While The Walking Dead carried a great deal of heart and adapted to how you played to give you a different outcome, I think I preferred The Last of Us for leaving us no options. The only options you really have along the way are how you're gonna deal with remarkably dangerous situations. Do you walk up to the infected with your fists-a-swingin' or do you instead gun them down. The different types of enemies really find ways to make both an option and potentially a disadvantage. For one thing, you really have barely any ammo in this game.
THAT'S BECAUSE THIS IS AN HONEST TO GOODNESS SURVIVAL HORROR GAME!!!!
Every decision you make is very important. If you use a bullet, you need it to count or else your chances of survival just dropped drastically. You may even find that experience to be stressful and scary.
I recall seeing media getting quite upset due to the excited audience reaction to some of the extreme violence in this game. Make no mistakes, this game is seriously brutal. Yes somehow, it always manages to carry a weight. When I kill someone, it's because I needed to, or I would die. As Joel, the main protagonist (of sorts) puts it, "It's him or me". It somehow brings you in and has you make the decision that it isn't gonna be you. Sometimes, you'll sneak up behind someone and grab them by the throat and start choking out, and what follows is hardly what gaming usually gives us. Instead of the victim exploding into coins and having a japanese voice shout from off screen "GREAT JOB", you find yourself listening to them beg for their lives. You start to second guess yourself. You wonder if you could just let them go and make a deal, however, every single time I found myself finishing them and begrudgingly continuing along. Of course, none of these emotions would be felt without the great acting that Naughty Dog is known for putting into their games.
The acting in this game is remarkable. It's subtle. It's a truly evolved way of playing a game, in fact. Where as before, you would have an exposition moment where one character would say they are sad, you instead see the character make a subtle facial expression change. These people have seen a lot, especially when you take into account the beginning of the game, where you experience the initial infection from a much less gruff Joel, who up to that point was living a life like anyone else.
The game has characters that you can relate to, whether you want to or not, and the ending result is that you find yourself playing for keeps. You find yourself, having been there and done it all before, but trying to protect the one pure thing that you've found along the way. Ellie is in many ways the opposite of Joel. She's a wise cracker with an imagination and a really unique curiosity for the world that we all take for granted. She was born after the infection, and the masters at Naughty Dog know what she will make you feel and seem to make Joel feel the same way about things. It's really interesting. I'm also pleased with how they avoided cliches in this story. It's not like she just shows Joel that hope overcomes all, so much as Joel finds something comforting about her hope and will do anything to protect her. All I can say for sure is that, when I'm playing as Joel, you better not mess with Ellie, 'cause I get Batman levels of grumpy.
I've tried to avoid spoilers as best as I could, so do understand that there was a lot I didn't talk about, but I can't recommend it enough. I also want to avoid overhyping as that is a very real threat. Just get this game and have fun with it (yeah, it's fun too. Not just emotionally draining).
I also need to mention that the multiplayer on this game is actually a lot of fun. It eventually gets old, but all multiplayer does for me eventually. This was one of the best and most interesting I've ever played.
Game of the year? Possibly. The year isn't over yet.
