For most of the game, she is blinded by her rage stemming from the brutal (but justified) murder of Joel at the hands of Abby, and this propels her to murder hordes of innocent people to get to her, sentencing her friends to death and destroying all of her most vital relationships in the process. Let’s cut to the chase: Ellie’s actions in The Last Of Us Part II are not justified. In my case, I was delighted by the ambition of this narrative, but for many, it was anathema.
#Last of us 2 characters full#
Many people (myself included) bought into that narrative, only to find that in the full release, the story is a lot more morally muddy than we first thought. The entire marketing machine leading up to the game’s release had painted an enticing picture, teasing a justified quest for vengeance in the sequel, in response to the death of a loved one that Ellie cared about. Credit: Naughty Dog.Īs I mentioned in my review, I was never that enamoured with the original game, but I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t rooting for Ellie when I first started digging into the sequel. The cult of personality surrounding Ellie is pretty die-hard, which makes the events of The Last Of Us Part II particularly difficult to stomach for some. Due to the strong emotional bonds formed while playing 2013’s The Last Of Us (and its Ellie-focused expansion, Left Behind), millions claim that she is one of the best characters to ever grace the medium. It’s useful to ground this discussion with some important context: Ellie is one of gaming’s most beloved avatars. It’s safe to say that I have many thoughts about this game, a lot of them still incongruous – but the one thing that I’m desperate to unpack is how it made me give up on a character that I really cared about. It’s been three weeks since I rolled credits on The Last Of Us Part II, and it is only now that I feel like I’ve had enough time to process the complex events of the narrative. And all it took was a name.**Spoiler Warning: This article discusses major plot details from The Last Of Us Part II** It’s subtle, but gives an entire back story to someone that in other games might just be any old NPC (non-player character). They do this thing where when you kill a random enemy, one of their allies might cry out “Steve!” or “Jill!” or whatever. But each death takes an emotional toll on the character and, I would argue, on the player.
I’m not saying killing in this game isn’t part of it. Take Call of Duty or some other shooter game where your goal is to just ratchet up the highest body count. In most games, for instance, murder costs nothing, and is often largely the point of playing. One thing that really stuck with me was the level of detail and care they put into hammering home the points they were trying to make. It was a feeling few games really give me, which is why it felt like more than a game? I made the allusion to an interactive film, given the numerous cut-scenes and story development cinematics. It left me sad and exhausted, as you say, but you have to marvel at the storytelling. At the end I was scared to finish because I was so worried what Ellie might do, and that’s a feeling I’ve never had in a game.
What struck you as the most novel thing about the sequel?Ĭonor: How emotional it made me. Kind of like what an actual zombie apocalypse might look like. The way they are willing to kill off characters made me feel a sense of, I don’t know, unease? Like the world they inhabit is actually dangerous, and that no one is really safe. I won’t go too heavily into spoilers, but I appreciated some of the risks the studio decided to take here right from the get-go. But sad movies aren’t fun either, and I found the game interesting and worthwhile in that it told an effective story and expanded my sense of what big-budget games can do.
Conor: If you find this fun in the traditional sense, you’re twisted.
0 kommentar(er)
