The Last of Us Part II

[Verdugo]

Is there any specific reason why Laura Bailey is always cast as a despicable character presented by writers as a hero?

Keep in mind that 90% of the negative customer reviews are from anti LGBT people

Nah.

[exochaft]

Nah.

The LGBT cope-out is usually a sign that people are trying to defend the indefensible when it comes to their opinions (kind of like racism with other topics that are for other discussions and threads).

One of my favorite gaming buddies is a lesbian, and she gets rather insulted by being lumped into this monolithic group of 'LGBTQ-etc.' constantly, as if they all have the same opinions and views on the matter. While this may come to a shock to some of the more woke-centric people, most people assumed to be part of the monolithic group of LGBT really don't like each other, nor do they agree with each other on what they're told they stand for. This gets extended to games, as well. One aspect she reeeeeeally gets pissed off about is when it's obvious creators of games and movies put woke politics and agendas before making a good game, even if she may agree with the stances/topics in general. Ironically enough, she doesn't like TLOU2 at all. I told her to give me a general reason without spoiling it for me, and she told me the story is just trash and spits on the first game, and she found it less focused on making the experience enjoyable compared to the first game.

So yeah... pretty sure the game is getting bad player reviews because there might be something bad about the game, not because gamers are all anti-LGBT or whatever cope-out people come up with. That's not to say people may actually enjoy the game, but one shouldn't need everyone else to agree with them to validate their own opinions, nor put down anyone who disagrees with them.

[Verdugo]

The LGBT cope-out is usually a sign that people are trying to defend the indefensible when it comes to their opinions (kind of like racism with other topics that are for other discussions and threads).

One of my favorite gaming buddies is a lesbian, and she gets rather insulted by being lumped into this monolithic group of 'LGBTQ-etc.' constantly, as if they all have the same opinions and views on the matter. While this may come to a shock to some of the more woke-centric people, most people assumed to be part of the monolithic group of LGBT really don't like each other, nor do they agree with each other on what they're told they stand for. This gets extended to games, as well. One aspect she reeeeeeally gets pissed off about is when it's obvious creators of games and movies put woke politics and agendas before making a good game, even if she may agree with the stances/topics in general. Ironically enough, she doesn't like TLOU2 at all. I told her to give me a general reason without spoiling it for me, and she told me the story is just trash and spits on the first game, and she found it less focused on making the experience enjoyable compared to the first game.

So yeah... pretty sure the game is getting bad player reviews because there might be something bad about the game, not because gamers are all anti-LGBT or whatever cope-out people come up with. That's not to say people may actually enjoy the game, but one shouldn't need everyone else to agree with them to validate their own opinions, nor put down anyone who disagrees with them.

You have to give corporations credit, their PR teams managed to spin perfect narative so that masses will defend them on the internet for free.

Too bad that the same masses dont have tendency to notice how corporations enforce the same virtues in some other countries.

[Vakir]

Is there any specific reason why Laura Bailey is always cast as a despicable character presented by writers as a hero?

This, Jaina Proudmoore (which is a fair bit more complicated), and...what, Catherine, a character designed to be ambiguous and fucked up? Kait Diaz? Not really sure who else would fit that.

Girl's had like 50,000 roles, so...always?

In any case, not surprised that the general concensus followed suit. It just disappoints me that, while not absolutely everyone is doing it because they're upset about LGBT issues, there are still gross people using it as an excuse to radicalize some. "Lol, it's ma'am. Bigot sandwich. Damn that (((Neil Cuckmann)))!"

[Verdugo]

(((Neil Cuckmann)))!"

I prefer Heel Fuckman. Or Dr. Uckman.

Wait, that one is real.

Piece of shit even brags about the crunch.

[minteK917]

This, Jaina Proudmoore (which is a fair bit more complicated), and...what, Catherine, a character designed to be ambiguous and fucked up? Kait Diaz? Not really sure who else would fit that.

Girl's had like 50,000 roles, so...always?

In any case, not surprised that the general concensus followed suit. It just disappoints me that, while not absolutely everyone is doing it because they're upset about LGBT issues, there are still gross people using it as an excuse to radicalize some. "Lol, it's ma'am. Bigot sandwich. Damn that (((Neil Cuckmann)))!"

I do like the golfing memes though. To be honest that part upset me not even because of what happened, but just because it felt the start of the game was just put on Fast Foward to just hurry and get to it, when this should have been the middle of the game. Which as i said in my review always aggreviate m when story based game do that, and than turns around and waste hours of my time in some absolute boring long ass padding where i often just wanna go to the actual good part?

[Verdugo]

Welp...the highest point of my day was both the summaries people sent me about the revenge story of this game...
Is soooo good.
Is actually perfect...

This hits all my weakpoints...(T_T) is beautiful
entirely personal though, not a fact, as it is all artform

Well prepare yourself because the OTHER main characters gets her revenge and walks free.

[Vakir]

I prefer Heel Fuckman. Or Dr. Uckman.

Wait, that one is real.

Piece of shit even brags about the crunch.

Yeah it's pretty tone-deaf. Albeit I think the people virtue signaling (ha, flipped that around on the usual people using it) about the bad labor conditions and all are pretty disingenuous. They only really bust it out as a talking point once they don't like story decisions or, indeed, politics in the game they do not like. And it is indeed at play in the latter. The majority of the same people weren't getting up on Rockstar's grill about it for RDR2, for example, because that story wasn't fresh ass.

IDK how much the "testing human limits" referred to crunch, though. I'm betting that was tossed in early enough in development before it became heavily public.

Seriously, though, who else has Laura Bailey voiced that's despicable but treated as a hero? I'm drawing a blank. Maybe it's the fact that they usually sound too damn similar.

[Verdugo]

Seriously, though, who else has Laura Bailey voiced that's despicable but treated as a hero? I'm drawing a blank. Maybe it's the fact that they usually sound too damn similar.

You have this, Jaina, that elf from Shadow of War.

Ok maybe not constantly but thats her most recent exposure that I noticed.

Also her atrocious voice acting in Silent Hill HD collection gets on my nerves, but everyone sucked in that one.

[Vakir]

You have this, Jaina, that elf from Shadow of War.

Ok maybe not constantly but thats her most recent exposure that I noticed.

Also her atrocious voice acting in Silent Hill HD collection gets on my nerves, but everyone sucked in that one.

I couldn't deal with Shadow of War. Jaina's a tad more nuanced. But Abby is way, way too hard to empathize with just based on how overly extreme they made the inciting incident and how late they reveal the motivation.

Well prepare yourself because the OTHER main characters gets her revenge and walks free.

Yeah, and that's the cliche thing to happen anyway. IDK how something can be jizzed about as a masterful revenge story when almost every modern revenge story ends with "...but then I didn't kill the actual target in the end because reasons." You're more unlikely to find a revenge story that's played straight than one that pretends to subvert it and takes a moral high ground.

Christ, The Southern Raiders in ATLA did the most G-rated version possible of it, and even that was better because the payoff was "I still don't forgive them and their life is worthless, plus I forgave someone who did deserve it." But even that has problems with the aesop the same way something like TLOU2 does. "Well, I raped someone from the inside out by controlling their blood...but at least I didn't murder a Fire Nazi."

[Loeko]

Nah.

I can understand why you would like to believe otherwise but if you'd just take the time to have a look at Metacritic, you'd see that most of the user reviews contain the words "trans" or "lesbian" followed by a zero. I wish that I was making that stuff up but saldy, you just have to take a look at Metacritic to see that the majority of bad scores are for homophobe reasons.

The game doesn't deserve a 10, it's not perfect, and as a matter of fact, no one but the reviewers has finished the game yet. Even if you consider these reviews as legitimate, they're simply not based on the entirety of the game, which makes them even less credible, not that they were in the first place.

[Verdugo]

I can understand why you would like to believe otherwise but if you'd just take the time to have a look at Metacritic, you'd see that most of the user reviews contain the words "trans" or "lesbian" followed by a zero. I wish that I was making that stuff up but saldy, you just have to take a look at Metacritic to see that the majority of bad scores are for homophobe reasons.

Then I guess every game with LGBTetc character should have low user score, proving you right.

[Loeko]

Then I guess every game with LGBTetc character should have low user score, proving you right.

Well, wasn't Life is Strange also bombed in the first place for having some lesbian content? Then, real reviews came in and it's now considered as a masterpiece.

Again, go on Metacritic and see for yourself. If you find that those scores and comments accurately represent the quality of the game, then I think that the issue we're having is not about our opinion of the game but about our tolerance towards homophobe bashing.

[Verdugo]

Well, wasn't Life is Strange also bombed in the first place for having some lesbian content?

Propably those were in a minority.

[Vakir]

Propably those were in a minority.

It's worth noting that the present review bomb might not hold up and a lot of the 0s might be deleted as a result of botting and content. Many review bombed games, including some of the ones in the image you provided, had similar situations. Hell, Death Stranding was approaching basement levels from similar bombing and is now around a 7.2.

I doubt it'll stay around the 3s, but I'm sure even accounting for purely people who played it from beginning to end, they will be let down regardless. TLOU2 was going to be a hard act to follow even if they didn't completely fumble it like so.

[Saltysquidoon]

I can understand why you would like to believe otherwise but if you'd just take the time to have a look at Metacritic, you'd see that most of the user reviews contain the words "trans" or "lesbian" followed by a zero. I wish that I was making that stuff up but saldy, you just have to take a look at Metacritic to see that the majority of bad scores are for homophobe reasons.

I just went and read through the first page of metacritic user reviews and saw exactly what I expected. People mad about the story and people lashing out at the obviously paid off 'real critics', I didn't see a single mention of the word lesbian, gay or trans.

I'm not saying they aren't there, hell they could be most of the user reviews. But this just seems to me to be the 'usual' backlash against the propaganda of the paid off shills I mean 'games journalists'.

Also, can we take a second to talk about how coincidental it is that the shill 'critcs' gave out 91 perfect scores? You would think given how divisive the game clearly is with the fans there would be some small deviation from 100/100.

[Verdugo]

It's worth noting that the present review bomb might not hold up and a lot of the 0s might be deleted as a result of botting and content. Many review bombed games, including some of the ones in the image you provided, had similar situations. Hell, Death Stranding was approaching basement levels from similar bombing and is now around a 7.2.

It might not apply for every game, since warcraft: refunded still sits at honorable 0.6 user score. Although I am sure Sony will push for some mass deletion of reviews, considering their recent track record.

[Vakir]

It might not apply for every game, since warcraft: refunded still sits at honorable 0.6 user score. Although I am sure Sony will push for some mass deletion of reviews, considering their recent track record.

WC3R reviews were based around purely the technical content of its release. It's impossible to deny that politics do indeed play a role in how hard TLOU2 is getting hammered, or something like Life is Strange and the like, even if it's for sure not the only reason in each case. Do a run-through on the history for the loudest people on Twitter or Reddit sometime. You'll go down a very interesting rabbit hole. Analytics with r/TheLastofUs2 have a lot of bleed-over into r/thenewright and r/smuggies.

[Verdugo]

WC3R reviews were based around purely the technical content of its release. It's impossible to deny that politics do indeed play a role in how hard TLOU2 is getting hammered, or something like Life is Strange and the like, even if it's for sure not the only reason in each case. Do a run-through on the history for the loudest people on Twitter or Reddit sometime. You'll go down a very interesting rabbit hole. Analytics with r/TheLastofUs2 have a lot of bleed-over into r/thenewright and r/smuggies.

Most people I care about mention only the story, absurd ammount of walking sections even when compared to first game and Druckman being and absolute self-absorbed twat. What Resetera and its polar oposite says about this game, I couldnt give less of a fuck.

[Stormdash]

It's dishonest to say that if someone is reviewing or playing the game and letting out an offhand barrage of shitty comments about LGBT characters or whatever, that this is the crux of their problem with the game. You can make a completely fair point about how stupidly the story is designed, how inconsistently characters are written, how dishonest the game's advertising campaign was, etc and those don't stop being valid points just because in your anger making them you made some mocking bigoted remark about one character's physique, for instance.

To wit: the game is getting trashed first, foremost and to the exclusion of almost any other reason because the story is trash. The story non-linear structure is trash. The attempts to make the antagonist into a deuteragonist is trash because her backstory isn't as sympathetic as they think (and frankly it's obvious they think this is a more sympathetic character than Ellie and that's straight up fucking lunacy in writing on a number of levels.

Honestly the LGB and T aspects of the game are... ephemeral, they are window dressing. They aren't a reason to care one way or another. I seriously doubt anybody was coming in here expecting Ellie to be retconned out of being a lesbian. The trans character is of little plot significance.