So, I see I came late to the party. Finished it last nine after a last 9-hour push into this game, and I have to say that the simple answer to the thread question is NO. I loved the game, loved the story, and loved the characters. I absolutely grew to love Abby, and that was not an easy task to achieve by ND. IMO the team still has what it takes to make absolutely amazing games, and remain firmly amongst the best developers in the world. Maybe I am just lucky, and this is exactly my cup of tea, IDK, but if this is the case, thank god
The ending might be very controversial, but it was a clear artistic decision there. We can't have both original ideas coming out of the industry and in the same dictate to developers EXACTLY what they need to make. That's not how things work.
On the idea of wrongful marketing, it reminds me a bit of MGS2... oh, how history reconsidered that "lie". I absolutely don't understand how people seem to hate to be surprised and they much rather play the same old shit all over again. But then, what should one expect after the last generation grew up on the Call of Duties and FIFA's of the industry.
Now, this is not to say that people are not allowed to not like the game. Fine by me (and no insult to the CoD/Fifa crowd either, I just used those titles as they are by far the most popular yearly franchises), I guess not everyone likes the way ND makes games, and that is also absolutely fine. But honestly, as an eastern-european, minority ethnicity, straight white male, I have seen no issue with the political message of the game. I only saw a new standard in what I hope will be a new generation of body-horror games

John2290 said: hunter_alien said: So, I see I came late to the party. Finished it last nine after a last 9-hour push into this game, and I have to say that the simple answer to the thread question is NO. I loved the game, loved the story, and loved the characters. I absolutely grew to love Abby, and that was not an easy task to achieve by ND. IMO the team still has what it takes to make absolutely amazing games, and remain firmly amongst the best developers in the world. Maybe I am just lucky, and this is exactly my cup of tea, IDK, but if this is the case, thank god The ending might be very controversial, but it was a clear artistic decision there. We can't have both original ideas coming out of the industry and in the same dictate to developers EXACTLY what they need to make. That's not how things work. On the idea of wrongful marketing, it reminds me a bit of MGS2... oh, how history reconsidered that "lie". I absolutely don't understand how people seem to hate to be surprised and they much rather play the same old shit all over again. But then, what should one expect after the last generation grew up on the Call of Duties and FIFA's of the industry. Now, this is not to say that people are not allowed to not like the game. Fine by me (and no insult to the CoD/Fifa crowd either, I just used those titles as they are by far the most popular yearly franchises), I guess not everyone likes the way ND makes games, and that is also absolutely fine. But honestly, as an eastern-european, minority ethnicity, straight white male, I have seen no issue with the political message of the game. I only saw a new standard in what I hope will be a new generation of body-horror games Mgs2 did it early enough to not be so jarring to progression and the deception had merit towards the story with "Pliscan" coming back into the story but yeah, one of the few characters that is written really well is Abby. Like I said a few times now this would have worked had the Abby and Ellie been weaved through and paced better from the start and I feel like that was the intent, instead we got somethingn that is terribly paced and one of the worst hits to progression, I've ever experienced in a game.

Well, they decided to do it later on in this game, so arguably they created a pretty daring surprise. It worked for some and it did not work for others. I agree that Abby is really well written and is arguably the most human character in the game. I didn't notice the hit in progression on a personal level, as I quickly realized that it will be pretty much a start of what is roughly a new game. I also felt that the setpieces with Abby managed to close some of the slower progression gaps as well. But this has nothing to do with the political agenda (or lack of it) of the game, so I will leave it at that.

Either Abby is transexual or she used steroids. Lots of steroids. It isn't possible for a female to gain this massive muscles at that age under these conditions. 

More baffling is the fact that someone at Naughty Dog saw it necessary to increase the orignal models body mass.

Compare reveal trailer to sex scene. 

Well if she looked like a normal woman then people would argue that she could never take down many of the men. Like people said about Ellie in the first game.

They could've made drug abuse part of Abbys story. That would've been something really refreshing and put more depth into the character.

Would be interesting for sure. As long as it didnt affect the gameplay. 

You think that girl is clean? The video more or less proves his point, it's extremely hard for women to build significant mass in the upper body, especially shoulders and arms. I know a couple of dozen girls who look more or less like that, none of which have gone without chemical aid. Female powerlifters usually have great squat and deadlift numbers, but comparatively low benchpress numbers, this is due to the mentioned discrepancy in muscle mass of the upper body and bench not getting the same direct benefit from strong legs (besides the grounding when you arch). Heavier division lifters tend to be large overall, with a much greater percentage of body fat, as females are more prone to both gaining and retaining fat naturally. A large, muscular upper body with low fat and good vascularity is nigh on impossible, even most men have problems accomplishing this.

Edit; for further example, look at the differences in female lifters in the IPF, and then the WPC (the latter group is not tested, and it shows) and their overall body composition, especially the lower weight classes.

It would also provide a target for the twitter-PC-brigade.

"ND implies women can only have gains by cheating"

#NaughtyDogHatesWomen

In games like God Of War, Diablo etc. this would be a non issue. But ND themselves set a bar for authenticity and realism.

Trying to please the PC crowd is futile anyway. Some of it is on ND for sure, but at the end of the day its a video game. Some things need to be sacrificed in order to make the gameplay fun. No one complained that Mario can jump 10 times his height back in the day. Now people expect characters to spend months in therapy after their first kill. Im exaggerating of course, but you get my point.

Really? I haven't played the game but did check some videos featuring her and while she's buff for sure she's not that buff.