Humans are weird... and complex. We take away from eachother and destroy, but we also care for one another and love. We strive to protect our families from harm but also care for the common good. We endlessly search for the "correct answer" to the ills of life, knowing we may never know what it is do the right thing. The Last of Us 2 is a game about a lot of things, but to me was a game about introspection and redemption.
Guilt, fear, and anger drive our two protagonists into a blood soaked fued across the Pacific Northwest. People you have grown to love in the first game and into the second will be harmed, characters you just met will affect you more than you could ever imagine. It's a different approach from the first game, which had you trekking from the Northeast in Boston all the way west through Denver and the Rockies. This time spend a majority of the game in Seattle, with some time in Jackson, Wyoming. Journey's in media have been my favorite way of telling stories, as it gives the audience an easy avenue to gauge character growth. Two examples I usually give are FullMetal Alchemist and Final Fantasy X. In Edward and Yuna's respective journeys you have moments from beginning to end that you can easily point to in an effort to explain how characters have grown and changed from their moments in the genesis of their quest. Yuna begins FFX as a spry young summoner on a mission to help her people, but the gravity of her situation and mortality turn her into a convicted heroine. Edward jumps into his quest to find the Philosopher's stone in good faith, but matures at an advanced pace one he learns of the consquences in attempting to do so. The Last of Us 1 was this kind of game, Joel and Ellie's relationship begins as a stranger-stranger transaction, but through the course of their physical trek across the plague-torn United States, they grow together and their dynamic changes. Personally, I believe The Last of Us 1 is one of the best written games ever made solely because of this. I feared that in the sequel changing this dynamic up and minimizing the locations visited would alter that for the negative, but it did just the opposite. Time spent with your friends and foes within the city of Seattle allow you to become more tightly knit than I could have imagined. Dina, Jesse, Tommy, Lev, Yara, Owen, Ellie, Abby are flexed in character intricacy and depth. Everybody is complex, and the emphasis on being around these people for as long as you are in the game makes their fates that much more important to you. Neil Druckmann and the Naughty Dog team did the impossible in making a cast as perfectly written as they did in the first title of the series. The city of Seattle is dense yet rich with action and life. It's those moments in traversal, in resting at a campsite, in the dark with your party that drive The Last of Us Part 2. Every major side character in this game has a story to tell, and man if they didn't knock it out of the park in making these stories engaging.
There's a substantial camp of people that have qualms with two moments in this game, spoilers not included, and to them I truely believed they missed the entire point of The Last of Us 1 and 2. It's the fact that a good story doesn't always have the ending you want, and I'm not talking Game of Thrones style. There's no way for humans to perfectly predict how they'll react to trauma, I know I sure haven't. It would be nice to say "Yeah I'll make that person pay for what they did to [INSERT PERSON HERE,]" but how would you know until you're in that moment? Ellie and Abby are two complex and trauma-ridden humans that have a world of hurt stored inside. They've seen and done unspeakable things because they were searching for their "right answer" to their issues. It's almost more of a case study on anger and revenge than it is a game about hunting someone down in a fungal apocalypse. Our two characters carve their own paths and plan their futures by consulting only their hearts, not by subscribing to a Hollywood-esque "plot has to resolve for resolution's sake" plotline.
I am trying to be weary about describing the locations and moments of this game because it's such a feel it for yourself title. Sometimes I like to talk about how beautiful a city or zone is in greater detail, and speak about some of the smaller moments that don't impact the story, but I strongly encourage the reader/player to discover that all on their own. I played on the PS5 patch (thank you Naughty Dog for making this free with the PS4 version) and my mouth was constantly agape at how incredible Seattle and the other locations were in the game. Buildings are complete and believable as places where humans once spent their lives and the cities, oh man the cities. Seriously, play this game and you'll know right away about how well-crafted and built the environments truly are.
The more I return to The Last of Us, the more I know two things. The first is that Troy Baker's job as Joel is probably the best (to this date) performance a voice actor has ever done at converying their character. I know it's a bad idea to make a generalization on something as subjective as that, but he does a perfect job with making Joel feel, real. It doesn't sound like you're listening to an actor read off a script, but like you're talking to a human that's seen more shame and violence than someone should in a hundred lifetimes. He's a concerned father, a veteran of the darkest days in human history, a survivor, and most importantly Ellie's guardian. Speaking of Ellie, my second takeaway is that she's one of my favorite fictional characters. A testament to the job the writing team has done with her, her personality is complex and her story a grave tragedy.
I'm going to have an "All-Time Great Video Game" sized hole in my heart for the forseeable future, I strongly recommend anybody who finished The Last of Us 1 and/or have seen the show to jump on this title and live through the continuation of the story. Open your mind and try to let the story breathe before judging its direction, The Last of Us Part 2 is a landmark of the medium.
Guilt, fear, and anger drive our two protagonists into a blood soaked fued across the Pacific Northwest. People you have grown to love in the first game and into the second will be harmed, characters you just met will affect you more than you could ever imagine. It's a different approach from the first game, which had you trekking from the Northeast in Boston all the way west through Denver and the Rockies. This time spend a majority of the game in Seattle, with some time in Jackson, Wyoming. Journey's in media have been my favorite way of telling stories, as it gives the audience an easy avenue to gauge character growth. Two examples I usually give are FullMetal Alchemist and Final Fantasy X. In Edward and Yuna's respective journeys you have moments from beginning to end that you can easily point to in an effort to explain how characters have grown and changed from their moments in the genesis of their quest. Yuna begins FFX as a spry young summoner on a mission to help her people, but the gravity of her situation and mortality turn her into a convicted heroine. Edward jumps into his quest to find the Philosopher's stone in good faith, but matures at an advanced pace one he learns of the consquences in attempting to do so. The Last of Us 1 was this kind of game, Joel and Ellie's relationship begins as a stranger-stranger transaction, but through the course of their physical trek across the plague-torn United States, they grow together and their dynamic changes. Personally, I believe The Last of Us 1 is one of the best written games ever made solely because of this. I feared that in the sequel changing this dynamic up and minimizing the locations visited would alter that for the negative, but it did just the opposite. Time spent with your friends and foes within the city of Seattle allow you to become more tightly knit than I could have imagined. Dina, Jesse, Tommy, Lev, Yara, Owen, Ellie, Abby are flexed in character intricacy and depth. Everybody is complex, and the emphasis on being around these people for as long as you are in the game makes their fates that much more important to you. Neil Druckmann and the Naughty Dog team did the impossible in making a cast as perfectly written as they did in the first title of the series. The city of Seattle is dense yet rich with action and life. It's those moments in traversal, in resting at a campsite, in the dark with your party that drive The Last of Us Part 2. Every major side character in this game has a story to tell, and man if they didn't knock it out of the park in making these stories engaging.
There's a substantial camp of people that have qualms with two moments in this game, spoilers not included, and to them I truely believed they missed the entire point of The Last of Us 1 and 2. It's the fact that a good story doesn't always have the ending you want, and I'm not talking Game of Thrones style. There's no way for humans to perfectly predict how they'll react to trauma, I know I sure haven't. It would be nice to say "Yeah I'll make that person pay for what they did to [INSERT PERSON HERE,]" but how would you know until you're in that moment? Ellie and Abby are two complex and trauma-ridden humans that have a world of hurt stored inside. They've seen and done unspeakable things because they were searching for their "right answer" to their issues. It's almost more of a case study on anger and revenge than it is a game about hunting someone down in a fungal apocalypse. Our two characters carve their own paths and plan their futures by consulting only their hearts, not by subscribing to a Hollywood-esque "plot has to resolve for resolution's sake" plotline.
I am trying to be weary about describing the locations and moments of this game because it's such a feel it for yourself title. Sometimes I like to talk about how beautiful a city or zone is in greater detail, and speak about some of the smaller moments that don't impact the story, but I strongly encourage the reader/player to discover that all on their own. I played on the PS5 patch (thank you Naughty Dog for making this free with the PS4 version) and my mouth was constantly agape at how incredible Seattle and the other locations were in the game. Buildings are complete and believable as places where humans once spent their lives and the cities, oh man the cities. Seriously, play this game and you'll know right away about how well-crafted and built the environments truly are.
The more I return to The Last of Us, the more I know two things. The first is that Troy Baker's job as Joel is probably the best (to this date) performance a voice actor has ever done at converying their character. I know it's a bad idea to make a generalization on something as subjective as that, but he does a perfect job with making Joel feel, real. It doesn't sound like you're listening to an actor read off a script, but like you're talking to a human that's seen more shame and violence than someone should in a hundred lifetimes. He's a concerned father, a veteran of the darkest days in human history, a survivor, and most importantly Ellie's guardian. Speaking of Ellie, my second takeaway is that she's one of my favorite fictional characters. A testament to the job the writing team has done with her, her personality is complex and her story a grave tragedy.
I'm going to have an "All-Time Great Video Game" sized hole in my heart for the forseeable future, I strongly recommend anybody who finished The Last of Us 1 and/or have seen the show to jump on this title and live through the continuation of the story. Open your mind and try to let the story breathe before judging its direction, The Last of Us Part 2 is a landmark of the medium.