The game and it's fans represent everything I resent in today's video game industry. The fact that this industry has fallen into a Hollywood wannabe. The new standards of what makes a game great are totaly shallow and has nothing to do with gaming. Throw a bunch of good actors and a nice script and everyone losses their mind.
So the best developers are those who can hire the best actors and write the best script? Is that what's the deffinition of good developers nowadays? And I'm sorry, alot of emotions in a game is a good bonus, I have nothing against that, byt TLOU is NOT the only game that can put you thru emotions. FF7 did it 15years ago and many other games also did it since.
Pros:
The graphics are some of the best I've saw but more importanly the game was colorfull despite being post-apocaliptic making the landscapes from snowy mountains to forests really beautifull.
-Really like the infecteds and how they evolve.
-I thought at first that I would hate Ellie (just a young smart ass acting tough and swearing all the time... because you know... nothing yells ''hardcore'' like a kid saying ''fuck'' in every two sentences) but she ended up being a lovable kid, acting and thinking like a kid her age despite being tough (loved her interest in comics), so I really liked the character.
-The upgrade system was a much needed addition that UC games lacked in order to give a sense of freedom.
-Despite being linear, the areas were big enough to give you a small feeling of exploration.
-The creepy and stressfull moments in the game really worked.
-The dialogues in the middle of the game felt natural
-The world felt real, for example each and every single houses are different and seemed like someone actually lived there.
Cons:
-It's gameplay is good but flawed. The AI is totaly idiotic at times both from the ally and ennemy side.
-The sound mechanic around the clickers have been done before and it felt like a missed oportunity since it was only around walking slowly and not shooting (opening doors, picking up gear, reloading or moving crates did'nt attract attention from the clickers despite all of these action making alot of noise).
-Every other mechanics has been done before in Uncharted and I don't remember anyone applauding UC for any of it's mechanics.
-The ending was terrible when looked with gaming standards (but offcaurse it's fans look at it with Hollywood standards). The last level did'nt feel like a last level. I was expecting something epic with hundreds of infecteds invading the millitary base, but instead we just get a average lvl with soldiers (that atleat had a higher difficulty lvl). Worst is that the last hour of the game is all about undoing what your goal was to do during the entire freaking game. Some may like this, but I did'nt like finding out just like that that all I did in the game was for nothing and that I have to spend the rest of my game undoing it. Plus it technically doesn't end... I know they want to make a sequel end/or DLCs, I get that, but would it kill them to actualy give us a ending that does'nt feel like you are about to start a new chapter right when the credits start rolling up.
-The melee mechanic is flawed yet OP. I ended up killing almost everyone in melee because it's overpowered and that the enemies forced you into melee so often it was frustrating, always when shooting, some dudes come at me forcing me to melee.
-Not being able to run whenever I wanted. Half the time I was forced to walk by the game and I hate that.
-The cliché storyline of someone being immune to the disease being humanity's only hope and the old man who lost her daughter and don't want to get closeto Ellie cause he is afraid of being hurt again despite not being able to do otherwise since she reminds her so much of her daughter. All of these are clichés done before, I have no problem personally with it, but with ppl acclaiming this game for it's ''phenomenal'' story I just had to point it up.
Overall, despite my con list being longer than the pros, most of this on my list are minor and the Pros outweight the Cons. I'd give it a 8.7/10. I have no problem with ppl saying that the game is great, but ppl saying that it's the best game ever made clearly have not been gaming for a long time and are playing video games for different reasons than I do. I play games hoping to find experiences that has nothing to do with movies, you can't compare TLoU with Earthbound, Super Mario Galaxy, Ocarina of Time, FF7 or more recent examples Portal2, Skyrim or Metroid Prime. If you think it's the best game ever, do yourself a favor and quit gaming in favor of watching The Godfather or other movie masterpieces since this are the experiences you are looking for.
The game is not unique. Games like Arkham City, Metal Gear and the Walking Dead already did what many claim to be unique in TLoU while also outdoing it in the game department (some of them, not all). Hell, personnally, Twilight Princess and other Zelda games thx to it's music and atmosphere made me feel more emotions despite having no actors, but that just me, my point is only to show that TLoU did'nt invent emotions.
