I LIVE MY LIIIIIIIIIIIFE
NOT FOR HONOR BUT FOR YOUUUUUUUUUU
AND WE'RE STILLLLLLLLLLL
IN A DREAMMMMMMMMM
SNAKE EATERRRRRRRRRRRRRR

《Spoilers Ahead!》
This game and the first are so different from each other, and I'm glad for that. People wanted this game to be exactly like the first, but I don't think the game would be anywhere near as meaningful or impactful if they played it safe.

They took the gameplay from the original game and improved it A LOT. There are elements of the original game, Resident Evil 2 Remake, Tomb Raider (2013), Uncharted 4, etc., scattered throughout. Nearly everything is an improvement.

The storytelling is effective (though it drags in certain places and goes on for a lot longer than it feels it should at times). Towards the end, you often feel like you know where it's going, "here it comes, finally, the ending is coming up!" Nope. "Oh no, here it actually is!" Nah. Every time you feel like it's going to end, it adds a few more hours. The story feels like it went on too long and was unnecessary (with a purpose) until you reach the ending. And man..what an ending.

The ending shows both the depravity of the world (and the people within it) and gives hope for a better future for some of the characters we meet along the way, though, the characters we have left at the end aren't left with much. Hopefully, they can find some sense of normalcy in this even more distorted version of the world that they've created for themselves.

This game is a deep dive into the human condition and some of the stupid things we do not only to others, but to ourselves. This is for sure my game of the year (at least so far). I have so much more that I want to say about this game, but I have yet to even process most of what I just played, so I'm not even sure how to put what I'm feeling into words.

extremely surreal to see that a prevalent consensus on this is that it's an OBVIOUS uberbleak nihilist exercise in cynical ultraviolence when I feel like it's Very Clearly shooting for (but emphatically not always flawlessly succeeding at) humanist themes exploring mercy, kinship, and absolution: The last spoken line/thesis of the game is literally "I don't know if I can ever forgive you, but I'd like to try" which basically mirrors the bubbly final sentiment in Steven Universe of all things... like come on people the game clearly has a lot of faith in human compassion and optimism that we can be (and are) better than our worst impulses. We can (and should!) totally debate the efficacy of the way the game communicates these ideas. I think there are plenty of areas to criticize or outright condemn in terms of execution; the pieces written about the games fraught zionist inspirations and the discomfiting misogynoir on display in regards to a specific moment are especially vital reads--but framing this story's outlook as intentionally nihilist, player-blaming pain porn about the inescapable cycle of violence is just.. totally disingenuous to what it's clearly trying to do, imo. A story about empathy without a soft and tender pastel veneer does not render it ineffective or worthless. I would probably argue that the game's refusal to over-sentimentalize the repugnance of its deuteragonists' actions (or make their realities easily accessible/justifiable) lends more integrity to the challenge of conveying the inherent worth and potential for change within them... I feel like the game makes it extra clear that Abby and Ellie are not universalizing prescriptive ciphers for the human condition / our inescapable URGE 4 VENGEANCE and are instead very specific / detailed character studies of damaged people whose emotional processing is expressed through borderline surrealist New French Extremity interactive dream logic in a world that also presents a variety of individuals with approaches and outlooks that are direct foils to these self-destructive coping strategies!!!

lots and lots of thoughts about this game, might revisit and explore further at some point

(also feel the need to say that Naughty Dog's crunch culture is a blight on the industry and this game could have been just as affecting as a more contained and less needlessly sprawling experience)