PixlBit

So, Chessa and I just started this last night and I have to say, thus far, I'm not impressed. Not sure exactly how far I am, but I'd wager that I played for somewhere between 2 and 3 hours. I just got out into the city area and we're in some crumbling building with clickers abound.

This part feels like the true beginning of the game and it's taken much longer to get there than expected. Didn't really care for how they set up the narrative either. Seeing Joel's daughter get killed felt a bit tactless and something that should've been worked into the middle of the game. Regardless, the characters haven't really grabbed me yet and the gameplay feels like the more tedious parts of Uncharted.

I'll keep posting in this thread as I get through the game, so expect spoilers going forward, which I'll do my best to black out, like above.

The game's story wouldn't work if that happened halfway through, trust me.

Meh, I wasn't interested in Last of Us.  I think I was kinda bummed to see Naughty dog go the "M" rating route.  I don't know why.

Interesting to see the critiques after the love fest for this game last year, but to be fair, I think most that did enjoy it have pointed out that the first part is a bit slow, like Greenman is doing.

Perhaps its taste, but the game totally worked for me on most levels. I dug the most things about it, with a few gameplay annoyances being my big complaints. To each his own I guess...

Alright, so I just met Bill, which for those who have played it means that Tess is dead. Was fully expecting her to become infected, so it was no surprise when it played out. It was nice to see a little sunlight for a change though when I got to the aforementioned part.

Not sure how long I've been playing at this point, but I'm a bit disappointed that there hasn't been more character building at this point. Furthermore, the entire dynamic of the current world is still kind of vague. What's the military up to? How about them Fireflies? Feels like they should've started pulling the covers back on some of this either through dialog or via in-game events.

Oh well. In any event, I'll be back with another update tomorrow night.

Alright, next update. I just arrived in Pittsburgh. I'm afraid it's going to be another slog through lots of combat-oriented sections, which I don't think the game does particularly well. On a less negative note, I really enjoyed the interactions between Bill and Ellie. They gave each other hell, but it always seemed to be good natured. Creeping through the backyards in Bill's town was another good segment. Of course, that all seemed to go to hell once I got inside the school, which culminated with that awful bloater battle.

Narratively the game doesn't seem to have gone anywhere yet and the character development has been very light still. I won't deny that I'm a more mechanics-oriented gamer, but I don't feel like this game is progressing steadily enough. I think 2 hours of gameplay was dragged into 6 and it's really killing the pacing for me. We'll see how things progress in this next section tonight, but I'm hoping to begins to pick up.

Prognosis thus far: still not impressed with this one, don't know if it's ever going to click. It's starting to feel like Bioshock Infinite where I kept waiting for it to get good and it just never happened.

Until next time...

You perceive Bill and Ellie's interactions as 'good natured'?

Interesting..

For sure. Seemed more like good ribbing than anything else. I mean Bill is clearly batshit insane, however, he seemed to warm to her because she could hold her own in his presence. Maybe I'm misreading it, but it never seemed really negative.

I always thought he was overly insane, therefore trusted no one. Sure, he helps Joel and Ellie, but he also owed Joel a favor if I'm correct. I think his interactions with Ellie was more along the lines of tolerating, not accepting.

Alright, next update: I'm just about at the bridge in Pittsburgh. Again, not much has really been going on, other than cutting my way through droves of hunters. Joel is starting to let Ellie in emotionally, but that was but a brief moment in this latest venture. I can't help but feel like so many of these areas could've been trimmed to better move the narrative along. Right now, it feels like there's just too much tedium.

Best I can perceive, the defining quality of The Last of Us is its narrative and its characters, but they so often feel like they're on the back burner to the mediocre action and stealth. I'm admittedly not a designer at Naughty Dog, but it really does feel like they padded the experience to reach some hour count. Anyway, tonight I should be on to whatever is beyond Pittsburgh and hopefully they start doubling down on the human parts of the game and less on the action, because it's all starting to wear thin on me.

Just made it to Pittsburgh myself. Am I the only one that thinks Bill is gay? I never realized it before until now, but the end of Bill's town after the school makes me think he is. Could explain why he's slightly nicer to Joel and colder to Ellie..

Plus, that was obviously a male themed porn in which Ellie stole from Bill's hideout. Why else would she ask Joel how he walks with that thing. 

Oh, for sure, Bill is definitely gay. Frank was his "partner," yeah, that kind of partner.

I made my way out of Pittsburgh last night and am now crawling through the sewers with the guy and his brother from the end of Pittsburgh, can't remember their names. Been enjoying the interaction with those two since I linked up with them. Expecting the action to kick in again any minute now, which is a bummer because this "down time" is where The Last of Us shines.

We'll see what tonight brings, hoping that I'm getting to the "good parts" soon.

 He is quite obviously. He has a boyfriend for crying out loud! Or had... anyway. 

 Anyway, the game is pretty good, but has quite a number of problems, mostly to do with pacing. As stated before, it does seem like they were forced to reach some arbirtrary hour count.

There are huge pacing problems in this game. Too much action, with the narrative being pushed to the backburner. Quite frankly, I'm at the point where I just want to get through it and move on. Interested enough to see how the narrative wraps, but that's about it. The characters are very human, but Naughty Dog really overestimated the tolerability of the gameplay. It's a drag on the experience and has really skewed my perception of the game. It's like Bioshock Infinite all over again, except here the narrative isn't total shit.

 I don't feel like the gameplay here is bad. If you want bad gameplay, play the Uncharted games. Seriously, I don't get why I used to like 2, replaying it, it's like the most boring game I've ever played. But the gameplay isn't that bad in The Last of Us It's tense and exhilerating at times.  But there is too much of it. They've shown how well the down time works, and honestly, we could do without a number of the action scenes. If I were designing the game, I'd have more downtime, and less action so it was more impactful. Really, it's the quiet moments that make the game, and there really are some emotional gut punches that just work better than any game I've played. 

 However, towards the end of the game, I was actually asking "When the fuck is this going to end?" Seriously, there's a gameplay section in a tunnel right at the end of the game. When you get to it, you'll know what I mean, and no spoilers, but it's fucking tedious. Not only is it tedious, but it shouldn't be there. It KILLS the pacing  that has been building to the end. Absolutely OBLITERATES it. It's an extra half hour that should have been scrapped entirely.

Ugh.. I can't believe I missed that last time.

Anyway Nick, you're currently meeting one of my favorite character now, Ish. His story is presented like Dark Souls though, and you only ever hear of him through notes and collectibles, so keep an eye out!

See, I can actually tolerate what Uncharted serves up and enjoyed both 2 and 3 quite a bit, despite most people shitting on 3. Neither masquerades as a stealth game like The Last of Us does. As someone who's very into the stealth subgenre, this is bad stealth. Reminds me of the newer Splinter Cell games, which I disliked for the same reason.

It could also be that there's just too much action and it really exposes the flaws, but I'm just sick to death of the encounters at this point. The game is at its best when you slow down to smell the roses. If I were reviewing this one, it's currently on track for 3/5. It's not the worst thing I've ever played, but it certainly wouldn't have touched my GOTY list for 2013.

Literally just finished this up - thank god. What a mediocre experience. The narrative wasn't anything special and I felt that the obvious conclusion to any given encounter with other humans was always what happened. Even the way the game wrapped is exactly what I expected all along. I guess I really just don't know what was so special about this one. Now don't get me wrong, I liked Ellie's character quite a bit and her dialog and reactions were the only thing interesting during the entire quest.

Looking back on it, I stand by my initial feeling that the loss of Joel's daughter should've happened later in the game. It would've brought into great clarity why he was so closed off to Ellie and what made him the man he was.

Anyway, I know a lot of people referred to some "emotional gut punches" in the game, particularly in Winter. Anybody care to shed some light on what exactly hit that chord for you. I can't remember anything in particular that really hit me emotionally. The constant reminder of dead kids seemed a bit unnecessary and nothing more than a cheap attempt to play on your emotions.

Overall, I can't help but feel completely meh about the whole thing.

I really don't see exactly how Sarah dying later would have made it more clear. I knew exactly why he acted the way she did because of that intro.

I didn't want it moved back for clarity. Obviously his actions are a result of that, which is why I didn't like it being frontloaded. I'd rather Joel have been something of a conundrum rather than just a cold dick for obvious reasons. It would've given the event more weight when it was revealed and it would've brought into clarity at that point why Joel has been this way since the beginning. It could've also left his daughter's status as an open question, because 20 years later he could've been separated from her for a lot of reasons.

As it stands, I feel like they did it in the most uneventful and least emotional way possible, leaving no room for character development or discovery for the entire front end of the game. I just thought it could've been approached in a much more interesting way that allowed for better expostion.

I never really felt that, it was never really about why he felt that way to me, just that he felt that way. I would have been predicting that the whole way through if they introduced it later, it would have just been a low payoff to something pretty obvious that would have distracted from his relationship with Ellie, which was the real focus of the story.

There wasn't much going on, so I'm not sure what it would've distracted us from. Regardless, it's not really all that important. I didn't find Joel to do anything unbelievable or unexpected. I saw a father behaving like a father would. His actions, straight up to the very last moment of the game were completely expected. He loved Ellie like a daughter, even when he kept her at a distance (as demonstrated by his actions), so I guess I would've liked there to be something else to focus on and pad out the game's endless trash mobs.

Maybe the beauty of this game is seeing Joel behave in a very human way, but it didn't do anything for me. And if that is the case, I would've liked more interaction between the two, especially in non-combat situations. Apparently nothing of note happened between Pittsburgh and Colorado, because they completely omitted it, but it seems like that would've been a great opportunity to see the two coexisting as they crossed the countryside. The narrative is supposedly the special part of the game, but they're more than happy to throw the player into encounter after encounter with barely a break in between. That was the tiring and slow part of the game, not the actual slow parts. I think Blake was spot on when he said that the game was padded to high hell. It took me 14 hours and I wish it lasted half as long.

Reviewed Left Behind for Rotorob if anyone's curious on it. Also being called a fanboy for liking the game on the site' Facebook page, I'm so happy. I feel like a real critic.

Its interesting to find that others arent head over heels for TLOU. I thought everyone loved it. 

'Cept me. I tried to get into it twice...now its gonna get the good old trade treatment. Too slow for me. Plus...im tired of zombie apocalypses.