Are we doomed to repeat the sins of our fathers? Can humanity change? If you were raised in violence, are you destined to solve your problems with nothing more than violence?
These are the things you’re destined to think about as you play through The Last of Us 2. Seven years ago, developer Naughty Dog delivered one of the final hits on the PlayStation 3 in the original The Last of Us, a riveting post-apocalyptic adventure that ended in overwhelming moral gray.
Now The Last of Us 2 arrives to usher out the PlayStation 4 era, and it does so in similar fashion, with a story that once again puts the ugly of humanity on display in violent, bloody, and, at times, truly saddening fashion.
The game picks up five years after the events of its predecessor. The Last of Us ended with Joel helping Ellie, perhaps the cure to the Cordyceps fungus turning humanity into zombies, to a research group that hoped to use her as the cure. But when he discovers that their research involves killing an anesthetized Ellie, he kills them all first and escapes with her. Hours later, Ellie comes to and asks Joel what happened, and he lies, claiming cure research had stopped.
When this latest game begins, Ellie and Joel seem to have settled into some semblance of a normal life, a tenuous relationship between surrogate father and young girl verging on adulthood. But when that quietude gets rocked, Ellie quickly abandons normalcy to chase retribution. Motivated, she heads off on a quest that embraces the mechanics and gameplay that carried you through the first game.
That means plenty of blood, this time on the potent PS4. Naughty Dog crafts a stunning world for Ellie and company to traverse, delivering snow-coated mountain areas, dense blends of city and foliage, and so much more. It’s a world that feels real and relevant, daring to wade into the weighty conversations of our day. Naughty Dog pulls no punches as you venture into a hidden weed factory here, ponder religion’s role in a key character’s life there.
It’s an immersive world with spot-on details that you can’t help but appreciate, and you can’t help but get lost in areas. The Last of Us 2 lets you explore more than its predecessor, granting you freedom while never feeling overwhelming. There’s so much to explore that you can miss whole buildings, although doing so robs you of valuable story.
It pulls no punches with Ellie, either, showcasing her as a complicated, multifaceted heroine. The original game’s Left Behind DLC started exploring her sexuality, and The Last of Us 2 dives deeper, treading strong gaming ground. Nineteen-year-old Ellie is brooding yet emotional, journaling often, sharing deep connection with few.
Solving problems with knives and agility, however, is her strong suit. And really, this makes sense. She’ll kill humans and infected alike (and other beasts too) throughout The Last of Us 2, utilizing agility and deft hand-to-hand combat skills all at once. Naughty Dog delivers splendid animations and places a host of tools at your disposal to control Ellie, creating an agile star with a mean streak.
She’s at her best during stealth, downing zombies by stalking them from behind, but you never feel trapped into that gameplay (if anything, Naughty occasionally forces you out from that in disappointing fashion). When stealth fails, you can shoot out of situations, run, or deliver brutal, bloody melee attacks. (And if things ever grow too hard, a host of difficulty sliders set a new bar for tuning a game to retain challenge while never letting it get frustrating.)
Ellie uses these tools against infected, animals, and humans alike, sometimes in combination. Some of the best battling occurs when she’s in an area with both humans and infected, when she can throw a bottle at humans and let the infected do her bidding.
She does all this without a hint of hesitation, a unique juxtapose to the reality Naughty Dog crafts around her. Humans scream and dogs whimper, and it all seems meant to feel more gripping than your Call of Duty kills. This feels more real, and yet Ellie is classic video game brutal.
This worked in the first game because of noble stakes: Joel had to fight for Ellie. This time around, it works only because it’s all Ellie has ever known. She’s a unique blend of strong and damaged, the product of all the flaws Joel gave her in those ending moments of the original game.
Thus it’s not out of line for her to act out with what she knows best, steely rage. She becomes an underrated character study in the tools we have to deal with rage, and how, in our darkest moments, we default to that which we know best.
She’s not the only one, either. Others also exist in darkness in this desperate, isolated world in The Last of Us 2, forsaking community and chances at “a better life” for quests similar to Ellie’s.
It’s as if the nature of humanity, according to Naughty Dog, is that of violence and of not letting go. Even when humans have to survive against a vicious, potent fungal infection, they still can’t put aside differences and truly band together, still can’t help battling each other.
That’s a disquieting echo throughout this game, for reasons that extend beyond this game, and, at times, that can make The Last of Us 2 emotionally challenging to play. But that’s not a reason to avoid this game; if anything it makes The Last of Us 2 that much deeper of a gaming experience. At times, you’ll wish you the game gave you options, permitted you to make choices for Ellie in critical moments.
Or maybe that lack of choice is the cold, hard lesson of it all.
