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At 32 years old I’ve just sort of gotten a sense for whether or not I’ll enjoy a game from basic first impressions, and I’ve only really been burned maybe once or twice in the last 4-5 years. I have gone in completely blind for TLoU2 and Ghost of Tsushima and they are the two best games I played this year, and completely ignoring reviews for them allowed me to just engage with the game as it happened instead of expecting something I know might run me the wrong way
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Jul 24, 2020 04:03
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Ghost of Tsushima really surprised me at how good it was. On the topic of TLOU2, one of my favorite parts of the game is seeing how places like Jackson, Seattle stadium and the cult's island have built their own little communities that have traits of normal life as well as post apocalypse. I feel like the stadium was what city in Fallout 4 should've looked like if Bethesda wasn't relying on the gamebryo engine. Chuka Umana fucked around with this message at 04:09 on Jul 24, 2020 |
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Jul 24, 2020 04:05
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Listening to the latest official podcast apparently it was originally going to be open world and Abby would have spent more time in Jackson and basically joined their group gaining their trust before killing Joel. They said they canned that because they wanted to get to the inciting event faster but also ND pls don't make an open world game
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Jul 24, 2020 05:18
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I haven't played every single one of their games so I'm probably really wrong but I think this is a pretty good departure for Naughty Dog's stories. Every Uncharted game on a console has had the villain side being a bunch of assholes ready to betray each other the second they can successful shiv the boss and dispose of the knife and here we are actually having a team that are opposed to the protagonist but aren't waiting to seize power the second they think their guard's down.
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Jul 24, 2020 05:20
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Yeah this is their best game easily
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Jul 24, 2020 05:24
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https://www.ronanwills.com/ronans-blog/2020/7/25/the-last-of-us-part-ii This is a very good review In my opinion, and the quoted part below is something i've tried to talk about before and they lay it out well. quote:But there are thematic issues with TLOU2 long before the end. The game seems to want the player to recoil from its extremely realistic and gory violence. The fact that all of the enemies have names and their comrades will be like “Wilberforth, noooo!” if you kill them is just as gimmicky and asinine as it sounds, but the game does actually humanize its NPCs quite effectively simply by making the enemies look and sound like normal people instead of scowling post-apocalyptic raiders.
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Jul 26, 2020 10:04
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BOAT SHOWBOAT posted:Other than RTS games, fighting games and the Alien vs Predator games (which tend to be separate 'campaigns' anyway), are there any video games where you play as characters whose interests directly conflict within the same continuous storyline? Within the last 3 years? Nier: Automata*, A Way Out. Both arguably did it better than TLOU2 even though Nier basically introduces the second character with the shocking murder of another protagonist the same way as Abby To be fair, when Kratos realized the cycle of violence must end, he finished the job. * Which is also about a cycle of violence! Boy, video games where you have to fight things over and over again sure love to use cycles of violence as a theme, almost as if the subject matter was chosen to fit visceral and pleasing gameplay rather than the other way around... emoticon fucked around with this message at 15:15 on Jul 27, 2020 |
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Jul 27, 2020 15:04
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BOAT SHOWBOAT posted:Listening to the latest official podcast apparently it was originally going to be open world and Abby would have spent more time in Jackson and basically joined their group gaining their trust before killing Joel. I liked the little open...district? bit in downtown Seattle. I wish there'd been a couple of those spread throughout the game. I wouldn't want them to go full open world though.
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Jul 27, 2020 17:09
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There’s something very unique about having a small chunk of your game be open world and the rest of it be on rails but I have to admit that Elli’s open world Seattle segment was the most carefree part of the game it is really the last moment you have to breathe before the narrative takes off
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Jul 27, 2020 17:12
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Just finished this and pretty much loved it the whole way through, I was team Abby the whole way once I got to play as her, Joel had what was coming to him. It was a surprising turn of events as I didn't have any of it spoiled to me beforehand. I don't have much more to add than what has already been said. I will say I had an extremely hard time sneaking around, the ominous humming noise made me freeze like a deer in the headlights as I slowly tried to pan my camera around to find what was about to spot me that I was always caught. I only realized after my play through that the usual visual sneaking indicator in every other modern game was hidden in the accessibility menu and off by default for some reason. The end result had me essentially poorly sneaking through most parts, getting caught and murdering/running for my life the whole time. It was pretty great. Narratively though, cutscene Ellie having trouble dealing with doing horrible things to other human beings in order to get the revenge she's looking for has a hard time contrasting with "Shut the gently caress up" Ellie as she slices open the necks of literally every other random person who happens to be in her way. This is just how I played it cause I'm terrible but for some reason this same play style did not feel as juxtaposing when I played as Abby. I was ready for the game to be over at the end of their encounter together in the theatre hideout, having Abby beat the poo poo out of Ellie and just leave, but ironically her desire for revenge actually ends up circumstantially saving Abby and Lev's life in the end.
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Jul 27, 2020 20:04
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Imagine they went full Kojima and the game asked you if you'd played TLOU1 and if you said "No" they just skipped the entirety of Ellie's section
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Aug 1, 2020 04:20
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A neat making-of of the museum sequence. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KW4JlxAEAE0
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Aug 4, 2020 22:02
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a friend loaned me their copy of the game so I’m finally getting around to playing it. gameplays good, story bad, etc, resurrecting this dead gay thread to ask: is every loving human encounter going to have dogs from here on in. cause I’m doing my level best to avoid killing these dogs, something they very clearly didn’t really design the game for you to do continually, and it’s just sucked all the fun out of it killing the dogs won’t be fun either but if this is going to be a Thing every encounter then I’m just gonna start blasting dogs
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Aug 30, 2020 15:07
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Just start blasting the dogs, it’s not like the game changes in any way from what you do and don’t kill.
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Aug 30, 2020 17:17
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Mandrel posted:a friend loaned me their copy of the game so I’m finally getting around to playing it. gameplays good, story bad, etc, resurrecting this dead gay thread to ask: is every loving human encounter going to have dogs from here on in. cause I’m doing my level best to avoid killing these dogs, something they very clearly didn’t really design the game for you to do continually, and it’s just sucked all the fun out of it If you kill their handler with a silenced headshot and there's nobody else around they'll usually stop tracking you.
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Aug 30, 2020 17:31
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Dewgy posted:Just start blasting the dogs, it’s not like the game changes in any way from what you do and don’t kill. oh yeah I know I just hate dog suffering even of the digital variety and avoid it if possible i tried just killing the guys but then they just stand over the bodies whimpering which is some bullshit. they might as well have just had a PiP of neal druckmann holding a gun to a baby’s head at all times basically im just only killing people who not only don’t have dogs, but who’s bodies i have determined will not be found by the dogs patrol route, preventing any chance of the dog having to be sad the next step when this becomes non viable will be headshotting the dogs humanely and with dignity so they can be free of this digital prison
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Aug 30, 2020 17:59
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Dewgy posted:Just start blasting the dogs, it’s not like the game changes in any way from what you do and don’t kill. The game doesn't change. But you will.
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Aug 30, 2020 18:20
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Theres not that many in the whole game, if you've passed the first one or two dog encounters you're probably past most of them really Though theres at least one plot mandated kill the dog
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Aug 30, 2020 18:35
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Pocky In My Pocket posted:Theres not that many in the whole game, if you've passed the first one or two dog encounters you're probably past most of them really yeah I’ve read about the plot one. that’s good to know though. i want to go back to going knife batman on dudes with impunity
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Aug 30, 2020 19:09
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Those dogs would kill you without hesitation or remorse, I say kill em all 
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Aug 30, 2020 19:22
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I think I killed two dogs max. But I prefer a stealth approach
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Aug 30, 2020 19:26
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some dogs are good. other dogs are bad. dogs trained by fascists are bad. this is not hard.
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Aug 30, 2020 19:28
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TLOU2 dataminers found that all the dogs are racist
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Aug 30, 2020 19:29
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BeanpolePeckerwood posted:some dogs are good. other dogs are bad. dogs trained by fascists are bad. wow way to victim blame
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Aug 30, 2020 20:47
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I got past tons of dogs by trying to conserve ammo that was just taken from me when they switched characters or whatever. Anyway, the game is as stealthy as you have the patience for.
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Aug 31, 2020 00:53
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I am a professional pet care specialist and work almost exclusively with dogs and I murdered EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THOSE FUCKERS while my real dog slept at my feet and I rubbed her tummy with my toes while i was gutting them. She woke up at the first one whining but she's 14 and understands video games and went back to bed.
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Aug 31, 2020 00:59
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Bust Rodd posted:I am a professional pet care specialist and work almost exclusively with dogs and I murdered EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THOSE FUCKERS while my real dog slept at my feet and I rubbed her tummy with my toes while i was gutting them. She woke up at the first one whining but she's 14 and understands video games and went back to bed. Funny enough, mine ignored TLOU2 entirely but howls at police sirens in Watch_Dogs 2...
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Aug 31, 2020 01:02
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Mandrel posted:wow way to victim blame K9 can't be rehabilitated 
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Aug 31, 2020 02:10
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Gotta say, about a third of the way in I’m enjoying the gameplay quite a bit.
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Aug 31, 2020 04:28
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General Dog posted:Gotta say, about a third of the way in I’m enjoying the gameplay quite a bit. Remember to stay hydrated, use your legs and move around the environment and rotate your camera to deter people from flanking you!
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Aug 31, 2020 06:57
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Bust Rodd posted:She woke up at the first one whining but she's 14 and understands video games your dog is smarter than most of the humans that played this game
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Aug 31, 2020 16:31
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When I murder the dog first, can I spare the human?
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Aug 31, 2020 16:39
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we don’t have to spoiler anything in here anymore right? anyway I’m on day 2ish of abby’s section and I just could not give less of a poo poo about this character or any of her stupid friends. if anything this is making me hate them more, not feel bad for my words and deeds as Ellie. lev and yara are cool though i guess on the flip side it has been fun to play more stupid and aggressive as abby because i’m just powering through and dont care at all about getting myself killed over and over, but im not sure if that was the intent
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Sep 5, 2020 19:21
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I'm sure you'll just have to finish and see.
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Sep 5, 2020 21:12
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BeanpolePeckerwood posted:I'm sure you'll just have to finish and see. Yeah I'm only allowed to talk based on the most generous definitions of freedom and very unqualified to explain basically anything. All that is to say is that I'd rather not try and tell you how you should feel about the characters. Especially as you're still working on finishing the game yourself.
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Sep 5, 2020 21:30
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just got to Santa Barbara/Abby got kidnapped and finally got back control of Ellie hope Lev is ok but haha eat poo poo Abby you idiot
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Sep 6, 2020 00:05
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finished it rich white people who like to cosplay as being working class always love crooked still can’t say playing it changed my opinion on the story as I’d read it. playing as Abby was only as successful in as much as it was an interesting if extremely too long world building exercise. like a DLC campaign, or Resident Evil B path story or whatever. i guess the “play the game” stuff is presuming the player will connect and empathize with Abby by spending so much time with her, and I did, but just empathizing didn’t add anything that changed my perspective on her role in Ellie/Joel’s story or on how valid her motives were (not at all). i imagine it might if you’re someone who thinks Joel made the wrong choice at the end of 1, but i’m not, so from my perspective the whole premise sort of falls flat no matter how much you show me she liked dogs and kids, because the central inciting crime still wasn’t justified. i feel bad for Alice, who did nothing wrong and was a perfect angel, but other than that line up 50 more of abby’s friends for me to kill, could not care less, all garbage. sorry about your dead dad and his friends who got killed trying to cut a 14 year old’s brain out. outside of that, Ellie’s arc is good up until the ending, where I feel like it would’ve been better if Ellie had either finished Abby off in the water or just let her walk after following her and Lev to the boat and skipped the fight altogether. either would’ve been more narratively consistent than what they went with. presumably the intent was Ellie’s realization that her rage was due to a lack of closure with Joel more than anything and killing Abby wouldn’t give her that, but it felt unearned to me and muddled by how the whole thing plays out at the end.
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Sep 6, 2020 08:13
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I think you can agree with Joel's choice, recognize how that choice would have consequences, and recognize that both Ellie and Abby are complex characters who make good and bad decisions and engage with the world in sometimes contradictory ways. It doesn't make any of them particularly evil, just flawed and rather human. I think all those things can be true. I feel for all three characters even if they mostly just end up hurting each other and doing bad things.
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Sep 6, 2020 10:08
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Not really sure how you can arrive at the conclusion and feel like it was “unearned”, I know I absolutely had to work my rear end off to get there.
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Sep 6, 2020 15:12
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One thing I've noticed is that most of the people who have problems with this game end up "rooting for" one side or the other, or feel like they have to pick a team to empathize with. They get uncomfortable when there's no moral handhold to grab onto on either side of the conflict. I never felt like the game was asking me to choose between Ellie or Abby, it was just showing me what happened and letting me figure out how I felt about it. The player has no agency over the plot at any point.
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Sep 6, 2020 18:37
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