One of the things that made The Last Of Us such a transcendent game was the fact that they focused on the characters in a real emotional way, rather than just focuses on the overall plot and the world they lived in. The tale of Joel as he tried to get Ellie to safety was powerful, especially when things started to go wrong and he had to save her from others. But now, with The Last Of Us Part II, things are changing. Even on the story level.
First off, the game is going to be focusing on Ellie more than Joel, and as Naughty Dog’s Neill Druckmann revealed to Buzzfeed, the emotional core of the story will be different as well:
“You’re kind of talking about the ultimate message of what the game is, right? With the first game, it’s that sense of irrational, unconditional love a parent feels for their child and how they’re willing to sacrifice everything for their child, right? The whole kind of game was built around that concept.”
As for the new game, they went more onto certain other feelings:
“A lot of our conversations are about hate, but it’s a more complicated, kind of nuanced thing, which is— I’m sure you’ve been in a situation where you’ve witnessed an atrocity. You’ve seen someone torture an animal, or they’ve pushed you too far and, for a second, your mind goes somewhere … primitive, where you want to hurt someone. And with this game, we’re like, ‘How do we explore that? How do we make you feel those feelings and lean into them, and then make you reflect on them?'”
It sounds like gamers are going to be put into a whole new mindset when the game arrives. No release date has been set for it as of yet.
