Five years later and we are still talking about it. Honestly, it’s kind of wild. Most games come and go, but The Last of Us Part 2 remains this massive, jagged pill that a huge portion of the gaming community just cannot swallow. You know the story. Or you think you do. You remember the leaks, the review bombing, and the absolute firestorm on Reddit when players realized they’d have to spend ten-plus hours playing as the person who killed their favorite character. It felt like a betrayal.
But looking back with some distance? It’s arguably the most honest sequel ever made.
Naughty Dog didn't go for the "safe" win. They could have easily given us The Adventures of Joel and Ellie: Part II, a fun cross-country romp where they bond over puns and kill some clickers. People would have loved it. It would have sold millions. Instead, Neil Druckmann and Halley Gross decided to dismantle the very idea of a hero. They took the "found family" trope from the first game and shredded it. It’s messy. It’s painful. It is, quite frankly, one of the most exhausting experiences you can have with a controller in your hand.
Why The Last of Us Part 2 broke the internet (and our hearts)
The backlash wasn't just about Joel. Well, it was mostly about Joel, but it was also about how the game forced us to look at the "enemy" through a human lens. Abby Anderson wasn't just a boss fight. She was a mirror.
When you first start the game, you're fueled by the same rage Ellie feels. You want blood. You want to track down these WLF soldiers in Seattle and make them pay for what happened in that basement in Jackson. And for the first half of the game, the developers let you do exactly that. You're Ellie. You're fast, you're brutal, and you're justified. Or so you think.
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Then the perspective shifts.
Suddenly, you're playing as Abby. You're seeing her friends—the people you just spent eight hours brutally murdering—having lunch, complaining about their jobs, and looking after dogs. It’s uncomfortable. It’s supposed to be. The game is essentially a giant experiment in empathy. It asks a very simple, very annoying question: Is your "hero" actually the villain in someone else's story? Most games shy away from this because, let's face it, being the "good guy" is fun. Being a complicated, grieving, and sometimes terrible person is a lot harder to sell to a mass audience.
The technical mastery nobody denies
Even the people who hate the story usually admit the game looks and plays like a dream. On the PS5, especially with the Remastered version's "No Return" mode, the combat is terrifyingly fluid.
The way the enemies call out to each other by name? That’s not just a gimmick. When you kill a guy named "Omar" and his friend screams his name in genuine horror, it changes the vibe of the encounter. It makes the violence feel heavy. You aren't just clearing a room of NPCs; you're ending lives. Naughty Dog used a system called "Motion Matching" to handle the animations, which is why Ellie moves so realistically through the environment. If she’s near a wall, she puts her hand out. If she’s crawling through grass, her posture shifts based on the height of the cover. It’s subtle stuff, but it adds up to a level of immersion that most other studios are still trying to catch up to in 2026.
And the sound design? Unreal. If you play with a good pair of headphones, you can hear the distinct "click" of a gun jamming or the wet thud of an arrow hitting bark. It’s gross. It’s beautiful.
Breaking down the cycle of violence
The game is obsessed with the idea of "the cycle."
Ellie thinks that by killing Abby, she will find peace. She thinks it will stop the nightmares about Joel. But the more she kills, the more she loses. She loses her fingers, her ability to play the guitar (her last connection to Joel), and eventually, her family. Dina and the baby leave because Ellie can't let go.
Abby’s arc is the inverse. She already got her revenge at the very beginning of the game. Did it make her feel better? Nope. She’s still plagued by nightmares of her father’s death in the Salt Lake City hospital. It’s only when she starts helping Lev and Yara—two kids from the enemy faction, the Seraphites—that she actually starts to heal.
It’s a heavy-handed metaphor, sure. But it hits.
The controversy of the "Ending"
A lot of players were livid that Ellie let Abby go at the end. They felt like they’d spent 25 hours working toward a goal that was snatched away in the final seconds. "What was the point?" they asked.
The point was that Ellie finally realized that killing Abby wouldn't bring Joel back. In that final flash of Joel playing the guitar on the porch, she saw him not as a corpse, but as the man who loved her. If she had drowned Abby in that shallow water in Santa Barbara, she would have drowned the last bit of her humanity, too.
It’s an ending that respects the characters more than the player’s desire for a "win." And in an industry where most games are designed to make the player feel like a god, that’s a pretty bold move.
What the critics got right (and wrong)
If you look at the Metacritic scores, you see a massive gap between the critics (93) and the original user scores (which started in the 3.0 range).
Critics praised the "ludonarrative consistency"—a fancy way of saying the gameplay and the story actually match up. Usually, in games like Uncharted, the hero is a nice guy in cutscenes but kills 500 people in gameplay. In The Last of Us Part 2, the violence is depicted as traumatizing for the characters themselves. Ellie gets physically sick after certain kills. Her face contorts with rage and pain.
However, some players felt the game was "misery porn." And honestly? They aren't entirely wrong. It is a grueling game. It’s long—maybe a bit too long in the middle Seattle sections—and it rarely gives you a moment to breathe. If you're looking for a fun weekend distraction, this isn't it. This is a game that wants to hurt your feelings.
How to actually approach a replay in 2026
If you’re thinking about diving back in, or if you skipped it because of the drama, here is how you should actually play it to get the most out of it:
- Don't rush the Abby sections. Most people try to speed-run the second half because they want to get back to Ellie. Don't do that. Take the time to explore the Forward Operating Base (FOB) and the aquarium. The game only works if you actually try to understand her.
- Experiment with the "No Return" mode. If the story is too much for you, the roguelike mode added in the Remastered version is incredible. It strips away the plot and focuses purely on the mechanics. You can play as characters like Tommy or Mel, each with different skill trees.
- Turn on the accessibility features. Naughty Dog is the industry leader here. There are over 60 settings, including options for the visually impaired and those with fine motor control issues. Even if you don't "need" them, some of the high-contrast modes are fascinating to see.
- Watch the "Grounded II" documentary. If you want to understand why they made these choices, the documentary on the making of the game is essential. It shows the toll the development took on the team and the genuine intent behind the story beats.
The Last of Us Part 2 isn't a game that wants to be liked. It wants to be reckoned with. It’s a story about how hate can consume you, but also about how it’s never too late to just... stop. Whether you love it or hate it, you can't deny that it pushed the medium of gaming into a more mature, albeit more uncomfortable, territory.
Next time you fire up your console, try to look past the memes and the old Twitter wars. Look at the eyes of the characters. Listen to the silence between the gunshots. There is a reason this game still dominates the conversation. It’s because it dared to tell a story where nobody really wins, which is a lot closer to real life than most of us are willing to admit.
Go back and finish that final chapter in Santa Barbara. Pay attention to the guitar. It’s not just a prop; it’s the whole story.
Key Insights for Your Next Playthrough:
- Focus on the Parallels: Notice how Abby’s Day 1 mirrors Ellie’s Day 1 in terms of structure but flips the emotional stakes.
- Check the Journals: Ellie’s journal entries change based on your progression and offer deep insight into her PTSD that isn't always spoken aloud.
- Utilize Stealth: The "Prone" mechanic is a game-changer; you can hide in much shorter grass than you think, but watch out for dogs who can smell you regardless of your line of sight.
- Upgrade Wisely: Prioritize the "Suppressed SMG" and "Explosive Arrows" for Ellie, and "Momentum" for Abby to handle crowd control during the intense Seraphite encounters.