I enjoyed it a lot. My primary complaint was that it went on about two hours too long. I wish it had just ended at the farm, but they had to go and tack on that extra bit at the end there and give the game a depressing ending. It felt like a DLC chapter.

The various plot twists and turns were well done. Aside from the annoying film grain you can’t disable, the graphics were top notch. The animation next-level. Ellie’s gameplay sections were acceptable but when the game reached the surprise Abby half of the game the gameplay actually got really good, definitely better than the first.

It took me 30 hours to finish the whole campaign. The game is at least twice as long as the first one which surprised me. But, as I mentioned, I could have done without those last two hours.

I think it’s getting a lot of hate because Druckmann did put in an amount of LGBT and female dominant content that gamers aren’t used to seeing. Both protagonists being female, the lesbian relationship being the center of the story, the surprise FTM trans character appearance. The few important male characters all getting killed. The focus put on pregnancies, a definitive female-only experience.

It was a lot of progressive storytelling for one game and by the time we got to the trans character part I just audibly laughed because it did feel a bit like they were trying too hard to be woke. Ultimately though I didn’t mind, because there’s no reason why women and LGBT people can’t get a game or two that focuses on their stories from time to time. It was nice to get to play a game where my gender and sexual orientation didn’t take a backseat.

I think all the hating was primarily from younger men in their teens to 30’s upset that a game didn’t revolve around them for once. I know guys, it can be threatening when something isn’t all about you. You just got a taste of what we’ve had to experience our whole lives. Women and non-heterosexual characters have always taken a backseat in media, especially video games. We’re used to having to play games or watch movies through your perspective but you clearly aren’t yet used to experiencing media through our perspective.