Unfortunately flawed and wasted potential for what could have been a 10/10 game. Expectations were always going to be high following up The Last of Us, one of the most universally praised and critically acclaimed games of the last decade, and a personal favourite of mine. I actually don't mind the premise, but its execution was mediocre and over-ambitious. The story is unnecessarily bloated with uninteresting sections of gameplay which stretch out for hours of the game with the occasional remarkable high point that just about makes the slog worth it. The gameplay and immersive world building however does help push through the almost 30 hours of gametime with much of the environmental storytelling being some of the best I've ever experienced. The world feels real and immersive despite the flaws of the story which is taking place in it. I want to reiterate however that the gameplay, graphics, and overall feel of the game is phenomenal and worth giving the game a go just to see the absolute peak capabilities of this generation of console. The weapons are diverse, and the level design lets you utilise many different playstyles and experiment with your variety of weapons alongside the stealth mechanics which have been expanded on from the first game.

The fact I'm even going into this much detail for a review I wouldn't even be arsed to read myself should tell you something about the strong feelings I and many others have towards both this game individually and as a series. I really want to love it but there's so much that just holds it back for me. There are so many elephants in the room I don't even know which one to address first.
-Spoilers-
I think what made me really enjoy The Last of Us 1 was the balance between the cruel and unjust world which is presented and the small sprinklings of hope and beauty which surrounds even the most horrible place imaginable. I'm thinking parts like with Ellie at the zoo with the giraffes or just generally how beautiful some of the destroyed cities look with nature reclaiming them. The bleakness which really starts to bring you down after a while all feels worth it when you get these small moments hope and joy, even at the lowest points of the world it’s just nice to know that life goes on and is still worth living. My biggest problem with The Last of Us Part II might actually be that I never felt this spark of hope once. I felt sad. And miserable. Angry even. But I never felt hope. I think they tried it at one point with the aquarium but that didn’t really work for me. Actually scratch that I did feel it a little, but only in the flashback scenes. And these scenes were always overridden with the knowledge that this was all in the past and all the knowledge that all that lies in the future is torment and pain. It’s the sort of bittersweet feeling you get when remembering the good times you had with a friend or pet which has passed away. And this is alright in its own way, but it isn’t what The Last of Us means to me. It’s just too fucking bleak.

So, the elephants in the room. They killed my boy Joel. At first I did hate this, I hated the brutal way which it was executed, and I hated what I knew it would lead to. Though as the game went on and I thought more rationally, it makes sense for the story to go in this direction.

And the other elephant in the room, Abby. Like many others, I hated Abby at first. That’s not to say I love her now, and for much of the game I merely tolerated her as a medium for good gameplay. She’s an okay character in the end, but for about 7 of the 10 hours you play her for, she’s a bit of an unlikeable knobhead. I would also argue that the character development feels strangely rushed for someone you spend so much time with, like they waited until more than half of her gameplay was complete until she switches slightly too quickly for what to me felt realistic. And whilst a lot of Ellie’s gameplay was quite forgettable and unremarkable, Abby has some of the best set-pieces splashed in between some of the most mundane and uninterested exploration in the series. Although I admit that parts of day 2 and day 3 were some of the best in the series in contrast, especially with that skyscraper section and the island raid section.

And that about leads me onto the ending. I thought it was okay, if underwhelming. I can picture the fight on the beach being really brutal and cinematic if it were in a well shot film, but executing this in a game is much harder and that’s easy to see. Not saying that I want this series to be cinematic, I like the gritty and grounded approach which separates this from the Uncharted series. But certain moments need to feel grander to keep me engaged and emotionally connected to the story. I don’t mind how it ends though. Maybe a bit too grim, but I wouldn’t have wanted Ellie to kill Abby. Despite what I’ve heard some people say I think that would be terrible and cause the story to feel way too straightforward and basic. Ellie grew as a character in the end (as well as Abby) as they both learnt the consequences of revenge. An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind or whatever. And I think that’s what the developers intended when you had that final battle. You don’t really want to kill Abby, but Ellie’s lust for revenge and justice has led her to this point, not considering that this lust is the same thing which led to Joel being killed in the first place. Though it’s clear that by the reaction of most people to this game, this wasn’t executed well as most people still despise Abby. Maybe the game’s terrible pacing is at fault for this, or maybe Abby is an irredeemable dick. I don’t really know the answer to this and although I’ve thought about ways in which the directors vision could have been executed better, the bottom line is that the game was just too ambitious. This is such a long game and there’s so much more I want to say but I think I’ll wrap it up on that. I did enjoy it, and although this series has concluded (?) with a lingering feeling of disappointment, I think, like Joel, I would do it all over again…