Review | The Last of Us Part II
This review contains spoilers for just about every part of The Last of Us Part II. If you’re good with that, go ahead and read it, but if you’re planning on playing it, I’d recommend waiting until you’re finished.
The Last of Us Part II is monumental. I don’t mean that in the sense that it’s universally good, but that it is a representation of everything that was successful in this generation of consoles. It is the final chiselled form of Sony’s prestige game, the sequel to the game that arguably kicked this whole concept into high gear. It’s a nightmare, so I suppose it’s fit to be the crowning achievement of the PS4.
There were times during The Last of Us Part II when I just wanted to walk away, to close and uninstall the game and forget I’d started. It is so pervasively miserable, so consistently egregious in its brutality and emotional torture that I almost couldn’t deal with it. Maybe it’s a symptom of the times or my own mental situation, but it’s too much, too often. There are no positive story beats that come and go without a soul-crushing counterweight. The funny scenes, the intimate scenes, the warm and fuzzy scenes—all too few and far between. But I finished it, and boy is it a video game that released in 2020.
It probably shouldn’t come as a surprise that Part II can be a dismal grind considering the state of Naughty Dog. A well-documented culture of overworking its employees to the point of hospitalisation and the immediate, defensive coverup amid accusations of sexual abuse in the workplace don’t paint a pretty picture of the “prestige” developer. Hell, they even made some of studio higher ups villains in the game’s trading card universe. When people wonder how the Naughty Dog magic happens, how their games ship with such a high-quality sheen? The answer is talented people being worked into the fucking ground.
Between the game’s massive leaks a few weeks back and the restrictive review embargo, discussion (or arguments, depending on where you look) around the story has been disappointing, to say the least. The countless misinformed or entirely false claims made about Part II’s characters have drowned out actual criticism. It’s 30 hours long on a thorough playthrough, bloated by filler cross-city travel sections and pacing issues. At the same time, it takes some big risks regarding its beloved cast of characters, and an even bigger risk in its structure. Some of those pay off, others absolutely do not.
The big twist, one that comes a fair distance into the game, is that we don’t actually play the whole thing through as Ellie. At the halfway mark, it switches perspective to Abby, the daughter of a Firefly doctor Joel murdered in the first game’s final chapter. I was hesitant about the decision at first, but two things quickly became clear: I’ve never played a triple-A game with a protagonist that looks like Abby, and she slaps.
Abby’s story is defined by her selflessness and her friendships, and those friendships are where Part II shines. Following the trail of destruction that Ellie cuts across Seattle, Abby’s chapters are less lonely, less miserable and magnitudes more enjoyable as a result. In the shadow of the game’s second half, Ellie’s story feels run-of-the-mill and represents the worst of the game’s torture porn tendencies.
The very best parts surround Lev, an escapee from one of the game’s rival factions and near-constant companion through Abby’s chapters. His coming out as trans results in him being cast out as an apostate, hunted by the only bit of civilisation he knew. It’s upsetting that much of his storyline is introduced by being deadnamed and abandoned by his family, and he certainly deserved a better ending than he received, but he’s far and away one of the game’s biggest strengths. Stacey Henley wrote a great piece on why Lev works (and occasionally doesn’t) and I’d encourage you to give it a read. The other cast members aren’t as strong, but none of them stuck out as bad, either.
One of its bigger issues is that I wasn’t motivated by Part II’s key, driving event: Abby avenging her father by killing Joel. Joel’s death comes early, and it comes swiftly. He’s barely reintroduced before he’s gone again, and even having replayed the first game in the runup to Part II, I struggled to find any desire to see Ellie hunt Abby down. But the game just kept reminding me of his attempts to be a father figure, retreading and “explaining” the first game’s ending in the process. The individual scenes are sweet, but their intent and usage in the wider narrative is clumsy, unnecessary and ultimately undermines the impact of that ending. Joel was not a good person, and the actions he inspires in Ellie are similarly awful. Given the content of the game, it was always going to have to address whether she truly knew what Joel had done and whether she would accept it, but the specific handling Naughty Dog followed didn’t always work for me.
Some other, miscellaneous spoiler thoughts:
The scene with Tommy towards the end of the game was the only character treatment that made me angry. The way he confronts Ellie about her reluctance to go after Abby seemed totally unlike him, and it spoiled what could’ve been a really warm reunion.
I like Yara as a character but considering the wider length and pacing issues I think both her and the Seraphite island could’ve been cut.
Naughty Dog worked talented people into the fucking ground to make this game.
It would’ve been nice to see Jackson again, or to spend more time there during the first chapter. I’m really interested in seeing how civilisation works in a world like that.
If there’s one outstanding element of Ellie’s side of the game, it’s Dina. Their scenes together show a genuine relationship. We don’t just see dramatic kisses in setpiece events, we get the little moments of intimacy and admiration that the game needed more of. I keep going back and watching the moment Ellie returns from her hunt for Nora because it’s gentle and beautiful without being remotely sexual, which is absolutely not what I expected.
Naughty Dog covered up allegations of sexual abuse in their space.
Naughty Dog spent a lot of promotional time discussing the gameplay improvements they made for Part II, including speeding up the movement as part of the switch to Ellie and adding new features like going prone, hiding in grass and jumping. None of them really make much difference when it comes to distinguishing this game from its predecessor, but it was enough for me because I enjoy the game’s blend of stealth and action, and on a few occasions the combat encounters get particularly intense in both gameplay and presentation, echoing some of my favourite horror cinema. The problem lies in the details.
The extra graphical fidelity and Naughty Dog’s attempts to make the player empathise with enemies just compound the fact that this game is miserable, and the fact that they worked talented people into the fucking ground to get it done is even more tiresome. I don’t need to kill a dog in a QTE to know that people like their dogs and that we shouldn’t kill them. Every gunshot fired and taken is like a brick to the head, and every arrow you fire into an enemy’s neck leaves them gurgling and spasming in horrific detail. Stretch that over the 26 hours it took me to beat the game and it becomes exhausting. Part II tries so hard to make you understand the consequences of violence that it accomplishes the opposite.
That fidelity isn’t always a detriment, however. The world is beautiful in its dinginess. The level of detail on both macro and micro scales would be unbelievable if it weren’t for the public knowledge of Naughty Dog working talented people into the fucking ground. Character animations, the way light shines through surfaces and colours environments, torrential rain playing off the hoods of abandoned cars; it all reaches levels of realism I didn’t expect from the PlayStation 4. There were times when the game looked like a concept art snapshot or, as my friend Josh says, a Roger Deakins film.
The technical and artistic teams that worked on Part II are outstanding, this is a masterful visual swan song for the PS4. The music that backs it all up is equally impressive, taking a more oppressive and louder route than the first game’s soundtrack. It has fewer memorable tracks but a stronger overall atmosphere, great video game music that I’m unlikely to listen to in any other context.
The Last of Us Part II is a disappointing sequel to a game that inspired so much creativity in me seven years ago. Its myriad attempts to ground and contextualise horrific violence quickly grow tiresome and the deaths of its major characters are all too predictable. Every moment of intimacy or humour is almost immediately drowned out by more hours of ceaseless mutilation, throat-slitting and suffering. The chapters with Abby and Lev were a welcome change of pace and tone, but I find myself ultimately wishing that we’d gotten a Lost Legacy-sized game focused solely on those two. Maybe Naughty Dog employees wouldn’t have been worked into the fucking ground making that. The Last of Us Part II is a massive, stunning sensory overload that, in many ways, feels like a perfect end to this generation. I hope I never play another game like it.
Review Round Up:
Pros:
A beautiful and intimate depiction of a queer relationship
Lev is a great character, a young trans boy handled with appropriate care
Abby is surprisingly the better half of the game, and unlike any character I’ve played as before
Stunning visuals I didn’t expect out of an aging console
Cons:
Too violent, too miserable, too obsessed with trying to make the player feel bad
Ellie’s story doesn’t really work and loses steam fairly quickly
Uses the same tricks to shock the player with character deaths
Some major characters handled poorly
Gameplay improvements don’t change much over the first game
Naughty Dog worked their employees into the fucking ground and covered up sexual abuse in the workplace.
