melmer

The Last of Us

Recommended Posts

Tom Bissel ladies and gentlemen. Why does anyone else bother to write anything about video games ever?

 

It will surely strike the non-gamer as unlikely that any game in which you stomp off the faces of fungal zombies could be described as "subtle," but you can, and it is, and there we all sit, thumbs firmly inserted into butts, on our different sides of the divide.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/06/05/the-last-of-us-review

 

I just scrolled to the bottom and the only thing I learned was that they're making a World War Z movie with Brad Pitt which is probably old news to everyone but me.

 i also learned about that on the walking dead forums, but people aren't happy that it was based on a book that specifically says about how only in hollywood movies do zombies run and not only can they run in it but they do this

world_war_z-thumb-630xauto-34948.jpg

 

i heard the zombies referred to as zoombies because they aren't proper zombies

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Tom Bissel ladies and gentlemen. Why does anyone else bother to write anything about video games ever?

Huh, I was going to make a snarky post about e e cummings being capitalised, but lo and behold. Facts!

 

e: holy shit, what an article. Thanks for the link

 

What I'm saying is that these glorious games are, in real and measurable ways, born of human misery.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I now have a copy lying on my desk. Should be fun to muck around with it tonight.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I can't believe it, its hasn't even be posted yet boooooooooooooo

But my PS Vita came today Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay

With a 30 day trial code for PS plus Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay

But the memory card hasn't turned up so i can't download anything booooooooooooooooo

But it did come with a physical copy of Souls Sacrifice so at least i can play that this weekend Yaaaooboobooaaaayay (don't know how i feel about this one)

I now have a copy lying on my desk. Should be fun to muck around with it tonight.

Sad face, i've literally been planning 'Last of Us' day for weeks. Girlfriends going to Goodwood races tonight so i can dedicate the whole evening to fungus zombies and pizza

alas, it was not to be

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Well, just fucking dandy. I seem to be having the worst luck with newly released Naughty Dog games. I hit some sort of glitch or bug, which apparently caused saving to no longer work. The short of it being that I lost around 4 hours of progress. Sigh. I got a patch update and they changed some little things in the menu around, so I assume that was the fix, but still really fucking annoying.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

alas, it was not to be

 

Now I feel bad as I didn't even really want to play this game as my buddy is coming round tomorrow for another Deadly Premonition session.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

To be fair i'm only renting it so it was in the hands of the gods anyway, this is the first time in a very long time that my rental company hasn't sent me the game on release day

 

Maybe i'll buy State of Decay instead, i was going to wait for an XBLA sale but i've just realised the sales are only for gold members :(

 

News on the autosave glitch, don't get caught out

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

To be fair i'm only renting it so it was in the hands of the gods anyway, this is the first time in a very long time that my rental company hasn't sent me the game on release day

 

Maybe i'll buy State of Decay instead, i was going to wait for an XBLA sale but i've just realised the sales are only for gold members :(

 

News on the autosave glitch, don't get caught out

 

Thanks for the tip!

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

So I just finished it about 10-15 minutes ago. Really pretty game, phenomenal voice acting and animation, and the gameplay is a combination of Uncharted and Vampire Rain.

 

It is very passable in terms of mechanics but I never really felt like that part deserved the rest of the game. So, in short, another classic Naughty Dog game. Definitely one that everyone who has a PS3 should play just so that they can see what a AAA title can do with narrative.

 

And all that talk about scant ammo? Bollocks, it is about as scant on ammo as Uncharted 3. By this I mean that it strongly recommends a melee focus but it really isn't necessary. The AI is also not as impressive as some had implied.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

At some point on friday, I got hit with the save bug again before Naughty Dog fixed it, so I did the old-school thing of leaving my console on until I had finished the game. Finished it later that friday! Definitely Naughty Dogs best work yet. I didn't want to get too OCD when it came to scavenging for supplies, which I think worked out in my favor. I played it through on normal 1.5 times now, so just exploring for fun and moving on when I felt I was done caused some tense moments later on having so little supplies to work with. I imagine that if you played on hard, the scarcity of resources increases?

 

I see what you mean about the mechanics not deserving the rest of the game, although the mechanics presented are pretty damn solid. A thing that bugged me during my playthrough was, for example,

the oft repeated raft "puzzles", where you swim Ellie across water. The last time (I think) you get a raft puzzle, Joel says "Okay Ellie, get..." "Get on the fucking raft, I know, I know." paraphrasing, but it felt like it was acknowledging exactly what I was feeling. That aside, I think those kinds of repeating elements didn't really do the game justice. AT THE SAME TIME, on the whole it's just a nitpick because holy shit. So. Much. Stuff. There's just so much art and things and, jeez. The Naughty Dog men and women are beasts!

 

I'm gonna assume that Naughty Dog already knows what is "wrong" with the Last Of Us, which already makes me super excited for whatever they're working on next. Whatever it is; day 1 perch! Personally, what I'd love to see is if they opened up the environments just a tad bit more. I think it'd do wonders for giving the world a better sense of place. Sometimes the locations you're at feel more like sets than actual places and spending large portions of your time navigating twisty buildings makes that thing happen where you need to stop and think to yourself "Wait, where am I and why was I here again?" Though that latter thing was less of a problem during my 2nd playthrough so far. Familiarity made the overall flow of the game way better for me.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

The mechanics are interesting in that the more game literate the player might be, the more they work to unsettle their perceptions about what's happening in the game.

For me as a player it solved a huge problem. If Mario 64 solved how to move in 3D space, and RE4 solved how to shoot a thing in that space. The Last of Us solved the problem of what to tell your future children when asked what you did in the Great War.

If Metal Gear 4 was the last of games then you'd have to tell them you were a secret agent who's cover was a film projectionist.

If Max Payne 3 was the last, then you'd have to say you were a grumpy Olympic pole vaulter who killed people.

If Dishonored was the last, and if you played the game like Chris Remo or myself then you'd have to say you were the sneakiness hugger.

If Bioshock Infinite was the finite then you'd say to your kids you were a schizophrenic freegan who killed people.

Now I can tell them the truth, I was a killer that killed (according to the game stats) on average 10 men a day sporadically by hugging and shooting.
The Drake dichotomy was solved by simply being honest! My feeling is that it lifts a weight off my chest by letting me feel the weight of the situation.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Just finished it. One of the very few games I've finished in just two sittings.

 

Guys...this game. Seriously, everybody needs to play it.

 

EDIT: Also, it has a new game plus mode. The weird thing is you can't change the difficulty on new game plus. Gotta beat it again on the same difficulty to unlock the other ones. Lame.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I agree with horsebaggins, the mechanics and narrative in TLOU really serve each other quite well. This is elucidated no more clearly than at the very end. What a fucking ending.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

This game is amazing so far.  I'm about 44% of the way through and so far I couldn't be more satisfied.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

gaming’s Citizen Kane moment

 

This term is so poisoned with cynicism. In terms of software The Last of Us has features lifted directly from other games. But they don't mean what they mean in the games they are lifted from.

The Winter opening hunt is taken directly from Metal Gear 3's sniper battle. Metal Gear's was a great boss fight, but it was a progress bar. In the last of us, the blood on the snow possibly implies mensturation.

 

An interesting read I just goog'd

THE DEER AS A SYMBOL

http://www.psychological-observations.com/psych-topics/universals/religion-mythology/201-published-deer-as-symbol

 

This would be the second time in a year the first mensturation of a female co-lead has been depicted. Bioshock Infinite's depiction was explicit, and a bit ridiculous showing Elizabeth's sanitary sundries in a jar (you can press a button to shock the cloth).

 

The cabin defence with David taken from RE4. This messed with my sence of trust that I took for granted with AI partners.

 

Looking you, Ken Levine

"We Can Kill The Industry With Cynicism" - Ken Levine - Bioshock

 

I actually find the growing trend of "Would've been better without guns" kind of annoying, cos I think it's an under-developed analysis of what's wrong with Bioshock Infinite and this game.

The lack of cynicism toward the player in The Last of Us is the world of difference. I don't know if Bioshock Infinite was a product of cynicism, pessimism, or neither.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm probably about halfway (just been saved by a person who's going to make me something if I can get all the components for it,) and so far I'm not loving it.

There's everything Naughty Dog has always been good at, like all the acting, character animations and beautiful, detailed environments, and almost everything is really polished and great, but I think all the 10/10 reviews ahead of release set my expectations too high, because so far the game has been very good, but it hasn't exactly redefined the landscape of entertainment. The level progression is linear, and the pacing feels really predictable (very light traversal, zombie room, traversal, soldier room, etc.) The characters fit into ND's history of having characters a million times more interesting than the average authored game character, but they're following a plot that's already been done to death (unless a sweet twist occurs, which will happen.) My companions running around in plain sight being ignored by enemies is the obvious, player-friendly solution to the problem everyone was worrying about, but it really breaks immersion when it happens, which is quite often. The pill upgrade system feels sort of unnecessary. The resource scarcity feels false too, since I just played a sequence where I was first loaded full of ammo, and then hanged upside down, emptying clip after clip at approaching undead. It's ultra-serious until you get to this crazy place where a crazy guy has made crazy traps everywhere.

It's a great game, and it's well made and fun – I guess I was expecting it to be really dark and deep and serious, but my impression so far is that, just like the Uncharted games, a lot of it is just crazy production values.

 

edit: Not super-happy with this post, but it's about 80-85% in line with my actual feelings about this game.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Couldn't agree more with what you had written. You elaborated on my gameplay gripes as I didn't want to go as full on into all the things that bothered me.

 

As for the story, don't worry, there are a few wrinkles that I really wasn't expecting near the end of the game that I challenge anyone to not return to multiple times after it is over and ponder about.

 

Also, that bit about emptying clip after clip, notice that there was no bullet counter? You were doing a turret sequence.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Sadly its not the gameplay that makes this game so great but the level of polish.  The sequences are so well crafted that I can't help but find something to admire in every room.  I will reserve absolute judgement until I finish the game but so far it has been worth every dollar.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm only 2-3 hours in to this, but one thing I'm loving about this game is the absence of clear break points (so far, anyway).  I have yet to encounter a feeling of "ah, I just completed a level"; instead, I'll just be moving along and realize "oh, yeah, I guess I just cleared out that building or evaded that group of bad guys or whatever."  The characters have a goal that they're focused on, and although the obstacles that get in their way vary, neither the characters nor the game are anxious to toss you a little check mark and say "Hey! You just accomplished something!"  It's really engrossing.

 

One thing I'm really disappointed in, however, is the very video gamey process of fully exploring areas to grab extra ammo and craftable supplies.  I had hoped that I would not play this game the way I've played many other recent games--figure out where the game wants you to go, and then go in every direction but that direction so that you can collect all the hidden items before you progress.  Certainly I deserve some of the blame for this--if I were truly dedicated to being in the moment, I could convince myself to direct myself to the objective and ignore all else unless my character has a real need to scavenge--but I wish they had designed around this tendency in some way.  I'm not sure what the solution is--limit supplies and collectibles along the critical path? just don't have them at all?--but I'm disappointed that this hasn't been solved.  It's a relatively minor gripe, as it reduces the odds I find this game to be a transcendent experience that makes me forget I'm in a Video game, but does nothing to stop it from being a really good Video game, but disappointing nonetheless.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Just played the first 45 minutes (had to stop for din dins)

Dat intro!

I can't help but scavenge ever nock and crany, hopefully it won't effect my immersion ;) to much. Like bioshock infinte when I'm supposed to be chasing after Elizabeth but instead looking behind every create along the way, I feel silly, but I just can't help myself! Are you supposed to just trust the game creators not to stick hidden collectables in story heavy events?

I did wonder whether this game would have collectables or not, and low and behold it does. As long as they're interesting artefacts from the world and not 50 dog togs

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now