I'm going to cut & paste something I've just written elsewhere.
It's been a tricky week in some ways. Some real world events have made me feel like time spent in virtual worlds is even more pointless than I usually do (I should have been Catholic with all this guilt!) And yet... I'm now 16+ hours into The Last of Us. I'm still playing on Easy, I'm still getting to grips with this whole stick waggly finger-fumbly nonsense (I hope that pad on the PS4 controller can be used for mousing), but I no longer feel like I'm playing a game.
Something strange happened along the way. Features like the crafting, and the constant hunting for resources started off as a "been here, done this all before" type affair, but came to feel like an integral part of the plot and experience. I started off thinking this was "just another linear game", with some better than average acting and very impressive artistic and aural flair. But before I knew it that wasn't an issue. Is The Sopranos a totally linear story? Yes. Is The Wire an open world to explore? No.
Obviously those are very grand comparisons to be making, but what I'm getting at is that I feel like I'm participating in an interactive episodic drama series, rather than the usual interactive movie. And a B Movie at best, in the vast majority of cases. Clearly The Last of Us is not really to be compared with the very best of TV drama. But it's not to be compared with the best of normal computer games either. It is much more than that; it's a wonderfully crafted experience which I will certainly never forget.
I'm 68% through. It's Fall. And I'm torn in exactly the same way I get torn as the end of a DVD or Netflix series approaches. I want to finish the journey. But I also want the journey to last forever. At 50 I didn't think a game would ever make me feel like this again. Maybe it's a paternalistic thing. Maybe it's because Joel is an old git like me. Or maybe it's early-onset senility. But I don't care.
Of course I may just be justifying a full price purchase to myself, or getting brainwashed by so many great reviews and the "buzz" which has grown up around this title. But I can also see why Polygon only gave it a 7.5. In some ways the gameplay is both derivative and as flawed as any one of a hundred other forgettable titles. However for me the frantic survival segments, the blessed relief of the exploratory phases, and the genuinely welcome drama in the cut scenes forms a cocktail unlike any gaming kool-aid I've ever drunk before.
Disclaimer: I'm enjoying this so much I've signed up for a year of PS+ because I now need to investigate Naughty Dog's other work, and Uncharted3 is 'free' this month. Given I've played hardly any PS3 titles, and the fact they'll be keen to keep the PS+ deal very sweet for PS3 and eventually PS4 owners, it seems like a very fair deal. But it's quite possible that I have been overcome by a bout of fanboy-ism, from which I will wake before too long.
The trophies are really glitchy though, missing the optional conversation one even though i definitely got it twice.
I had an old 40GB version which has been fine since I got it, but Last of Us sent it over the edge. The disk drive got very loud when playing and eventually the disk got stuck and the drive failed(YLOD).
. Enjoy the ride...
