The Last Of Us Part II is a huge departure from the style of the first game. Where Part I was a thoroughly "it is what it looks like" affair, a straightforward story about a relationship with a neat little twist at the end to give you a new perspective, Part II is much more ambitious. Its got THEMES.

There are mechanical subversions in the name of themes, story beats reassert those themes, the game might even intentionally toy with the level designs enjoyability to make the player empathize with certain characters better? I could describe it as an indie game story made on a GTA budget, and I really wanted to enjoy it, but I'm afraid the game just didn't do it for me.

The biggest crime of all is length. Where the first game could not have been over 20 hours long, Part II feels like it needs close to FORTY HOURS to complete, including a totally unnecessary final act which sucks all energy out of what could have been a perfectly satisfying climax.

Many of my gripes with the first game still stand. The tender, introspective story found in the cutscenes clashes with the hours-long murder holes one regularly finds themselves stuck in. For a game that wants to subvert our attachment to the First's protagonist, this one indulges in gratuitous flashbacks to him several times. The game wants to critique the consequences of protagonist-brain, solipsistic worldviews, but cannot conceive of a world in which a single girl can't kill like 500 people because she was Built Different.

I think a story that focused on Abby primarily would have been a solid 4 from me. The Ellie stuff drags this game down hard.