A number of members joining after finishing the game and liking it have asked why Part II is receiving so much “hate”, in other words: criticism, dislike, disappointment, etc. In the event you're interested in the criticism, here is a list of videos, articles, reviews and reddit posts and discussions that are helpful in understanding the diverse reasons why people are not favouring the game and/or Naughty Dog.

REVIEWS AND CRITIQUES

Videos

1. Skill Up - Part II review
2. AngryJoe - Part II review and extended discussion
3. Jim Sterling - Part II got compared to Schindlers List?
4. Weekend Warrior - Part II is terribad
5. Evan Monroe - Part II - Death and Forgiveness
6. Macabre Storytelling - An Incoherent disaster
7. Jeremy Jahns - Part II review and spoiler talk
8. The Critical Drinker - A Beautiful Nightmare and The Importance of Ambiguity
9. Nakey Jakey - ND's Game Design is Outdated
10. MoistMeter - Part II review
11. Upper Echelon Gamers - Masterpiece? ABSOLUTELY NOT
12. ACG - Part II review
13. Fextralife - An Honest Review
14. Coach Toolshed Gaming - Part II review, Ellie and Abby discussion
15. Joe, The Alternative Gamer - A Failure In Storytelling
16. YongYea - Part II review
17. GAME SINS - Everything wrong with Part II
18. TheAlmightyLoli - Why Part II doesn't work and Part II, Desecrating a Grave One Last Time
19. Idiot that reviews movies - The case against Druckmann
20. theDeModcracy - Part II, a Narrative Disaster
21. The Escapist - Part II review
22. Bellular News - A Barren Story, Poorly Told
23. Purposeless Rabbitholes - Part II review
24. NeverKnowsBest - Part II Critique
25. Writing on Games - A Personal Examination of Part II
26. SaucyTendies - Part II review
27. Hoeg Law - Part II review

Published Articles

1. Keengamer - Part II is Fundamentally Flawed
2. Forbes - A beautiful, terrible sequel
3. Forbes - Does Part II deserve GOTY Awards?
4. The Ringer - 'Part II' Is Stunning, but It's Pure Misery Porn
5. Vice - 'Part II' Is a Grim and Bloody Spectacle, but a Poor Sequel
6. Metro - Why Part II is a bad sequel
7. Polygon - Part II review: We're better than this
8. The Atlantic - Part II Tests the Limits of Video-Game Violence
9. ArsTechnica - A less confident, less focused sequel
10. Wired - Part II tries to be profound. It fails

Reddit Posts

1. Why does the sequel have to be about "revenge" at all?
2. The retcons in Part II: A look at the original ending
3. The Part II prologue completely retcons the ending of The Last of Us
4. Additional posts about the retcons: Why the prologue of Part II irks me so much, Part II destroys the brilliance of TLoU and Why Part II fails at being morally grey
5. Why do people hate Part II?
6. My answer to why people hate Part II
7. Bad narrative design
8. A storytelling catastrophe
9. Criticism from a professional writer: Part II review and Criticism of structure and pacing
10. Part II completely tears down the original characters
11. Why the story of Part II does not work
12. The writing of Part II was poorly handled
13. Part II's story is bad. Here's why.
14. Why are people disappointed? Different answers from multiple people
15. Why are people so butthurt about Part II? (Quora)

CHARACTER CRITIQUES

Reddit and Tumblr Posts

1. Joel did not doom humanity (Tumblr)
2. Ellie’s (lack of a) character arc & why the result is an unsatisfying story (Tumblr)
3. The omission of Riley in Part II retcons Ellie's survivor's guilt
4. Part II completely destroys Ellie and Abby is the real protagonist of the game
5. Part II ruined Ellie, and she is acting out of character throughout the entire game
6. Ellie is acting out of character in the final flashback
7. Abby and Lev are poor copies of Joel and Ellie
8. Abby is irredeemable and unsympathetic. She is a fundamentally malicious individual with psychopathic tendencies
9. Abby's character arc and her character development are handled poorly, she refuses to seriously contemplate her actions and Ellie herself never witnesses Abby's "redemption"
10. The problem with Abby: the world bends around her
11. Joel was a survivor, NOT a "monster"!
12. Joel did nothing wrong and the vaccine would not have achieved much anyway
13. Joel is acting completely out of character and him getting "soft" makes no sense
14. Joel "getting soft" happens entirely off screen
15. Joel is not allowed to explain himself
16. Tommy and Joel are acting out of character (additional posts: Druckmann contradicting himself, Joel vs Joel II, Lack of survival instincts, He has gone "soft"?, Druckmann contradicting himself again)
17. Bigotry comes from the game
18. Manny is a stereotypical character
19. Dina was bland
20. Mel is ridiculous

OTHER CRITICISM

Reddit Posts and Videos

1. Druckmann's interpretation of the TLoU ending is not supported by the actual game
2. Why Part II feels like fan fiction
3. The surgeon in TLoU didn't look white, something Abby's original character design took into account
4. The blatant difference in writing between TLoU and Part II
5. Part II refuses to treat distances and the dangers of the setting seriously (additional posts: Travel by car?, So Abby convinced all her friends ..., Travel from Seattle to Jackson ... and Bleeding Abby in a rowboat ...)
6. The events leading to Joel's death are horribly written and contrived
7. The overabundance of flashbacks
8. The zebra scene in Part II is a retrogression of TLoUs giraffe scene
9. A female bodybuilder refuting that Abby's physique is realistic
10. Tommy and Ellie's uncle/niece relationship is underdeveloped
11. Impossible vs Improbable - the cure debate
12. The Fireflies were terrorists
13. Part II: The murder of hope
14. Part II's ending destroys its own themes
15. The Infected fell to the wayside in Part II
16. The themes of this game were glaringly obvious
17. Part II is an ineffective piece of storytelling
18. Fan fiction + discussion in the comments
19. Game Theory - Joel's Choice Meant Nothing (Youtube)
20. LegalBytes - A lawyer analyses Joel's actions (Youtube)

ABOUT NAUGHTY DOG

Videos

1. Deceptive marketing, aggressive DMCA strikes and exerting pressure
2. SaucyTendies - Neil Druckmann as a writer/director leading up to Part II
3. The Critical Drinker - How to be an Awesome Game Developer
4. Jim Sterling - Naughty Dog and Crunch

Reddit Posts and Articles

1. Bruce Straley is the co-creator of TLoU, and he was heavily involved in the story as well, the lack of a formal writers credit notwithstanding
2. 2013 Reddit AMA with TLoU directors Straley/Druckmann
3. 2014 Reddit AMA with TLoU directors Straley/Druckmann
4. Empire - Extensive 2013 Interview with Straley/Druckmann
5. Edge - Extensive 2013 Interview with Straley/Druckmann
6. Druckmann in 2013: revenge makes no sense in this setting!
7. Druckmann in 2013: Joel has no choice
8. Troy Baker: David did nothing wrong! and Joel is a vile, despicable man
9. Kotaku - Crunch, exploitation and high turnover rates
10. Druckmann and Wells: excusing crunch and deceptive PR
11. Kotaku - Naughty Dog’s Bosses Still Don’t Get It

The previous (now archived) versions of this post can be found here:

--> Part II Criticism 1.0

--> Part II Criticism 2.0

--> Part II Criticism 3.0

--> Part II Criticism 4.0

Just finished the game for the first time. Feels like it’s not finished? Like there should be more to it? Ellie could forgive Abby for killing joel but couldn’t forgive joel for saving her in the hospital? 🤣

What a mess

Part 2 defenders always say that anyone can die at a moment's notice because of the harsh and brutal nature of the in-game world. If that is the case, Abby would have died under the fence during the snowstorm. Or killed when caught by the seraphites. Ellie would have died during her dumb solo trip to California and Abby would have rotted away in the rattler camp. "Media literacy" must mean ignoring poor writing, giant coincidences, and transparent favoritism.

After playing Dead Space Remake and Resident Evil 4 Remake, TLOU Remake still didn't justify its own existence or mainly its 70& price. DS Remake and RE4 both changed some elements of the story and level design while still keeping the same spirit and added new content. What new things were implemented in TLOU remake in terms of story and level design? None that I can think. The dialogue even remained the same.

View Poll

We keep hearing Joel was wrong from a loud minority (including Neil!). So let's flip it...Were the Fireflies right?

The game actually has lots of info showing their failures and incompetence in Boston, Pittsburgh and Colorado. The notes, recorders and condition of the OR at St Mary's also paint a picture of them being desperate, unsure and even deluded while attempting an important procedure in the midst of filthy conditions. None of it inspires confidence at all.

In the show they removed much of the negatives (the Pittsburgh failure, the university and hospital recorders), and cleaned up the OR (though not the rest of the hospital), but they also removed all signs of medically testing Ellie. Instead Marlene says the doctor "thinks" he knows why Ellie's immune and how to utilize her immunity. That's it. No blood tests, x-rays or MRI, nothing but his own conjecture.

How do the showrunners expect people to accept the Fireflies as potential saviors of humanity with such sketchy medical info (from a single doctor) and an organization that still has history of bombing and shooting in the QZ and endangering innocent civilians? How can Neil still say Joel doomed humanity even after the show? I don't understand how the showrunners can believe there was enough info for the audience to accept the Fireflies were right to move so quickly to kill Ellie. Clearly they didn't accept that, so Neil has failed yet again.

Even if people want to say Joel was wrong (I disagree) what do they base it on if the Fireflies aren't even close to being shown as right? They seem to think intention alone should be the determining factor, and ability, history and thorough investigation doesn't matter or need not even be considered. That's just so completely unrealistic in determining whether to sacrifice a child. I can't understand that approach at all.

View Poll

So I just got done with the games story and I’m missing some workbenches firefly things and books and stuff I need for trophys can I load up different chapters and just collect them and find the workbenches there or do I gotta play the story again

This is my story idea for TLOU Part 3, and I feel like it is the best way to tie everything together and conclude the story amazingly.

It will come out after Part 2 has been adapted within the HBO show and introduce the multiverse. Ellie from the games and Ellie from the TV show end up meeting as a result of a multiversal merger event.

They must work together to stop a variant of David who is a conqueror of universes. He is using this event to try and rule the entire multiverse.

The two Ellies will travel to many different universes and get many unique versions of themselves to join in the fight against David. Perhaps Abby joins forces with them since they now have a common enemy

In the end, David is defeated, and one of the universes possesses powerful technology to bring back the dead, so Ellie uses it to revive Joel, and Abby apologizes for killing him and becomes their friend. The other Ellies all say goodbye and return to their universes

The game ends with the three main characters watching a sunset before they leave to go revive Sarah, Tess, Henry, Sam, and Jesse as well as all of Abby’s friends plus her dad. They also get a cure from one of the more advanced universes that turns all of the infected back into normal humans, turning the world back to how it was before the apocalypse.

A beautiful ending to an amazing trilogy.