This review contains spoilers
The following longpost is more or less a detailed summary of a collection of my thoughts written up immediately after finishing the Last Of Us Remastered one evening and internalizing my thoughts in the breaks inbetween playing it. These are just my own thoughts and experiences regarding the game, and it's perfectly okay if you don't agree with me!
The Last of Us has been a game which has been acclaimed and hyped as this revolutionary groundbreaking title that not only won GOTY award after award, but is also considered one of the greatest video games of all time by many publications. And I've had a couple of friends tell me it's an experience worth having. Needless to say, the expectations were definitely raised quite high for years, and I didn't get to experience The Last of Us until recently, when I picked up a PS5. Unfortunately, this was one of those rare occasions where I felt a bit let down and the overall game and experience did not fully resonate and click with me.
I suppose the main breaking factor for me was the combat. I understand that the combat in The Last Of Us is meant to feel punishing, shaky, and in a sense "feel bad," and I respect that decision. But the game's AI and mechanics turn this punishing combat into a bit of a finicky and contradicting mess; essentially, I feel that the combat lacks a bit of focus. Because combat is meant to be this grueling and costly exercise, you're encouraged to stealth past enemies whenever possible. But personally, I found stealth to be somewhat unreliable, because enemy AI often have randomized patrol patterns (I confirmed this through other hubs on the internet as well to ensure I wasn't the only one going through this) and because enemies are surprisingly quite good at spotting you from a distance or have much larger peripheral vision than you'd expect. There were also several occasions where I was tailing enemies for a stealth take down only for the enemy to suddenly turn around or be alerted, which left me short out of luck. Needless to say, I tried the stealth approach whenever possible, but due to the above reasons, I often got caught one way or another. So because I was trying to play optimally and conserve ammo for the big fights/required fights in the game (such as the bloater in the gymnasium, some zombie fights in tight hallways or some of the bandit encounters), a lot of these fights either ended up turning into situations where I was mashing the X button (to punch zombies to death) and the square button (to escape being grabbed), with the occasional use of triangle when I got grabbed by a clicker (or being forced to use my weapons if I saw the clicker early enough). As such, most of the early combat was me reloading sequences over and over because stealth was not working out and I didn't have the resources to comfortably fight off the mobs, and this is extremely punishing in the early game when you don't have the shiv upgrade (or enough shivs to begin with) to fight off clickers that will end your run. This definitely becomes less of a problem once you get better weapons and equipment upgrades as the game progresses, but regardless, this unreliability of stealth was a giant deterrent playing through the game and especially soured my experience playing through the early game. Again, I understand that this is intentional game design, but to me it turned this part of the game that was supposed to be difficult into a part of the game that became tedious, and as a result, interfered with my ability to progress the narrative and enjoy the game as a whole.
Regarding the story, I think it's fine. Not exceptional mind you, it does play out like a lot of post apocalyptic zombie narratives I've read/viewed before, but it's engaging enough to keep you going to see what happens next. So the narrative itself is not what I take issue with. What I take issue with (and this is where I admit I may be expecting too much) is how the story is often told. I'll admit that I'm looking for an immersive "show not tell" method of story telling in my video games, sort of similar to how games like Journey or Shadow of the Colossus manage to marry storytelling with game mechanics and gameplay. (If I sound like TotalBiscuit and Josef Fares here, let's just say that I do appreciate their commentary regarding gameplay and storytelling and often look to them for the path forward.) And the Last of Us both does that and doesn't do that. I feel the Last of Us uses cutscenes too much. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but I think the Last of Us's most powerful moments are when it tries not to be a game and just lets you savor the moment as Joel. Some of those moments include every peaceful interlude where Joel and Ellie are just chatting, the opening of The Last of Us, Joel hanging from the ceiling desperately tearing down zombies while Ellie frantically hacks at the rope (thank god you don't have to worry about your ammo there as per the UI, Naughty Dog made the right decision there), and running while holding Ellie escaping the hospital. More of that would have done the Last of Us justice, but unfortunately the majority of the most important storytelling takes place via cutscenes where you aren't in control of Joel, and that really cuts through my immersion when The Last of Us has proven it knows how to make you feel like you're actually Joel. So I'll repeat that I understand this sounds very nitpicky, but when I think about The Last of Us's storytelling, I just see lost potential. I think on this frontier, it was so close but ultimately tried too hard to be a movie instead of a video game, and it suffers and left me a little disappointed for this.
Now I realize I've been somewhat critical of The Last of Us but still gave it 2.5 stars, so I'll go into the things I actually like. As mentioned above, when the Last of Us focuses on instilling meaning and emotion in its sequences rather than focusing on combat gameplay mechanics (see the paragraph above for some of the moments that I found to be quite powerful), it gets the point across very well and does indeed evoke a wide range of emotions. Playing as Ellie struggling to crawl to the knife as David watches and taunts you; playing as Joel limping to the university doors while his vision blurs and a raider charges at him so he's forced to scramble and pull the trigger; even some of those moment interspersed with quicktime events such as Joel getting stuck in the drowning bus and grasping desperately for the handles after repeatedly trying to bust open the compartment. These are all experiences that focus less on gameplay mechanics and more on making the player savor the moment, and Naughty Dog pulls it off well. It's also worth mentioning that this game has fantastic atmosphere thanks to the sound design (you absolutely can feel the tension when you hear footsteps and barking orders all around you) and the graphics as a whole. The Last of Us is definitely one of the prettiest looking games out there, and it manages to both capture beauty in the tranquil abandoned levels and danger in the sinister basements and stuffy buildings that zombies and raiders alike have holed up in. And of course, the soundtrack is quite good, sounding lush and melancholic when there a moment of peace and frenetic and menacing when you get caught in combat or need to escape your foes.
So is the Last of Us overrated? I think in the sense that I felt the Last of Us did not live up to the nearly universal praise and groundbreaking game design that publications have heaped upon it (in my eyes at least), yes, I could see that The Last of Us is overrated. Mind you, I don't think The Last of Us is inherently a bad game because I can see its potential and it does in fact do many things quite well. Ellie and Joel are very believable and dynamic characters, and watching their personalities evolve over the course of the story through their changing interactions is definitely one of the big draws of the game. That said, I think the Last of Us could have been so much more. It definitely doesn't help that many big name games look at the Last of Us as this pinnacle of game design and storytelling and proceeded to do both so much worse. But it's not The Last of Us's fault that it's stuck as the poster child for big budget Hollywood esque titles as it is its derivations. I gave this game an honest shot and maybe it is just a difference of game taste and opinion at the end of the day; who am I to tell you what not to like and like? After all, I can see why people would like The Last of Us. It just wasn't the title for me and definitely wasn't the experience that made me remember why I play video games.
The Last of Us has been a game which has been acclaimed and hyped as this revolutionary groundbreaking title that not only won GOTY award after award, but is also considered one of the greatest video games of all time by many publications. And I've had a couple of friends tell me it's an experience worth having. Needless to say, the expectations were definitely raised quite high for years, and I didn't get to experience The Last of Us until recently, when I picked up a PS5. Unfortunately, this was one of those rare occasions where I felt a bit let down and the overall game and experience did not fully resonate and click with me.
I suppose the main breaking factor for me was the combat. I understand that the combat in The Last Of Us is meant to feel punishing, shaky, and in a sense "feel bad," and I respect that decision. But the game's AI and mechanics turn this punishing combat into a bit of a finicky and contradicting mess; essentially, I feel that the combat lacks a bit of focus. Because combat is meant to be this grueling and costly exercise, you're encouraged to stealth past enemies whenever possible. But personally, I found stealth to be somewhat unreliable, because enemy AI often have randomized patrol patterns (I confirmed this through other hubs on the internet as well to ensure I wasn't the only one going through this) and because enemies are surprisingly quite good at spotting you from a distance or have much larger peripheral vision than you'd expect. There were also several occasions where I was tailing enemies for a stealth take down only for the enemy to suddenly turn around or be alerted, which left me short out of luck. Needless to say, I tried the stealth approach whenever possible, but due to the above reasons, I often got caught one way or another. So because I was trying to play optimally and conserve ammo for the big fights/required fights in the game (such as the bloater in the gymnasium, some zombie fights in tight hallways or some of the bandit encounters), a lot of these fights either ended up turning into situations where I was mashing the X button (to punch zombies to death) and the square button (to escape being grabbed), with the occasional use of triangle when I got grabbed by a clicker (or being forced to use my weapons if I saw the clicker early enough). As such, most of the early combat was me reloading sequences over and over because stealth was not working out and I didn't have the resources to comfortably fight off the mobs, and this is extremely punishing in the early game when you don't have the shiv upgrade (or enough shivs to begin with) to fight off clickers that will end your run. This definitely becomes less of a problem once you get better weapons and equipment upgrades as the game progresses, but regardless, this unreliability of stealth was a giant deterrent playing through the game and especially soured my experience playing through the early game. Again, I understand that this is intentional game design, but to me it turned this part of the game that was supposed to be difficult into a part of the game that became tedious, and as a result, interfered with my ability to progress the narrative and enjoy the game as a whole.
Regarding the story, I think it's fine. Not exceptional mind you, it does play out like a lot of post apocalyptic zombie narratives I've read/viewed before, but it's engaging enough to keep you going to see what happens next. So the narrative itself is not what I take issue with. What I take issue with (and this is where I admit I may be expecting too much) is how the story is often told. I'll admit that I'm looking for an immersive "show not tell" method of story telling in my video games, sort of similar to how games like Journey or Shadow of the Colossus manage to marry storytelling with game mechanics and gameplay. (If I sound like TotalBiscuit and Josef Fares here, let's just say that I do appreciate their commentary regarding gameplay and storytelling and often look to them for the path forward.) And the Last of Us both does that and doesn't do that. I feel the Last of Us uses cutscenes too much. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but I think the Last of Us's most powerful moments are when it tries not to be a game and just lets you savor the moment as Joel. Some of those moments include every peaceful interlude where Joel and Ellie are just chatting, the opening of The Last of Us, Joel hanging from the ceiling desperately tearing down zombies while Ellie frantically hacks at the rope (thank god you don't have to worry about your ammo there as per the UI, Naughty Dog made the right decision there), and running while holding Ellie escaping the hospital. More of that would have done the Last of Us justice, but unfortunately the majority of the most important storytelling takes place via cutscenes where you aren't in control of Joel, and that really cuts through my immersion when The Last of Us has proven it knows how to make you feel like you're actually Joel. So I'll repeat that I understand this sounds very nitpicky, but when I think about The Last of Us's storytelling, I just see lost potential. I think on this frontier, it was so close but ultimately tried too hard to be a movie instead of a video game, and it suffers and left me a little disappointed for this.
Now I realize I've been somewhat critical of The Last of Us but still gave it 2.5 stars, so I'll go into the things I actually like. As mentioned above, when the Last of Us focuses on instilling meaning and emotion in its sequences rather than focusing on combat gameplay mechanics (see the paragraph above for some of the moments that I found to be quite powerful), it gets the point across very well and does indeed evoke a wide range of emotions. Playing as Ellie struggling to crawl to the knife as David watches and taunts you; playing as Joel limping to the university doors while his vision blurs and a raider charges at him so he's forced to scramble and pull the trigger; even some of those moment interspersed with quicktime events such as Joel getting stuck in the drowning bus and grasping desperately for the handles after repeatedly trying to bust open the compartment. These are all experiences that focus less on gameplay mechanics and more on making the player savor the moment, and Naughty Dog pulls it off well. It's also worth mentioning that this game has fantastic atmosphere thanks to the sound design (you absolutely can feel the tension when you hear footsteps and barking orders all around you) and the graphics as a whole. The Last of Us is definitely one of the prettiest looking games out there, and it manages to both capture beauty in the tranquil abandoned levels and danger in the sinister basements and stuffy buildings that zombies and raiders alike have holed up in. And of course, the soundtrack is quite good, sounding lush and melancholic when there a moment of peace and frenetic and menacing when you get caught in combat or need to escape your foes.
So is the Last of Us overrated? I think in the sense that I felt the Last of Us did not live up to the nearly universal praise and groundbreaking game design that publications have heaped upon it (in my eyes at least), yes, I could see that The Last of Us is overrated. Mind you, I don't think The Last of Us is inherently a bad game because I can see its potential and it does in fact do many things quite well. Ellie and Joel are very believable and dynamic characters, and watching their personalities evolve over the course of the story through their changing interactions is definitely one of the big draws of the game. That said, I think the Last of Us could have been so much more. It definitely doesn't help that many big name games look at the Last of Us as this pinnacle of game design and storytelling and proceeded to do both so much worse. But it's not The Last of Us's fault that it's stuck as the poster child for big budget Hollywood esque titles as it is its derivations. I gave this game an honest shot and maybe it is just a difference of game taste and opinion at the end of the day; who am I to tell you what not to like and like? After all, I can see why people would like The Last of Us. It just wasn't the title for me and definitely wasn't the experience that made me remember why I play video games.