Rate The Last Game You Played
- Thread starter ShineCero
- Start date
JamesYTP
Blue Jacket
The Last of Us Part 1...I give it an 8/10, intense ride from beginning to end as I played it on hard and suck at shooters to the point it was almost stressful lol. Best graphics I've seen on PS3, great sound work all around...gotta say the story wasn't all it was cracked up to be though, not bad but I was expecting more out of 7 years of hype.
Last of Us Part 2
Alright, so I played the game a couple of days and wanted to share some thoughts of the game. Before I do, I created a scoring system that I believe makes sense on a 0-5-point scale:
I checked the leak content of the games before the official release and seen rounds of people reporting various things. Please actually play the game (or at least, check out the legitimate playthroughs). There is an intentional outrage that swept unsuspecting people into their thought-bubble to radicalized people. Stay alert.
With that said, overall, I give the game a 2/5, an average score (one point lower than Last of Us 1,which is a 3/5).
Gameplay
Throughout the game, I noticed a distinct pattern that each section of the game follows: go to a place; find various items for crafts and upgrades; fight a horde of infected; and fight off those various humans that get in your way. The game gives you an option to confront your enemies head-on or kill them through stealth; but it 100% punished you if you do full confrontation. They added dogs as a new way to make you think about your options and avoidance.
To the game’s credit, they did add several new features. You can jump, prone, dodge, make new weapons and add some quality of life to the gameplay compared to the first one (i.e. when you find a pair of scissors, you make two shivs, rather than a singular one). Though, there were time where the dodge button were a bit… clunky? Sometimes when I hit it, it doesn’t fully register, and I still get hit. Perhaps when the third game comes out, they can do a more touch up on that.
The gameplay was serviceable, for the most part. When I meant by this is usually tied into the story. As I mention before, the game itself is very straight-forward (sometimes, for its own good), that the gameplay aspect became boring after a while. You go an area, scrap for items, fighting infected, humans—rinse and repeat. Even with new additions, it didn’t do much to make the game more intense. They did add Boss Battles in comparison to the first game, but once again, they were so few that it wasn’t enough to spice things up. And those boss battles, with the exception of two, were practically palette swap of each other (one big guy, one big girl, and another big guy). And since the story does have a lot of filler points between one place and another, the gameplay really wears absolutely thing.
One thing I did not like when switching characters the first time, you essentially have to start over from scratch on your build. I understand from a in-story perspective, but I felt that they could’ve let things transfer over except for specific upgrades design for specific characters.
In addition, the gameplay between Abby and Ellie plays exactly the same—there’s no difference aside from “bigger guns” and more dramatic cutscenes flair.
The story is fine, if not extremely predictable. It’s weak but it gets the point across (compassion over revenge). There’s issues with the story pacing (disjointed flashbacks, things being resolved only in flashbacks for other characters, extreme surface level characters not named Abby and Ellie). I felt that when Abby once again spares Ellie, and we [timeskip] to the latter adapting to new life with Dina, I thought that was a good end, and the point was made. Both characters stop, and the cycle of violence ends. Yet the game push forward—which felt like a third game suddenly tact on. A brand-new last addition of a group that are depicted as slavers, Ellie v Abby final confrontation, and an ending I felt wasn’t really deserving for either characters. It felt like “more you can chew” situation, and they definitely continue chewing during that final act.
Another thing is that the story hamfisted that compassionate is key, and letting go preferable, and violence only beckons more violence… but those themes weigh thin when you are mowing people left and right in the game. I would be more interested if they allow you to make choices in the game, whereas you have the ability to spare people (i.e. instead of killing them, you can just knock them out instead or let them go). Yet, it’s hard to make a theme where a player is constantly shoving a shiv up in an enemy’s neck in a very, very close-up interaction. The biggest example is the situation of killing Abby’s dog as a huge thing—but the issue with that, the players have already mowed down dogs before that incident. Even with the backstory of Alice in Abby’s story didn’t change any feelings, other than “whelp, sucks for that dog”, due to how the gameplay aspect desensitize the entire issues.
It's a good game to play but do note that it can be pretty boring in some length of game with few things that spiced it up. There was an open world area, which I felt was a good thing to add. Maybe more of those? I also think they need to amp up the gameplay aspect a bit more to keep the player engage. Maybe if the gameplay were shorter (i.e. removed the last section of the game), it wouldn’t worn out so fast, but I don’t know.
If there is a third addition to this series, I hope they moved away from the human villains, and go a more “risky route”. Maybe a Clicker that gains intelligence and leads a horde of infected in intentional manner? That’ll be an interesting antagonist. :thinking:
Alright, so I played the game a couple of days and wanted to share some thoughts of the game. Before I do, I created a scoring system that I believe makes sense on a 0-5-point scale:
- 5 = Excellent
- 4 = Amazing
- 3 = Good
- 2 = Average
- 1 = Poor
- 0 = Bad
I checked the leak content of the games before the official release and seen rounds of people reporting various things. Please actually play the game (or at least, check out the legitimate playthroughs). There is an intentional outrage that swept unsuspecting people into their thought-bubble to radicalized people. Stay alert.
With that said, overall, I give the game a 2/5, an average score (one point lower than Last of Us 1,which is a 3/5).
Gameplay
Throughout the game, I noticed a distinct pattern that each section of the game follows: go to a place; find various items for crafts and upgrades; fight a horde of infected; and fight off those various humans that get in your way. The game gives you an option to confront your enemies head-on or kill them through stealth; but it 100% punished you if you do full confrontation. They added dogs as a new way to make you think about your options and avoidance.
To the game’s credit, they did add several new features. You can jump, prone, dodge, make new weapons and add some quality of life to the gameplay compared to the first one (i.e. when you find a pair of scissors, you make two shivs, rather than a singular one). Though, there were time where the dodge button were a bit… clunky? Sometimes when I hit it, it doesn’t fully register, and I still get hit. Perhaps when the third game comes out, they can do a more touch up on that.
The gameplay was serviceable, for the most part. When I meant by this is usually tied into the story. As I mention before, the game itself is very straight-forward (sometimes, for its own good), that the gameplay aspect became boring after a while. You go an area, scrap for items, fighting infected, humans—rinse and repeat. Even with new additions, it didn’t do much to make the game more intense. They did add Boss Battles in comparison to the first game, but once again, they were so few that it wasn’t enough to spice things up. And those boss battles, with the exception of two, were practically palette swap of each other (one big guy, one big girl, and another big guy). And since the story does have a lot of filler points between one place and another, the gameplay really wears absolutely thing.
One thing I did not like when switching characters the first time, you essentially have to start over from scratch on your build. I understand from a in-story perspective, but I felt that they could’ve let things transfer over except for specific upgrades design for specific characters.
In addition, the gameplay between Abby and Ellie plays exactly the same—there’s no difference aside from “bigger guns” and more dramatic cutscenes flair.
The story is fine, if not extremely predictable. It’s weak but it gets the point across (compassion over revenge). There’s issues with the story pacing (disjointed flashbacks, things being resolved only in flashbacks for other characters, extreme surface level characters not named Abby and Ellie). I felt that when Abby once again spares Ellie, and we [timeskip] to the latter adapting to new life with Dina, I thought that was a good end, and the point was made. Both characters stop, and the cycle of violence ends. Yet the game push forward—which felt like a third game suddenly tact on. A brand-new last addition of a group that are depicted as slavers, Ellie v Abby final confrontation, and an ending I felt wasn’t really deserving for either characters. It felt like “more you can chew” situation, and they definitely continue chewing during that final act.
Another thing is that the story hamfisted that compassionate is key, and letting go preferable, and violence only beckons more violence… but those themes weigh thin when you are mowing people left and right in the game. I would be more interested if they allow you to make choices in the game, whereas you have the ability to spare people (i.e. instead of killing them, you can just knock them out instead or let them go). Yet, it’s hard to make a theme where a player is constantly shoving a shiv up in an enemy’s neck in a very, very close-up interaction. The biggest example is the situation of killing Abby’s dog as a huge thing—but the issue with that, the players have already mowed down dogs before that incident. Even with the backstory of Alice in Abby’s story didn’t change any feelings, other than “whelp, sucks for that dog”, due to how the gameplay aspect desensitize the entire issues.
It's a good game to play but do note that it can be pretty boring in some length of game with few things that spiced it up. There was an open world area, which I felt was a good thing to add. Maybe more of those? I also think they need to amp up the gameplay aspect a bit more to keep the player engage. Maybe if the gameplay were shorter (i.e. removed the last section of the game), it wouldn’t worn out so fast, but I don’t know.
If there is a third addition to this series, I hope they moved away from the human villains, and go a more “risky route”. Maybe a Clicker that gains intelligence and leads a horde of infected in intentional manner? That’ll be an interesting antagonist. :thinking:
Appelsider
Green Jacket
After procrastinating for 2+ years I finally got around to finishing the Ace Attorney Trilog
I give it an 7.5 since the cases are interesting by themselves but I cant help but feel like the game doesnt go in depth enough in its characters. So the plot etc is amazing, even more so when you think about it, but when going through the actual story it misses that emotional impact, and the localization felt off at times too.
But AA is an amazing series in general and I love the sprites so its definetly a good game series!
I give it an 7.5 since the cases are interesting by themselves but I cant help but feel like the game doesnt go in depth enough in its characters. So the plot etc is amazing, even more so when you think about it, but when going through the actual story it misses that emotional impact, and the localization felt off at times too.
But AA is an amazing series in general and I love the sprites so its definetly a good game series!
Vegetto
Green Jacket
Gonna post my own thoughts on the Last of Us 2, given the game has generated probably the most controversial feelings I've had for content in awhile. I will keep them in spoiler tags, as in order to explain my viewpoints on how the story was executed, I will have to spoil the content:
I'll start things off with my take on the first game, which I viewed to be a fantastic story due to its immersive execution into the world of Joel and the absolute spiral of the zombie apocalypse. The first game introduced a character him that resonated actual survivalist themes: we've all heard the "made hard choices to survive" bit before, but in simply just executing moments of that game of Joel commenting about killing civilians after recognizing the trap set by the hunters or the interrogation scene, the first game's story really managed to stand out in simply it's immersive take on zombie stories we already know so much about. It was a cliche in totality, until the very end when Joel actually made the personal decision to save Ellie over letting her commit to the greater good of all humanity for a cure. A simple choice, where the most common result is always the hero sacrificing for the greater good, but in this instance, we get to see a man who was so fed up with the absolute disaster most of humanity was, and make a selfish choice to preserve his relationships in killing unquestionably good people.
That simple flip in a story where the most cliche story of father/son (in this case, daughter) in an zombie apocalypse setting ended up being unique because you got to feel human in choosing what is wrong for the good of all, simply for yourself. Combined with an intro that absolutely makes you feel for Joel and see where that direction is going, you get to see that typical story flipped on its head for an ending that makes you come to understand and relate more to Joel despite his decision being the worst outcome for humanity. That, imo, is what made the game so successful as a story in a genre that has been fleshed out way too dramatically.
That being said, the sequel lost sight of the great execution that the first game endured. The story begins in a time where it draws you into seeing where Ellie is at in her current life, but the progression of how it got to that is more importantly missed. We are in a state of "why should I care about these events?" for a majority of the opening, and right until we got to the actual death of Joel as a character, I felt no real compelling narrative to keep playing.
Enraged at his death, I did feel a fantastic draw in and thought, "alright cool, so this is how we finally get to be roped into this story of hunting the other character." I instantly saw Abbey and her crew as villains that I would personally enjoy the graphic scenes to come, getting nuances and flashback to instances of games like the original God of War titles, etc where you understand the other side and they may even be more fair than yours (original God of War was fantastic at this), but you don't care because your connection to the original cast is more important to you. Yet as the story progressed, I came to respect it more for the immersive qualities it brought in introducing Dina's pregnancy, the hunt for Tommy, small things like hearing enemy characters yelling out actual names when you took one of them down, and an overall feeling of, "maybe revenge isn't all that worth it" because of just how much of a mess you end up finding yourself in purely in a goal that could likely end up with everyone you care about dying for practically nothing of tangible value.
All of that, however, went out the window the second Abbey's portion of the game began. I sat through her entire story, completely annoyed with the extensive efforts they took to humanize her and her crew. The Mexican guy who spat on Joel's dead body being the "great friend" that talked about sorting out relationships, was a womanizer, and wanted to connect with the audience with comments like, "I'd rather be home drinking and watching anime." absolutely infuriated me. Each crew member, learning about the story of the surgeon Joel killed, all if it was a disjointed mess in my eyes because the damning effect of Joel's death at the start just ruined any chance for people to view Abbey in a positive light. Not one of those characters, minus possibly Owen due to his involvement in everything and how he handled himself, did I ever feel sorry for and personally, I cheered at almost every one of their deaths.
We go on to see her story in becoming disillusioned with a literal gang war in Seattle, and towards the end, I finally got to understand the whole purpose: the entire point of the story was to create a connection of Abbey/Lev, to Joel/Ellie. Where Abbey giving up everything for this seemingly transgender boy (the whole, "Lev was supposed to be a wife instead of a ___ so he cut off his hair against religious tradition leads to me believe he's FTM, but I'm not entirely sure since nothing seemed to be confirmed?) is supposed to connect with Joel giving up his survivalist mentality to try and find love with Ellie once more.
Yet, despite that aim and execution of that story, I felt it was frankly trash because not once did I ever truly care for Abbey or Lev. I remember distinctly playing out failures in the missions as Abbey solely because I enjoyed watching her die; the entire problem with the story was not in the actual content, but the execution. Having Joel's death at the start of all this frankly ruined any real hope for development to see Abbey's side in a light that would lead you to actually feel any sort of conflict.
The result of it all, however, was the only saving grace I could take from the story: while tragic and horrible in feeling, I do absolutely enjoy the notion of how Ellie's greatest fear was to "end up alone" as presented in the first game. And at the end, her need for revenge and indecisiveness led her exactly to that result: Tommy left her because she did not avenge Joel, Dina left because even more so, Ellie attempted to avenge Joel against her plea to stay. Joel is dead, and her focus for that rage, Abbey, is gone both literally and metaphorically. Ellie, as a character, is at the complete worst possible point she can be in for an arc, and as someone that enjoyed seeing Naughty Dog once again flip the script away from a "happy ending post revenge story", I am curious to see how the next story is done.
That being said; I fully believe that had this game opened with Abbey's second portion of the story (At the Wolves' dome, where everyone mentions Jackson but no one explains what happened because the tension caused by it leads to everyone not talking about it) that led all the way up to killing Jesse and almost executing Tommy in the theater, would've been a way better rendition. If the first time we see Ellie in the game was when she stood up with her hands in the air, and mentions fully the death of Joel to Abbey as "I know why you killed Joel", then I believe we would've actually felt some semblance of emotion and good immersive sensation of the cycle that Naughty Dog presented in this story. The flashbacks with Joel being the first renditions of the story, leading up past the first fight over the truth of Joel's actions in the first game, and then ending finally with Joel's death, would've cemented a story where you feel for Abbey's side at least and could really appreciate the conflict while also getting to really appreciate the new Joel/Ellie dynamic despite it being a tragic story.
Then the finale of the game would be praised just as well as the first: the tremendous flip, being partial to the conflict as a viewer and then making those realizations on where Ellie was at character wise, all of that would be realized much better by the general audience than these aggressive critics trying so desperately hard to defend the absolute train wreck of execution this story was in hopes of seeing what is to come. However, that didn't happen, purely because the entirety of this story was executed in a manner like Batman vs Superman or any Zack Synder film: horrible disjointed and poorly connections led to the disaster this game ended up being.
All in all, I firmly stand by the notion that I dislike this game from a creative standpoint and as a fan. However, I will see it through to the next game and wish to see the story. However, if Naughty Dog loses sight once again of that brilliant execution they demonstrated in the first story in favor of just simply doing something controversial like they did with part 2, then I will honestly have no problems proclaiming them an absolute failure. I only hope this experience allows them to understand the mistakes that came from this game, so that the next story will be significantly better.
That simple flip in a story where the most cliche story of father/son (in this case, daughter) in an zombie apocalypse setting ended up being unique because you got to feel human in choosing what is wrong for the good of all, simply for yourself. Combined with an intro that absolutely makes you feel for Joel and see where that direction is going, you get to see that typical story flipped on its head for an ending that makes you come to understand and relate more to Joel despite his decision being the worst outcome for humanity. That, imo, is what made the game so successful as a story in a genre that has been fleshed out way too dramatically.
That being said, the sequel lost sight of the great execution that the first game endured. The story begins in a time where it draws you into seeing where Ellie is at in her current life, but the progression of how it got to that is more importantly missed. We are in a state of "why should I care about these events?" for a majority of the opening, and right until we got to the actual death of Joel as a character, I felt no real compelling narrative to keep playing.
Enraged at his death, I did feel a fantastic draw in and thought, "alright cool, so this is how we finally get to be roped into this story of hunting the other character." I instantly saw Abbey and her crew as villains that I would personally enjoy the graphic scenes to come, getting nuances and flashback to instances of games like the original God of War titles, etc where you understand the other side and they may even be more fair than yours (original God of War was fantastic at this), but you don't care because your connection to the original cast is more important to you. Yet as the story progressed, I came to respect it more for the immersive qualities it brought in introducing Dina's pregnancy, the hunt for Tommy, small things like hearing enemy characters yelling out actual names when you took one of them down, and an overall feeling of, "maybe revenge isn't all that worth it" because of just how much of a mess you end up finding yourself in purely in a goal that could likely end up with everyone you care about dying for practically nothing of tangible value.
All of that, however, went out the window the second Abbey's portion of the game began. I sat through her entire story, completely annoyed with the extensive efforts they took to humanize her and her crew. The Mexican guy who spat on Joel's dead body being the "great friend" that talked about sorting out relationships, was a womanizer, and wanted to connect with the audience with comments like, "I'd rather be home drinking and watching anime." absolutely infuriated me. Each crew member, learning about the story of the surgeon Joel killed, all if it was a disjointed mess in my eyes because the damning effect of Joel's death at the start just ruined any chance for people to view Abbey in a positive light. Not one of those characters, minus possibly Owen due to his involvement in everything and how he handled himself, did I ever feel sorry for and personally, I cheered at almost every one of their deaths.
We go on to see her story in becoming disillusioned with a literal gang war in Seattle, and towards the end, I finally got to understand the whole purpose: the entire point of the story was to create a connection of Abbey/Lev, to Joel/Ellie. Where Abbey giving up everything for this seemingly transgender boy (the whole, "Lev was supposed to be a wife instead of a ___ so he cut off his hair against religious tradition leads to me believe he's FTM, but I'm not entirely sure since nothing seemed to be confirmed?) is supposed to connect with Joel giving up his survivalist mentality to try and find love with Ellie once more.
Yet, despite that aim and execution of that story, I felt it was frankly trash because not once did I ever truly care for Abbey or Lev. I remember distinctly playing out failures in the missions as Abbey solely because I enjoyed watching her die; the entire problem with the story was not in the actual content, but the execution. Having Joel's death at the start of all this frankly ruined any real hope for development to see Abbey's side in a light that would lead you to actually feel any sort of conflict.
The result of it all, however, was the only saving grace I could take from the story: while tragic and horrible in feeling, I do absolutely enjoy the notion of how Ellie's greatest fear was to "end up alone" as presented in the first game. And at the end, her need for revenge and indecisiveness led her exactly to that result: Tommy left her because she did not avenge Joel, Dina left because even more so, Ellie attempted to avenge Joel against her plea to stay. Joel is dead, and her focus for that rage, Abbey, is gone both literally and metaphorically. Ellie, as a character, is at the complete worst possible point she can be in for an arc, and as someone that enjoyed seeing Naughty Dog once again flip the script away from a "happy ending post revenge story", I am curious to see how the next story is done.
That being said; I fully believe that had this game opened with Abbey's second portion of the story (At the Wolves' dome, where everyone mentions Jackson but no one explains what happened because the tension caused by it leads to everyone not talking about it) that led all the way up to killing Jesse and almost executing Tommy in the theater, would've been a way better rendition. If the first time we see Ellie in the game was when she stood up with her hands in the air, and mentions fully the death of Joel to Abbey as "I know why you killed Joel", then I believe we would've actually felt some semblance of emotion and good immersive sensation of the cycle that Naughty Dog presented in this story. The flashbacks with Joel being the first renditions of the story, leading up past the first fight over the truth of Joel's actions in the first game, and then ending finally with Joel's death, would've cemented a story where you feel for Abbey's side at least and could really appreciate the conflict while also getting to really appreciate the new Joel/Ellie dynamic despite it being a tragic story.
Then the finale of the game would be praised just as well as the first: the tremendous flip, being partial to the conflict as a viewer and then making those realizations on where Ellie was at character wise, all of that would be realized much better by the general audience than these aggressive critics trying so desperately hard to defend the absolute train wreck of execution this story was in hopes of seeing what is to come. However, that didn't happen, purely because the entirety of this story was executed in a manner like Batman vs Superman or any Zack Synder film: horrible disjointed and poorly connections led to the disaster this game ended up being.
All in all, I firmly stand by the notion that I dislike this game from a creative standpoint and as a fan. However, I will see it through to the next game and wish to see the story. However, if Naughty Dog loses sight once again of that brilliant execution they demonstrated in the first story in favor of just simply doing something controversial like they did with part 2, then I will honestly have no problems proclaiming them an absolute failure. I only hope this experience allows them to understand the mistakes that came from this game, so that the next story will be significantly better.
Appelsider
Green Jacket
Just beat the final boss of Hades on my 35th attempt AND in one go, and omg I was literally shaking and having trouble breathing afterwards
Safe to say action games aren't really my forte so it was very stressfull for me. XD
But the game is made in the way that you need to clear it over and over to progress the story so I'm not done playing it just yet!
It's honestly an amazing game, I'm glad I impulse bought it. XD
Safe to say action games aren't really my forte so it was very stressfull for me. XD
But the game is made in the way that you need to clear it over and over to progress the story so I'm not done playing it just yet!
It's honestly an amazing game, I'm glad I impulse bought it. XD