Ping Hu

Due to the heated fight of the plot, I waited a year to play it and lowered my expectation to the bare minimum. But I still feel so pissed by the ending and had to delete the game immediately after seeing it. I won't be playing it ever again and definitely won't buy any DLC for the game. As a story driven game, I do believe the graphics and game play is great, especially the former. However, these features are not near enough to justify an acceptable score for the overall experience. Here's why (Heavy spoilers ahead). The first game of the series (The last of us) is such a wonderful masterpiece that I firmly believe it is THE best story telling action game I've ever seen. In that game we saw Joel's action as a moral grey codeless survivor -- the man did whatever takes to save Ellie; the man who don't believe there's humanity left to save, certainly not at the cost of the only thing valuable to him. And there's Ellie, a young girl at the time, talking cold jokes awkwardly but strong and caring. She has maintained her humanity (immune to the infection on the surface) and can still be like a kid after been through so many horrifying experiences. She IS the one and only light in the apocalyptic darkness and the true firefly in that lightless night. The first game eventually ends in a stunning, shocking but yet beautiful drama. However, everything we love in the first of the series has been completely destroyed and ruined in this sequel. Joel died early on in a painful death and Ellie, transferred into a coldblooded, ruthless, nonsensical murderous monster afterward. She headed off for revenge and spilled blood everywhere. She killed Owen, who convinced others to spare Ellie's own life early on and his obviously pregnant wife without any remorse -- this is particularly out of character since Ellie almost collapsed after she tortured Nora for Abby's whereabout. The "new" Ellie is definitely "a threat" not "just a girl". She eventually got most pathetic ending anyone could possibly get -- her nonsensical vengeance costed her loved ones again and deprived her from even playing guitar; and she did not receive anything in return -- no avenge as she let Abby live and thus no closure. This whole story is completely ridiculous and out of character. It would work if this happens on a new character but from what I saw in the first TLOU, Ellie would never possible become the bloodlust mad woman in the sequel. As for the other main playable character Abby, she's just unlikeable and unforgivable. Anyone so cruelly murdered a man who just saved her life is absolutely a monster. Anyone who slept with her already married ex and betrayed her pregnant friend is absolutely immoral. As Issac's No.1 Scar killer, saving Lev and Yara is far from sufficient Abby to become a good person -- she never showed any regret about killing Joel in such a brutal way, which even her own friends felt deeply troubled. But yet, Naughty dog somehow not only want to force players to forgive and even like her, but also decided to let her walk away unscratched. She got to keep her cared one (Lev) and all her body parts. The only loss? Her ex, who would not possibly be with her anyway. if you have played and liked its predecessor, TLOU2 as a story driven game is totally worthless to play. It could be a fine game had it been a totally independent story. I feel deeply sorry for those who invested their efforts to deliver such a stunning visual effect and players who spent their time. The plot writers ruined everything for everyone, themselves included.

I had a really high expectation for the game. Now after around 20hrs, I feel overall it a bit worse than Odyssey and Origin. It certainly much better than AC3 (the worst) and Unity (unplayable) but not outstanding in anyway either. While the new side mission system is great, I feel players can use a little bit more hints/tips when resolving a myth. For many times, I had no idea what to do and since that's no mission track, if I left, I don't know what the icon on the map is really about. Raven is technically useless in this title, which is really frustrating since there are so many blocked walls/floors, caves and secret entrances. Without the help from your eagle sight, it's not fun to locate every single one of these (considering how many of them). The new gear upgrade system while being a good attempt, also deprives the diversity of your gears, especially weapons. The earlier titles (Origin and Odyssey) are plagued with useless loots but this title goes directly into another extreme: no loot at all. They really should have stroke a middle ground -- at least let elites and especially zealots to drop some unique weapons. The skill tree is laughable -- usable skills are still those a few and what the point of having those increase melee/light/heavy/range/stealth attack added as skill points??? Completely useless, complicating the system and utterly nonsense. If they really want to introduce a RPG like skill points system, at least they should do something like Diablo 2... Fighting system is my biggest complain and I have to separate it from all other concerns. This part alone makes the game worse than many other titles. First off, why the hell they introduced "ration" system??? None of major action games has this trash system. You either automatically recover (ToR) or your enemies drops something to make up your HP loss (GoW). Even in Diablo 3 -- an ARPG, you REGENERATE health. Worse still, those strong foes (zealots) can heal up as well. So while you finally found some berries/mushrooms and ready to keep on fighting, your foe is back to full heal already -- and most of them drop NOTHING even if you defeated them! Stamina bar is another extremely frustrating addition -- how can Eivor, aka Odin, becomes out of breath after 3-4 times of dodging??? Is dodging spending more energy than swing two heavy axes/or sprinting for 10km?? How does that make any sense? Even worse, I don't see anyway to improve your stamina -- oh come on!! Edit: After spending more hours, it does feel better than the beginning. The story line is actually one of the best, which is the main reason of me keep playing. I found one more con though: the weapon balance is horrible. Dual wielding spears and daggers are way more powerful and makes other weapons literally useless. 2 hand sword really needs a buff.

Horrible story development. Terrible fighting direct. Awful acting. This is one of the worst soap show to watch -- completely waste of time.

Will think twice buying another IW-COD for the rest of my life -- I bought every single one of the title they've made so far. The game is fun but even after 3 months still carries numerous unbearable bugs/glitches especially the new installed shipment map spawn and IW has no intention to fixed it whatsoever. The daily challenges often do not work properly -- very frustrating to see this over and over again. Not even need to mention the 19148 error that plagues ground war games -- have been getting it every other game since the latest patch. Unless IW can fix those issues, I promise this will be my last title of COD -- I have stopped buying SHG and Tryarch made titles for some time now. As someone preordered the game, I am very disappointed.