Zero Punctuation: The Last of Us

[IronMit]

snip

My interpretation of the title - massive spoilers!

Spoiler

I think it referred to Ellie and Joel having nobody else left in the world.
You see many examples of 'couples' throughout the game Billy &his lover friend, Tess, Joel's daughter, Henry and his lil brother Sam, Tommy &his wife. All these people had someone to fight for.
The order in which you meet them is important; Billy and Tess were met at the start and hid their feeling except for briefly in a moment of weakness.
The Henry commits suicide when he loses the one person he was fighting for
Tommy survives by marrying.
Couple this with Ellie saying that everyone she ever cared about left her or died and Joel saying something along the lines of 'I struggled a long time with surviving ....you need someone to fight for'

So I think it's referring to Ellie and Joel. Joel and Ellie did potentially doom all of humanity by deciding to be together at the end

 

[Slash2x]

Did not care for this game either. The story really just made me go WTF??? You mean to tell me that in 20 years you could not find or build a better knife? Hell use fucking rebar from one of the THOUSANDS of collapsed buildings. Hell build a spear out of the shit and keep the infected at arms length. Like these.... (Spoilered for size)

Spoiler

And you think after TWENTY YEARS Joel would be able to do more than 2 take-downs... He should be a hardened combat vet who should have a whole bag of moves to pick from.

And about the ending

Spoiler

Really? Going to take her head apart with your 20 year old equipment to get a cure?

"Hey Joel we have no real clue what it is that makes her immune. We are not even going to test her blood. We figure that taking her head off will give us the answer we need in one shot. No we do not want to take blood from her once a week for how ever many decades we could look for a cure we think doing it all in one try should give us the answer we need."

"Yes we know that her blood has the infection in it but we are not interested if she is producing antibodies for the spores or if she is fighting off the infection in another manner. Has to be her brain. Why? Fuck you that is why! If taking her head apart does give us the answers then we are just fucked, but we are confident...... Wait why are you pointing that gun at me?"

 

[Evonisia]

I'm happy to see a more balanced opinion on this game, what with it and BioShock: Infinite being among the best games evar!!

Yahtzee's voice has also increased in speed which really helped me enjoy the episode, reminded me of erm... 2011 episodes?

 

[unstabLized]

Overall, I agreed with some points he made, like with the friendly AI and smoke bombs, but some of his points were misguided. In some cases, specially the beginning, I can see how his point about human life having more value in a post-apocalyptic scenario should hold more value, but does not.

I feel like this game doesn't really have enough to call itself a "Game". Call me dumb, stupid, whatever you want, but that's how it felt to me. It feels like they focused a lot on story, dialogue, cutscenes, so on and so forth, and it was fantastic to listen and watch no doubt, but it didn't make it a game. The gameplay was there to give the player something to do to reach the next part of the story (and in my case, some things broke up the gameplay, but I let that slide). 4 Types of enemies, 2 different approaches (Stealth and Action), and the action only had a few different methods (cover and gun, smoke bomb and melee, or just run?). I don't consider moving trash cans and ladders to the right location "puzzles", but to each his own. Good game, but I feel it would've sacrificed a lot less feel and immersion if it was a movie or TV series. It was... a "Cinematic experience"?

 

[IronMit]

The whole everyone is really just a psychopath forced to not murder by society this is utter ball-shit
Human didn't always have society, we only invented that about 5000 years ago.

So what you think before then every random encounter ended in murder?

Also, don't play Fallout 3.
the wild west still had Sheriff's and some sort of law and order.
At Hounslow Heath in the UK. There were highwaymen there causing havock back in the day, there is not crime on that scale now.
If you have read Game of Thrones - As soon as the war started it became difficult to rule and bandits and criminals went around raping, stealing, burning and killing.

Don't think of it as a black and white thing, if criminals can get away with crime they will do it. The more lax the law is the more crazy everything becomes.
Eventually after so many years someone will become pretty powerful and create a system to keep order.
A lot of media tries to cover this; the prison in prison break season 3, Legion in fallout new vegas, that bad guy town in book of Eli. They base it on history. Not a histroian so I can't give you other examples.

You can look and riots, in London, birmingham etc when police lose control even more people go crazy because they can get away with it

 

[Historyism]

snip

This is exactly my point

I hate that!

The whole everyone is really just a psychopath forced to not murder by society this is utter ball-shit
Human didn't always have society, we only invented that about 5000 years ago.

So what you think before then every random encounter ended in murder?

And yes we all (99%) would kill rather then be killed but we'd be unset about it and try not to do it again.

I mean even the wild west didn't have a murder rate all that high, (about the same as some of the worse mexican drug war cartel towns now)

So those messages always fall flat for me

Eh, the setting's pretty standard for the post-apocalyptic wasteland genre.

I don't think anyone in the game murders for fun; it's just that everyone's looking out for his or her own safety. Joel doesn't ever look for conflict, but he defends himself and Ellie against raiders and cannibals and stuff. I thought the game did a pretty good job of making the kills seem desperate and necessary. And of course, this type of fall-of-society setting is going to make people feel like it's the end of the world, and everything goes.

YMMV, of course.

For what it's worth, I think this game is excellent, and worth playing just for the relationship between the characters, which I really liked. I thought everyone had great emotional depth. Again, YYMMV.

 

[A1]

snip

This is exactly my point

I hate that!

The whole everyone is really just a psychopath forced to not murder by society this is utter ball-shit
Human didn't always have society, we only invented that about 5000 years ago.

So what you think before then every random encounter ended in murder?

And yes we all (99%) would kill rather then be killed but we'd be unset about it and try not to do it again.

I mean even the wild west didn't have a murder rate all that high, (about the same as some of the worse mexican drug war cartel towns now)

So those messages always fall flat for me

Not every random encounter in the Last of Us's setting ends in murder. It's just not uncommon.

Trying not to do it again may be a bit tricky in a horrible kill or be killed world in which not doing it again isn't really a feasible option. And upset if we hadn't already gotten used to it, which can, does, and has happened.

People living in the wild west didn't have to deal with a worldwide zombie creating plague or a general collapse of human civilization.

And it's not that humans are forced not to murder by society. Humans have both positive and negative tendencies. But if society collapses the negative tendencies can be given a good environment in which to emerge and thrive. This can vary depend on how bad the exact situation is. And in the setting of The Last of Us it is very, very, bad. Far worse than the wild west or mexican drug war cartel towns.

 

[Lucky3rteen13]

The rest of it I couldn't agree with less. It seemed like complaining for the sake of it and/or deliberately missing the point.

New to Zero Punctuation? That tends to be Yahtzee's thing... taking the piss out of games even if they are generally good.

Normally he seems to try and be humorous about it while being comically over the top, with this it just seems to be a mild rant. Usually even if I disagree with him I can find the humour in it, in this case it felt like somebody just complaining, like in a "Why does everybody love The Last of Us?" thread.

This really is a pathetic review. If he really wanted to make legitimate complaints about the game there are only 3 real issues, the Ellie AI (which he covered) and the two instances of foul play by Naughty Dog being the use of Ellen Page's likeness and the use of a reconstructed transportation map apparently taken from some guys blog. Also, almost half of the review was complaining about the Uncharted series rather than the real focus.

 

[90sgamer]

Sorry Mr. Croshaw, but I feel this critique was lazy. I'm not in the camp that believes this is the greatest game ever, but I disagree with many of your points. For instance, how do you know Joel and Ellie got away with anything? Joel is this bitter, unhappy character who is at odds with the law before and during the game: it seems to me he is paying for his prior and current actions. At the end, he lies to Ellie, and she does not believe him. Do you believe he will live happily ever after with her after that? Doubtful. As for Ellie, what is there for her to get away with? I can't think of any wrong doing on her part other than stabbing a soldier in the leg outside of the city, and that was arguably in self defense since infected gets dead on the spot. All of the other killing was done in self defense with the exception of the fireflies which was supposed to characterize Joel (protip: he's a shitty person).

 

[Sir Thomas Sean Connery]

The amount of mad going on is kind of astounding.

I hate to pull this old line out, but how new are you people?
This is what Yahtzee DOES. He finds the bad in games. Also, just because YOU are fine playing a protagonist that's a complete bastard, that doesn't mean everyone is. I for one despise playing protagonists I can't empathize with. In a movie, ok maybe, but in a game, it just makes me WANT to fail. It makes me want to stop playing so these cunts can't reach their goal.

So come on. Stop getting mad at a Yahtzee review. Not only are you mostly bringing up entirely opinion based things, it's completely pointless anyway.

 

[deadish]

The only part I agree with is the problem with the enemies all ignoring Ellie. In stealth situations having her happily run around and Clickers not even noticing was a little jarring.

The smoke bomb part I agree that they are useless, but not because they are not necessary, it's just that they don't seem to work properly. The enemy never stopped firing at me when I threw them either when it was at their feet or at mine.

The rest of it I couldn't agree with less. It seemed like complaining for the sake of it and/or deliberately missing the point.

If all Yahtzee does is nitpick, it means it's is a relatively positive review.

If the game was bad, he would have ripped it to tiny little pieces.

 

[gjkbgt]

[

[

I know that "tropes" says after the apocalypse goes down everyone starts there kill rampage
Don't mind that can be a bit of fun.

What i object to is people taking that Trope. Declaring it true and trying to tell a heart breaking lord of the flies style storey based around it
Because it's not true.
Humas have three basic need food, water & shelter. If you are in a hostile environment full of zombies then shelter is hard to find alone

so you form groups, no one want to be kicked out of the group and everyone benefits from being in the group.

No one wants to risk death assisted with gang warfare when there are so many zombies about so groups interact peacefully.

we evolved to be nice as a survival strategy. same for evolving to not wanting to kill our fellow man.

The less fights you get in the longer you live: Fact!

If you want to imagine a world where apocalypse makes everyone a murder go for it
but don't use your headcanon to make teach me a moral lesson

 

[Darth_Payn]

With all the grim gritty seriousness of what I hesitate to call a game, I was expecting this to be another SO"TL review.

Another great review Yahtzee, thank you.

Thank you for also calling out the biggest problem with the "zombie apocalypse" setting - that human life you'd think would be treated as something more precious in such a scenario. What was the line that President Roslin had in the BSG movie/series start? "The only way for us to survive is to start having babies." Nah, 6+ Billion people have all been wiped out, humankind is in serious jeapordy of being extinct, and the first thing we need to do is still killing each other because "reasons."

No more zombie games for me thanks.

Oh, that's exactly what I hate in scripted games: the fact that all characters are retarded, and you have to play retarded because you're not yourself, you're roleplaying dumb people so you have to do dumb stuff.

That's my problem with this game. I haven't played it myself, but watched it a at a friend's house, and holy FUCK is it depressing. It's supposed to show complex characters in a morally gray setting, but everyone's just a miserable bellend or psychopath. I hate any story that goes that way, no matter the medium, where the central message is "HEY HUMANITY! YOU ALL SUCK!!!" As low as my opinion is of the greater population, I do believe in our ability to change for the better. This just adds to my suspicion of game developers throwing in the message to their players that we are awful sacks of shit with no other counterpoint.
Also, remind me what the Fireflys are supposed to do? Are they pro- or anti-zom... I mean "infected?"

 

[Legion]

Wait, if Ellie is of bugger-all use in gameplay and essentially invisible to zombies then why is she even there?

So the devs could stick a female character on the front cover to score an easy win with the "moar female protagonists!" parade?

See, that's just him using a flawed argument. The reason she is there is because the story revolves around the two of them, so for her to not be there at all it'd be extremely odd.

She may not have a whole lot of game-play influence, but she is vital to the story, so I don't see it as them using it as a female protagonist angle.

That's my problem with this game. I haven't played it myself, but watched it a at a friend's house, and holy FUCK is it depressing. It's supposed to show complex characters in a morally gray setting, but everyone's just a miserable bellend or psychopath. I hate any story that goes that way, no matter the medium, where the central message is "HEY HUMANITY! YOU ALL SUCK!!!" As low as my opinion is of the greater population, I do believe in our ability to change for the better. This just adds to my suspicion of game developers throwing in the message to their players that we are awful sacks of shit with no other counterpoint.
Also, remind me what the Fireflys are supposed to do? Are they pro- or anti-zom... I mean "infected?"

People do have the opportunity to be good. But most people don't have to fight for their lives every day. The kind of places where people do tend to be places with a significantly higher murder rate than most others. So on a global scale the idea that people would all band together and live in harmony is absurd.

It's not even about people being bad. It's about people essentially being animals, and self preservation is one of the strongest instincts for all living creatures. If a being is put in a situation where their life is constantly in danger then they adapt to that situation. Some do it by isolating and protecting themselves and others actively seek to eliminate possible threats.

It's not about "good" or "bad".

 

[freakonaleash]

The 'What' is predictable but the 'how' & 'why' is executed well

The part about not liking Joel....That was the point. What all the survivors do to survive is supposed to be in question, whereas in Uncharted it was not a theme. For example (spoiler) the cannibal/rapist/pedo guy mirrored Joel. Ellie calls him an animal just as she goes down on all fours and scoffs up the grub. All this stuff was intentional. Tess and Joel argue about weather they are good people or not.
Everyone being selfish murdering a-hole was addressed.

random analogy:
It's like complaining about the Dark Knight because Batman doesn't just kill Joker when that's what half the movie is about. It's a weak criticism unless you are criticising the execution or believability of it , unlike let's say the 'Man of Steel', when 100,000 people die and it's not really addressed.

There are a few reasons to dislike this game but the main criticism here is way off mark. Especially coming from someone that liked spec ops the line.

Spec ops the line and Last of us are so far the most powerful character driven stories I have experienced.
(Before you mention it, stuff like portal, Bioshock etc are stories with a silent protagonist, walking dead is more role play)

I agree, I felt like he was trying to miss the point of alot of those things that made it such a great story.

 

[TurkeyProphet]

That's not true at all. You might call your mother mom. But you'd call any one elses' mother a zombie. You might try to call them "infected" but then you'd realize after a few breaths that maybe you've been infected, because you are speaking in a weird language that would only be allowed in a badly written video game. And then you'd try to come up with something other than zombie to say to your buddy when one of the zombies is sneaking up on him from behind. But you'd give up after you realize that every other word is equally ill fit and blurt out ZOMBIE.

And you'd never be able to shake the feeling that just maybe you've become a zombie. Because only a zombie would be so braindead as to not call a zombie a zombie. Bad games 101.

I've no idea why you think this. Zombies are the LIVING DEAD. The Infected are not zombies and in real life I would not connect the two because I think of zombies as monsters from horror films that eat human flesh and come back from the dead. I do not think zombies are sick people.

 

[Something Amyss]

Well then, who criticizes the critics?

Whoever wants to. I mostly find it funny that people only have an issue with Yahtzee being "lazy" or "teh bias" when it comes to games they like. In fact, more than a few of these same people seem to be more than happy to join in with Yahtzee if they don't like the game.

The whole "You're not allowed to criticize, because you don't agree" line then basically means we're never allowed to call critics out on anything, ever.

It's also irrelevant here. Perhaps you're attempting to attack a strawman, I don't know.

Since my comment actually had to do with the quality of his job being reliant on whether or not one agrees with him, I am addressing a completely different point. Even if there is an issue of clarity, you have no real foundation to assume that specific line.

 

[TurkeyProphet]

That's my problem with this game. I haven't played it myself, but watched it a at a friend's house, and holy FUCK is it depressing. It's supposed to show complex characters in a morally gray setting, but everyone's just a miserable bellend or psychopath. I hate any story that goes that way, no matter the medium, where the central message is "HEY HUMANITY! YOU ALL SUCK!!!" As low as my opinion is of the greater population, I do believe in our ability to change for the better. This just adds to my suspicion of game developers throwing in the message to their players that we are awful sacks of shit with no other counterpoint.
Also, remind me what the Fireflys are supposed to do? Are they pro- or anti-zom... I mean "infected?"

That isn't the central message of the game at all. The central message is about how good people are. The Last of Us is about the few last good people. In the end when Joel saves Ellie he thinks he is saving humanity by saving the last good thing in the world.

 

[zalithar]

After having played through the game several times I've noticed that on survivor difficulty you can in fact punch a clicker to death.

Smoke bombs are really useful in certain situations, I only needed them in two though. Right at the last door you need to open that enemies are guarding, and to sneak by the bloater in the hotel basement on survivor because I didn't have enough supplies to dent it's armour.

Most enemies in the game actually attack first; though you have no real reason to kill the military until chapter three. It is always justified to kill the infected no matter what,they are dicks. When you first meet the hunters they are attempting to kill you and steal your stuff; when you meet David's men they are trying to kill and eat you.

The worst Ellie ever did was brutally murder a psycho, there really wasn't all that much to "get away with." The characters where actually very human because they weren't perfect. They could get hurt and make mistakes.

Yes the AI not noticing your partners can be a little jarring but on anything above normal it's a god send.

For a point that is not based on the game; DO NOT DAMN FROM IGNORANCE. Mick P. You say you don't own the game and then damn it anyway for reasons that do not apply in chapter or past chapter two. The only time you are the aggressor is in chapter two. In chapter 9 you attack a village of people after they attack you, cripple you, kidnap Ellie, and attempt to kill and eat her. That's not being an aggressor

 

[TurkeyProphet]

Whoever wants to. I mostly find it funny that people only have an issue with Yahtzee being "lazy" or "teh bias" when it comes to games they like. In fact, more than a few of these same people seem to be more than happy to join in with Yahtzee if they don't like the game.

I think the reason the comments are mostly negative is because it wasn't a good summary of the game and a lot of them like me assumed he would talk about the story. He has talked a lot about silent protagonists, just using crappy exposition to tell stories, using idle chatter to build characters, games just throwing characters at us and expecting us to care, bad dialogue in games, using gameplay to tell the story and the proper way to make horror survival game. He even has article recently about stealth games giving us non-violent solutions and he fawned over the storytelling technique of Spec Ops and clearly he appreciated The Walking Dead.

So here we have a game that encourages non-violent stealth, that clearly understands how to implement survival horror and can tell a story very well using techniques he has discussed and what do we get? "Naughty Dog sucks and uh... it's just a generic action adventure like Uncharted".