[Fetch The Bolt Cutters]

This isn’t shade btw i love it but it definitely is

[Tom4784]

It's a game that I can appreciate but I feel like a lot of the emotional heft of the storyline was lost on me simply because I never felt too sorry for Abby.

[Toy Soldier]

In some ways yes. I think it has a good and important message about the futility of seeking revenge, though. But in terms of story beats... Yeah its one depressing situation to the next .

One of the saddest scenes in the whole game is when Ellie finally comes home and realises she can't even play the guitar any more - the most positive thing Joel ever taught her . Although I know there are ways to work around things like that and re-learn how to play chords with fewer fingers. I like to imagine she went back to Jackson and did that.

But yeah I do think being able to sympathise with Abby is important to getting the full effect and realising that the story isn't about getting revenge, it's about revenge ruining multiple people's lives. I think they could have done a better job of conveying Abby's regret and how killing Joel affected her. It seemed like they were hinting at her regretting it but not quite strongly enough.

[Fetch The Bolt Cutters]

I don’t understand why abby was so hated tbh like sis was only trying to get revenge against the person that murdered her dad... which is exactly what ellie was doing (sort of) so yeah the backlash abby got made zero cents

[Ramsay]

Originally Posted by Fetch The Bolt Cutters

I don’t understand why abby was so hated tbh like sis was only trying to get revenge against the person that murdered her dad... which is exactly what ellie was doing (sort of) so yeah the backlash abby got made zero cents

Also humanity's only chance of getting a vaccine, Joel had it coming as much I liked him.

[The Slim Reaper]

The problem I had, is that I just didn't care about Abby, I cared about Joel and Ellie because what we went through in the first game. I understand all the clever lessons the game thought it was telling, but that in itself was part of the problem. Reminded me of the last 2 seasons of GoT, the themes were potentially good and interesting, but it felt too rushed and wasn't fleshed out enough.

[Fetch The Bolt Cutters]

Originally Posted by Ramsay

Also humanity's only chance of getting a vaccine

[Fetch The Bolt Cutters]

Originally Posted by The Slim Reaper

The problem I had, is that I just didn't care about Abby, I cared about Joel and Ellie because what we went through in the first game. I understand all the clever lessons the game thought it was telling, but that in itself was part of the problem. Reminded me of the last 2 seasons of GoT, the themes were potentially good and interesting, but it felt too rushed and wasn't fleshed out enough.

I grew to like abby towards the end (mainly bc of lev and yara) but i think if they’d made owen the other protagonist that would have been better bc he just seemed a lot more likeable

Plus i wanna suck his dick

[Scarlett.]

I nominate Silent Hill 2

Spoiler:

You play a guy who thinks his wife died 3 years ago, turns out he killed her an hour before the game begins after her illness made her verbally abusive towards him and he couldnt take it anymore. The whole game is him torturing himself as he come across a man who shot a dog and loses it because he's been constantly bullied for his weight, and a woman who killed her father after he sexually abused her growing up. The most likely ending to the game is the main character driving his car into a lake with his dead wife in the boot

So yeah, depressing af

[Brother Leon]

I mean, the Fireflys were happy to kill a young kill without even at least consulting her about it first. Joel done what any father would do really. That said, I never hated Abby as I got why she was so ****ed up and angry. I just didn’t care for that half of the story outside of Lev.

[Moniqua]

yes and ah loov it <3

[Tom4784]

I grew to tolerate Abby but what she tried to do to Dinah just turned me against her forever. Ellie killed Mel but you knew she wouldn't have done it if she knew she was pregnant and she was distraught by it but Abby was just like 'hah! I'm gonna slit this preggo bitch's throat and be glad of it!' It just kind of revealed that she works better as a villain than a protagonist. Abby is one of gaming's most successful villains but a weak protagonist.

Honestly, I think the story would have worked better if they told the events out of order.

If we started off with Abby in Seattle, we could have grown attached to her more easily and then the big reveal could come when Abby goes to the Theatre that it's Ellie that's killed her friends. THEN we could go back, do the Jackson bit and understand the context behind everything and then finish with Ellie's parts (with brief interludes playing as Abby in the Theatre and Santa Barbara). Could you imagine growing to like Abby and then finding out that she killed Joel? Potentially feeling hatred to whoever was killing off Abby's friends only to find out that it was Ellie? It would have worked so much better.

I feel like the things they wanted to do in the story, like making Abby and Ellie's journey's serve as a reflection and the whole business of making us walk a mile in both of their shoes in order for us to realise that, to Abby, Joel and Ellie were as much a villain to her as Abby is to Ellie, would have worked better if we had no pre-conceived notions of Abby going into her half of the game.

[Toy Soldier]

I actually agree with that; playing as Abby first, and hitting the "reveal" at the hotel when Ellie bursts in, would have been absolutely epic... For it to then cut to the opening scenes in Jackson and follow Ellie's path.

I wonder if they considered it? I feel like the reason they might not have gone that way is that people would have been expecting Ellie and Joel and would have been confused, maybe even put off, by spending 10+ hours without seeing them.

[Brother Leon]

Originally Posted by Dezzy

I grew to tolerate Abby but what she tried to do to Dinah just turned me against her forever. Ellie killed Mel but you knew she wouldn't have done it if she knew she was pregnant and she was distraught by it but Abby was just like 'hah! I'm gonna slit this preggo bitch's throat and be glad of it!' It just kind of revealed that she works better as a villain than a protagonist. Abby is one of gaming's most successful villains but a weak protagonist.

Honestly, I think the story would have worked better if they told the events out of order.

If we started off with Abby in Seattle, we could have grown attached to her more easily and then the big reveal could come when Abby goes to the Theatre that it's Ellie that's killed her friends. THEN we could go back, do the Jackson bit and understand the context behind everything and then finish with Ellie's parts (with brief interludes playing as Abby in the Theatre and Santa Barbara). Could you imagine growing to like Abby and then finding out that she killed Joel? Potentially feeling hatred to whoever was killing off Abby's friends only to find out that it was Ellie? It would have worked so much better.

I feel like the things they wanted to do in the story, like making Abby and Ellie's journey's serve as a reflection and the whole business of making us walk a mile in both of their shoes in order for us to realise that, to Abby, Joel and Ellie were as much a villain to her as Abby is to Ellie, would have worked better if we had no pre-conceived notions of Abby going into her half of the game.

I agree. I think it would have worked much better in reverse. Playing as Abby just after she kills the main character of the first game was always going to be a stretch to make you end up liking her. Playing as her just after you thought she killed Tommy too didn’t help either.

[Toy Soldier]

Originally Posted by Brother Leon

I agree. I think it would have worked much better in reverse. Playing as Abby just after she kills the main character of the first game was always going to be a stretch to make you end up liking her. Playing as her just after you thought she killed Tommy too didn’t help either.

Tommy really is a bit of an arsehole though, I was more gutted for poor Jesse. Simping his pregnant gay ex girlfriend across the country only to get shot in the face .

[Tom4784]

Yeah, I liked Jesse and that didn't help Abby's case.

I just think she's quite an unlikable character. I did begin to like her when Lev was introduced but then I came to realise that she's a monster that relies on others to be her moral compass. She didn't care that Scar kids were being killed until she spoke with Owen and probably wouldn't have gone back to Lev and Yara without Owen's influence and she would have probably killed everyone in the theatre if it wasn't for Lev. I think realising that just killed all likability and empathy I might have had for her.

It's a shame really because I love the concept of the game's story a lot, I'll defend what they tried to do to the end but I think the execution of it all is just flawed and I think that's why the reception to this game has been divisive beyond the gamergate crowd. Excellent ideas, themes and intent but badly executed. In a story that falls apart if we don't care for Abby, the writers should have done more to make us root for her. Her section was like, what, 10-12 hours long? That's like most of the length of the first game and they did little with that time to adhere us to Abby much.

She did have the best set pieces in the game though, the island part and the hospital basement were sensational.

[Toy Soldier]

The sky bridge and the crumbling/fungus infested skyscraper that followed, also. Brilliantly done. A lot of Ellie's environments are quite "samey" and the one I enjoyed most was actually the Rattler stronghold right at the end, it was the best stealth-gameplay arena in the whole game.

I think they had a fine line to tread with the character. It might have worked better if they'd made her more likeable, but also they had to make her bitter enough that she'd track down and kill Joel.

Honestly though, Ellie wasn't very likeable in this game either. I think that was the point really. She was single-minded and selfish.