ellie again in a heartwarming way and says "I'm not going nowhere, kiddo. Ellie then says, "I forgive you, dad." Joel's eyes tear up and their bond is repaired.

In this sub, hating the game is a big reason why we gather but it is not the only big reason. We gather because we loved Joel and Ellie so much in our hearts enough to grieve what Neil took from them and all of Bruce Straley's work. Our community is a place where dissapointment becomes connection and where shared hurt becomes shared feeling.

I came to this sub after the devastating events of TLOU2, the absolute terrible story with the same ache in my chest, that somehow made the weight easier to carry. Only a community that cared about these characters, obviously more than Neil and we care so much to express our criticisms in the way we do.

And yes we laugh, rant, rewrite stories, and tell ourselves pt II is not Canon, but the important part is we do it together​ and thats what makes this place feel like home.

I will forever hate neil for causing me misery and destroying my favorite duo in all of games. Joel and Ellie was written so well (thanks Bruce straley) and they care for each other so much which is why part II doesnt make sense. No I dont buy Ellie avoiding joel for 2 years, and becoming the pissy teen she was in whatever the hell pt 2 was. The real Joel and Ellie bond was so heartwarming and just flat out beautiful. Joel and Ellie wasnt just "fictional characters" to me. They were family. They brought me happiness. And without this sub, I wouldn't be able to rant on all the game's issues the way I do now, and I feel like I have a support group around me when I grieve about the character assassination of Joel and Ellie

In my mind, Joel and Ellie are living happily together on the same roof and have accepted each other as father and daughter. Oh yeah and fuck neil and fuck Abby.

Joel is probabaly my favorite character and all of gaming and no one deserves the treatment he gets from Ellie. She treats him like trash in the second game. This is not the same person who said "everybody I have ever cared about has either left me or died". I get it, that he lied to you, and I get why you would be mad at him for a month or so, or maybe even a few months, but this guy saved your life, took you in, loved you with his heart, and this is how you treat him back. You don't even try to understand the full story, the fact Marlene betrayed you, the fact that he didn't have a choice. Ellie finally has a parental figure, a father, someone that cares about you in which you act like he doesn't exist. Joel won't be there forever, spend time with the ones that are important to you when there is still time.

And this really pissed me off. The dance scene, where Seth confronts Ellie and Dina and then Joel pushes him, and then asks if Ellie is ok, but then she responds with "I don't need your help", with a whole crowd watching, just totally embarrased Joel where he's just broken and says very quietly "right". Get the hell out of here. Shitty character writing, the real Ellie would NEVER. You know what the real ellie would of said, she would have said "Thanks for having my back Joel, I appreciate it." The real Ellie would have came to forgive Joel in months, maybe even feeling bad for avoiding him for that time, because she didn't understand why Joel did what he did at first. The real Ellie would always be there for Joel, like they were always there for each other. It is like Ellie never cared about Joel's feelings in this game, after all they have been through, ignored what Joel would have felt if the one person that gave him a second chance, a new glimmer of hope, acted like he didn't exist.

This whole game is just misery, after misery, depressing moments after depressing moments and totally shitting on the Joel and Ellie we loved the most, Neil really hates those two characters, huh.

*note there is a typo around the 6:50 mark of the video where the guy in the video says tlou2 instead of tlou1*

Seriously, I don't get how TLOU2 won over Witcher 3, because Witcher 3 is so much better than the story of TLOU2 and I just started playing it.

In TLOU2, there is practically no development from Ellie, she is just an angry teenager who is super out of character and is very unlikeable, and the whole situation with Dina just seems forced and her character is just very boring. And playing as Abby for 12 hours just doesn't work, and even then her character is very flat, her only "motivation" is revenge. And she shows absolutely no remorse for her actions, and the few new good side characters like Jesse, hell we kill them off without advancing their character in a meaningful way or before we know anything more about them. The only things we know about Jesse is that he's Ellie's friend, but it doesn't feel like Ellie treats him as a friend and that he was a sperm donor. And he was killed in the most disrespectful way, absolutely disgusting. And also Joel's death, was so out of character, not to mention Tommy was acting really weird this entire game, and you're telling me Joel will stand in the middle of the room, most vulnerable position and give out his own name to a bunch of strangers. And I am not mentioning the various plot holes and plot armor surrounding this game.

In Witcher 3, I feel like I am in a journey working towards something but TLOU2 feels like punishment. TLOU2 is just "misery porn" to follow a hollow "revenge is bad" theme, and it literally makes me feel miserable, angry, guilty, hopeless, and emotionally exhausted. And yes some TLOU2 stans might say "you just want a game that is sunflowers and daisies", and I am clearly going to say you haven't played the first game then. The first game, we had trauma, we had dark moments, like Sam and Henry's death, Tess's death, Sarah's death, the end of David scene, etc. But we also balanced it with some awesome moments, Ellie saving Joel, just add the whole Ellie and Joel adventure, and the funny jokes they told around the way. And not to mention how Witcher 3 builds relationships, but TLOU2 destroys them, yeah thanks Neil for destroying the core of the game, the stuff we actually care about, the Joel and Ellie relationship. The emotional core of Witcher 3 is the Geralt and Ciri bond which is similar to the Joel and Ellie bond, it is loving, protective, complicated, hopeful, and deeply human.

And talking about the characters, my god they are so much better like we start off with Geralt (the main protaganist we play as, he is a very hardened Witcher, who is known as a ruthless killer, but is driven by his love for Ciri, just like how much Joel loves Ellie, and his partner Yennerfer, and loyalty to friends). Then we get introduced to Vessemir (who is another kind of like father figure to Ciri and teaches the Witcher's ethical code of duty, sacrifice, and integrity) and even is called "Uncle Vesemir" by Ciri herself. And then I start to see Geralt and Ciri running down and they are having some fun, and it just reminds me of the great Joel and Ellie scenes we had (especially the musuem scene). We also get introduced to a badass monster antagonist (the Wild Hunt) in a dream, and then emperor emhyr who is the biological father of Ciri, who is someone who prioritizes power in the most brutal way possible, so kind of like a tyrannical power. Ciri dislikes and avoids him because all Emhyr wants to do is use her as political tool and control her, and eventually why she considers Geralt her true father. This is who gives you the task to find Ciri and eventually we meet Bloody Baron as a side character who is also written so well, probabaly written better than any TLOU2 character. He is not a black and white character, as he is cruel and abusive and a drunk, but he also acts as a loving father, traumatized by his past actions, and trying to fix his broken family. And that is how you write a complex side character.

And HOLY COW, the PACING, let me say that again, THE PACING is already so much better. Like when we are having flashbacks or switching to a character, it never feels forced. For example, when Geralt goes to Baron to ask where Ciri went, and he starts explaining that Ciri was at Baron's castle, we transition into what happened in that moment, but we are playing as Ciri, which is so much better, and is exactly what the second game should have done. Play 1 hr of Ellie than Abby, than Ellie, etc.

I only just played a few hours into the game, but these characters are already so much more interesting, more compelling, and more immersive than any character in TLOU2 was, and I just started! And I also heard toward the end, although a bit short, there is a signficant series of father-daughter bonding moments between Geralt and Ciri when they meet, and I am looking forward to it. This game just feels like the devs care for their characters, care about what the fans want, and actually can WRITE A GOOD, COMPELLING STORY.

I was currently looking for something that would heal my wounds of how traumatic TLOU2 was, and this, Witcher 3 might be it. It feels like I have a new set of characters I can connect to, that I have faith that the writers won't destroy unlike another person named Neil. And another thing I love about this game so far is the choices you make in this game matters, and it leads to different endings or storylines. Something I wish TLOU2 did.