Extrapolating on the lore of The Last of Us isn’t really something I think is necessary. The game doesn’t hide too much from its audience in terms of its character’s backgrounds that fuel their personalities and role in their calamitous situation. If it did, the game probably wouldn’t be as lauded as it is, but I already drained all the possible vitriol I have for this game while discussing the material in the base game. This is why Left Behind, the additional downloadable content campaign for The Last of Us, feels more like an opportunistic draw to light another match on the roaring hot flame that The Last of Us created rather than filling any holes in the narrative mold for artistic purposes. Nevertheless, Naughty Dog found it imperative to give the players a closer glimpse into Ellie’s past in Boston before meeting Joel and the period of the base game in Colorado where Ellie is nursing a wounded Joel back to health.
Ellie controls the same way she did the base game here in her solo DLC campaign. She’s physically weaker than Joel in both offense and defense on account of her being an adolescent girl who is still growing (but is probably devastatingly malnourished). However, she compensates for her lack of strength with her youthful scrappiness, making the stealth sections easier by simply plunging a blade into her enemies quickly as opposed to the struggle of snapping their necks that Joel performs. Left Behind features zero new weapons, so the player should already be an Ellie expert for their time playing as her in the main game. I argue that the developers should’ve introduced at least one new tool to use against the hostile elements that exist around them, but perhaps it would’ve been nonsensical for Ellie to find a new contraption just to abandon it when the DLC circles back around to the events of the base game.
Left Behind alternates between the relatively recent past before Joel met Ellie and the present predicament of finding Joel medical supplies so he doesn’t bleed out on the cold mattress he’s lying on and leave Ellie on her lonesome. The relevance between the two periods of Ellie’s life is that the past section highlights the last moments she spent with her dear friend (and potential lover) Riley. Riley is summoned by Fireflies leader Marlene to join her on a mission elsewhere outside of the Boston area, so she treats Ellie to one last hurrah of fun in an abandoned shopping mall before she parts to serve the resistance. Either that, or the joyous atmosphere she’s creating for her and Ellie is an attempt to make Ellie beg her to stay so she’ll have a reason not to leave. Using their imagination to reignite the neon sparkle spectacle of a pre-apocalypse shopping mall, the girls have a grand ol’ time together. That is, until they accidentally provoke a horde of infected by playing some music a little too loudly, resulting in both of them getting bit and waiting out the inevitable like MacReady and Childs in the Antarctic. While Left Behind doesn’t add any weapons or tools, the lighthearted gameplay mechanics used during the various sections with the squirt gun battle and Ellie revisioning a boss battle in a defunct arcade fighter with the button combinations are fairly fresh and enjoyable.
Riley being bitten by an infected person is not a shocking gut punch of a conclusion, but that is not the intention. Ellie has mentioned that Riley was one of her fallen comrades at the end of the base game, so those who are crushed by Left Behind’s ending were not paying attention. The purpose that the contrasting sequences have is to showcase that Ellie hurts as much from the effects of the spore infection as Joel does and that she is as afraid of losing him as he is her. The girl’s camaraderie in the most mirthful moments The Last of Us offers is actually infectious, putting the hidden beauty of the apocalypse into a perspective that was not apparent in the base game. We jump back and forth from these cherished memories to times of trouble not only to present a dichotomy between the pleasant past and the perilous present, but how Ellie desperately does not want to endure the tragic pain of losing someone close to her again and is emotionally prepared for the worst case scenario because of it. It makes us respect her decision at the end of the base game even more and resent Joel at the same level for his.
Like the base game it stems from, The Last of Us: Left Behind succeeds on its narrative strengths while neglecting the gameplay. All it offers is character development for the deuteragonist by letting us become privy to her tragic struggles we’re already aware of and not much else. The few quirky moments in the mall slightly mix in some unfamiliar elements, but the game treats these sections as flippantly as the girls do by flatlining the stakes of them. Considering this DLC did not come as a free extension at its initial PS3 release, I’d feel ripped off if I paid for this paltry piece of content (I have the remastered version on the PS4 where Left Behind is included for free). I guess the conclusion is to simply watch all content involving The Last of Us for its full effect. Hey, it seems like what Naughty Dog wants.
...
Make an arcade port of Jak X a real thing, you cowards.
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Attribution: https://erockreviews.blogspot.com
Ellie controls the same way she did the base game here in her solo DLC campaign. She’s physically weaker than Joel in both offense and defense on account of her being an adolescent girl who is still growing (but is probably devastatingly malnourished). However, she compensates for her lack of strength with her youthful scrappiness, making the stealth sections easier by simply plunging a blade into her enemies quickly as opposed to the struggle of snapping their necks that Joel performs. Left Behind features zero new weapons, so the player should already be an Ellie expert for their time playing as her in the main game. I argue that the developers should’ve introduced at least one new tool to use against the hostile elements that exist around them, but perhaps it would’ve been nonsensical for Ellie to find a new contraption just to abandon it when the DLC circles back around to the events of the base game.
Left Behind alternates between the relatively recent past before Joel met Ellie and the present predicament of finding Joel medical supplies so he doesn’t bleed out on the cold mattress he’s lying on and leave Ellie on her lonesome. The relevance between the two periods of Ellie’s life is that the past section highlights the last moments she spent with her dear friend (and potential lover) Riley. Riley is summoned by Fireflies leader Marlene to join her on a mission elsewhere outside of the Boston area, so she treats Ellie to one last hurrah of fun in an abandoned shopping mall before she parts to serve the resistance. Either that, or the joyous atmosphere she’s creating for her and Ellie is an attempt to make Ellie beg her to stay so she’ll have a reason not to leave. Using their imagination to reignite the neon sparkle spectacle of a pre-apocalypse shopping mall, the girls have a grand ol’ time together. That is, until they accidentally provoke a horde of infected by playing some music a little too loudly, resulting in both of them getting bit and waiting out the inevitable like MacReady and Childs in the Antarctic. While Left Behind doesn’t add any weapons or tools, the lighthearted gameplay mechanics used during the various sections with the squirt gun battle and Ellie revisioning a boss battle in a defunct arcade fighter with the button combinations are fairly fresh and enjoyable.
Riley being bitten by an infected person is not a shocking gut punch of a conclusion, but that is not the intention. Ellie has mentioned that Riley was one of her fallen comrades at the end of the base game, so those who are crushed by Left Behind’s ending were not paying attention. The purpose that the contrasting sequences have is to showcase that Ellie hurts as much from the effects of the spore infection as Joel does and that she is as afraid of losing him as he is her. The girl’s camaraderie in the most mirthful moments The Last of Us offers is actually infectious, putting the hidden beauty of the apocalypse into a perspective that was not apparent in the base game. We jump back and forth from these cherished memories to times of trouble not only to present a dichotomy between the pleasant past and the perilous present, but how Ellie desperately does not want to endure the tragic pain of losing someone close to her again and is emotionally prepared for the worst case scenario because of it. It makes us respect her decision at the end of the base game even more and resent Joel at the same level for his.
Like the base game it stems from, The Last of Us: Left Behind succeeds on its narrative strengths while neglecting the gameplay. All it offers is character development for the deuteragonist by letting us become privy to her tragic struggles we’re already aware of and not much else. The few quirky moments in the mall slightly mix in some unfamiliar elements, but the game treats these sections as flippantly as the girls do by flatlining the stakes of them. Considering this DLC did not come as a free extension at its initial PS3 release, I’d feel ripped off if I paid for this paltry piece of content (I have the remastered version on the PS4 where Left Behind is included for free). I guess the conclusion is to simply watch all content involving The Last of Us for its full effect. Hey, it seems like what Naughty Dog wants.
...
Make an arcade port of Jak X a real thing, you cowards.
------
Attribution: https://erockreviews.blogspot.com