You know, a thought came to me after scrolling through all the memes.
The reactions to this particular game reminds me a lot of Salvador Dali's early films, shock value material that critics absolutely loved to the consternation of the confused public. The Last of Us 2 reminds me a lot of the absurdist movement in avant-garde modernist aesthetic, a Duchamp toilet that is more to enrage traditional thought than encourage art.
I admit I am being closed minded when I say this: unlike movies, books, or pieces of art, I think video games are meant to be 'fun', or, at the very least, emotionally satisfying. Movies and books can afford to have open ended endings and feelings of shock and unhappiness because it's a passive experience. At the risk of sounding entitled, a gamer is trusting a video game with his time, actively interacting with an experience, even losing himself to a game's protagonist to fully immerse himself to the world the developers created. It's a trust that Neil Drukkman eschews entirely for a pretentious message that fails to land.
But who know if Neil's weird fantasies will be celebrated decades down the line? Who's to say my thoughts on video games are valid? Critics have once lampooned Earthbound for being an esoteric JRPG in the West, but it's now a beloved classic. Red Dead Redemption 2 is nothing more than an interactive movie with minimal gameplay, but it's one of the best games of the current generation , And Life is Strange is proof that you can have gay characters and shitty endings.
I don't like TLOU2. I think it's an irresponsible, reckless, sequel that paints an needlessly bleak story where its predecessor gave a satisfying, heartfelt story despite its setting. However, it is not up to me to dictate how video games evolve in the eyes of the public, much less set limitations on the medium to stagnate interactive experiences. This game could very well be the video game equivalent of the modern art toilet years down the line, and I can't stop people from celebrating it if it does happen. I just don't want to be called a transphobe when I express my dissatisfaction with the product.