Vemsie

I get that a lot of the musical praise goes to Gustavo Santaolalla, who has a nice cameo in the game as well, but the dark, foreboding synth tunes that Mac 'Mr. Robot' Quayle cooked up add so much to the package as well.

Slick.

UK figures for June. https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2020-07-03-playstation-unseats-nintendo-in-june-with-the-last-of-us-part-2-l-uk-charts

It's a fantastic game, but not really the type of game people en masse buy consoles for.

I don't play many open world games as I often get bored of doing them sooner or later, but I love the look of the world in this and the fact that it's a more grounded samurai tale. Hopefully it has some fun mechanics.

Do you mean Baba is You? And have you played Return of the Obra Dinn and Outer Wilds? Seem games you would enjoy.

Shame but I guess it makes sense, given their fairly small size and recent start.

I think Ubisoft deserves some credit at least for making and publishing far more varied games than they get credit for. They're hardly EA in that regard. I mean, they make games ranging from Anno to Steep, from Just Dance to The Division 2, from For Honor to Starlink and from Watch Dogs Legion to Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle. Also, R6 Siege and For Honor are excellent games mechanically. That said, I haven't bought a Ubisoft game in years now. I do think Legion looks interesting and I'm certainly interested in seeing what Gods & Monsters really is (it will have a new name) so I'll give this a watch.

I think that works in terms of making you question Ellie more and more as time goes on. She is so blinded by revenge that she kills everything between her and Abby, even when other characters question that everything is black and white, like Dina when she talks to Ellie about the WLF letting her and Tommy live, that she can't see the wood for the trees. In comparison, Abby mostly kills infected, violent Seraphites and the WLF that threaten the lives of Lev and Yara. Also, I'm sure it's no coincidence that Hotline Miami makes a cameo in this game. I found it more effective than that game, mainly because this game has actual characters that are really fleshed-out. Perhaps I was too busy chasing those S-scores to be really disturbed by Hotline Miami, perhaps it was because the characters had no depth to them. But I knew I felt something when Joel was brutally offed, I felt something during those heartfelt flashbacks, I felt something when Ellie was brutalizing Nora, I felt something when she left Dina and JJ to continue her selfish desire for revenge and I certainly felt something when she was drowning Abby, who managed to go from villain to a person I really cared for and wanted to have a better life with Lev. I mean, there is some ludonarrative dissonance in that they made the actual combat fun (something that goes for Hotline Miami as well), but as Just Write points out, I think you can still acknowledge that contradiction without throwing away what the narrative is doing succesfully. The alternative would be something like Spec Ops the Line, an interesting game in what it wants to say but an absolute chore to play. One thing is for sure: The Last of Us 2, more than any game I can think of in a long, long time, is evoking a lot of discussion and weeds out tons of alt-right trash in the process. It dares to go to places other AAA games don't and it's very progressive and inclusive, and that makes it one of the most important games in a long time I feel. I mean, certain indies do this as well, but they don't have the reach of a title like this. There are already so many great analysis vids and thinkpieces about this game, someting very few games manage to achieve.

- Bloodborne's switch from classic Victorian horror to full-blown cosmic horror was masterfully done. The whole game is a masterpiece, by far the best game of this gen I think, but if I had to pick one thing from it, that would be it. Followed by the Ludwig boss fight, which has the best mid-fight transistion ever. ""Aah, you were at my side, all along. My true mentor... My guiding moonlight..." - Playing Cuphead and realising I'm playing a damn Fleischer cartoon. - VR and Astro Bot in particular. The first water level is astonishing. Water as far as you can see and then actually going under water with those robot dolphins swimming next to you was magical. The towering shark boss is another highlight. - Hitman returning to its roots for two brilliant murder sandboxes. - The final boss in Sekiro, one of the most exhilarating boss fights ever, forcing you to nail all the mechanics the game had taught you. - The sheer systemic depth of Prey. Sorry, Breath of the Wild. This was 2017's best game and it deserved a bigger audience. - The ending of SOMA, probably the most thought-provoking game of this gen. - The sense of discovery in Outer Wilds, a game that nails the wonders and dangers of space in an unrivaled manner. - The Last Guardian's Trico, probably the most astonishing AI companion in all of gaming. The ending was beautiful and I loved that little water puzzle where you needed to ride the wave caused by Trico's jump into the water. - The final stretch of Inside, one of the craziest, weirdest moments I've ever played in a game. - The Last of Us 2 No AAA game this gen has been as ambitious as this one. What a gen.

This is an awesome post.

Druckmann tweeted this after all the death threats and racist shit he got. Good to see him sticking to his guns. As for the violence, I agree with what my countryman Paul Verhoeven once said on that. If people do violent things in a violent world, you should show the consequences of said violence. Otherwise you're a hyprocite.

Funny how these things can differ. I had to force myself to stop playing later at night. I was totally invested in both the narrative and gameplay loop. So much so that I started a Survivor+ run run on Friday and I'm almost at Day 3 again. It's probably my second favourite game of this gen at this point, tied with Arkane's Prey. And I really appreciate how you can still play the game dynamically on higher difficulties, in fact you're encouraged to do so. Uncharted 4 has a great combat loop as well, but if you played it like an action hero on Crushing, you'd get easily killed. Here the systems shine on higher difficulties, forcing you to make the most out of your toolset.

Yeah, for all some people are moaning about its length, I'm replaying Part 2 on Survivor and I'm absolutely loving it. The gameplay is just that good.