Adrianne Georgia

[no spoilers] Ignore the review bombs. Ignore the people who hate the game because they refused to give it a chance. "The Last of Us Part II" is a nuanced and emotional story with a message that feels very timely, a message about how hatred can only thrive when people refuse to understand one another. The creators gave themselves a monumental task by writing a story that requires players to empathize with a character who does something that seems unforgivable, and I strongly believe that the difficulty of doing this, rather than a problem with the storytelling, is the real cause of the negative reviews. The fact of the matter is that you will not like this story if you refuse to try to understand it, and many people were too angry to do so after what happens a couple hours in. The game is not perfect. It had some pacing issues and overall was long enough that I got tired of the combat encounters, but the story gripped me in a way that hasn't happened for a while. I was extremely emotional at the ending of the game, and that doesn't happen to me often. The graphics were beautiful, the facial animations stunning, the gameplay mechanics impressive. Overall, it was a difficult game to stomach but well worth it.