I hope you liked today's video! It took me an obscene amount of time to make it happen. To let you know, I've burnt myself out hard over the past months due to me making 4 hours worth of video essays. I'll be taking a 1-2 month break from UA-cam and I'll be spending that time editing my sci-fi novel which I'll *hopefully* have out early next year. So if you see I haven't uploaded in over a month, know that I'm not dead... probably :D
*Me at the beginning of the video:* Oh you’re a writer, huh? Can’t wait to count how many times he plugs his book. *Me at the end:* ....d-do you have a book I can read?
I stayed away from the video most of these guys bring stupid arguments this guy is awsome. I have to admit after already dedecating 2.5 houers i am only at the 25 minute mark but his explanation of why the pacing made me pause and have 2 houer conversation with myself about how you can do it in videogames. Because Nier automata did somthing similar but the pacing is not getting ruind. By using its form of delivery as a videogame.
@@jackieboy3528 it should, otherwise, there isn't going to be any sympathy (or at least a bit of exposition to her story) for Abby after she kills Joel.
Doesn't that just kind of demonstrate how bad of a person he was? He's killed and hurt so so many people that it isn't even worth guessing who Abby is. He knew his past was going to catch up to him eventually.
I’m very glad you brought up Joel’s survival instinct or lack of cause before anything even happen my immediate thought was why would he give out his real name to complete strangers knowing there’s entire factions that would kill him on sight? He tells Ellie to hide that she’s immune but the thought of hiding his own name never came to mind when he had a whole conversation to her about slipping up around the wrong people when she didn’t want to put her gas mask on
He was in jackson for years and got older. He dropped his guard after living in peace and safety for years. But it is weird how he still wasn't semi cautious with a group of people he had never met or seen before.
@@thereallexai6751 they went around the town daily, just because it’s a “safe” area doesn’t really mean it’s safe. Nothing in this world is safe and nobody forgets that. Joel would never drop 20+ years of survival instincts because he has a family now in a little town. In fact he would be more likely to try and protect them at any cost.
@@BrandonGavin_EDC People change, Joel wasn’t an exception, as we saw through the entirety of the first game. Also through everything Joel Abby Tommy had just gone through almost dying, I doubt the first thing on Joel’s mind was getting ambushed by the person he just saved.
Yeah, jeez. I could see so clearly Joel hearing the phone call, running to the rescue and so badly loosing your footing. The grit and strain, small stains and wear, all falling to the wayside in the face of his determination. He's gonna save his (grown) little girl no matter what. 😭💔💓
Ok, someone NEEDS to hire you. I started watching this because I didn't like the last of us 2. I was expecting a 2 hour breakdown of it, and a "How to do it better". I didn't expect a 5 star audio book to come with.
i only had one problem at the end of his story that ellie knows that joel would never lie to her nor would break promises given to her. so ellie believing dina may not be correct
That’s weird considering he ignored half of her story. Of course it seems boring and pointless if you ignore the point of it all. Realistically, whether you loved this story or not came down to if you could get over your hate of Abby for killing Joel. If you couldn’t, then it didn’t matter to realize how good of a person that Abby and most of her crew were.
The game has problems but I think it was fine with how it played out to be honest. It wasn't what some people want but it told a story that was difficult for players to be invested in. Whe things don't go how you expected it you felt betrayed. -I feel like people needed to move on. What people expected TLOU2 to just be another Ellie and Joel on an another adventure essentially a last of us 1.2 and play the first game again. But people needed to move on. But after what Joel did at the hospital it wasn't gonna happen. Karma was going to catch up and bite his ass. -In regard to how Joel's death happened, I think it was fine for this type of game. People wanted him to have an epic hero's death or fight to the death where he would be honoured by the game because we saw all the things he an Ellie went through in the game. Plus we feel even more connected to the characters because we play and control them we feel more connected. Think of when you die in games you may say something like 'I died' or the game tells you 'you died' No you didn't but it feels more personal. But narratively they way he went out works for this type of game. People in this universe have pathetic deaths just like all the other NPCs you kill. But because we spent the first game with Joel we grew attached to him and as the centre of that universe and some may even see him as the hero but he is not. He's the enemy and trigger of Abby and her arc and in that universe was just like any other character. -They live in a bleak world where's there's not much to live for. Those moments of happiness and family can be so meaningful as it's a breakaway and escape from the hard world which heightens the joy felt by the characters. When you take away that joy what is there really left in the world to distract you from going on a rampage? That's what happened to Abby. -Joel in the 5 years has been living a good and happy life which must seem like the complete opposite from the past 25 years he's led. He's grown softer and let his guard down as the world is starting to recuperate a little that groups have now become forming with their own agendas. -When you plan to kill someone you want to restrain effectively so they have no means of escape. And in this empty world giving them a slow death may make you feel very satisfied rather than shooting them in the head. This is what Abby did. And will nothing left for Ellie going on a rampage was probably the only means she felt to give closure. However Ellie's journey di her more harm than good. She's left alone, unable to play her guitar, lost her friends, and left off in a worse place. And what Ellie said she feared the most happened.
I guess this guy's rewriting of the game (which literally anyone can do, even in their own heads) can be your safe space from the reality of the actual plot. I'm not trying to be an asshole, but the outrage over this game is pathetic. It's a fictional story. I don't remember any outrage when Ned Stark was brutally murdered in front of his own daughter in Game of Thrones....
@@KingstonHawke did you not watch this video? Generalizing everyone’s disdain for the story that way doesn’t really leave any room for a conversation. When I saw the leaks of Joel being killed by Abby, I was honest to god excited to see how we got to that point in the story. I figured he was going to die long before we got a trailer, and when I saw that leak I was praising Naughty Dog for having the BALLS to do it..... but when I saw how the story actually played out I was left FLOORED by how terrible the entire structure was. I’ve taken several creative writing classes for my education, and I’m pretty sure that every single instructor I’ve ever had would rip LoU Part 2’s story into tiny pieces. It’s not just a terrible sequel, it’s just a bad story overall.
Jesus, the idea of FEDRA using helicopters to drop containers full of infected is a brilliantly horrific idea. It’s like if Ellie shoved a spore mushroom into the WLF’s ventilation system and slowly poisoned every single person inside the compound, and she uses the distraction to destroy everything since she’s immune to the spores
@@lm_slayer1Yeah, absolutely lol A fucking “Fedra” helicopter appearing and using infected as a weapon is such an idiotic unoriginal concept. So yes Abby being bulky bc she trained for the last 4 years lol Yeah it’s VERY realistic than what the “better story” has told. Again, it’s very contradictory towards the first game.
It's sad that we hated the second game because it's trash and terribly written, and not because of an actually interesting and compelling story, that makes us feel envolved with the amazingly superficial characters.
@@Rorington imagine when the list of mistakes is longer than the total time the game takes to complete its literally more mistakes than game. 150% mistakes XD
Tbf. Most of this video was his fan fiction. I agree and disagree with what he lists as mistakes. Respect his analysis though. I enjoyed the game. Not a masterpiece, not a shitshow. Nice to see someone who didn’t like the game make a video like this.
I really like the idea of this story being the canon one. Cures, larger than life threats from other humans and disturbing minds being in authority, that's a really gripping apocalypse story.
a HERO that doesn’t know what protect means sometimes a cliche just works better for the story. I don’t mean rehashing cliche after cliche is a good thing, but sometimes you don’t need a big twist or to make everything different for the sake of being different. So long as it feels like a natural progression to the story that works, sometimes having one or two cliches is okay. Then again I typically don’t notice these things, so, what do I know.
a HERO that doesn’t know what protect means To be fair, those themes are not uncommon at all in literature. Those themes are wildly apparent in nearly every revenge-plot story; usually dark fantasies or grim-dark stories. The issue is that TLOU1’s story was ultimately a realistically optimistic tale, thus such a dark moral isn’t really suited to what TLOU1 tried to establish with its theme or tone. It goes back to what is said in the video- grim morals _can_ be enjoyed by a specific audience, but it’s not the same target audience that TLOU1 captured. They expected a more lighter tone (which does not equate with a “happy” story, just that it would portray the characters with hope) with a realistically optimistic message at the end. If you like those themes, I highly recommend finding pieces of literature that do it well. However, for a game such as TLOU2 to follow that path when TLOU1 was its stark opposite in terms of themes and morals just feels like the writers misunderstood their target audience and why they enjoyed the first game so much.
And she writes: “Kill me.” This gave me chills all over myself, this is petrifying and freaking sweet af at the same time. I’ve listened to the rewrite a few times now and this part gets me every single time.
Jojje after being a clicker for years and being unable to control your body because of the fungus infection and after being experimented on... i doubt it. Anyway this was just an example of all the far fetched, contrived, illogical and inconsistent things in the alternate story. Smaller things than that are attacked in the original story but then happen in the alternate story presented here... If one claims that this is “A better story” than it should be bulletproof.
bavorec but the thing is, this was what, one guy trying to rewrite a story over a couple weeks to a few months vs a big production company with a large amount of employees with several years to work on a story. I don’t expect everything here to be perfect, but I’d prefer this rewrite with its flaws compared to the mess of a story that is the actual TLOU2 game and the creators behind it
I won't even lie, your rendition of the game's story literally made me gasp and pulled me right into it. I feel like I was listening to an audiobook, rather than a hypothetical reimagining of the game. This writing was so well done I am eagerly awaiting when you finish the book you are writing.
I legit got excited that I figured out Dina cured Ellie long before the story revealed it, despite the fact that it wasn't what actually happened. Darn good storytelling for sure.
The switch from playing as Abby to then playing as Joel during the struggle was mindblowingly brilliant. Im just putting myself in the shoes as the gamer in your story, and that transition would have hit very very hard and most players would get the biggest smile on their face. You sir are a great writer and I hope Neil watches this.
Neil’s ego is too big to even consider a story as good as this, he wouldn’t even consider it IMO. He literally believes that garbage story was a masterpiece.
The fact that this video made me appreciate The Last Of Us 2's story even more than before, Ellie calling Joel "dad" is so out of character for her, Dina betraying Ellie is so out of character for her, Abby not killing Joel because she's "better than him" is so out of character for her, because she's not better than him, she shouldn't be, and Abby doesn't even gets some sort of character development in this new story, and the fact that the doctor and "the cure of humanity" situation is playing out again in the story when that story already played out at the first game and it should be done with already, I can't imagine as a player playing this game, how boring it would've been, we already have enough interaction and moments with Joel, this "better story" seems just like some sort of blinded by nostalgia fan fiction, that supposed to dick ride the Fanbase rather than making a good story for the game
The fact that that your rewrite is actually darker, and more depressing, yet so much better and more coherent, is insane. Would love to see you get the chance to write a story for a game someday.
I'm working on the plot for my game, Solid Shadows, which is meant to be a pretty intense - and particularly scary - horror game. This channel is great, really has helping out a lot, for anyone new I'd suggest this.
That fucking fight scene between Joel and Abby oh fuck that would of been so good! I got excited by him just reading it. Also love your videos keep up the good work.
I know a lot of people say Joel's an unlikeable protagonist but the problem is he is actually so so likeable lol. He's my favourite thing about the whole franchise, I adore him.
He's unlikeable on paper. If he wasn't the main character we would hate this murderer, but because he's the focus we understand the motivations behind his actions and root for him despite his actions.
Despite Joel being unlikeable on paper, he's extremely sympathetic and you just can't help but to feel bad for him for all the shit he has to endure, because Joel is the most tragic character in TLOU.
A friend of mine once said "You learn so much more from a failed story because then you will be able to avoid the mistakes it made" and I guess it's true for this case, and otherwise we wouldn't have YOUR amazing version of sequel
Obviously, this rewrite has some issues, it was written by a single dude in a span of what I'd assume to be couple of weeks at most. Yet somehow it holds up better than a story created by a team of writers over the course of many months. This is truly remarkable.
I agree. There are some flaws, like How could the cured clicker lady realistically still be alive after brain damage that the cordiceps could have caused, how could you play as Joel if he has a prosthetic leg and why would Dina cure Ellie? Other than that I think it’s way better then the actual story.
Like I'm still baffled on how he was able to make a story better than what they gave us over a week. Like they need to make the last of us part 2 non canon and make a new game called the REAL last of us part 2, bring in this guy to write the story, and slap Neil Druckmann in the face... maybe that last one was a little too much
@@naththegamer845 just a bit, he still made the first last of us which is still an amazing game. He just made the mistake of not taking into account the audience and everything with Abby.
@@forrestmanbro0981 That is true, I'm still a little mad at how it all turn out... Ima just pretend that last of us pt 2 never existed... and that Neil Drunkmann made one game and nothing else... for now... Edit: I TAKE BACK WHAT I SAID...
Why tf would Joel bother to avenge some dude named Kyle and put his own life at risk? Is this not out of character? Jesus, did y'all even watch the whole video? This is just a cowardly written fanservice story designed purely to earn clout.
I never had a problem with Joel dying…the problem I had was the fact they killed him off in the beginning, and players were expected to sympathize with Abby during her 10 hour long side quests.
Five hours into unsatisfying gameplay just waiting to be Joel or Ellie again, and you get to face the most difficult infected in the series with limited ammo! Have fun, fuckers! >:D
Every single player who played Abby would lose On Purpose, Nothing she does after made her sympathetic to, anyone :/ I feel with game testers that should have been expressed if it wasn't already, if it was ignored, developers Sure don't understand anything about their audience
Abby's side quests. Wow. That setting is unfamiliar to all of us. None of us think we would end up in a paramilitary army taking orders from one man you barely met a couple years prior because you had to flee the place that held so much meaning and purpose to come to this warzone that you don't belong to. Abby's story is actually a very emotional and morally difficult story to experience.
@@BEERBOMB113 lol It's Tomb Raider + Farcry, and Ellie's arc just becomes female Red Dead. Not to mention all of the terrible dialogue, poorly executed plot points, and ridiculous inconsistencies with previous world-building. Nah, it's really bad, dude.
I want to play your version. Absolutely incredible writing. I like Abbey in your version. Shows that I didn’t hate Abbey to begin with, just hated the writing.
You liked his Abby, who is a completely different character. It's not the same, she didn't even 'kill' Joel in his version (I get she shot him, but there is no need to revenge or hate her for killing him in his version.)
@@matthewcooper4248 The game has a lot of subtext dude, all main characters have delvopment. Owen,Joel,Ellie and Abby. The side characters are just small side stories as they should be.
i started tearing up when he said that joel kept getting up every. time. he fell down while going to save ellie. that goes to show how much joel truly cares about ellie and i love how this retelling puts more emphasis on that.
Man is amazing how he used more of the infected to help in the choices of human and stuff, instead of Neil druckman who focused on people being blinded by revenge lol
The whole “being trapped inside” when you’re a runner or clicker would have been a great throwback to when Henry’s brother talks about being infected in the first game, it’s a shame that ND didn’t do something with this
That's now how any of this works. Even brain tumors in some parts of the brain can cause significant shifts in one's personality and behaviour yet a parasite fungus that grows on the brain and takes control somehow doesn't change the level of consciousness? At least ND got that part right.
No, because it's not him losing control, it's him changing, HE is behaving like this, nobody is controlling him, he has been changed mentally, so there is no "trapped inside" because he is in control, but he is aggressive now.
@@thescruffinator8830 N-no dude. He said that the people who experienced it had 0 control but were trapped there, dont know if they saw or felt any of the things the fungus did aside from the pain he mentions tho. But they are in, suffering. Kinda of a lucid dream of sorts.
@@FDALl-ms5kg And what makes you think he's right? he's never been infected, the fungus makes YOU aggressive, it doesn't take over for you, it makes YOU do those things, it's the difference between being possessed and FORCED to do things, or being injected with something that makes YOU want to do those things.
@@thescruffinator8830 I think hees right because he was making this story, this is fan fiction afterall. Whos gonna know what the fuck happens better than the writer? Edit: Im that kind of an idiot that doesnt realize who are you talking about. And even then im still right, the guy has heard Testimonies of people that experienced it, why should they lie to him
No one would shout dad as their surrogate father figure is getting his head beat it. It is pure emotional manipulation from "people" who pretend they stand against such things.
Dude, you are ready to be a script doctor as a profession. You talk a lot about still growing as a writer, but I seriously think you'd be an INCREDIBLE editor to help video game companies clean up their final drafts and help mould the material to be the best it can be. SERIOUSLY.
Golf being a historically white male dominant sport and a golf club is used to kill the white male protagonist by a trans analog character to signify the smashing of the patriarchy. I wouldn't say strange. Contrived. Ham-fisted. On the nose. Oh, look at me purposely missing the joke! Whoops!
This rewrite is incredible, this can easily be turned into a 30+ hour game which will be compelling all the way through and never stray away from the main story. I particularly liked element of the antibiotic cure and how it gives the player that shock surprise to know that people still have their awareness whilst being infected, this makes me remember when Sam tells Ellie in the first game that he thinks this is what happens and is terrified by it, and then to know that this is actually the case makes it extremely horrifying, It shows just how cruel the world of The Last of Us is, NOT by making the main characters unlikeable psychopaths and force you to play as them. The FEDRA Sergeant seems to be the only psychopathic character in your story however it is justified, he reminds me of Hugo Strange from Gotham.
The fact that this video made me appreciate The Last Of Us 2's story even more than before, Ellie calling Joel "dad" is so out of character for her, Dina betraying Ellie is so out of character for her, Abby not killing Joel because she's "better than him" is so out of character for her, because she's not better than him, she shouldn't be, and Abby doesn't even gets some sort of character development in this new story, and the fact that the doctor and "the cure of humanity" situation is playing out again in the story when that story already played out at the first game and it should be done with already, I can't imagine as a player playing this game, how boring it would've been, we already have enough interaction and moments with Joel, this "better story" seems just like some sort of blinded by nostalgia fan fiction, that supposed to dick ride the Fanbase rather than making a good story for the game
@@nehirsonmaz287 because its a blinded by nostalgia fanfiction, its literal wattpad levels of "I can do it better" without even known how character development works
Killing Joel was a pretty obvious move. It was the most emotional gut punch Naughty Dog could give us and at his age, he probably wouldn’t have played much of a role in a Part 3, even if he had survived. But once Abby kills Joel…. We’re not going to like her. It doesn’t matter how it is motivated, it doesn’t matter how pleasing you try to make her, we’re not going to like her. Once she kills Joel, there’s no going back. The fact that she does it in the first Act means there’s no redeeming her and man, did they try hard.
I don't think that's necessarily true. There are people such as myself who see Joel's actions in the first game as supremely selfish, fucking over humanity for his and his friend's happiness. But the big problem is that Abby kills Joel for very personal and selfish reasons herself, so you've lost the only audience in the world who would not mind seeing Joel die for his crimes. That's not to say that she couldn't have personal motivation against Joel alongside something more lofty, be it desire for justice, or trying to get Ellie to cooperate for a cure, etc. It's that when it's only vengeance that's her motivation, any moral high ground she may have had as a shield vanishes. I get that the futility of the cycle of violence is what they were going for, but why do I care who among the 3 selfish assholes that kill hundreds of people for personal reasons lives or dies? It seems like Abby, Ellie, and Joel actively make the world a worse place and kill more people than zombies.
@@popsicleman8816 But the other problem was not Joel paying for what he did, it was ND trying to rewrite the first game and what players knew about it. It was known that the Fireflies really had no clue what they was doing and had killed other immune people from notes in that hospital looking for a cure. Think about that for a second, you had other immune people and killed them, not find other ways to keep them alive, or let them have kids and hope to pass on that immunity, just crack them open and hope you hit upon a cure. The playerbase knew about this, so when ND was trying to make Joel a horrible monster for making that choice, but the players who found out the information were not going to be on board. But they still could have pulled it off if they had approached it with more sense and not go for the SHOCK of killing Joel.
@@dolomaticus1180 Oh, no doubt that if you look at things with understanding of basic logic and medicine, fireflies are being dumbasses. 1) immediately going for a lethal procedure is a terrible idea, and closes off all other avenues of investigation. this should be the last resort. 2) Immunity is based on the immune response, so Ellie's blood and csf would be far more useful than her brain anyways 3) vaccines are made by presenting to the human body a neutralized or weakened antigen. They can get cordyceps sample from non immune patients and it would work just as well 4) Why remove the whole brain? It'd be a tricky procedure, but they only need a brain biopsy, not taking the whole damn thing out. But you are mistaken in thinking that they had other immune subjects. The surgeon's recording in the lab talks about other test subjects, but they make a point of emphasizing that ellie's immunity is special. This implies that fireflies experimented on non immune infected patients and that ellie is indeed the only immune patient. Therefore, it brings up the question. Are fireflies idiots, or did the writers contrive a scenario in which Joel and fireflies are driven to fight? I'd say it's the latter. Think about how none of the multiple medical researchers and assistants recognized the obvious flaws of the plan. In fact, no one makes the argument that this is a completely unreasonable course of action. Even Joel has no rebuttal despite him being the most incentivized to argue for Ellie. If it was 1 character that was being an idiot, I'd buy that, but everyone in the game's world thinks this makes sense. And think about the fact that if fireflies don't act like this, no fuss would be made and there would be no dramatic ending scene. Therefore, when I judge Joel's actions, I do so under the lens that what the fireflies are doing isn't inherently ridiculous within the logic of that universe. Furthermore, at the very least, Joel does not think that this idea is flawed. Therefore the faultiness of the firefly plan did not factor into his decision. When you examine his actions under this lens, what he does is fucking over all of humanity for the sake of 2 people. Therefore, his actions are inexcusably selfish. tl;dr - fireflies plan was dumb, but it was most likely the writers being dumb or manufacturing artifical conflict for the ending. Even if fireflies actions are dumb within the game-universe, Joel didn't know it, so it's not an excuse for his immoral action.
But why could they not have given him a proper and meaningful death like with Arthur Morgan and John Marston. The problem is not Joel’s death itself. But it was just poorly written
Gonna be real with you chief, I got this video on my recommended section multiple times but avoided the video because it's nearly 2 hours long. I really wish I clicked sooner, not only was the review the best I've seen so far, the rewrite made me tear up 3 times and I wish it was canon.
Yeah listening to this was such a fantastic journey. My hopes were raised then dashed with kyle. Then he absolutely destroyed me with joel's death, I ugly cried at that.
I had no clue that some guys mere rewrite of a game's story could bring me to tears. Congrats bro, you brought a grown-ass man to tears better than Naughty Dog ever could have.
This is actually a real story telling method. You can either have the plot as the main point or the characters. Game of Thrones is a great example of characters pushing the plot and Harry Potter for the opposite. If your characters are strong enough, the plot will be equally strong. Read The First Law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie for a perfect example of strong characters pushing a plot. The plot is basically non-existent even.
Said the “author” who give Dina a bite mark in a really sketchy story, paired her with Joel and give them “special magical phones” and made her (and practically everyone outside of Joel), fall into the worst kind of exposition, stating out loud their motives and doing all kinds of stupid things, just to be able to start the beginning of his fanfic. 🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️
Randi Rayunegara I’m not saying that the original game it’s better (although it is), but you can’t call your lazy crow pleasing fanfic “A better story” and then deliver that bs. 🤷🏻♂️
@@TheCloserLook Your new story is realy compelling with many clever ellements... It would have been great, although it's become an entirely different thing alltogether... I was wondering if you, with your writing tallent, see a possible way to rearrange and tweak the original Part 2 to make it work better while trying to tell the dark story naughty dog wanted here?... Thus maintaining key elements like: The death of joel and revenge story... the two perspectives told and played seperately... the downward spiral... the bleak lonely ending... I feel like the concept they wanted is realy interesting, but somehow it didn't work in execution.... You said the storyline of Abby hardly interact with Ellie's storyline, i feel this is key... How would you fix this without changing the structure and concept of the original is what im currious about.... do a video on this pls
Even just swapping Jesse the forgiving ex-boyfriend for Kyle the dickhead brother makes a huge difference for the story I think. The conflict and dynamics that arose from that were very interesting!
The movie “Warrior” has two bothers pitted against each other and both are extremely sympathetic characters. And the ending is still so satisfying. That’s a story that handles 2 protagonist against each other really well.
I almost cried with your ending. On the opposite side, I felt nothing after Joel's death in TLOU2 despite spending 20 hours caring for him in the first part.
Honestly, same. My favourite story section from the first one is the chicago section. You meet some strangers, start working together, get separated in an uncomfortable situation, trust them, get betrayed, then get saved by your betrayers later, earn genuine trust, and finally have to watch as one brother turns. The eldest shoots him, then himself because he didnt see a way of going on living. That alone is a better fucking story than the trainwreck of this fuckin game.
When I listen to your rewrite and imagine the story as you tell it, the realization hits that sometimes, good writers don't get to tell their stories. That sometimes, the limited resources of money and team effort are kept from a writer in favor of another. What a depressing thought. This story should be made. I wholeheartedly believe that a game with this plot would be a valuable addition to all of our experience. What a heartwrenching and deeply touching rewrite. Deepest respect to your vision.
Not just that, a lot of popular "flagships" get taken over so to speak as a means to use them in screaming political messaging. There was so much of that in TLoU2 that it just added fuel to the fire that was garbage writing, and it was blatantly obvious.
Honestly, the end of YOUR story made me cry, just to hear it as a player, instead of just a watcher, made me remember of RDR2, very well done, thank you for this
The fact those flashbacks were actually good, to me at least, shows how much of a personality Joel was, and how major a factor that small amount of lightheartedness was to the story. They showed they COULD write it, but deliberately went off base with the horrific story writing decisions. Also, this story, is now my Canon lol. That is bounds better than the actual sequel. I was enthralled by how much better one dude did than all others. That ending panged my heart, very well done Ps. Your idea about the fungus just locking them in their own bodies is exactly how it works. Thats what the actual basis disease does to ants and insects. Eventually they may go through necrosis, but yeah, even in game you can here human cries and words in some parts as they gorge themselves on human flesh. Horrific stuff.
Dude the humans being alive even if they turned into zombies because of the "cure" game me chills. Closer Look just proved to us that you don't need to spend millions of dollars to get creative ideas
I feel like the reason the flashbacks worked so well for so many people, myself included, was because many of us already had an attached to Joel because of the first game, so when we see the museum scene and the search for the guitarstrings, we automatically go: "Awww, Joel" However, I feel like the flashbacks served more as a relation to Ellie's main plot and character arc. One of the point The Closer Look makes is that Ellie doesn't have an arc, but that's the point I disagree with the most. I'm saying this as someone who studies the art of writing, a character arc isn't always the same thing as a character going from good to bad or vice-verca. Sometimes it's about how we, as an audience, see a character. Throughout the first half of the game we constantly believe that we are in Ellie's mindset and that we understand her. With the first and second flashback, we believe it serves more as a reminder as to what Joel meant to her. But with the third one we see that she was aware of Joel's actions at the hospital since the beginning of her plot when she wakes up in Jackson. And since both us and Ellie have just learned from Nora that Abby and her crew killed Joel for those actions at the hospital, actions that Ellie agrees were wrong of him, we wonder: "Then why do you still want to go through with this Ellie?" But with the last flashback at the end of the game, we learn that Ellie was willing to try and forgive him. This changes our view of Ellie's entire journey now that we know she didn't just wanted to take revenge because of what Joel meant to her, but also because she lost him just when she was ready to allow him back in her live, so she felt that the only way to honor him, was to avenge him.
@@randomserbianguy5677 honestly, it's kind of uplifting, in my eyes. where there's life, there's hope. the sick may may get better, the lost may be found, anything is possible as long as you're still alive. i'd gladly go through any hell to keep hold of the slightest chance of survival.
I enjoyed being in many of the flashbacks, including, obviously, the museum. BUT, I felt like the flashbacks often directly undermined the previous actions of the characters. Like before the flashback, it made sense for a character to be in a red-hot rage about something they didn't get closure on, and then they'd show a flashback about how they actually had closure on the issue and mowing down a neighborhood worth of opponents didn't change anything.
This rewrite was absolutely amazing and its such a shame they didn't just hire you to write it lol. You left my jaw wide open at a few parts and I was at the brink of tears when Ellie said "Dad." If this was fleshed out into a fully written book, I know I would be sobbing at more than one moment. You brought up a lot of points during the criticisms as well that I noticed but just couldn't put into words myself. AMAZING video thank you so much for making this!
Playing this game, I got the impression that the two people who wrote the story kept it a bit too close to their chests. I find it hard to believe that the story they wrote would have gotten positive responses if shared with a panel of professional screenwriters. I think the sequel's concept was Druckmann's baby and it seems he was just too proud to change it and share it with others for potential rewrites. This is one of the dangers of doing too much on one's own without proper workshopping.
I had a “holy shit” moment when you were discussing the General’s backstory and how Abby was seeking out Ellie for a chance at a cure to overthrow FEDRA. That’s damn good storytelling. Left a like and subscribed.
That "holy shit"moment for me was the backstory for the infected. Just imagine suffering that much pain for years, or how friends killed their infected friends only to realize that they were conscious all along. Haunting stuff
I feel like I must be crazy. I'm about an hour into the "rewrite" and, while I agree with some of the points he's made about where TLOU 2 went wrong, I don't like his rewrite any better. It's not making a few suggestions that improve the story, it's changing the whole thing and becoming it's own fanfic. It's not compelling to me at all.
That thing about Joel getting soft because of the 4 years in a safer area is a bad take. Even in the very beginning of the first game when the outbreak starts he is still unwilling to trust people as showcased when he doesn't let Tommy pick up the hitchhiking family.
@@bobbyfischer9927Joel had a guitar in his house before the outbreak started. That’s not out of the question for him to be playing guitar and singing a song 20 something years later
@@bobbyfischer9927doesn’t matter Joel would still never go soft like that. Playing guitar doesn’t count as evidence he went soft. Also could ever really go soft in that world.
It would be ideal yes but this world is everything but ideal besides Tommy was the one who said their names when they were escaping from the Ski lodge, it was a matter of trust and Tommy's fault but either way if it wasn't for that we wouldn't have had this masterpiece of a game!
(I know I'm way late but) Your rewrite of the story was soo much better, primarily because of the sense of urgency around a cure. After 3-4 decades from the outbreak people wouldn't just drop that possiblity. And I hated how part 2 just loosely uses it to move the plot.
I kinda see it like this: The fireflies had momentum going and a strong leader, they knew and hoped that the end could be close, they were so close to finally getting it done. When that hope(and their leader) was snatched from them, despair settled in and it shattered the core of the group. The group was torn apart and that takes a long time to rebuild. Which is what was hinted at(I think) when Abby was trying to get in contact with the remnants of what was left of the fireflies, they WERE trying to rebuild and reorganize.
When she called out "DAD!" at Joel's death I fully lost it and started welling up. Your version was just so good, made more logical sense and I just... wish it had been the game we got
Great rewrite, only thing that I'd probably change is Abby's ending. Feels like she's a bit underused there. What if she survives her final encounter with Joel and sees him die and Ellie's anguish. Then she has that moment of realization that she's made another girl fatherless.
In doing that, you could set up a relationship between Ellie and Abby similar to Kyle (but obviously a little more heavy handed) in the sequel as Abby would probably know more about the General and potentially help, their relationship would be incredibly rocky at first but progress over the game to be at least a mutual respect. Plus dialogue between Abby and Dina after the events of the rewrite would be very interesting to hear. Edit: added something
I LOVE your addition to the lore about the people being conscious in the infected bodies - it actually ties into TLOU1 and Sam's question about whether or not they're still "alive." Brilliant!
I think Roanoke actually explores the infection in Terms of biology/science, and for the First two stages or so, He does say the People are still conscious
Around 1:19:00 you discuss the reveal that all infected are still themselfs... despite the infection. That is an amazing arc to the question Sam asks Ellie in part 1. Knowing that Sam, just a kid, is infected at that point... asking such a deep question at that time with al the implications to every kill. Amazing. Loved that.
this seemed really childish tho, because it's such an overused and unrealistic trope " oh they're still 100% themselves deep down, except their brain have turned into cordyceps mush and they're controlled to kill people", like no, even with real life diseases like parkinson or alzeihmer, people are not themselves anymore, they turn into strangers to their families, and everything that defines them changes ( honestly the psych horror aspect too with the faceless ex clicker and the runners in cage wasn't impressive at all, and it was kind of cheesy). for the cure that the faction possess, I would scratch it all together, and instead put something like a "rabbies vaccine", meaning you can save yourself from being infected if you take your antiviral shot within 2-3 days, but once the symptoms start showing youre done for and there's no way to save you, no treatment, no cure. The thing is, a parasite sets in the host brain, finding a cure for this type of disease is 10000 times harder than developing a vaccine.
@@2010josem Its just my 2 cents on this aspect in particular, the rest of the plot was great. btw it would've also made for a more engaging story if there was a time limit for the mission to save ellie's gf, just saying.
@@oogabooga5653 i feel you, i just meant that hey maybe some aspects may appear childish or unrealistic, but for me its fine to have one or two of those cause it is a game after all. Regarding what you said about the time limit, yeah that would be cool like at the final boss or something, in which you should hurry and kill the rat king fast or else you lose Dina.
The fact that this video made me appreciate The Last Of Us 2's story even more than before, Ellie calling Joel "dad" is so out of character for her, Dina betraying Ellie is so out of character for her, Abby not killing Joel because she's "better than him" is so out of character for her, because she's not better than him, she shouldn't be, and Abby doesn't even gets some sort of character development in this new story, and the fact that the doctor and "the cure of humanity" situation is playing out again in the story when that story already played out at the first game and it should be done with already, I can't imagine as a player playing this game, how boring it would've been, we already have enough interaction and moments with Joel, this "better story" seems just like some sort of blinded by nostalgia fan fiction, that supposed to dick ride the Fanbase rather than making a good story for the game
@nehirsonmaz287 The Closer Look's version of the story is objectively better from a writers standpoint because, as the video mentions, it is written for the same target audience as the first Last Of Us game. With that said - if you don't like it, that's fine. But why not just go replay the game if you enjoy it as it is? Why watch this video and leave such a long comment on why you personally didn't enjoy his version? Why watch a feature-length rewrite at all? I'm genuinely asking, because I would never waste my time making myself so angry. It's why I didn't play the second game - it was too bleak for me. That doesn't mean I hate it or think it did everything wrong. I enjoyed the gameplay, and the attempted message, but overall I never finished it because it was not made with players like me in mind. This re-write is not only better paced than the game, but it was written for people who enjoyed the message of hope in the first game. It doesn't matter if Abby is ooc, because she's essentially a DIFFERENT character in the rewrite. Dina as well. And personally I like them more, but you can disagree. But don't try to convince people who enjoy the rewrite that we are wrong or somehow stupid, if only because you will not succeed. It is not difficult to respect the opinions of others. Please respect the people in this comment section who prefer the rewrite.
This rewrite is BRILLIANT! I must say however that Dina's character rewrite was a bit too reckless and a little unlikable, could've done better there. The scene where Ellie discovered that Dina was actually the one who injected her with the cure could've been slightly justified and empathised with if you mentioned a brief dialogue between them where Dina confesses to being scared of losing Ellie just as she lost her brother, making it the driving force for why she did what she did. That way, we dislike her less for causing the rift between Ellie and Joel in the last scene, and making it a tad possible for them to maybeee rekindle what they had because I refuse to suffer through them not being together again even in your version of the game. Your version is so much more depressing, at least give Ellie a small chance at happiness lmao.
Just want to say your input is the only one not treating Dina's brother as a "suddenly written out of the script" character. Dina wasn't even depicted as crying over his death. In this, I believe dina could even be better written as the story shows her not only as incompetent by defying Joel leading to her capture and his leg replacement, but needs to show she framed him cause she blames him for that capture and tourture of the fungus infection. She certainly deserves some sympathy too, but the story ends with Ellie neither trying to understand making her feel justifiably angry at her, while said object meant to be saved returning from torture, losing her brother, and being beaten, caused by both Joel and Ellie acting as though she forgot everything to a degree. But that's just me.
And with that it can happen an end that I wanted to: Showing Ellie and Dina together in the end, showing that different from the orginal story, Ellie learns to forgive
I dont know, i kinda like this Dinah, because make her a special type of unlikeable character. A complex one. Because what she does to Joel it exactly what that ex-girlfriend she had did to her in this version of the story. You can almost make a point about Dinah being a poor choose by Ellie, that without Joel guidance in her teenager years, has made some mistakes (like the gas mask one). That way you can show that Dianh was in fact more toxic in her love than Joel, and not necessarely because of evilness, but because she is insecure, coward, and not have experience with the real world dangers, and as you say, maybe she reached a breaking point with her brother dying (and her transformation in runner), making her made that decision, showing she never understood Ellie relationship with Joel (or worst, that Ellie never told her the real good things she had with Joel, so for Dinah that lie it is just making the things be as they way they were between them).
You know at the end where Ellie rides off, I might have given the player a choice too. Let Dina on the back of the horse or leave her there. The letting her get on being a moment of Ellie going "I'm not doing the same mistake again." because she regrets not forgiving, or at least understanding Joel's actions sooner.
Not to take anything from the rewrite, I think it is easier to put out the bad stuff and rewrite it to please more of the fandome. Not to say that it would have been impossible to write a good story from a blank page - I think that would have been possible as well. Some spoilers for the rewrite ahead: This rewrite actually was great. I would have played the hell out of that game. And the last scenes in the rewrite for Joel totally hit me emotionally just by thinking about them - seeing them on screen with good acting/voice acting would propably hit most of the fans right in the feels, that would have been a great way to end the character for this franchise. The kind of sad part is, that he talks about how to setup TLoU3, which I think would have been totally possible with that rewrite, while the actual TLoU2 propably killed the franchise for good. It kind of feels like that could have been the intend if you look how the "story" of the game ends, but who knows... but just by the fact that alot of fans are not very pleased it is hard to make another game, simply because part of the fanbase isn`t interested in it anymore. Also, I think the reputation of the whole developer suffered a bit. In the end, Druckman is a representative, and the way he treated the game, the leaks, the fans was REALLY bad. Taking down videos? Thats a no go. Raging and whining about fans, although they KNEW the game will piss them off? Thats something you should not do, you look silly and unprofessional. Such behaviour always falls back to the developer overall, you lose credibility with your fanbase. Who knows if they will try to make a third, my guess is that alot of people will be waiting to see if it is actually worth buying. And who knows how much hype there will be for the next project of the developer... only the future will tell.
your version of the story is so unbelievably better. i seriously got teared up just listening your story. i could go on about the details, but you now why this works so well.
@@Doradexplora when I heard Joel gets back in the fight after he had his leg blown off, I was like “hell yeah, Joel’s back and kicking ass”. Then I realized that I’ll never be able to play through this story in a game 😢.
Perfectly is a very bold statement. In my opinion he did not attempt to make a nuanced approach to his "autopsy" of the game. It is only perfect in your sense because it agrees with your view. Easy likes because everyone is hating this game. Poor analysis though
@@dnv1139 "because everyone is hating this game"... Because it was poorly executed lol... Too much time spent on the same protagonist instead of actually splitting it between them. Poorly timed flashbacks. I don't even care that Joel died, its how they did it. There's a reason why the game is hated...
@@tacoxaco There are just as many people who do not share the opinion that it was poorly executed. I felt that the flashbacks were a nice change of pace especially the museum scene. I agree that both Ellie's part and Abby's part felt long and could have had some cuts. Joel dying the way he did is also up for debate, but it is in tone of the franchise of how quickly people die.
1:22:45 - The inclusion of that “treated” woman into the story hits so good. The amount of sudden hopelessness, urgency (as you said) and feeling of doom that “Kill Me…” adds is amazing! I could imagine so vividly that kind of eldrich horror for the moment. Ellie finding out how much more horrifying the whole thing is than she would have thought… Simply brilliant! Henry, you’re probably not going to see this comment. But if you do, I’m telling you: You dropped this 👑, king!
It’s an amazing rewrite but it’s very “Hollywood” and would also have been criticised for being very different from the tone of the first game. There’s a middle ground here but there are clearly issues with the story of TLOU Pt II.
Holy shit, your story was beautiful, I was transfixed and an overwhelming sense of longing overtook me as I realised that this was the story I needed. In a sense I felt like I had closure after all these years of loving the first game, and despising the second. I felt, for lack of a better word, betrayed by the writers of the last of us 2, I felt as we and the characters didn't deserve what we got. Your story will be what I will be believing as canon from now on. Your description really made me feel like I was playing it. So thank you
I have nothing more than utter respect to your analysis approach and the fact that instead of just bashing the game, you gave us a gift of a whole another story. This was spot on and you made me feel less alone in this world. Greetings from Mexico. And thank you.
The part in the rewrite where Joel is revealed to have single-handedly killed the entire Scar camp would be a great nod to how much people love the character. Treat him like a badass, and don't spend the entire game kicking him like a wounded puppy.
Joel did terrible things after Sarah. Dooming humanity is just the icing on the cake. In such a grounded story why are people so upset that his actions have consequences. Yes Joel is a badass, however he doesn't live in a Hollywood action world. His luck had to run out sooner or later
I fell victim of misjudging this video in the first 10 mins… I have to say this was incredibly well done. You’re an amazing story writer/teller. You have a great gift at connecting with the audience on an emotional level. It take a keen eye for understanding the human psyche to do what you just did. Bravo. Subscribing.
Genuinely, I feel like the only reason they made Abby's section of the game so damn long is because they had to stuff it full of so much wholesome, sympathetic, "see she's a good person" fluff so that the they could make the final fight have more conflict.
@Simple Weirdo Well Ellie did messed up shit too, both of them were in the same situation, lost father/father figure and went out for revenge. In my opinion i don't think they made the game so people can like Abby, they made it so she can be understood and both of them learned their lessons
@@stone-vq7vo I was attached to both of them too but I don't hate Abby for what she did, at first i hated her so much but after I understood her kinda but again thats my perspective, I still miss Joel so much.
@@zlata784 i hate abby because she killed him in a extremley fucked up way, don't get me wrong if someone killed my parent i would want them dead, but in a quickly dead way, but to prolong their suffering while their loved one watched... there has to have been something already wrong with you to do that sort of thing, even more so after they saved my life, and showed no ill will towards me . and that they have multiple people who clearly cared about them, i would definatley consider what i'm doing and most likely stop, even more so if enough time has passed since the death
I straight up almost cried at the end of this retelling. Why could this not have been the original story? Why? It has so many more plot twists and interesting premises which could be built on for a future game as well, its amazing. I do think it would maybe be advantageous to explain why FEDRA has helicopters or maybe show that they only have a few because it would be kinda hard to believe that they could maintain more than a few in the disastrous state of the world.
This needs more likes, I can't believe how much of all the top comments are people bitching about the real last of us 2 story and not gushing over how fucking amazing The closer looks version is. Too many aspects of it were excellent for me to list out here but I also had a tear in my eye throughout half of this storytelling and that is far from easy to get out of me someone who just isn't the type to be moved to tears over media. Thinking about it now her calling Joel dad at the end seems kinda out of place for the character and honestly, kind of one of the writing sins The closer look speaks of earlier in the video as there are no examples of her calling him dad before so it seems odd that she would do so in a genuine way as he dies. All of that being said I have to forgive it for the fact that at the moment it was said I choked up slightly in large part due to the fact that I didn't see the "dad" drop coming at all. Keep up the awesome work you do The closer look.
@@seanleggat6138 I personally think the "dad" drop *could* work, only it should be a very deliberate drop rather than a mindless one. It'd fit more with her character if it was something she said for Joel's sake in his dying moment than her own. A sort of 'I forgive you too' thing, or simply to make his last few seconds easier and more peaceful, only for her to realize that it's too late cause he's already dead.
I loved this rewrite because of the rising tension he mentions. It is palpable. Unlike the original game where the use of the flashbacks confuses me and ruins the pace of the story
@@Unifarts I did think of this but it also seemed like it might be a little unrealistic for her to be thinking so logically but it's hard to say how much someone's thought process would be affected by such extreme grief
This, my God, THIS, is the definition of a GOOD ENDING! If this was the actual story, I would have wept a tear playing it. This just goes to show that the reason why we hate the ending isn't because its not happy. This ending is depressing too. But it's so handled so well! I am really looking forward to reading your book, sir!
There I was, just laying on my bed listening to your own version of the story and holy crap, it would've been one hell of an experience if canon. Nostalgia and well-written interactions in equal measure, plus Abby isn't portrayed as an unlikable psychopath. I almost teared up when you have Ellie mutter "Dad...", would've been a fitting send-off to such an iconic duo. As a fellow writer, I've learned a lot from just this video. It is truly a shame that the actual game's story left much to be desired in a sequel to an otherwise amazing story in the first game.
There are so many different routes they could have taken this game. But Druckmann insisted on telling a revenge story he thought was the absolute best for this game. Then he has the nerve to get mad at people who don’t like it when he himself said that people were going to hate this game. This whole shit-storm with this was just completely unnecessary.
@@Nassit-Gnuoy Exactly. There were so many different routes he could take and even if a revenge story is a must, as shown by this video, it still could've gone much better than what we got. Druckmann has been acting like a massive hypocrite with how he handled the backlash. In fact, for those unaware, Druckmann pitched to Bruce Straley for a similar revenge story during the first Last of Us's development. He wanted Tess to hunt down Joel for revenge over the death of her brother. She would've succeeded at the end of the game and left it in a depressing note with Ellie all alone (sound familiar?). Straley shot down that idea, pointing out how absurd it is for anyone in a zombie apocalypse to risk their life and those of their friends, wasting resources and braving hordes of infected across the country, just to kill one man. Ended up being a good idea to cut that crap because the first game was better without it and Tess was rewritten and more likable than Abby is.
LoneWolfHBS to put it simply, I enjoyed your work with White Lie and decisions you made as to where the story went but you can’t seem to appreciate the decisions made by Neil for his story.
Are we ignoring the absolute cinema of this rewrite, fantastic job, i would pay triple what i did for this re-telling, taking her immunity away was just brilliant
why did Dina do it? why is taking her immunity away good in the context of his story? As a concept, pretty impactful, in his story, a nonsensical decision by a character that is only there to make Ellie run back to Joel.
I'm not lying when I say your version got a few gasps from me, a cheer here & there and even a few tears I want your version of all this. It genuinely feels like LoU to me
The second half of Nier: Automata does the opposing protagonist revenge story really well, imo. I think the reason it works is it's based on a misunderstanding that you, the player, are aware of. Over the course of this part of the story you see one character consumed by the need for revenge. This culminates in a tragic final confrontation where you get to choose which character to side with. Funnily enough, the misunderstand involves the death of a character that you as the player have been very attached to up to this point.
@Tahmid Antar I'd argue it's gaming strongest argument when it comes to qualifying video games as a form of art. A game that is not afraid to be a game, and actually uses the strenghts of the medium to convey a message and make a point about the value of games and of life itself.
@Tahmid Antar HECK ! Event the first NieR back in 2010 made me root for the Shadowlord to some extent given everything we learn in routes B and C. It's almost like there's a consistent pattern here... Like... A competent writer... Hmmmm...
A beautiful story that hits many players so much they would willingly erase their precious data for altruistic purpuse. Truly the frosting and cherry on top were the credits. For a culture that hides their emotions to the outside they can express it beautifully in a different outlet
Honestly, last of us should’ve been an anthology series. Then Neil could have his depressing last of us game, but the fans of the first game wouldn’t have been as pissed about it
That would be the smart idea, however Neil's a failed comic writer for a reason. He *cannot* do original stories, because if he did nobody would like them or even be able to pretend to. TLOU2 was *supposed* to be a launchpad for Abby to take over the series, and we've all seen how that panned out with Sony having tried to sweep her under the rug.
The only thing I find wrong with the Joel getting rusty trope is the fact that he consistently went on patrol for the past 4 years and it was shown in flashbacks that he had come across not only infected but hostile strangers as well over that period of time. I think that’s just a weak argument as to why he and Tommy gave their identities away so easily. I actually had a good time with the tlou2 from a gameplay and world building perspective, however I didn’t get as invested in the story as I did the first game even though I tried and didn’t get spoiled. I really do feel if they switched between players more frequently and evenly while also maybe killing Joel in a more believable way or just later on in the game after having the time with Abby and not changing Ellie’s characteristics so drastically so fast would’ve made for a much better story experience.
but Joel didn’t give away their identities? Tommy did. Tommy had already revealed their names when they first met Abby, so there wouldn’t have been a point in lying about it. not only that, but Abby saves both Joel and Tommy multiple times during their escape from the horde. plus, it’s not like this is the first time Joel gave away his identity. he did it in the first game with Henry and Sam. he wasn’t even rusty. he’s just older and a bit softer, and the scene was written to give him no other option but to go along with Abby and put himself at a disadvantage. Joel softens up a bit by the end up TLOU1. that’s the entire purpose of his character arc. he spends those years before the second game going on patrol, yes, but he also spent them helping people. Abby wasn’t the first new person they’d come across to help based on journals/conversations within the game. and Tommy giving away their identities makes perfect sense for his character to begin with.
@@Lalacremini They *both* gave away their identity, only Tommy did it first (and twice). In fact, I couldn't believe Tommy's personality, like he was completely retconned on this sequel. Firstly, who in their right minds have time to introduce themselves in the middle of running away from a horde? That was pretty obvious, and then, when arriving to the Baldwin's place, Tommy acted all carefree telling them their location and even inviting them to restock? I was shocked, it was too much. Granted, Tommy did complain in the first game that he had nothing but nightmares from those years Joel protected him, but to act this naive when he *knows* he can't trust people that easily? Way too contrived. It's not that they had to lie, but they also didn't need to act *out* of character. Both knew how not to engage so easily with people, and just because they accept new people and trade with others doesn't mean they have to become gullible. Heck, even the game portrays how Joel still protects and cares for Ellie, like when he told her to keep using her mask despite being alone, or as Jesse said: "Funny how involved he gets whenever you're scheduled to go out". Either you are just repeating what you read in another thread (because this is something blind fanboys like to wrongly argue) , or you didn't played the game, because Joel never said his name to Henry and Sam. It was Henry who said: "I think I caught your name was Joel?" And then Ellie said hers, and the game *briefly* shows how Joel was reluctant, for how he reacted like he didn't want Ellie to say her name, then Joel rushed to ask how many were with them, still acting careful around Henry, and when Ellie suggested they could help each other, Joel didn't want to go along, but after hearing their responses, he ultimately ended up accepting, so please get your facts straight before claiming something is not true. The scene could have gone a *lot* better, like asking how many friends were with Abby the moment she said their location, you know, just how usually Joel would behave, then maybe Tommy saying something like c'mon, stop it, and Joel reminding him not to be so trustful, then after arriving to the Baldwin's place, Joel could have realized their intentions (like how in the first game he saw the ambush the hunters made from miles away), and then tried to get away or maybe put a fight, regardless their fail attempt to escape because they were outnumbered, you know, just like how Joel's character was in the first game... so there could have been a lot of options, but ND decide to take the easy (and out of character) way out. Omg you really need to play the first game again. Getting softer wasn't the purpose of his character arc. It was gaining hope in a world that was already doomed. He lost a daughter, hence be became a hardened survivor, but meeting Ellie reminded him of his lost child, and even though at first he didn't want to bond with her, he ended up seing her as a surrogate daughter. And the ending meant Joel will go any lenght to protect Ellie, making it an ambiguous well done ending. So please, fanboys need to stop making elaborated gymnastics to defend this game, because truth remains the same, it was a flawed game, with good looking graphics and gameplay, but an awful story. If only Tommy would have introduce himself and accepted Joel and Ellie right away when they arrived to the hydroplant, instead of welcoming them at gunpoint, I could believe it made sense for his character to reveal their identities, but guess what, he did not. Surviving along with Joel made him careful, not stupid. But what can be expected from a man who *retconned* his own characters 🤷♀️
@@paolacarmona1369 Cool, so if Tommy already gave away their identities, there would be zero point to lying about it, especially considering Abby knew who they were from the first time she heard it. congrats, that’s my point. and retconned? no, that’s exactly how Tommy was in the first game. Tommy was the one that was open to a better world. that’s the entire reason he left Joel to join the fireflies. we see him actively building a community in the first game, and he continues that in the second. again, they’d just fought together with Abby. she saved them multiple times and vice versa. he had no reason to not trust her. it’s not a “retcon” just because you don’t like it. and yeah? key words there, “for Ellie”. he has always been overprotective of her. that doesn’t mean that, when by himself, he’s going to be completely closed off to everyone else. Joel still trusted Henry and Sam? twice? even after they left him and Ellie to die? he was literally following them back to where they assumed a larger group would be? did YOU play the game? because my entire point is that Joel TRUSTED them and allowed himself to be led somewhere he thought more people would be, the EXACT thing you’re calling out of character in the second game. they had no time? did you even play the second game? the horde was at their door, they had to decide and move. no time to sit around asking a bunch of questions and Joel knew the area Abby mentioned and knew it was fortifiable. again, she’d just saved them and they’d saved her. no reason to not trust her. Joel only knew about the hunters because he WAS one. the same logic cannot be applied to Abby’s group. Joel DID catch on, but by then, he was already in the lodge. exactly what could he have done? nothing. literally nothing. Abby blew his knees out with a shotgun and Tommy got his ass handed to him. getting softer WAS the point. are you even reading what you type? Joel finding hope is literally him “getting softer”. him returning to Jackson to build a community is literally him getting softer. he opens up to Ellie, and in turn, everyone else including his brother? like? you’re acting like Tommy was some random person and that there was no reason for Joel to adapt to Tommy’s lifestyle after they spent YEARS there. Joel wanted a better world FOR Ellie, and you’re saying it doesn’t make sense that he was part of trying to make one? oh, if only Tommy and Joel had saved Abby from a horde, and then watched her save them multiple times from infected(something you don’t do to people you want to kill) to establish some sort of trust between them that would make Tommy and Joel following her back to avoid dying to the horde reasonable… wait. yeah. that’s exactly what they did. wasn’t “poorly written” you’re just a Joel d rider that thinks he’s infallible and every decision he makes has to be the best one. he’s not omniscient. they had two options. follow the girl who had already saved them both back to a place they knew was defendable, or die to the horde. literally. that’s another thing that shows me you didn’t pay attention to the second game. they didn’t have another choice regardless. they’d have never made it back to Jackson in the storm with the horses and that’s flat out said in game. Joel wasn’t the main character anymore. plot armor? doesn’t apply. him dying? well written. no “retcons”. you just didn’t like that it happened, which is fine, but that’s a reflection on your preference. not the game.
@@Lalacremini I don't know if you can't see this, but you are grasping at straws here really bad. I told you why the way Tommy acted is out of character, and you keep saying there would be zero point lying about it, when I never said anything about telling lies, you need to comprehend what you're reading. I never said I didn't like it, here I thought I was giving you proof of what retcon mean but I guess you don't know the definition of that word. But he was completely closed off to everyone else, that's why I keep asking, did *you* played the game? In the first game, Joel only had Tess, and she is the one who goes around tell him what to do, like a boss, in fact, is Tess the one who told him to keep going with Ellie, and everytime he met someone, it wasn't like he was happy about it, he just wanted to get through with the task Tess gave her. So idk why you keep blatanty ignoring what I am saying, almost like you can't fathom facts. Omg ur bias is too much. I can't believe I have to explain this bit by bit, but I guess you missed it. He was angry at Henry for leaving them behind, and was close to shot him, but Ellie stopped him saying he saved her too from drowning. So it's not like he kept on trusting Henry (and i'm only adressing him because his brother Sam is just a kid, I mean c'mon), but as Henry said it, he would have do the same, sacrificing someone else's life in order to save their loved ones. And twice? Idk what other time you are refering too, I'm afraid you'll have to be especific here. But they way I see it, it seems u r only nitpicking everything I just wrote. I said what could have be done, so I'm not gonna explain again what I already did, since you blindly keep on defending it. It's ok if you like it, but sadly, it was not well done, and there's nothing wrong with liking something bad. To each their own. Soft doesn't mean he would forget all those years surviving, also, returning to Jackson to build a community? I think you are assuming something he never implied, he just wanted to be with Ellie, something like emulate those happy times with Sarah, I thought that was obvious, because he never cared for other people than himself, and Ellie came to change that, if he ever cared for someone, that person was Ellie, or did you forget how Joel didn't care for Tommy's new born friends? How that translate to him wanting to built a community? See, you are just doing gymmastics trying to defend something is not there. For starters, why would Joel risk their lifes to save someone they don't know? In the first game, there was a family who wanted to escape and Joel rejected the idea of bringing them up, saying so do we (have a kid), so it would make sense if Tommy was the one saving Abby, and Joel being upset but going along anyway since that's what the plot needs right now, a lazy and contrived way to expose Joel to Abby. Wanna know why? It's been recorded in interviews that there was a far better plot where Abby and crew make it to Jackson and spend some time there before finally busting Joel, but they decided to speed up and waste a better development and went with the easy way, go ahead, make some research before claiming things you *think* you know for sure. Now using ad hominems? Way to lose an argument kid, I cannot take you seriously anymore, I mean I did called u fanboy, but that does not compare to what you are calling me. Read again what I wrote first, and then read your reply. I never said anything about those two options you keep bringing up, either follow Abby or die. I clearly said options that could happen between meeting Abby and getting to the Baldwin's place. Again you are grasping at straws at something I never address, that's why I think you need to improve your reading comprehension. I won't be answering, it's clearly to me you are going to eristicly defend this game, and whatever floats your boat mate.
@@paolacarmona1369 also a point to add that being selfish was always part of Joel's personality. In literally thr prologue of the first game when they were driving through the chaos they saw a burning farmhouse that could have many people along with children and Joel pushed on to help none of them. It was his personality to be selfish and save his own before anyone else and at a point when theres a horde nearby and someone like Joel and his brother go on to help a stranger despite having no need to with an ticking danger close enough to grab hold of you? It is certainly hard to believe a survival selfish veteran knowing the tricks and decieving acts of others would go out of his way to do something like that. People can say whatever they want about the game later on but the starting was horrific to say the least.
As a person who has never played the games before, after listening the entire video, I genuinely cried after hearing the end of your version. Well done
I like this rewrite, but while Dina’s naïveté is certainly established, is it realistic? Wouldn’t she receive training before going out on patrols so as not to risk endangering the group?
At that point we'd have to assume at what point Dina got to Jackson. And even then, nobody at Jackson was ever known for having military training or any kind of training at all. They're just to be assumed they know how to survive, and considering in the rewrite that Kyle has most of the heavy lifting, we can assume that he never bothered to teach her how to properly survive on her own until maybe when they got to Jackson. But idk, maybe I'm just trying to be fair with the rewrite because of how much I hated the actual game we got.
The entire thing surrounding patrols seemed naive to me, even before the rewrite. Like, I legit think the only requirement is knowing how to use a gun/when to wear a mask, and even then they don't encounter many people or infected, so I doubt it's a requirement and is instead more of a precaution. I say this because 1: if they encountered many people, Joel and Tommy wouldn't have been as naive as they were to INSTANTLY trust a stranger despite being veterans (their situation isn't a justification; it's an excuse). And 2: if they encountered many infected, there wouldn't have been an entire horde of that size lurking with them in those very same mountains (entering or leaving) unnoticed, despite the fact that they make patrols daily. In a flashback Tommy was sniping them from miles off. Heck, one guy made an entire weed farm in secret. Eugene was it? The entirety of Jackson and its Scouts just seems too naive to me, so I totally buy the rewritten Dina.
I think you can put it in as a scenario as Jackson also recruits people to help out either for patrols,farming,scavenger parties etc. and that way you have the naivete of her come from Jackson seemingly openess of inviting folks in
@AnimeGaMRr We can agree this rewrite is much better, and in the grand scheme this is a fairly minor complaint. But let’s imagine for a minute that the game we got didn’t exist and this WAS the game we got (if only). I think Dina’s lack of caution would rub people the wrong way. Tommy himself is a firefly. He knows how to survive. And he’s married to Jackson’s leader, who from the first game we can see is pretty on the ball as well. On that basis I think Jackson would be more security conscious, and they’d vet potential scouts in advance. It would probably also make it difficult for the player to invest themselves in Dina, knowing she’s capable of being that stupid.
@な6IXLXRD Hm. I can’t say I buy it. Their being naive to an unrealistic degree in the released version doesn’t justify that same naïveté in the rewrite.
Im a year late, but wow that rewrite was amazing. Gut wrenching, heart breaking, engaging, brutal and wholly meaningful- i was so invested in your hour or so of telling an amazing story. Kudos man. Keep it up
I hope you liked today's video! It took me an obscene amount of time to make it happen.
To let you know, I've burnt myself out hard over the past months due to me making 4 hours worth of video essays. I'll be taking a 1-2 month break from UA-cam and I'll be spending that time editing my sci-fi novel which I'll *hopefully* have out early next year.
So if you see I haven't uploaded in over a month, know that I'm not dead... probably :D
Please tell at us when you release it!
Well good luck to you really love your videos but take a break when you feel burnt out so you can get motivation.
Have a wonderful break.
Take how much time you need man. This One Hour Video of quality content must be such an ass to put together. Have an good break lad!
1 hour 48 mins - This is going to take a while.
The fact that so many people feel so strongly about this sequel is a testament as to how beloved the original was.
The first was a masterpiece! Part II was idiotic, to say the least.
The same can be said about Star Wars
TLOU doesn't need a sequel in the first place. The first TLOU is already a perfect story 😔
And still is nothing will ever spoil it for me not even part 2
Elias toufexis, agree
*Me at the beginning of the video:*
Oh you’re a writer, huh? Can’t wait to count how many times he plugs his book.
*Me at the end:*
....d-do you have a book I can read?
Me too
I stayed away from the video most of these guys bring stupid arguments this guy is awsome. I have to admit after already dedecating 2.5 houers i am only at the 25 minute mark but his explanation of why the pacing made me pause and have 2 houer conversation with myself about how you can do it in videogames. Because Nier automata did somthing similar but the pacing is not getting ruind. By using its form of delivery as a videogame.
You need to listen to his rewrite of the star wars sequel, I CRIED. It was amazing.
Same -- now I'm excited to read his book.
@@lennynero8614 oh honey, ok. You can admire a person without being upset about yourself.
Abby: you took everything from me.
Joel: I don't even know who you are.
Abby: you will. Because you’ll be forced to play as me for half the game
lmao, Joel was a god among men and Abby is like “meh meh mehmeh”
What does it matter whether he knows who she is or not?
@@jackieboy3528 it should, otherwise, there isn't going to be any sympathy (or at least a bit of exposition to her story) for Abby after she kills Joel.
Doesn't that just kind of demonstrate how bad of a person he was? He's killed and hurt so so many people that it isn't even worth guessing who Abby is. He knew his past was going to catch up to him eventually.
I’m very glad you brought up Joel’s survival instinct or lack of cause before anything even happen my immediate thought was why would he give out his real name to complete strangers knowing there’s entire factions that would kill him on sight? He tells Ellie to hide that she’s immune but the thought of hiding his own name never came to mind when he had a whole conversation to her about slipping up around the wrong people when she didn’t want to put her gas mask on
He wouldn’t, that is why the story is sooo bad. He went against every single thing Joel was about in the first game and 20 + years in the timeline.
He was in jackson for years and got older. He dropped his guard after living in peace and safety for years. But it is weird how he still wasn't semi cautious with a group of people he had never met or seen before.
@@thereallexai6751 they went around the town daily, just because it’s a “safe” area doesn’t really mean it’s safe. Nothing in this world is safe and nobody forgets that. Joel would never drop 20+ years of survival instincts because he has a family now in a little town. In fact he would be more likely to try and protect them at any cost.
@@BrandonGavin_EDC People change, Joel wasn’t an exception, as we saw through the entirety of the first game. Also through everything Joel Abby Tommy had just gone through almost dying, I doubt the first thing on Joel’s mind was getting ambushed by the person he just saved.
@@thereallexai6751 nobody forgets their survival instincts. It’s hardwired into you from 1000’s of years.
Joel back in the battlefield without a leg is the Joelest of Joel's moments.
This is my favorite comment of all time.
He will fully handicap abby with just the wheels on his wheelchair
Yeah, jeez. I could see so clearly Joel hearing the phone call, running to the rescue and so badly loosing your footing. The grit and strain, small stains and wear, all falling to the wayside in the face of his determination. He's gonna save his (grown) little girl no matter what. 😭💔💓
@@leenone8456 He lost one daughter, he refuses to lose another.
@@IzukuMidoriya38855 💔😭 So true
Ok, someone NEEDS to hire you.
I started watching this because I didn't like the last of us 2. I was expecting a 2 hour breakdown of it, and a "How to do it better". I didn't expect a 5 star audio book to come with.
i only had one problem at the end of his story that ellie knows that joel would never lie to her nor would break promises given to her. so ellie believing dina may not be correct
I agree bro, his version was phenomenal
Same fam. Tbh I would've preferred a game about abby the wolves and the scars nothing to do with elli and joel
Rishi teja I think it makes perfect sense, bc as Martin pointed out, Ellie made Joel sweat on it but the latter still lied.
Me after reading this comment:
2 hours?
**clicks on video to check time**
*TWO HOURS?!?!*
This guy's rewrite of the story is officially how the sequel plays out in my head now. Thank you for this.
That’s weird considering he ignored half of her story. Of course it seems boring and pointless if you ignore the point of it all.
Realistically, whether you loved this story or not came down to if you could get over your hate of Abby for killing Joel. If you couldn’t, then it didn’t matter to realize how good of a person that Abby and most of her crew were.
yea its so much better
The game has problems but I think it was fine with how it played out to be honest. It wasn't what some people want but it told a story that was difficult for players to be invested in. Whe things don't go how you expected it you felt betrayed.
-I feel like people needed to move on. What people expected TLOU2 to just be another Ellie and Joel on an another adventure essentially a last of us 1.2 and play the first game again. But people needed to move on. But after what Joel did at the hospital it wasn't gonna happen. Karma was going to catch up and bite his ass.
-In regard to how Joel's death happened, I think it was fine for this type of game. People wanted him to have an epic hero's death or fight to the death where he would be honoured by the game because we saw all the things he an Ellie went through in the game. Plus we feel even more connected to the characters because we play and control them we feel more connected. Think of when you die in games you may say something like 'I died' or the game tells you 'you died' No you didn't but it feels more personal. But narratively they way he went out works for this type of game. People in this universe have pathetic deaths just like all the other NPCs you kill. But because we spent the first game with Joel we grew attached to him and as the centre of that universe and some may even see him as the hero but he is not. He's the enemy and trigger of Abby and her arc and in that universe was just like any other character.
-They live in a bleak world where's there's not much to live for. Those moments of happiness and family can be so meaningful as it's a breakaway and escape from the hard world which heightens the joy felt by the characters. When you take away that joy what is there really left in the world to distract you from going on a rampage?
That's what happened to Abby.
-Joel in the 5 years has been living a good and happy life which must seem like the complete opposite from the past 25 years he's led. He's grown softer and let his guard down as the world is starting to recuperate a little that groups have now become forming with their own agendas.
-When you plan to kill someone you want to restrain effectively so they have no means of escape. And in this empty world giving them a slow death may make you feel very satisfied rather than shooting them in the head. This is what Abby did. And will nothing left for Ellie going on a rampage was probably the only means she felt to give closure. However Ellie's journey di her more harm than good. She's left alone, unable to play her guitar, lost her friends, and left off in a worse place. And what Ellie said she feared the most happened.
I guess this guy's rewriting of the game (which literally anyone can do, even in their own heads) can be your safe space from the reality of the actual plot. I'm not trying to be an asshole, but the outrage over this game is pathetic. It's a fictional story. I don't remember any outrage when Ned Stark was brutally murdered in front of his own daughter in Game of Thrones....
@@KingstonHawke did you not watch this video? Generalizing everyone’s disdain for the story that way doesn’t really leave any room for a conversation. When I saw the leaks of Joel being killed by Abby, I was honest to god excited to see how we got to that point in the story. I figured he was going to die long before we got a trailer, and when I saw that leak I was praising Naughty Dog for having the BALLS to do it..... but when I saw how the story actually played out I was left FLOORED by how terrible the entire structure was. I’ve taken several creative writing classes for my education, and I’m pretty sure that every single instructor I’ve ever had would rip LoU Part 2’s story into tiny pieces. It’s not just a terrible sequel, it’s just a bad story overall.
Jesus, the idea of FEDRA using helicopters to drop containers full of infected is a brilliantly horrific idea.
It’s like if Ellie shoved a spore mushroom into the WLF’s ventilation system and slowly poisoned every single person inside the compound, and she uses the distraction to destroy everything since she’s immune to the spores
Fedra idea is very unrealistic to TLOU and very poorly thought out. It’s unoriginal asf and sounds like The Maze Runner movies
@toxin1552 Il love stupid ppl like you. Hou junst make me laughs.
@@toxin1552 abby being built like a tank in a post apocalyptic world is realistic then? Lmfao
@@lm_slayer1Yeah, absolutely lol A fucking “Fedra” helicopter appearing and using infected as a weapon is such an idiotic unoriginal concept. So yes Abby being bulky bc she trained for the last 4 years lol Yeah it’s VERY realistic than what the “better story” has told. Again, it’s very contradictory towards the first game.
@@lm_slayer1 this “better story” does not work as a sequel to the first game AT ALL.
The part where Joel comes back to fight despite his leg is probably the most Joel thing ever
Agreed
He did get impaled in the first game and seemed to suffer no long lasting effects so yeah that would make sense.
Yes
I’m not really a fan of how plot armor-ish that aspect of the story was but yeah. It was badass
That part is canon now.
I love how Druckman said the first game was about love and everyone loved it and he said the second game is about hate and most people hated it
Exactly
It's sad that we hated the second game because it's trash and terribly written, and not because of an actually interesting and compelling story, that makes us feel envolved with the amazingly superficial characters.
Ah, the pieces are coming together...
He did his job.
“It’s like poetry.”
"Here's a short list of all the mistakes in TLOU2"
-2 hours left
Only the biggest mistakes, the total list is a good three day marathon.
@@Rorington imagine when the list of mistakes is longer than the total time the game takes to complete
its literally more mistakes than game. 150% mistakes XD
@@bratwurst8931 I guess it takes one to know one, XD
@@ttime441 more like it takes Joel to know one 😂
Tbf. Most of this video was his fan fiction.
I agree and disagree with what he lists as mistakes. Respect his analysis though. I enjoyed the game. Not a masterpiece, not a shitshow.
Nice to see someone who didn’t like the game make a video like this.
I really like the idea of this story being the canon one. Cures, larger than life threats from other humans and disturbing minds being in authority, that's a really gripping apocalypse story.
It’s crazy how Joel’s death in the game only made me angry, but your script almost made me tear up just hearing it, good job man
a HERO that doesn’t know what protect means sometimes a cliche just works better for the story. I don’t mean rehashing cliche after cliche is a good thing, but sometimes you don’t need a big twist or to make everything different for the sake of being different. So long as it feels like a natural progression to the story that works, sometimes having one or two cliches is okay.
Then again I typically don’t notice these things, so, what do I know.
a HERO that doesn’t know what protect means To be fair, those themes are not uncommon at all in literature. Those themes are wildly apparent in nearly every revenge-plot story; usually dark fantasies or grim-dark stories. The issue is that TLOU1’s story was ultimately a realistically optimistic tale, thus such a dark moral isn’t really suited to what TLOU1 tried to establish with its theme or tone. It goes back to what is said in the video- grim morals _can_ be enjoyed by a specific audience, but it’s not the same target audience that TLOU1 captured. They expected a more lighter tone (which does not equate with a “happy” story, just that it would portray the characters with hope) with a realistically optimistic message at the end.
If you like those themes, I highly recommend finding pieces of literature that do it well. However, for a game such as TLOU2 to follow that path when TLOU1 was its stark opposite in terms of themes and morals just feels like the writers misunderstood their target audience and why they enjoyed the first game so much.
I started crying its so fucking good
And she writes: “Kill me.”
This gave me chills all over myself, this is petrifying and freaking sweet af at the same time. I’ve listened to the rewrite a few times now and this part gets me every single time.
How can she write without a face though.
@bavorec realistically speaking, you’re probably right. But l can probably write something with my eyes closed.
@@bavorec You can sense where your body is without looking.
Jojje after being a clicker for years and being unable to control your body because of the fungus infection and after being experimented on... i doubt it.
Anyway this was just an example of all the far fetched, contrived, illogical and inconsistent things in the alternate story. Smaller things than that are attacked in the original story but then happen in the alternate story presented here... If one claims that this is “A better story” than it should be bulletproof.
bavorec but the thing is, this was what, one guy trying to rewrite a story over a couple weeks to a few months vs a big production company with a large amount of employees with several years to work on a story.
I don’t expect everything here to be perfect, but I’d prefer this rewrite with its flaws compared to the mess of a story that is the actual TLOU2 game and the creators behind it
I won't even lie, your rendition of the game's story literally made me gasp and pulled me right into it. I feel like I was listening to an audiobook, rather than a hypothetical reimagining of the game. This writing was so well done I am eagerly awaiting when you finish the book you are writing.
Saaame. I was audibly saying "that's so cool", and "ooooooohhhhhh" so many times. Instant sub from me too.
Right?! It's sooo bloody brilliant!
I legit got excited that I figured out Dina cured Ellie long before the story revealed it, despite the fact that it wasn't what actually happened. Darn good storytelling for sure.
riding a feels train with this rendition of the story😢
Cringey.
The switch from playing as Abby to then playing as Joel during the struggle was mindblowingly brilliant. Im just putting myself in the shoes as the gamer in your story, and that transition would have hit very very hard and most players would get the biggest smile on their face. You sir are a great writer and I hope Neil watches this.
I want to play that sequence so badly now. It would be the most badass moment of this hypothetical game
Neil’s ego is too big to even consider a story as good as this, he wouldn’t even consider it IMO. He literally believes that garbage story was a masterpiece.
The fact that this video made me appreciate The Last Of Us 2's story even more than before, Ellie calling Joel "dad" is so out of character for her, Dina betraying Ellie is so out of character for her, Abby not killing Joel because she's "better than him" is so out of character for her, because she's not better than him, she shouldn't be, and Abby doesn't even gets some sort of character development in this new story, and the fact that the doctor and "the cure of humanity" situation is playing out again in the story when that story already played out at the first game and it should be done with already, I can't imagine as a player playing this game, how boring it would've been, we already have enough interaction and moments with Joel, this "better story" seems just like some sort of blinded by nostalgia fan fiction, that supposed to dick ride the Fanbase rather than making a good story for the game
If that were to have happened it would immediately become one of my favorite boss battles I would ever play in a video game❤
Yeah that would be awesome to play through, no other game that I can think of has done that
That “Dad!” exclamation from Ellie was uncalled for
That classic “The feeling’s mutual!” moment we never got.
Looking forward to Sunday school tomorrow Dad
Wendigoon your a goat! Lol
Oh crap it's you!
Maybe, a bit
The fact that that your rewrite is actually darker, and more depressing, yet so much better and more coherent, is insane. Would love to see you get the chance to write a story for a game someday.
I'm working on the plot for my game, Solid Shadows, which is meant to be a pretty intense - and particularly scary - horror game. This channel is great, really has helping out a lot, for anyone new I'd suggest this.
It's because for many of us, it's not the darkness of the story that we dont like
@@SStupendous Is it going to be out on Steam eventually?
@@JustANyanCat Yes, Solid Shadows will be a mainly-PC game, developed in UnReal Engine, will be released on Steam.
@@SStupendous Alright, I'll keep an eye out for it!
I wish you would have been the guy who wrote TLOU2 lol nicely done vide man
Same man he did amazing with this if this was the actual game would have enjoyed it so much more and had little to no complaints about it
That fucking fight scene between Joel and Abby oh fuck that would of been so good! I got excited by him just reading it.
Also love your videos keep up the good work.
Yo what you doing here Roanoke
@@squizolifting just hanging out lol
@@RoanokeGaming man...Just wanted to say mega big fan of your vids, you made my quarantine a lot less grey, thanksss
I know a lot of people say Joel's an unlikeable protagonist but the problem is he is actually so so likeable lol. He's my favourite thing about the whole franchise, I adore him.
He's unlikeable on paper. If he wasn't the main character we would hate this murderer, but because he's the focus we understand the motivations behind his actions and root for him despite his actions.
The show "House" pulls this off, too.
Despite Joel being unlikeable on paper, he's extremely sympathetic and you just can't help but to feel bad for him for all the shit he has to endure, because Joel is the most tragic character in TLOU.
A friend of mine once said "You learn so much more from a failed story because then you will be able to avoid the mistakes it made" and I guess it's true for this case, and otherwise we wouldn't have YOUR amazing version of sequel
Obviously, this rewrite has some issues, it was written by a single dude in a span of what I'd assume to be couple of weeks at most. Yet somehow it holds up better than a story created by a team of writers over the course of many months. This is truly remarkable.
I agree. There are some flaws, like How could the cured clicker lady realistically still be alive after brain damage that the cordiceps could have caused, how could you play as Joel if he has a prosthetic leg and why would Dina cure Ellie? Other than that I think it’s way better then the actual story.
Like I'm still baffled on how he was able to make a story better than what they gave us over a week. Like they need to make the last of us part 2 non canon and make a new game called the REAL last of us part 2, bring in this guy to write the story, and slap Neil Druckmann in the face... maybe that last one was a little too much
@@naththegamer845 just a bit, he still made the first last of us which is still an amazing game. He just made the mistake of not taking into account the audience and everything with Abby.
@@forrestmanbro0981 That is true, I'm still a little mad at how it all turn out... Ima just pretend that last of us pt 2 never existed... and that Neil Drunkmann made one game and nothing else... for now...
Edit: I TAKE BACK WHAT I SAID...
Why tf would Joel bother to avenge some dude named Kyle and put his own life at risk? Is this not out of character?
Jesus, did y'all even watch the whole video?
This is just a cowardly written fanservice story designed purely to earn clout.
I never had a problem with Joel dying…the problem I had was the fact they killed him off in the beginning, and players were expected to sympathize with Abby during her 10 hour long side quests.
Sympathize with a chick that is banging a dude with a pregnant girlfriend? Yeah... right.
Five hours into unsatisfying gameplay just waiting to be Joel or Ellie again, and you get to face the most difficult infected in the series with limited ammo! Have fun, fuckers! >:D
Every single player who played Abby would lose On Purpose, Nothing she does after made her sympathetic to, anyone :/ I feel with game testers that should have been expressed if it wasn't already, if it was ignored, developers Sure don't understand anything about their audience
Abby's side quests. Wow. That setting is unfamiliar to all of us. None of us think we would end up in a paramilitary army taking orders from one man you barely met a couple years prior because you had to flee the place that held so much meaning and purpose to come to this warzone that you don't belong to. Abby's story is actually a very emotional and morally difficult story to experience.
@@BEERBOMB113 lol It's Tomb Raider + Farcry, and Ellie's arc just becomes female Red Dead. Not to mention all of the terrible dialogue, poorly executed plot points, and ridiculous inconsistencies with previous world-building. Nah, it's really bad, dude.
I want to play your version. Absolutely incredible writing. I like Abbey in your version. Shows that I didn’t hate Abbey to begin with, just hated the writing.
You liked his Abby, who is a completely different character. It's not the same, she didn't even 'kill' Joel in his version (I get she shot him, but there is no need to revenge or hate her for killing him in his version.)
Not gonna lie:
I'd pay to see this version as a game.
It's majestic.
No.
@@whywhy9808 Everybody has his own opinion, pal.
@@dinorex3464 Why is it that you think this rewrite is any good?
@@whywhy9808 Because the game is a masterpiece that had some flaws.
This story is surprising, especially because it is fanmade.
@@dinorex3464 The rewrite is primitive and cliched, it does not fit into the universe of TLOU.
Joel: *Does anything during the rewrite.*
Ellie: *Absolutely lays into Joel.*
Right? This game was a fanfic but my God was the rewrite even worse.
@@matthewcooper4248 The game has a lot of subtext dude, all main characters have delvopment. Owen,Joel,Ellie and Abby. The side characters are just small side stories as they should be.
Their action usually make sense, besides the side characters again
All he is doing is adding too much unnecessary details. The game shows, not tells
@@matthewcooper4248 I actually thought the rewrite was quite good.
Just poking fun at a common theme in it.
me: I'll only watch the first 6 minutes
also me (two hours later): this is now the official storyline for TLoU2 and nobody can change my mind
literally same
Same lol, I got so invested
LittleBigPlanet is my favorite 🙂
Same
If someone novelizes it and posts it on FFN or something, I will pay you. Or maybe I'll just do it. Could be a fun project.
i started tearing up when he said that joel kept getting up every. time. he fell down while going to save ellie. that goes to show how much joel truly cares about ellie and i love how this retelling puts more emphasis on that.
yes 😭😭
Joel’s death in the original made me angry and didn’t make me cry. Joel’s death in the rewrite made me well up so quickly.
Ellie crying out "Dad" to Joel in his final moments would have had me bawling my eyes out just like Lee's death in The Walking Dead Season 1.
In the original, I was laughing. I couldn't take it seriously.
What rewrite are you speaking about?
@@codymyers9480 he wrote his own version of the story in this video, it starts somewhere in the middle
@@codymyers9480 at 45:25
Dude... this rewrite was EVERYTHING. Seriously, it’s a tragedy that this wasn’t the story we got. I’m amazed.
I actually fckin cried and care about all the characters in the rewrite lol, he is such a good storyteller
This listened as a real story. I got emotional as well and my feelings flowed with the story. So well done!!!!
Man is amazing how he used more of the infected to help in the choices of human and stuff, instead of Neil druckman who focused on people being blinded by revenge lol
No
No
The whole “being trapped inside” when you’re a runner or clicker would have been a great throwback to when Henry’s brother talks about being infected in the first game, it’s a shame that ND didn’t do something with this
That's now how any of this works. Even brain tumors in some parts of the brain can cause significant shifts in one's personality and behaviour yet a parasite fungus that grows on the brain and takes control somehow doesn't change the level of consciousness? At least ND got that part right.
No, because it's not him losing control, it's him changing, HE is behaving like this, nobody is controlling him, he has been changed mentally, so there is no "trapped inside" because he is in control, but he is aggressive now.
@@thescruffinator8830 N-no dude. He said that the people who experienced it had 0 control but were trapped there, dont know if they saw or felt any of the things the fungus did aside from the pain he mentions tho. But they are in, suffering. Kinda of a lucid dream of sorts.
@@FDALl-ms5kg And what makes you think he's right? he's never been infected, the fungus makes YOU aggressive, it doesn't take over for you, it makes YOU do those things, it's the difference between being possessed and FORCED to do things, or being injected with something that makes YOU want to do those things.
@@thescruffinator8830 I think hees right because he was making this story, this is fan fiction afterall. Whos gonna know what the fuck happens better than the writer?
Edit: Im that kind of an idiot that doesnt realize who are you talking about. And even then im still right, the guy has heard Testimonies of people that experienced it, why should they lie to him
“Vengeance is a fool’s game.” - Arthur Morgan, Red Dead Redemption II
Fun fact: hearing is one of the last senses you'll lose before you die so Joel could've heard Ellie said "dad"
Where could he have heard this?
lol, when did ellie say dad in joel's death scene?
@@kevingaspari5848 in his version of the story, at around 1:45:00
bless you kind sir
No one would shout dad as their surrogate father figure is getting his head beat it.
It is pure emotional manipulation from "people" who pretend they stand against such things.
Dude, you are ready to be a script doctor as a profession. You talk a lot about still growing as a writer, but I seriously think you'd be an INCREDIBLE editor to help video game companies clean up their final drafts and help mould the material to be the best it can be. SERIOUSLY.
strange how a golf game became so controversial
I think it’s because Abby got a Joel in one
Imo The Last of us 2 has nothing on Wii sports golf.
2/10
Honestly I think EA should sue ND for copying tiger woods.
George W. Bush : *Now watch this drive!*
Golf being a historically white male dominant sport and a golf club is used to kill the white male protagonist by a trans analog character to signify the smashing of the patriarchy.
I wouldn't say strange. Contrived. Ham-fisted. On the nose.
Oh, look at me purposely missing the joke!
Whoops!
this rewrite was so beautiful😭 just goes to show how many amazing paths to take the game with were possible, and how they naughty dog fumbled so bad
Lol your version is so good I could imagine some banter between them
Joel:"I've had worse odds "
Ellie:" you also had both your legs"
That's something Ellie would say for sure 😂
😂😂😂
Perfect
Sooooooo good lol
This rewrite is incredible, this can easily be turned into a 30+ hour game which will be compelling all the way through and never stray away from the main story. I particularly liked element of the antibiotic cure and how it gives the player that shock surprise to know that people still have their awareness whilst being infected, this makes me remember when Sam tells Ellie in the first game that he thinks this is what happens and is terrified by it, and then to know that this is actually the case makes it extremely horrifying, It shows just how cruel the world of The Last of Us is, NOT by making the main characters unlikeable psychopaths and force you to play as them. The FEDRA Sergeant seems to be the only psychopathic character in your story however it is justified, he reminds me of Hugo Strange from Gotham.
now this is the sort of depressing game i can get into
This adaptation is WAYYY better
That addition to how the fungus works is EXACTLY how it works on ants. It only controls their muscles, the brains is left intact.
I feel so validated in not being the only one to deliberately let Ellie win.
Lol same. I was hoping for it to be the actual cutscene and that I'd be able to play as Ellie again.
The "Better Story" Part is so good that I have been re-watching the video like 20 times just to hear ii again
Imagine if someone were to actually make a game off of it that actually looks like the real game to
Nah... I think what i predicted it would be our was better... abbey iz ellies mom and we learn her fate
because hearing fanfiction is always better than accept the course of history, conservatives know much about that
The fact that this video made me appreciate The Last Of Us 2's story even more than before, Ellie calling Joel "dad" is so out of character for her, Dina betraying Ellie is so out of character for her, Abby not killing Joel because she's "better than him" is so out of character for her, because she's not better than him, she shouldn't be, and Abby doesn't even gets some sort of character development in this new story, and the fact that the doctor and "the cure of humanity" situation is playing out again in the story when that story already played out at the first game and it should be done with already, I can't imagine as a player playing this game, how boring it would've been, we already have enough interaction and moments with Joel, this "better story" seems just like some sort of blinded by nostalgia fan fiction, that supposed to dick ride the Fanbase rather than making a good story for the game
@@nehirsonmaz287 because its a blinded by nostalgia fanfiction, its literal wattpad levels of "I can do it better" without even known how character development works
Killing Joel was a pretty obvious move. It was the most emotional gut punch Naughty Dog could give us and at his age, he probably wouldn’t have played much of a role in a Part 3, even if he had survived. But once Abby kills Joel…. We’re not going to like her. It doesn’t matter how it is motivated, it doesn’t matter how pleasing you try to make her, we’re not going to like her. Once she kills Joel, there’s no going back. The fact that she does it in the first Act means there’s no redeeming her and man, did they try hard.
It's all about empathy, that's why the game is so divisive. Honestly if she killed Joel halfway through the game it would have changed nothing.
I don't think that's necessarily true. There are people such as myself who see Joel's actions in the first game as supremely selfish, fucking over humanity for his and his friend's happiness. But the big problem is that Abby kills Joel for very personal and selfish reasons herself, so you've lost the only audience in the world who would not mind seeing Joel die for his crimes.
That's not to say that she couldn't have personal motivation against Joel alongside something more lofty, be it desire for justice, or trying to get Ellie to cooperate for a cure, etc. It's that when it's only vengeance that's her motivation, any moral high ground she may have had as a shield vanishes.
I get that the futility of the cycle of violence is what they were going for, but why do I care who among the 3 selfish assholes that kill hundreds of people for personal reasons lives or dies? It seems like Abby, Ellie, and Joel actively make the world a worse place and kill more people than zombies.
@@popsicleman8816 But the other problem was not Joel paying for what he did, it was ND trying to rewrite the first game and what players knew about it. It was known that the Fireflies really had no clue what they was doing and had killed other immune people from notes in that hospital looking for a cure. Think about that for a second, you had other immune people and killed them, not find other ways to keep them alive, or let them have kids and hope to pass on that immunity, just crack them open and hope you hit upon a cure.
The playerbase knew about this, so when ND was trying to make Joel a horrible monster for making that choice, but the players who found out the information were not going to be on board. But they still could have pulled it off if they had approached it with more sense and not go for the SHOCK of killing Joel.
@@dolomaticus1180 Oh, no doubt that if you look at things with understanding of basic logic and medicine, fireflies are being dumbasses.
1) immediately going for a lethal procedure is a terrible idea, and closes off all other avenues of investigation. this should be the last resort.
2) Immunity is based on the immune response, so Ellie's blood and csf would be far more useful than her brain anyways
3) vaccines are made by presenting to the human body a neutralized or weakened antigen. They can get cordyceps sample from non immune patients and it would work just as well
4) Why remove the whole brain? It'd be a tricky procedure, but they only need a brain biopsy, not taking the whole damn thing out.
But you are mistaken in thinking that they had other immune subjects. The surgeon's recording in the lab talks about other test subjects, but they make a point of emphasizing that ellie's immunity is special. This implies that fireflies experimented on non immune infected patients and that ellie is indeed the only immune patient.
Therefore, it brings up the question. Are fireflies idiots, or did the writers contrive a scenario in which Joel and fireflies are driven to fight? I'd say it's the latter. Think about how none of the multiple medical researchers and assistants recognized the obvious flaws of the plan. In fact, no one makes the argument that this is a completely unreasonable course of action. Even Joel has no rebuttal despite him being the most incentivized to argue for Ellie. If it was 1 character that was being an idiot, I'd buy that, but everyone in the game's world thinks this makes sense. And think about the fact that if fireflies don't act like this, no fuss would be made and there would be no dramatic ending scene.
Therefore, when I judge Joel's actions, I do so under the lens that what the fireflies are doing isn't inherently ridiculous within the logic of that universe. Furthermore, at the very least, Joel does not think that this idea is flawed. Therefore the faultiness of the firefly plan did not factor into his decision. When you examine his actions under this lens, what he does is fucking over all of humanity for the sake of 2 people. Therefore, his actions are inexcusably selfish.
tl;dr - fireflies plan was dumb, but it was most likely the writers being dumb or manufacturing artifical conflict for the ending. Even if fireflies actions are dumb within the game-universe, Joel didn't know it, so it's not an excuse for his immoral action.
But why could they not have given him a proper and meaningful death like with Arthur Morgan and John Marston. The problem is not Joel’s death itself. But it was just poorly written
Gonna be real with you chief, I got this video on my recommended section multiple times but avoided the video because it's nearly 2 hours long. I really wish I clicked sooner, not only was the review the best I've seen so far, the rewrite made me tear up 3 times and I wish it was canon.
Saaaame
Yeah. I felt that too.
Same here. I rather play his version of this game.
yo same
Yeah listening to this was such a fantastic journey. My hopes were raised then dashed with kyle.
Then he absolutely destroyed me with joel's death, I ugly cried at that.
I'm forever going to act like this is actually what happened in the game and no one can stop me
Same, I'll forever think that this is the true canon.
I had no clue that some guys mere rewrite of a game's story could bring me to tears. Congrats bro, you brought a grown-ass man to tears better than Naughty Dog ever could have.
Same
Yeah i came to say how much his story affected me but decided to just find the top similar comment and add my:
Same
Well I mean the last of us 1 did bring me to tears
Same
I dunno ND's version brought me to tears too, just not good ones
"The characters are the ones pushing the plot, not the plot pushing the characters"
This is actually a real story telling method. You can either have the plot as the main point or the characters. Game of Thrones is a great example of characters pushing the plot and Harry Potter for the opposite. If your characters are strong enough, the plot will be equally strong. Read The First Law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie for a perfect example of strong characters pushing a plot. The plot is basically non-existent even.
Said the “author” who give Dina a bite mark in a really sketchy story, paired her with Joel and give them “special magical phones” and made her (and practically everyone outside of Joel), fall into the worst kind of exposition, stating out loud their motives and doing all kinds of stupid things, just to be able to start the beginning of his fanfic. 🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️
@@Piticlir joel saving abby in the start of the game is also a coincidence
@@Piticlir at least the fanfic have better story structure without a ton of flashback
Randi Rayunegara I’m not saying that the original game it’s better (although it is), but you can’t call your lazy crow pleasing fanfic “A better story” and then deliver that bs. 🤷🏻♂️
Your re-write of the game sounds INCREDIBLE.
Thanks, I'm happy you liked it!
@@TheCloserLook Your new story is realy compelling with many clever ellements... It would have been great, although it's become an entirely different thing alltogether... I was wondering if you, with your writing tallent, see a possible way to rearrange and tweak the original Part 2 to make it work better while trying to tell the dark story naughty dog wanted here?... Thus maintaining key elements like: The death of joel and revenge story... the two perspectives told and played seperately... the downward spiral... the bleak lonely ending... I feel like the concept they wanted is realy interesting, but somehow it didn't work in execution.... You said the storyline of Abby hardly interact with Ellie's storyline, i feel this is key... How would you fix this without changing the structure and concept of the original is what im currious about.... do a video on this pls
Even just swapping Jesse the forgiving ex-boyfriend for Kyle the dickhead brother makes a huge difference for the story I think. The conflict and dynamics that arose from that were very interesting!
Incredibly bad lmao
@@EmelioSmoke lmaoo
The movie “Warrior” has two bothers pitted against each other and both are extremely sympathetic characters. And the ending is still so satisfying. That’s a story that handles 2 protagonist against each other really well.
I almost cried with your ending. On the opposite side, I felt nothing after Joel's death in TLOU2 despite spending 20 hours caring for him in the first part.
Honestly, same. My favourite story section from the first one is the chicago section. You meet some strangers, start working together, get separated in an uncomfortable situation, trust them, get betrayed, then get saved by your betrayers later, earn genuine trust, and finally have to watch as one brother turns. The eldest shoots him, then himself because he didnt see a way of going on living. That alone is a better fucking story than the trainwreck of this fuckin game.
@@drexin7303 Isn't that Pittsburgh?
When I listen to your rewrite and imagine the story as you tell it, the realization hits that sometimes, good writers don't get to tell their stories. That sometimes, the limited resources of money and team effort are kept from a writer in favor of another. What a depressing thought. This story should be made. I wholeheartedly believe that a game with this plot would be a valuable addition to all of our experience.
What a heartwrenching and deeply touching rewrite. Deepest respect to your vision.
Imagine the amazing stories that could be written if everyone in the world had their basic needs covered and the time to pursue their passion.
*Fanfiction has entered the chat*
@@Mosstoad That's very unrealistic.
@@saber2802 hence the word “imagine” at the beginning of his sentence
Not just that, a lot of popular "flagships" get taken over so to speak as a means to use them in screaming political messaging. There was so much of that in TLoU2 that it just added fuel to the fire that was garbage writing, and it was blatantly obvious.
Your version was like therapy after recently playing TLoU2.
The ending between Joel and Ellie actually brought tears to my eyes. Well done my friend.
When the No face thing was mentioned and how he described it scared me so much it made my eyes water
His version is so impactful that it manages to captivate you into this alternative world, better than the original.
Well his version is WAY BETTER than the part II tbh
@@brokenlord3218 His version shakes Red Dead 2 (Joel's death) and Days Gone (Joel's leg)
@@brokenlord3218 I was more invested in this guys 2 hour vid than the 25 odd hours playing part 2 😂
Honestly, the end of YOUR story made me cry, just to hear it as a player, instead of just a watcher, made me remember of RDR2, very well done, thank you for this
The fact those flashbacks were actually good, to me at least, shows how much of a personality Joel was, and how major a factor that small amount of lightheartedness was to the story. They showed they COULD write it, but deliberately went off base with the horrific story writing decisions.
Also, this story, is now my Canon lol. That is bounds better than the actual sequel. I was enthralled by how much better one dude did than all others. That ending panged my heart, very well done
Ps. Your idea about the fungus just locking them in their own bodies is exactly how it works. Thats what the actual basis disease does to ants and insects. Eventually they may go through necrosis, but yeah, even in game you can here human cries and words in some parts as they gorge themselves on human flesh. Horrific stuff.
Dude the humans being alive even if they turned into zombies because of the "cure" game me chills.
Closer Look just proved to us that you don't need to spend millions of dollars to get creative ideas
I feel like the reason the flashbacks worked so well for so many people, myself included, was because many of us already had an attached to Joel because of the first game, so when we see the museum scene and the search for the guitarstrings, we automatically go: "Awww, Joel"
However, I feel like the flashbacks served more as a relation to Ellie's main plot and character arc.
One of the point The Closer Look makes is that Ellie doesn't have an arc, but that's the point I disagree with the most.
I'm saying this as someone who studies the art of writing, a character arc isn't always the same thing as a character going from good to bad or vice-verca. Sometimes it's about how we, as an audience, see a character.
Throughout the first half of the game we constantly believe that we are in Ellie's mindset and that we understand her. With the first and second flashback, we believe it serves more as a reminder as to what Joel meant to her.
But with the third one we see that she was aware of Joel's actions at the hospital since the beginning of her plot when she wakes up in Jackson. And since both us and Ellie have just learned from Nora that Abby and her crew killed Joel for those actions at the hospital, actions that Ellie agrees were wrong of him, we wonder: "Then why do you still want to go through with this Ellie?"
But with the last flashback at the end of the game, we learn that Ellie was willing to try and forgive him. This changes our view of Ellie's entire journey now that we know she didn't just wanted to take revenge because of what Joel meant to her, but also because she lost him just when she was ready to allow him back in her live, so she felt that the only way to honor him, was to avenge him.
@@randomserbianguy5677 honestly, it's kind of uplifting, in my eyes. where there's life, there's hope. the sick may may get better, the lost may be found, anything is possible as long as you're still alive. i'd gladly go through any hell to keep hold of the slightest chance of survival.
I enjoyed being in many of the flashbacks, including, obviously, the museum. BUT, I felt like the flashbacks often directly undermined the previous actions of the characters. Like before the flashback, it made sense for a character to be in a red-hot rage about something they didn't get closure on, and then they'd show a flashback about how they actually had closure on the issue and mowing down a neighborhood worth of opponents didn't change anything.
Exactly
This rewrite was absolutely amazing and its such a shame they didn't just hire you to write it lol. You left my jaw wide open at a few parts and I was at the brink of tears when Ellie said "Dad." If this was fleshed out into a fully written book, I know I would be sobbing at more than one moment. You brought up a lot of points during the criticisms as well that I noticed but just couldn't put into words myself. AMAZING video thank you so much for making this!
You spoke my exact thoughts. Thank you for you're ability to explain how incredible this was.
@@chadk6078 you spoke my exact thoughts, i was literally going to say the same thing to him
Playing this game, I got the impression that the two people who wrote the story kept it a bit too close to their chests. I find it hard to believe that the story they wrote would have gotten positive responses if shared with a panel of professional screenwriters. I think the sequel's concept was Druckmann's baby and it seems he was just too proud to change it and share it with others for potential rewrites. This is one of the dangers of doing too much on one's own without proper workshopping.
I had a “holy shit” moment when you were discussing the General’s backstory and how Abby was seeking out Ellie for a chance at a cure to overthrow FEDRA. That’s damn good storytelling. Left a like and subscribed.
It’s crazy how some people have the writing gene or something like that. I couldn’t write a compelling story to save my life
I know right! This whole thing was super amazing
P.s didn't expect to see you here scp dude😅
That "holy shit"moment for me was the backstory for the infected. Just imagine suffering that much pain for years, or how friends killed their infected friends only to realize that they were conscious all along. Haunting stuff
I feel like I must be crazy. I'm about an hour into the "rewrite" and, while I agree with some of the points he's made about where TLOU 2 went wrong, I don't like his rewrite any better. It's not making a few suggestions that improve the story, it's changing the whole thing and becoming it's own fanfic. It's not compelling to me at all.
Crichton you’re not crazy, just might have different tastes and a differ opinion
That thing about Joel getting soft because of the 4 years in a safer area is a bad take. Even in the very beginning of the first game when the outbreak starts he is still unwilling to trust people as showcased when he doesn't let Tommy pick up the hitchhiking family.
Yes dude, Joel is the same as he was at the beginning of the game.
Did you play the second game? You can see Joel has changed a bunch just in the couple hours he’s in it… He plays a guitar and sings a song..
@@bobbyfischer9927Joel had a guitar in his house before the outbreak started. That’s not out of the question for him to be playing guitar and singing a song 20 something years later
@@bobbyfischer9927doesn’t matter Joel would still never go soft like that. Playing guitar doesn’t count as evidence he went soft. Also could ever really go soft in that world.
Abby: Who are you?
Joel: My name is Nathan and this is my brother Sam.
*END CREDITS*
Joel: My name is Jak and this is my brother Daxter.
@@ryantheanimator1156 I understood that reference
Like a Far Cry secret ending. Nothing to see here folks. Lets all go home.
It would be ideal yes but this world is everything but ideal besides Tommy was the one who said their names when they were escaping from the Ski lodge, it was a matter of trust and Tommy's fault but either way if it wasn't for that we wouldn't have had this masterpiece of a game!
@@juanpedro_mov7372 "Masterpiece of a game"
You smoke way too much weed, bruh.
(I know I'm way late but) Your rewrite of the story was soo much better, primarily because of the sense of urgency around a cure. After 3-4 decades from the outbreak people wouldn't just drop that possiblity. And I hated how part 2 just loosely uses it to move the plot.
Yeah finding a cure had a bigger impact on the first game I agree
I kinda see it like this: The fireflies had momentum going and a strong leader, they knew and hoped that the end could be close, they were so close to finally getting it done. When that hope(and their leader) was snatched from them, despair settled in and it shattered the core of the group. The group was torn apart and that takes a long time to rebuild. Which is what was hinted at(I think) when Abby was trying to get in contact with the remnants of what was left of the fireflies, they WERE trying to rebuild and reorganize.
Honestly, I'm making this guy's version my cannon. This is what actually happened.
same dood
Savannah Fires same
Absolutely. The original just feels like a hollow shell in comparison.
This was a way better take and story than what we got
Yup, this happened
It takes a special kind of UA-camr to be able to make me tear up at the plot of a rewrite of a game I have never played. Excellent job.
Didn’t make me cry. He’s a dumm@$$. The original game made me cry. It’s better.
When she called out "DAD!" at Joel's death I fully lost it and started welling up. Your version was just so good, made more logical sense and I just... wish it had been the game we got
Ik I’m in so much denial I’m pretending it’s canon
Totally. I almost cried with that. Also, Kyle's death was so much emotional than Jesse's lol fuck him.
@@rodrigososa6098
Periodt
yeah I fully cried, like why couldn't you let my mans hear her say dad :'((((((( I don't care what anyone says this is the real LOU2
Let me teach something not everyone dies heroically
*Insert mandatory comment about the ten minute mark being pushed in this video.*
I think I may have pushed the ten minute mark a little too far with this one.
@@TheCloserLook really padded for the ten minutes. Smh youtubers these days
@The Closer Look smh my head it’s at least 2 minutes over the 10 minute mark this video is so poopy butts now
@@TheCloserLook unsubscribed
Eric Song now THAT's an insult if i've ever seen one! 😂😂
the dark revelation of the true horror of the cordyceps infection is bone chilling!
fart
fart
fart
Imagine. Knowing you're killing your whole family while you're aware the whole time. It's literally a living hell.
fart
Your rewrite of this story is so much more emotionally compelling its beautiful. I shed a few tears over it honestly
Great rewrite, only thing that I'd probably change is Abby's ending. Feels like she's a bit underused there. What if she survives her final encounter with Joel and sees him die and Ellie's anguish. Then she has that moment of realization that she's made another girl fatherless.
In doing that, you could set up a relationship between Ellie and Abby similar to Kyle (but obviously a little more heavy handed) in the sequel as Abby would probably know more about the General and potentially help, their relationship would be incredibly rocky at first but progress over the game to be at least a mutual respect. Plus dialogue between Abby and Dina after the events of the rewrite would be very interesting to hear.
Edit: added something
Nah.
Very good
How about just forgetting this game exist?
@@ashrimplecreature9210 They could even end up dating in part 3!! Because Dina's evil in this version, Ellie is still open for a love interest.
I LOVE your addition to the lore about the people being conscious in the infected bodies - it actually ties into TLOU1 and Sam's question about whether or not they're still "alive." Brilliant!
It also ties with that runner from the first game crying
I wish this guy was the writer of the second game smh
I think Roanoke actually explores the infection in Terms of biology/science, and for the First two stages or so, He does say the People are still conscious
Around 1:19:00 you discuss the reveal that all infected are still themselfs... despite the infection. That is an amazing arc to the question Sam asks Ellie in part 1. Knowing that Sam, just a kid, is infected at that point... asking such a deep question at that time with al the implications to every kill. Amazing. Loved that.
I thought the same thing too!
this seemed really childish tho, because it's such an overused and unrealistic trope " oh they're still 100% themselves deep down, except their brain have turned into cordyceps mush and they're controlled to kill people", like no, even with real life diseases like parkinson or alzeihmer, people are not themselves anymore, they turn into strangers to their families, and everything that defines them changes ( honestly the psych horror aspect too with the faceless ex clicker and the runners in cage wasn't impressive at all, and it was kind of cheesy). for the cure that the faction possess, I would scratch it all together, and instead put something like a "rabbies vaccine", meaning you can save yourself from being infected if you take your antiviral shot within 2-3 days, but once the symptoms start showing youre done for and there's no way to save you, no treatment, no cure. The thing is, a parasite sets in the host brain, finding a cure for this type of disease is 10000 times harder than developing a vaccine.
@@oogabooga5653 this is the part where it's a game remember?
@@2010josem Its just my 2 cents on this aspect in particular, the rest of the plot was great. btw it would've also made for a more engaging story if there was a time limit for the mission to save ellie's gf, just saying.
@@oogabooga5653 i feel you, i just meant that hey maybe some aspects may appear childish or unrealistic, but for me its fine to have one or two of those cause it is a game after all. Regarding what you said about the time limit, yeah that would be cool like at the final boss or something, in which you should hurry and kill the rat king fast or else you lose Dina.
Daaaamn. Such a better idea for a story. This scene where Joel looks at Dina and gets her to say Ellie is genius.
The fact that this video made me appreciate The Last Of Us 2's story even more than before, Ellie calling Joel "dad" is so out of character for her, Dina betraying Ellie is so out of character for her, Abby not killing Joel because she's "better than him" is so out of character for her, because she's not better than him, she shouldn't be, and Abby doesn't even gets some sort of character development in this new story, and the fact that the doctor and "the cure of humanity" situation is playing out again in the story when that story already played out at the first game and it should be done with already, I can't imagine as a player playing this game, how boring it would've been, we already have enough interaction and moments with Joel, this "better story" seems just like some sort of blinded by nostalgia fan fiction, that supposed to dick ride the Fanbase rather than making a good story for the game
@nehirsonmaz287
The Closer Look's version of the story is objectively better from a writers standpoint because, as the video mentions, it is written for the same target audience as the first Last Of Us game.
With that said - if you don't like it, that's fine. But why not just go replay the game if you enjoy it as it is? Why watch this video and leave such a long comment on why you personally didn't enjoy his version? Why watch a feature-length rewrite at all?
I'm genuinely asking, because I would never waste my time making myself so angry. It's why I didn't play the second game - it was too bleak for me. That doesn't mean I hate it or think it did everything wrong. I enjoyed the gameplay, and the attempted message, but overall I never finished it because it was not made with players like me in mind.
This re-write is not only better paced than the game, but it was written for people who enjoyed the message of hope in the first game.
It doesn't matter if Abby is ooc, because she's essentially a DIFFERENT character in the rewrite. Dina as well. And personally I like them more, but you can disagree. But don't try to convince people who enjoy the rewrite that we are wrong or somehow stupid, if only because you will not succeed.
It is not difficult to respect the opinions of others. Please respect the people in this comment section who prefer the rewrite.
@KateCat420 Hes some neilcuckman suck up thats replied to every comment that agrees with the story rewrite lmaoo
“But that’s not why you did it.”
Ah man... this version is just too good.
This rewrite is BRILLIANT!
I must say however that Dina's character rewrite was a bit too reckless and a little unlikable, could've done better there.
The scene where Ellie discovered that Dina was actually the one who injected her with the cure could've been slightly justified and empathised with if you mentioned a brief dialogue between them where Dina confesses to being scared of losing Ellie just as she lost her brother, making it the driving force for why she did what she did.
That way, we dislike her less for causing the rift between Ellie and Joel in the last scene, and making it a tad possible for them to maybeee rekindle what they had because I refuse to suffer through them not being together again even in your version of the game.
Your version is so much more depressing, at least give Ellie a small chance at happiness lmao.
Just want to say your input is the only one not treating Dina's brother as a "suddenly written out of the script" character. Dina wasn't even depicted as crying over his death.
In this, I believe dina could even be better written as the story shows her not only as incompetent by defying Joel leading to her capture and his leg replacement, but needs to show she framed him cause she blames him for that capture and tourture of the fungus infection. She certainly deserves some sympathy too, but the story ends with Ellie neither trying to understand making her feel justifiably angry at her, while said object meant to be saved returning from torture, losing her brother, and being beaten, caused by both Joel and Ellie acting as though she forgot everything to a degree.
But that's just me.
And with that it can happen an end that I wanted to: Showing Ellie and Dina together in the end, showing that different from the orginal story, Ellie learns to forgive
I don’t even like Dina tbh so I don’t care if they never get back together again
I dont know, i kinda like this Dinah, because make her a special type of unlikeable character. A complex one. Because what she does to Joel it exactly what that ex-girlfriend she had did to her in this version of the story. You can almost make a point about Dinah being a poor choose by Ellie, that without Joel guidance in her teenager years, has made some mistakes (like the gas mask one). That way you can show that Dianh was in fact more toxic in her love than Joel, and not necessarely because of evilness, but because she is insecure, coward, and not have experience with the real world dangers, and as you say, maybe she reached a breaking point with her brother dying (and her transformation in runner), making her made that decision, showing she never understood Ellie relationship with Joel (or worst, that Ellie never told her the real good things she had with Joel, so for Dinah that lie it is just making the things be as they way they were between them).
You know at the end where Ellie rides off, I might have given the player a choice too. Let Dina on the back of the horse or leave her there. The letting her get on being a moment of Ellie going "I'm not doing the same mistake again." because she regrets not forgiving, or at least understanding Joel's actions sooner.
I'm at that part in the rewrite where the woman writes "kill me" and *IM SO MAD I WANT THIS VERSION MORE*
Fr
I was disappointed with the game before. After he described that part, I feel robbed cuz what if this was actually in the game LOL.
Not to take anything from the rewrite, I think it is easier to put out the bad stuff and rewrite it to please more of the fandome. Not to say that it would have been impossible to write a good story from a blank page - I think that would have been possible as well. Some spoilers for the rewrite ahead:
This rewrite actually was great. I would have played the hell out of that game. And the last scenes in the rewrite for Joel totally hit me emotionally just by thinking about them - seeing them on screen with good acting/voice acting would propably hit most of the fans right in the feels, that would have been a great way to end the character for this franchise.
The kind of sad part is, that he talks about how to setup TLoU3, which I think would have been totally possible with that rewrite, while the actual TLoU2 propably killed the franchise for good. It kind of feels like that could have been the intend if you look how the "story" of the game ends, but who knows... but just by the fact that alot of fans are not very pleased it is hard to make another game, simply because part of the fanbase isn`t interested in it anymore. Also, I think the reputation of the whole developer suffered a bit. In the end, Druckman is a representative, and the way he treated the game, the leaks, the fans was REALLY bad. Taking down videos? Thats a no go. Raging and whining about fans, although they KNEW the game will piss them off? Thats something you should not do, you look silly and unprofessional. Such behaviour always falls back to the developer overall, you lose credibility with your fanbase. Who knows if they will try to make a third, my guess is that alot of people will be waiting to see if it is actually worth buying. And who knows how much hype there will be for the next project of the developer... only the future will tell.
I got shivers at that part, it was truly genius
oh no... I’m rn at the beginning of part 2 and I really don’t want to get to part 3 because I really liked the game and don’t want to get it ruined
your version of the story is so unbelievably better. i seriously got teared up just listening your story. i could go on about the details, but you now why this works so well.
Bruh, this man’s story got me more immersed than the actual game 🤦🏿♂️
I finally felt some of the emotion I expected to feel in P2 when he gets to the end and Ellie calls Joel dad.
@@Doradexplora when I heard Joel gets back in the fight after he had his leg blown off, I was like “hell yeah, Joel’s back and kicking ass”. Then I realized that I’ll never be able to play through this story in a game 😢.
@@bluejay22 lol I can relate with that XD
It’s just a generic fan fiction.
@@Luis-by7li
Still way better than that generic Neil's fan fic we got as the game.
Jesus, i was more into that story than i can admit, how funny is it that im gonna treat this random video made by one dude as canon now.
Its honestly better if we just forget and take this as cannon tbh.
same, its really good like really good
I'm confused... I thought this was the game, I sent my 60$ to patreon and everything...
@@alencifps1535 well its not but gameplay wise its great so its not a total waste of money in my opinion
@@johny2811 It was a joke man XD, I was saying that this dude story is what the game should of been, hints the reason why I said 60$ to patreon
The Lord of the Rings books literally do what you described as being a detrimental hypothetical structuring at the 10:45 mark
I had to remind myself that this guy made a hour and 48 mins long video, dissecting LoU2 perfectly. The amount of work you did is much appreciated
Dude is a legend for this video, been rewatching it every time for as long as I can remember.
Not only that, he made a fanfic of the story and made it 1000x better than the actual story NaughtyDog made
Perfectly is a very bold statement. In my opinion he did not attempt to make a nuanced approach to his "autopsy" of the game. It is only perfect in your sense because it agrees with your view. Easy likes because everyone is hating this game. Poor analysis though
@@dnv1139 "because everyone is hating this game"... Because it was poorly executed lol... Too much time spent on the same protagonist instead of actually splitting it between them. Poorly timed flashbacks. I don't even care that Joel died, its how they did it. There's a reason why the game is hated...
@@tacoxaco There are just as many people who do not share the opinion that it was poorly executed. I felt that the flashbacks were a nice change of pace especially the museum scene. I agree that both Ellie's part and Abby's part felt long and could have had some cuts.
Joel dying the way he did is also up for debate, but it is in tone of the franchise of how quickly people die.
1:22:45 - The inclusion of that “treated” woman into the story hits so good. The amount of sudden hopelessness, urgency (as you said) and feeling of doom that “Kill Me…” adds is amazing! I could imagine so vividly that kind of eldrich horror for the moment. Ellie finding out how much more horrifying the whole thing is than she would have thought… Simply brilliant!
Henry, you’re probably not going to see this comment. But if you do, I’m telling you:
You dropped this 👑, king!
This is canon now.
Your damn right it is
At the very least, Druckmann's isn't the canon anymore. I'll make a complete rewrite with an OC if I have to, as long as I can salvage this universe.
Ouch
It’s an amazing rewrite but it’s very “Hollywood” and would also have been criticised for being very different from the tone of the first game. There’s a middle ground here but there are clearly issues with the story of TLOU Pt II.
The galactic senate doesn't think so
Holy shit, your story was beautiful, I was transfixed and an overwhelming sense of longing overtook me as I realised that this was the story I needed. In a sense I felt like I had closure after all these years of loving the first game, and despising the second. I felt, for lack of a better word, betrayed by the writers of the last of us 2, I felt as we and the characters didn't deserve what we got. Your story will be what I will be believing as canon from now on. Your description really made me feel like I was playing it. So thank you
I have nothing more than utter respect to your analysis approach and the fact that instead of just bashing the game, you gave us a gift of a whole another story.
This was spot on and you made me feel less alone in this world.
Greetings from Mexico.
And thank you.
I agree 100%. I loved this game but still enjoyed hearing his take.
The part in the rewrite where Joel is revealed to have single-handedly killed the entire Scar camp would be a great nod to how much people love the character. Treat him like a badass, and don't spend the entire game kicking him like a wounded puppy.
Nah
Ayyy Loli
@TheUltimateGamer245 i mean....he kinda was, since we were playing him.
@TheUltimateGamer245 Did you forget he, abby, and ellie have killed armies on their own. Why would Joel doing it off screen be any different?
Joel did terrible things after Sarah. Dooming humanity is just the icing on the cake. In such a grounded story why are people so upset that his actions have consequences. Yes Joel is a badass, however he doesn't live in a Hollywood action world. His luck had to run out sooner or later
His ending to the rewrite almost made me tear up. That’s how compelling it is Edit: Yoooooooo, thanks for all the likes everyone
I just pretend ellie and joel got to watch thay movie and ellie forgave him and they lived out there days in Jackson the end
This is what happend nobody can change my mind
Y’all are snowflakes. The ending is what it is you’re gonna have to deal with that for part 3
@@Xxsorafan ew
@@Xxsorafan The ending wasn't sad it was just pointless a bad.
I fell victim of misjudging this video in the first 10 mins… I have to say this was incredibly well done. You’re an amazing story writer/teller. You have a great gift at connecting with the audience on an emotional level. It take a keen eye for understanding the human psyche to do what you just did. Bravo. Subscribing.
The "Better Strory" is already more engaging than what I paid 50 bucks for.
Play4yourLife I pre-orders it for €70 but yeah same
Lucky that you only paid 50 bucks for this garbage.
I bought the delexe edition for 70 bucks plus tax
@@brady7418 deluxe edition? mine was the normal one and it was 70 euros aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Rodrigo L I live in the USA so I paid in American dollars
Genuinely, I feel like the only reason they made Abby's section of the game so damn long is because they had to stuff it full of so much wholesome, sympathetic, "see she's a good person" fluff so that the they could make the final fight have more conflict.
@Simple Weirdo Well Ellie did messed up shit too, both of them were in the same situation, lost father/father figure and went out for revenge. In my opinion i don't think they made the game so people can like Abby, they made it so she can be understood and both of them learned their lessons
@@zlata784 people were really attached to joel & ellie so there was no coming back for abby after what she did
@@stone-vq7vo I was attached to both of them too but I don't hate Abby for what she did, at first i hated her so much but after I understood her kinda but again thats my perspective, I still miss Joel so much.
Actually Ellie's half of the story takes longer to complete.
@@zlata784 i hate abby because she killed him in a extremley fucked up way, don't get me wrong if someone killed my parent i would want them dead, but in a quickly dead way, but to prolong their suffering while their loved one watched... there has to have been something already wrong with you to do that sort of thing, even more so after they saved my life, and showed no ill will towards me . and that they have multiple people who clearly cared about them, i would definatley consider what i'm doing and most likely stop, even more so if enough time has passed since the death
honestly this re-write is one of the most moving and satisfying stories I've ever heard
good luck with your novel, shall anticipate it's release!
41:00 the accent impression caught me off gaurd lmao
I straight up almost cried at the end of this retelling. Why could this not have been the original story? Why? It has so many more plot twists and interesting premises which could be built on for a future game as well, its amazing. I do think it would maybe be advantageous to explain why FEDRA has helicopters or maybe show that they only have a few because it would be kinda hard to believe that they could maintain more than a few in the disastrous state of the world.
This needs more likes, I can't believe how much of all the top comments are people bitching about the real last of us 2 story and not gushing over how fucking amazing The closer looks version is. Too many aspects of it were excellent for me to list out here but I also had a tear in my eye throughout half of this storytelling and that is far from easy to get out of me someone who just isn't the type to be moved to tears over media. Thinking about it now her calling Joel dad at the end seems kinda out of place for the character and honestly, kind of one of the writing sins The closer look speaks of earlier in the video as there are no examples of her calling him dad before so it seems odd that she would do so in a genuine way as he dies. All of that being said I have to forgive it for the fact that at the moment it was said I choked up slightly in large part due to the fact that I didn't see the "dad" drop coming at all. Keep up the awesome work you do The closer look.
@@seanleggat6138 I personally think the "dad" drop *could* work, only it should be a very deliberate drop rather than a mindless one. It'd fit more with her character if it was something she said for Joel's sake in his dying moment than her own. A sort of 'I forgive you too' thing, or simply to make his last few seconds easier and more peaceful, only for her to realize that it's too late cause he's already dead.
I loved this rewrite because of the rising tension he mentions. It is palpable. Unlike the original game where the use of the flashbacks confuses me and ruins the pace of the story
I can relate
@@Unifarts I did think of this but it also seemed like it might be a little unrealistic for her to be thinking so logically but it's hard to say how much someone's thought process would be affected by such extreme grief
This, my God, THIS, is the definition of a GOOD ENDING! If this was the actual story, I would have wept a tear playing it. This just goes to show that the reason why we hate the ending isn't because its not happy. This ending is depressing too. But it's so handled so well! I am really looking forward to reading your book, sir!
It's the definition of hack.
because it reads like a 12 year old's fanfic@__itsnogood__06
There I was, just laying on my bed listening to your own version of the story and holy crap, it would've been one hell of an experience if canon. Nostalgia and well-written interactions in equal measure, plus Abby isn't portrayed as an unlikable psychopath. I almost teared up when you have Ellie mutter "Dad...", would've been a fitting send-off to such an iconic duo. As a fellow writer, I've learned a lot from just this video. It is truly a shame that the actual game's story left much to be desired in a sequel to an otherwise amazing story in the first game.
There are so many different routes they could have taken this game. But Druckmann insisted on telling a revenge story he thought was the absolute best for this game. Then he has the nerve to get mad at people who don’t like it when he himself said that people were going to hate this game. This whole shit-storm with this was just completely unnecessary.
@@Nassit-Gnuoy Exactly. There were so many different routes he could take and even if a revenge story is a must, as shown by this video, it still could've gone much better than what we got. Druckmann has been acting like a massive hypocrite with how he handled the backlash. In fact, for those unaware, Druckmann pitched to Bruce Straley for a similar revenge story during the first Last of Us's development.
He wanted Tess to hunt down Joel for revenge over the death of her brother. She would've succeeded at the end of the game and left it in a depressing note with Ellie all alone (sound familiar?). Straley shot down that idea, pointing out how absurd it is for anyone in a zombie apocalypse to risk their life and those of their friends, wasting resources and braving hordes of infected across the country, just to kill one man. Ended up being a good idea to cut that crap because the first game was better without it and Tess was rewritten and more likable than Abby is.
well I lost respect for you 🤷🏻♂️
@@Bossghost26 You're gonna elaborate?
LoneWolfHBS to put it simply, I enjoyed your work with White Lie and decisions you made as to where the story went but you can’t seem to appreciate the decisions made by Neil for his story.
Are we ignoring the absolute cinema of this rewrite, fantastic job, i would pay triple what i did for this re-telling, taking her immunity away was just brilliant
why did Dina do it? why is taking her immunity away good in the context of his story? As a concept, pretty impactful, in his story, a nonsensical decision by a character that is only there to make Ellie run back to Joel.
I'm not lying when I say your version got a few gasps from me, a cheer here & there and even a few tears
I want your version of all this. It genuinely feels like LoU to me
Agreed, this was riveting. I love the idea of switching to Joel mid fight and then playing as an old man with a prosthetic leg.
FR FR FR FR
And THAT from only hearing it. Now imagine it with fully fleshed out cutscenes and acting...
same. especially on the tears
A riviting story against the backdrop of a postapocalyptic Usa? One with real mature subject matter? Yeah, this is cannon.
The second half of Nier: Automata does the opposing protagonist revenge story really well, imo. I think the reason it works is it's based on a misunderstanding that you, the player, are aware of. Over the course of this part of the story you see one character consumed by the need for revenge. This culminates in a tragic final confrontation where you get to choose which character to side with.
Funnily enough, the misunderstand involves the death of a character that you as the player have been very attached to up to this point.
THANK YOU !
NieR:Automata has been very well received, but I still believe it's underrated as all hells...
@Tahmid Antar I'd argue it's gaming strongest argument when it comes to qualifying video games as a form of art.
A game that is not afraid to be a game, and actually uses the strenghts of the medium to convey a message and make a point about the value of games and of life itself.
@Tahmid Antar HECK ! Event the first NieR back in 2010 made me root for the Shadowlord to some extent given everything we learn in routes B and C.
It's almost like there's a consistent pattern here...
Like... A competent writer... Hmmmm...
A beautiful story that hits many players so much they would willingly erase their precious data for altruistic purpuse. Truly the frosting and cherry on top were the credits. For a culture that hides their emotions to the outside they can express it beautifully in a different outlet
Wow you nailed I didnt even think of it till you said it. That game had me feeling emotions last of us 2 ...pure apathy after killling joel.
Your story sounds better. Especially with Ellie being the symbol of “Guilt”
and Abby being the symbol of “Grief”. A much better revenge story.
Honestly, last of us should’ve been an anthology series. Then Neil could have his depressing last of us game, but the fans of the first game wouldn’t have been as pissed about it
That would be the smart idea, however Neil's a failed comic writer for a reason. He *cannot* do original stories, because if he did nobody would like them or even be able to pretend to.
TLOU2 was *supposed* to be a launchpad for Abby to take over the series, and we've all seen how that panned out with Sony having tried to sweep her under the rug.
The only thing I find wrong with the Joel getting rusty trope is the fact that he consistently went on patrol for the past 4 years and it was shown in flashbacks that he had come across not only infected but hostile strangers as well over that period of time. I think that’s just a weak argument as to why he and Tommy gave their identities away so easily. I actually had a good time with the tlou2 from a gameplay and world building perspective, however I didn’t get as invested in the story as I did the first game even though I tried and didn’t get spoiled. I really do feel if they switched between players more frequently and evenly while also maybe killing Joel in a more believable way or just later on in the game after having the time with Abby and not changing Ellie’s characteristics so drastically so fast would’ve made for a much better story experience.
but Joel didn’t give away their identities? Tommy did. Tommy had already revealed their names when they first met Abby, so there wouldn’t have been a point in lying about it. not only that, but Abby saves both Joel and Tommy multiple times during their escape from the horde. plus, it’s not like this is the first time Joel gave away his identity. he did it in the first game with Henry and Sam. he wasn’t even rusty. he’s just older and a bit softer, and the scene was written to give him no other option but to go along with Abby and put himself at a disadvantage.
Joel softens up a bit by the end up TLOU1. that’s the entire purpose of his character arc. he spends those years before the second game going on patrol, yes, but he also spent them helping people. Abby wasn’t the first new person they’d come across to help based on journals/conversations within the game.
and Tommy giving away their identities makes perfect sense for his character to begin with.
@@Lalacremini They *both* gave away their identity, only Tommy did it first (and twice). In fact, I couldn't believe Tommy's personality, like he was completely retconned on this sequel. Firstly, who in their right minds have time to introduce themselves in the middle of running away from a horde? That was pretty obvious, and then, when arriving to the Baldwin's place, Tommy acted all carefree telling them their location and even inviting them to restock? I was shocked, it was too much. Granted, Tommy did complain in the first game that he had nothing but nightmares from those years Joel protected him, but to act this naive when he *knows* he can't trust people that easily? Way too contrived.
It's not that they had to lie, but they also didn't need to act *out* of character. Both knew how not to engage so easily with people, and just because they accept new people and trade with others doesn't mean they have to become gullible. Heck, even the game portrays how Joel still protects and cares for Ellie, like when he told her to keep using her mask despite being alone, or as Jesse said: "Funny how involved he gets whenever you're scheduled to go out".
Either you are just repeating what you read in another thread (because this is something blind fanboys like to wrongly argue) , or you didn't played the game, because Joel never said his name to Henry and Sam. It was Henry who said: "I think I caught your name was Joel?" And then Ellie said hers, and the game *briefly* shows how Joel was reluctant, for how he reacted like he didn't want Ellie to say her name, then Joel rushed to ask how many were with them, still acting careful around Henry, and when Ellie suggested they could help each other, Joel didn't want to go along, but after hearing their responses, he ultimately ended up accepting, so please get your facts straight before claiming something is not true.
The scene could have gone a *lot* better, like asking how many friends were with Abby the moment she said their location, you know, just how usually Joel would behave, then maybe Tommy saying something like c'mon, stop it, and Joel reminding him not to be so trustful, then after arriving to the Baldwin's place, Joel could have realized their intentions (like how in the first game he saw the ambush the hunters made from miles away), and then tried to get away or maybe put a fight, regardless their fail attempt to escape because they were outnumbered, you know, just like how Joel's character was in the first game... so there could have been a lot of options, but ND decide to take the easy (and out of character) way out.
Omg you really need to play the first game again. Getting softer wasn't the purpose of his character arc. It was gaining hope in a world that was already doomed. He lost a daughter, hence be became a hardened survivor, but meeting Ellie reminded him of his lost child, and even though at first he didn't want to bond with her, he ended up seing her as a surrogate daughter. And the ending meant Joel will go any lenght to protect Ellie, making it an ambiguous well done ending. So please, fanboys need to stop making elaborated gymnastics to defend this game, because truth remains the same, it was a flawed game, with good looking graphics and gameplay, but an awful story.
If only Tommy would have introduce himself and accepted Joel and Ellie right away when they arrived to the hydroplant, instead of welcoming them at gunpoint, I could believe it made sense for his character to reveal their identities, but guess what, he did not. Surviving along with Joel made him careful, not stupid. But what can be expected from a man who *retconned* his own characters 🤷♀️
@@paolacarmona1369
Cool, so if Tommy already gave away their identities, there would be zero point to lying about it, especially considering Abby knew who they were from the first time she heard it. congrats, that’s my point.
and retconned? no, that’s exactly how Tommy was in the first game. Tommy was the one that was open to a better world. that’s the entire reason he left Joel to join the fireflies. we see him actively building a community in the first game, and he continues that in the second. again, they’d just fought together with Abby. she saved them multiple times and vice versa. he had no reason to not trust her. it’s not a “retcon” just because you don’t like it.
and yeah? key words there, “for Ellie”. he has always been overprotective of her. that doesn’t mean that, when by himself, he’s going to be completely closed off to everyone else.
Joel still trusted Henry and Sam? twice? even after they left him and Ellie to die? he was literally following them back to where they assumed a larger group would be? did YOU play the game? because my entire point is that Joel TRUSTED them and allowed himself to be led somewhere he thought more people would be, the EXACT thing you’re calling out of character in the second game.
they had no time? did you even play the second game? the horde was at their door, they had to decide and move. no time to sit around asking a bunch of questions and Joel knew the area Abby mentioned and knew it was fortifiable. again, she’d just saved them and they’d saved her. no reason to not trust her. Joel only knew about the hunters because he WAS one. the same logic cannot be applied to Abby’s group. Joel DID catch on, but by then, he was already in the lodge. exactly what could he have done? nothing. literally nothing. Abby blew his knees out with a shotgun and Tommy got his ass handed to him.
getting softer WAS the point. are you even reading what you type? Joel finding hope is literally him “getting softer”. him returning to Jackson to build a community is literally him getting softer. he opens up to Ellie, and in turn, everyone else including his brother? like? you’re acting like Tommy was some random person and that there was no reason for Joel to adapt to Tommy’s lifestyle after they spent YEARS there. Joel wanted a better world FOR Ellie, and you’re saying it doesn’t make sense that he was part of trying to make one?
oh, if only Tommy and Joel had saved Abby from a horde, and then watched her save them multiple times from infected(something you don’t do to people you want to kill) to establish some sort of trust between them that would make Tommy and Joel following her back to avoid dying to the horde reasonable…
wait. yeah. that’s exactly what they did.
wasn’t “poorly written” you’re just a Joel d rider that thinks he’s infallible and every decision he makes has to be the best one. he’s not omniscient.
they had two options. follow the girl who had already saved them both back to a place they knew was defendable, or die to the horde. literally. that’s another thing that shows me you didn’t pay attention to the second game. they didn’t have another choice regardless. they’d have never made it back to Jackson in the storm with the horses and that’s flat out said in game.
Joel wasn’t the main character anymore. plot armor? doesn’t apply. him dying? well written. no “retcons”. you just didn’t like that it happened, which is fine, but that’s a reflection on your preference. not the game.
@@Lalacremini I don't know if you can't see this, but you are grasping at straws here really bad. I told you why the way Tommy acted is out of character, and you keep saying there would be zero point lying about it, when I never said anything about telling lies, you need to comprehend what you're reading.
I never said I didn't like it, here I thought I was giving you proof of what retcon mean but I guess you don't know the definition of that word.
But he was completely closed off to everyone else, that's why I keep asking, did *you* played the game? In the first game, Joel only had Tess, and she is the one who goes around tell him what to do, like a boss, in fact, is Tess the one who told him to keep going with Ellie, and everytime he met someone, it wasn't like he was happy about it, he just wanted to get through with the task Tess gave her. So idk why you keep blatanty ignoring what I am saying, almost like you can't fathom facts.
Omg ur bias is too much. I can't believe I have to explain this bit by bit, but I guess you missed it. He was angry at Henry for leaving them behind, and was close to shot him, but Ellie stopped him saying he saved her too from drowning. So it's not like he kept on trusting Henry (and i'm only adressing him because his brother Sam is just a kid, I mean c'mon), but as Henry said it, he would have do the same, sacrificing someone else's life in order to save their loved ones. And twice? Idk what other time you are refering too, I'm afraid you'll have to be especific here. But they way I see it, it seems u r only nitpicking everything I just wrote.
I said what could have be done, so I'm not gonna explain again what I already did, since you blindly keep on defending it. It's ok if you like it, but sadly, it was not well done, and there's nothing wrong with liking something bad. To each their own.
Soft doesn't mean he would forget all those years surviving, also, returning to Jackson to build a community? I think you are assuming something he never implied, he just wanted to be with Ellie, something like emulate those happy times with Sarah, I thought that was obvious, because he never cared for other people than himself, and Ellie came to change that, if he ever cared for someone, that person was Ellie, or did you forget how Joel didn't care for Tommy's new born friends? How that translate to him wanting to built a community? See, you are just doing gymmastics trying to defend something is not there.
For starters, why would Joel risk their lifes to save someone they don't know? In the first game, there was a family who wanted to escape and Joel rejected the idea of bringing them up, saying so do we (have a kid), so it would make sense if Tommy was the one saving Abby, and Joel being upset but going along anyway since that's what the plot needs right now, a lazy and contrived way to expose Joel to Abby. Wanna know why? It's been recorded in interviews that there was a far better plot where Abby and crew make it to Jackson and spend some time there before finally busting Joel, but they decided to speed up and waste a better development and went with the easy way, go ahead, make some research before claiming things you *think* you know for sure.
Now using ad hominems? Way to lose an argument kid, I cannot take you seriously anymore, I mean I did called u fanboy, but that does not compare to what you are calling me.
Read again what I wrote first, and then read your reply. I never said anything about those two options you keep bringing up, either follow Abby or die. I clearly said options that could happen between meeting Abby and getting to the Baldwin's place. Again you are grasping at straws at something I never address, that's why I think you need to improve your reading comprehension. I won't be answering, it's clearly to me you are going to eristicly defend this game, and whatever floats your boat mate.
@@paolacarmona1369 also a point to add that being selfish was always part of Joel's personality. In literally thr prologue of the first game when they were driving through the chaos they saw a burning farmhouse that could have many people along with children and Joel pushed on to help none of them. It was his personality to be selfish and save his own before anyone else and at a point when theres a horde nearby and someone like Joel and his brother go on to help a stranger despite having no need to with an ticking danger close enough to grab hold of you? It is certainly hard to believe a survival selfish veteran knowing the tricks and decieving acts of others would go out of his way to do something like that. People can say whatever they want about the game later on but the starting was horrific to say the least.
As a person who has never played the games before, after listening the entire video, I genuinely cried after hearing the end of your version. Well done
I like this rewrite, but while Dina’s naïveté is certainly established, is it realistic? Wouldn’t she receive training before going out on patrols so as not to risk endangering the group?
At that point we'd have to assume at what point Dina got to Jackson. And even then, nobody at Jackson was ever known for having military training or any kind of training at all. They're just to be assumed they know how to survive, and considering in the rewrite that Kyle has most of the heavy lifting, we can assume that he never bothered to teach her how to properly survive on her own until maybe when they got to Jackson. But idk, maybe I'm just trying to be fair with the rewrite because of how much I hated the actual game we got.
The entire thing surrounding patrols seemed naive to me, even before the rewrite. Like, I legit think the only requirement is knowing how to use a gun/when to wear a mask, and even then they don't encounter many people or infected, so I doubt it's a requirement and is instead more of a precaution. I say this because 1: if they encountered many people, Joel and Tommy wouldn't have been as naive as they were to INSTANTLY trust a stranger despite being veterans (their situation isn't a justification; it's an excuse). And 2: if they encountered many infected, there wouldn't have been an entire horde of that size lurking with them in those very same mountains (entering or leaving) unnoticed, despite the fact that they make patrols daily. In a flashback Tommy was sniping them from miles off.
Heck, one guy made an entire weed farm in secret. Eugene was it? The entirety of Jackson and its Scouts just seems too naive to me, so I totally buy the rewritten Dina.
I think you can put it in as a scenario as Jackson also recruits people to help out either for patrols,farming,scavenger parties etc. and that way you have the naivete of her come from Jackson seemingly openess of inviting folks in
@AnimeGaMRr
We can agree this rewrite is much better, and in the grand scheme this is a fairly minor complaint.
But let’s imagine for a minute that the game we got didn’t exist and this WAS the game we got (if only). I think Dina’s lack of caution would rub people the wrong way. Tommy himself is a firefly. He knows how to survive. And he’s married to Jackson’s leader, who from the first game we can see is pretty on the ball as well. On that basis I think Jackson would be more security conscious, and they’d vet potential scouts in advance.
It would probably also make it difficult for the player to invest themselves in Dina, knowing she’s capable of being that stupid.
@な6IXLXRD
Hm. I can’t say I buy it. Their being naive to an unrealistic degree in the released version doesn’t justify that same naïveté in the rewrite.
Damn . You tell good stories man . I want to think and believe that the rewrite you did is the real last of us part 2 . Thanks
Im a year late, but wow that rewrite was amazing. Gut wrenching, heart breaking, engaging, brutal and wholly meaningful- i was so invested in your hour or so of telling an amazing story. Kudos man. Keep it up