The Last of Us Part 2

[Dark]

Daaamn, that was an awesome cutscene!

 

[┌HP┘]

I liked how it looks, the animation, render, and overall quality of it all is very striking. 

I have no idea what I'm looking at tho, and it kinda bugs me. Who the hell are these women? Is that older ellie? 

If their goal was to make you ask more questions, then great sucess, they deffo do, but it's seriously lacking context, for you as a viewer, regardless on whether or not you played tlou1 there's not a single conecting tissue to anything else you've seen before on this franchise, other than the infected that apear for a glimpse of a second at the end there. 

If they had a bit more context people wouldn't be bitching about the exagerated violence either.

[blackdog]

I hope that's not older Ellie, doesn't really look like her. I think/hope they are trying to introduce new factions/characters... overall made me think of The Walking Dead in the last season when they introduced new communities

[Dark]

On 02/11/2017 at 1:56 PM, [HP] said:

I liked how it looks, the animation, render, and overall quality of it all is very striking. 

I have no idea what I'm looking at tho, and it kinda bugs me. Who the hell are these women? Is that older ellie? 

If their goal was to make you ask more questions, then great sucess, they deffo do, but it's seriously lacking context, for you as a viewer, regardless on whether or not you played tlou1 there's not a single conecting tissue to anything else you've seen before on this franchise, other than the infected that apear for a glimpse of a second at the end there. 

If they had a bit more context people wouldn't be bitching about the exagerated violence either.

Yup exactly this, had no idea the context behind it, personally didn't mind because I'm not all that interested in this.  The animation was great stuff though

 

 

[MaK]

Wikipedia says: "The trailer revealed four new characters: Yara (played by Victoria Grace), Lev (Ian Alexander), Emily (Emily Swallow), and an unnamed character played by Laura Bailey. Druckmann stated that the characters 'are integral to [Ellie and Joel's] next journey'"

I was confused at first too and thought it was a hella buff Ellie.

[blackdog]

I don't want to watch since I haven't played the first game but here it is

Drukmann talking a bit about the game as well

 

Edited June 12, 2018 by blackdog

[nikkoship]

Naughty gods... they set the standard for how good games can look every time they make something. It's incredible.

This showcase is cool, but I feel like they're holding alot back. They're keeping the story a mystery for now it seems and they've barely shown any infected but have teased that they have new types of infected. Animations look downright breathtaking (although I'm worried how much is systemic) and it looks like they've continued to keep that feel of emergent/creative stealth they had in the first one which was something I loved.

The most exciting thing for me is the level design that they've been experimenting with lately. Namely the little mini open world "wanderthon" levels they've made in UC4 and Lost Legacy. (Western Ghats, Madagascar jeep level) I'm really into these quiet/peaceful exploration segments in AAA games recently (God of War comes to mind), and The Last of Us is such a perfect franchise for this type of level design. They always had nice little bits of story or supplies to tuck away in corners that I love finding.

Just imagining exploring large ghost towns or a rotting downtown area with this kind of mini open world structure gets me soo soo excited, I can't wait!

[┌HP┘]

This gameplay preview didn't surprise me as nearly as the tlou1 hotel gameplay preview did back then, that, for me is still the hallmark of fantastic AI. This one feels very scripted and planned.

I am happy that they kept the gameplay pretty much intact from tlou1, it is one of the best games I've ever played, feels very smooth with some smaller things added to the mix, also glad they're keeping the UI / Backpack inventory system, its a genius way to manage your shit and fits the gameplay style like a glove. 

I hope the survival horror aspect is still there and they don't make it more actiony, if anything i want it to be even more strategic, i want to have to count every bullet, every time I squeeze the trigger needs to feel meaningful, save every medpack for when i reeeealy need it. 

[r1ar]

Two pages and no one message about intro by Santaolalla. What the hell?

 

 

[blackdog]

14 hours ago, [HP] said:

This gameplay preview didn't surprise me as nearly as the tlou1 hotel gameplay preview did back then, that, for me is still the hallmark of fantastic AI. This one feels very scripted and planned.

I gave up and watched it. Twice or thrice  glad they are not giving away story stuff.
My god how good this thing looks, and the animations were the biggest stand out for me (in comparison to Death Stranding for eg where they are really good, but then for something as simple as turning left/right the model does a simple pivot which breaks the illusion and is still so MGS).

And yeah, watching it I was wondering how much this was scripted. I was like "and what if instead under the truck you just try to circle around". If you can get this kind of pathos in the moment to moment gameplay, retaining freedom of choice, it would be the shit.

Regarding the stock, it would seem that very keeping you on your toes is what they are doing, I was observing right away how she only had 2 arrows in the backpack. What I don't understand and find inconsistent is that she picks up an arrow from a dead body in the shop... but not from the people she impaled.

[Vilham]

20 hours ago, [HP] said:

This gameplay preview didn't surprise me as nearly as the tlou1 hotel gameplay preview did back then, that, for me is still the hallmark of fantastic AI. This one feels very scripted and planned.

I am happy that they kept the gameplay pretty much intact from tlou1, it is one of the best games I've ever played, feels very smooth with some smaller things added to the mix, also glad they're keeping the UI / Backpack inventory system, its a genius way to manage your shit and fits the gameplay style like a glove. 

I hope the survival horror aspect is still there and they don't make it more actiony, if anything i want it to be even more strategic, i want to have to count every bullet, every time I squeeze the trigger needs to feel meaningful, save every medpack for when i reeeealy need it. 

Pretty sure half of the combat sections are precanned anims. Which is probably why it felt so scripted. If its not I will be amazed.

Honestly I hope the combat and stuff is better in 2. In the first one it was the worst part of the game, luckily it was probably the best story in a game to date, if that wasn't the case it would of been an ok game instead of a fantastic one.

[nikkoship]

This demo does feel suspiciously scripted, but I've been consistently surprised by how much "e3 demo stuff" actually ended up being systems in the final game in their last 2 games. So who knows.

From what they talked about, it sounds like they want the AI to each have their own "line of sight" and when they see Ellie they have to communicate among themselves. In TLOU the AI sometimes cheated and they all immediately knew your position without communicating among themselves. They kinda show it off at the end of Ellie's fight, when the girl with the bow doesn't see Ellie for a split second while she is flanking her. They already *sorta* did this in UC4, but I'm really excited to see them take it further.

Also it seems they have by default disabled the "wallhack mode" that TLOU1 had, which was only disabled in the harder difficulties. The game was always best without it imo.

Although they said that you can craft ammo now? I'm really worried about the balancing of this, it's super important to discourage the use of ranged weapons as much as possible. It's better when they push you to be creative with other systems. Maybe it could be a trade-off like the molotov/bandage in the first game.

I'm also really worried about the foliage hiding, in UC4 the "assassin's creed grass" was kinda overpowered. Contrivances like that are easier to swallow in Uncharted, but in TLOU I think it will feel awkward. In the demo they found Ellie hiding under a car, but not when she was barely crouched in some grass behind a car, it just felt kinda strange for the series. Hopefully they check grass systemically in their "caution state" as well as cars and other stuff.

Edited June 14, 2018 by nikkoship

[┌HP┘]

3 hours ago, Vilham said:

Honestly I hope the combat and stuff is better in 2. In the first one it was the worst part of the game, luckily it was probably the best story in a game to date, if that wasn't the case it would of been an ok game instead of a fantastic one.

Could you elaborate why you didn't like the combat in the first game? 

And, do you like stealth games?

I personally love stealth games, MGS, splinter cell and the likes are my jam, and playing a zombie apocalypse stealth game really spoke to me. I love the little swooooosh sound the game does to telegraph that you're about to be seen, such a simple and genius idea, not even Kojima thought of that. 

[Izuno]

10 hours ago, [HP] said:

Could you elaborate why you didn't like the combat in the first game? 

And, do you like stealth games?

I personally love stealth games, MGS, splinter cell and the likes are my jam, and playing a zombie apocalypse stealth game really spoke to me. I love the little swooooosh sound the game does to telegraph that you're about to be seen, such a simple and genius idea, not even Kojima thought of that. 

Basically this. 

And @nikkoship I can respect if TLOU combat did not put the cream in your ringdings.  (Some guy in a giant duck outfit was tossing them out in the corridor between South and West halls at E3 this week. ) 

 

That said, I recall very similar combat demos at E3 before TLOU launched in...whatever year that was...and at Naughty dog itself later that summer at an analyst day.  They didn't let us play it hands on but they let us ask questions in the middle of the demo and interrupt the flow so it was clear the E3 gameplay (that year) was not heavily scripted. 

So....for TLOU 2 I really do not believe the demo was goosed up ...however....you never know.  It would really DevilDog me up if they pulled some YankeeDoodles on us.  Personally, I loved the combat in TLOU as "stealth lite-ish"  and if the sequel brings it back, I'm sold. 

[Vilham]

13 hours ago, [HP] said:

Could you elaborate why you didn't like the combat in the first game? 

And, do you like stealth games?

I personally love stealth games, MGS, splinter cell and the likes are my jam, and playing a zombie apocalypse stealth game really spoke to me. I love the little swooooosh sound the game does to telegraph that you're about to be seen, such a simple and genius idea, not even Kojima thought of that. 

Do I like stealth games  HP o HP, I completed MGS4 with a Big Boss Rating.

Yes I like stealth games, atleast good ones.

The combat was just floaty and pretty plain. Essentially core gameplay was a little too shallow, story made up for it.