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Now some in the media are blaming Twitch streamers for the bad user scores for Last of Us 2. The lack of accountability is staggering. TLOU2 makes an early controversial creative decision. A LOT of people don't like it and can't get over it. That's valid.
To be clear, that's not my issue. My issue is that I've spent 10 hours with a lesbian couple that doesn't even seem to like each other much, the dialogue is horrendous, the combat is gummy, and the grand uses my religion as an inaccurate set piece. Other complaints are spoilers.
The problem here is that the exact same base of critics who have gone after GTA for optional killing of sex workers, some gross looking cosmetic bugs in AC Unity, and every time Hideo Kojima breathes the wrong way are now participating in a complete double standard.
This isn't the first time a mediocre game has received glowing review scores. Every Halo game since Halo 2 and Bioshock Infinite are examples. The Bioshock Infinite examples closely matches the phenomenon here.
Bioshock Infinite has some pretty subtle, insidious stuff going on that flatters the preconceptions of arrogant white "progressives". The core is a fake wokeness that white men are to blame for everything, so white men can save everything. Of course, this is still a power grab.
Yes yes, the white male savior must still sacrifice himself, but he's still the savior. To like these games you must embrace that the ONLY solution was that of the white male savior. It rings false. Last of Us 2 tries to surface subvert this, but I don't want to drop spoilers.
Because these critics are so puffed up by the artificial "white men are scum and that's your superpower" crap, they overlook the myriad, obvious flaws and lack of polish. They do not focus on how these games fail as games.
Both Bioshock Infinite and Last of Us 2 use frenetic gameplay moments to fake challenge. But difficulty due to sloppy mechanics isn't challenge. It's a mistake. We're supposed to believe that the games' stories overcome this, but i don't pay $80 + tax for a movie.
For every 15 minutes of Last of Us 2 where something actually happens, there's 30 minutes of utter nothing as you navigate through glorified tech demos. But that visual realism clashes with an utter lack of internal logic within the game.
For instance, the "save your partner" mechanic when they're being attacked by infected. Since Ellie is the only one immune, that close quarters stuff would likely result in Dina's slow, painful death. And the 1 hit kills on Ellie by infected make NO sense.
AS A GAME TLOU2 feels like a bunch of ideas that never quite gelled. I can see the great game that could have been, but it was too focused on being artificially shocking and preaching to the player to get there. The best gameplay mechanics are borrowed from Uncharted 4.
But there's a deeper truth here. The only way you accept a bunch of young adult women behaving about 5 years too immature for their circumstances is if you secretly, deep down, don't see them as immature. You see WOMEN in general as incapable of cutting the shit when it matters.
I find it VERY telling that "game critics" bought young adults in a world where they have to grow up fast behaving like 15 year olds, while Twitch steamers find it laughable. I won't speculate on the reasons, but it does make me question the maturity of game reviewers.
