Execution / Game

[Cuyir]

@Cuyir
TLOU gameplay is said to be quite "meh", though, isn't it?

Meh how? Clunky? Hard to control?

I thought that the combat didn't only feel realistic to both characters (Joel would fight in such a way that showed his true personality, which made me go ''oh.....'' later in the game and Ellie would be mostly only able to fend them off for a moment) but also controlled well. Both characters reacted to kills made by Joel (Joel with a bit of post fight anger and exertion and Ellie with ''holy shits'' and her body language).

Not only that but they had the perfect amount of ''setpieces'' (which I won't spoil) that reflected the narrative events in the controls, they showed character development through gameplay (walking through gorgeous post apocalyptic greenery while they're conversing and paying attention to stuff in the environment you're walking through). There are moments that players can miss where Joel and Ellie are exploring and they see something and if you press a button Joel will say something. There's also a scene that's features a core mechanic (that by that moment in time players will be incredibly used to) being interrupted because Ellie isn't responsive and you, as a player, have the option to jar Ellie out of her funk by walking to her and saying ''psst hey, need help''.

It has really small moments in the gameplay (both combat and exploration) that add that extra wrinkle which marries gameplay with tone, themes and narrative. It's really hard to explain without sounding like a wanker. You play it and you're liable to notice some of the little touches that makes the world have heft.

It controls well and it's fun (while being just brutal and tense enough to not break the ''illusion'' of playing a game). That's a pet peeve of mine: when games break that immersion ''illusion'' by having a mechanic that feels too game-y and tone/thematically out of place (Bioshock is again the ultimate example of this, but contemporary war shooters also suffer from it).

It features the same ''gameplay galleries'' I've spoken about but it's done in such a good way that it makes it harder to detect the seams and thus makes it work.

@ Bridge: MGS4 is pretty tiresome. You're explained a whole timeline of events up to that point in the first 1/4 of the game. Then a big important character comes in and shatters everything you were forced to watch and memorize. THEN another character does the SAME thing and then AGAIN. It got tiresome. It made me look back on my experience of MGS4 poorly because of it.

And as for TLOU: watching isn't the same as experiencing it first hand. Watching a lets play of a videogame is sort of the equivalent of being told what happened in a movie without seeing it.

Morrowind is incredible. It's a great game. It's a masterpiece. Wouldn't call it high art. Its gameness brings down other elements, which is where my whole stance on the topic rests on.