So I am replaying both games after a few years as I have noticed they have both been ported to my favourite platform, the PC.

I generally really like the games. The story is strong and mostly really well written, the characters are fascinating. I have enjoyed playing through them in the past as I am enjoying it now.

That being said, I am again baffled by what I consider to be the biggest plot issue I have ever encountered in an otherwise really stellar game story.

This plot point that I am finding the issue with takes place at the end of the first game and most of the second game plot stems around it and revolves around it, so it is no insignificant overlooked mistake.

(Major spoilers beyond this point)

So the story of the first game ends as follows: After having traveled across a good chunk of the decimated USA, Joel and Ellie finally reach the Firefly base in the Salt Lake City hospital. Ellie nearly drowns and as Joel gives her a heart massage, he is knocked unconscious by a firefly soldier. The game cuts to Joel waking up in a bed and Marlene telling him, that Ellie is fine, but they are sadly going to need to perform a fatal surgery on her in order to extract her unique mutated fungal infection and to eventually develop a humanity saving cure from it. Joel, unwilling to let Ellie die and driven by paternal instinct, proceeds to fight his way to Ellie and escape the hospital with her, having murdered (at least) one unnamed soldier, Marlene and the Firefly head surgeon along the way.

The second game then tells the story about a daughter of this head surgeon whom Joel had killed and who was apparently the only person capable of developing said cure. In a quest to revenge her father and the hope of humanity wasted by Joel, this lady murders Joel in an exceptionally cruel and inhumane way. Setting of on another revenge mission, Ellie then goes to hunt her.

From the combination of collectible items in both games and retrospective flashbacks in the second game we learn a few more details about what went down in that hospital prior to the attempted surgery: Marlene was thrilled to see that Joel and Ellie managed to get to them, but devastated after having learned that Ellie would have to die. Ellie was apparently like a daughter to her. She was asked to kill Joel, but decided not to, since she considered him the only person able to understand how she felt. She tells Joel about the planned operation, but, despite obviously understanding and emphasizing with him and despite Joel asking surprisingly politely, she denies him seeing Ellie.

She also had a quite heated discussion with the surgeon on the topic of killing Ellie for the cure. Some quotes from that retrospect:

Surgeon: "How many Fireflies died for less?"
Marlene: "That was their choice."

Marlene: "If this was your daughter, what would you do?"
Right after this Abby (Surgeons daughter) comes to her dad and says "If it was me, I would want you to perform the surgery."

Me: "Then why do you not make this operation Ellies choice?"

My thoughts: When Joel and Ellie have reached the Fireflies, Ellie, having nearly drowned, was unconscious. Judging by her words in the car after having escaped the hospital, they have kept her unconscious throughout her entire stay and intended to chop her up without even having talked to her.

Would Marlene not have wanted to talk to Ellie, to hear her speak one last time?

When not in the heat of a battle, is it not a basic politeness to ask before you euthanise someone, even if it is for the better future of humanity?

In one other second game retrospect Ellie says "I was supposed to die in that hospital. My life would have f** mattered. But you took that from me." From this we can judge that she would most likely have complied and agreed with the surgery. If Marlene was so close to her, she would have known that about her. Would hearing her approval not have made her conscience lighter, her decision easier? (Edit: yes, there is a slim chance she would have refused. But again, there is Marlene, who, if she knows Ellie as well as we are lead to believe, knows, that is very unlikely. Logically, she would request for Ellie to be woken up so that she could talked to her, and again, she is apparently a very highly ranking Firefy for this request to be at least considered.)

And would hearing Ellies approval not have prevented Joel from going on a rampage, killing the only person capable of developing a cure and dooming humanity to eternity with the infection?

What would waking Ellie up / letting her wake up and talk to her have costed? A few extra hours, days at most? Some bits of food and/or medicine? The infection have thrived for over 20 years, it is not like a few extra days are going to make or break their chances of developing a cure.

The facility was also pretty large. Ellie was their greatest hope of achieving what they all have dedicated their lifes to, so her arrival must have been huge news for them. Her death must have been a collective and well discussed and thought through decision, it could not have just been a shortcut split-second call of one overly excited boss man.

So why did no one ask Ellie?

Edit: I am not saying this is a plot HOLE. I am saying this is a plot ISSUE. An irracional behaviour of characters so that the story can unfold in the intended way. This is the only way for the first game to get the ambiguous ending and for the second game to work. I am not saying this story does not work, as some people seem to be understanding it. I am saying, that there are some reaches in logic and reason that needed to be made.

Okay, so he had to have been a good dad because it just hit me how affected she was by his death. Like, I always knew, but yesterday I was like, “Oh, she really loved him.”

Then there’s the scene of her telling Lev that her dad painted a whole jungle for her, with colourful birds and trees, for her bedroom or whatever. That’s so cute. Too bad he was a shit person.

I would love to see more of their relationship, though.

(I have no clue why I only now really realised that)

I’m pretty late to this question, I played part 1 ages ago and finally decided to start part 2 which i’m enjoying, I don’t mind any spoilers about the cure if there is any as long as the ending of the game isn’t entirely spoiled. This “cure” that Ellie supposedly could have provided , which I have no clue if it would work or not, what would it have even done? The world is like 25+ years into the apocalypse, there’s no government and majority of people have become cannibals or killers/thieves for supplies, some built safe communities like Jackson, and the rest are just infected, like literally to the point where there are more infected than healthy I think. What point is a cure if infected will persevere anyways? There’s no way everyone of them can be wiped out.

Unless the cure can be passed down genetically to newborns, then that would be useful in the long run. Though isn’t the whole plot the world got warmer and that’s why Cordyceps can take over humans now? you can’t reverse global warming at this point.

With that being said do I think Joel deserved what he got, sure, but I think I would have done the same under those circumstances.

Hopefully all of that makes sense, just been on my mind.

I know gta physics and storyline will be amazing but does the near future of TLOU content suffices you more than GTA ?

I just finished tlou-i, (rated 4.5 on backloggd btw, liked it very much) But before it i played re9 requiem and before that "days gone" . All are zombie games and now I wanna try something different and apart from undead, zombie people, but at the same time I wanna try tlou-ii too! Would this make me bore in tlou-ii quickly because I played too much of the same genre? I want it to be a good experience. Please advice.

Watch 1.

Play 2.

So in the series it is established people have been born in the setting after the apocalypse. How often and open are people that experienced the old world to discussing that time for children that never experienced it. Did FEDRA try to rewrite history or is it going to become more of an issue as the world ages?

I am playing tlou 2 on my ps4, the game ran really well until now. My game is running really slowly. I tried restarting the console, reinstalling the game and even open it to clean the fans but nothing worked. What can i do ?

Not a big fan of long, narrative heavy games. Me have gamer goop brain. I enjoy shooting things, gore, and gameplay that keeps me engaged. I genuinely do not care about the story or the characters. I did enjoy the first one and played the factions mode and it was phenomenal.

I just want your raw, unfiltered opinions. I'm getting vibes of people holding back or filtering themselves. I just want genuine, authentic opinions. Be honest, even if your opinion is unpopular or goes against the consensus.

There have been many theories about what people would like to see in Part III if it comes out. There has also been a lot of discussion about if Ellie's journey will lead her back to the Fireflies and the cure.

We see Part II focus heavily on grief and revenge through Ellie. We also see what redemption begins to look like for Abby through her relationship with Yara and Lev. They both mirror each other's journey.

I was wondering what "redemption" might look like for Ellie. Does she still think her purpose lies with the Fireflies? After everything that has happened, what does her immunity mean to her, if anything? Will she look for the opportunity to give her life for this cause now that she has the choice and knows the consequences? Outside of the Fireflies, will she find something else to give her life for?

How come in no return the male characters are terrible! Joel and Tommy cant dodge and the other guy i can’t remember is name. Manny can’t even make med kit i know its to make it more challenging but i really wish they made it toggle switch so i can dodge but way is it just a male characters all the women can dodge and do everything fine So way just the men? Its really upsetting because i was so excited to play as Joel but i never do because if u get a mealie weapon attack you cant defend yourself and no im not a noob i just really love to play around with the combat ok sorry for the rant if you read it all thank you

So basically I just got Ellie’s tattoo and now I’m wanting to play the game again but I don’t have my ps5 at my parents house. What’s the cheapest way I can play it? I have 10mb internet, a MacBook and a Xbox One X if that helps haha.

I’ve played both Part I & II and now I genuinely can’t find anything that hits the same...

My little sister watched me play both from start to finish and we were both completely hooked... Now I’m looking for another story-driven game with that same emotional + cinematic + addictive feeling...

I want something where you actually get attached to the characters and look forward to playing every day...

What game gave YOU the closest feeling to TLOU? I need something good ....

if i play grounded, ng+ and chronological mode at the same time, will i still get the achievements? already did permadeath lol

This is my second play through of Part 2. I’m doing a Permadeath run to get that achievement and I knocked out 6 other achievements on this run. I was using the IGN guide to keep track of my progress to make sure I was getting the trading cards, coins, and artifacts.

I just left Haven and realized I’m still missing 2 coins. I don’t have my backpack anymore so can’t check to see what coins I’m missing. Is there a way to see what coins I’ve grabbed so I can cross reference them on a list?

I would love some more levels and think that integrating Part I would be awesome. If they’re going to have playable characters from Part I, why not levels? And why not more from Part II while we’re at it
Examples:
The Lodge
The Restaurant
Outside Pittsburgh
The Museum
The Hotel
The Capital House
The Bank

What levels would you like to see? What about other modifiers to switch things up?

What would the game be like if Abby had killed Ellie or Tommy instead of Joel?

Joel and Tommy avenging Ellie would be the most depressing game imaginable.

They teased Ellie and Joel going after Dona's killer as a misdirect. What do you think that would have been like?

I was thinking about that just now. Nora seemed so determined not to rat on Abby. So why didn’t she just fool Ellie about this information?

Part 1 and (even more so) Part 2 are narrative forward games with a lot of set-up and preamble before they get going. Even more notable there are more then one insta-death scenarios and mechanics in them that feel too risky to try whole game perma-death on, I thought. So it never really seemed like something I would be down for attempting.
But I was itching for a replay, part 1 is shorter, and I’ve played it at least a dozen times in my life, surely I can keep my wits about me in combat and be fine. Enter… the nailbomb… I even had my brick out to be extra sure!!!! That wire is so hard to see!!!

This is a warning to those who think they can breeze through this game on perma-death. The last thing you expect can get you.

With all this talk about ND going back to TLOU after Intergalactic, I've gone back to thinking about how the already great gameplay could be enhanced.

One problem I have with the gameplay is that damage doesn't really affect how you or the enemies fight. A guy who's been shot twice in the torso will fight the exact same way a guy who hasn't been shot at all. And I know most games work like this, but I think ND could go a step further and give us more realistic consequences for damage outside of shooting specific places to stun. Stunning itself is also kinda weird. It makes sense that shooting someone in the leg would put them on their knees, but five seconds later they are running as if nothing happened. And it's weird how other kinds of damage usually don't stun as well, like hitting someone with a fricking lead pipe. Hand to hand coild also be improved, maybe with a more sophisticated grappling or defending mechanic.

Some things in stealth also bug me a bit, like enemies not seeing a brick/bottle being thrown right in front of them, as well as not noticing someone jamming a bunch of scissors into a baseball bat five feet from them, or someone swimming and splashing around next to them. But the moment you stab someone too fast that automatically alerts everyone lol.

Anyway, I really like the way combat works, but still think it could be even better.