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UltraVioletLlama's The Last of Us Remastered (PS4)
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| [January 21, 2017 09:30:12 PM]
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The Last Of Us, PS4, Game Log January 21st, 7:35-8:08 (33 minutes)
I fought a few more of Robert’s men and then finally caught him and ended him. The woman tortured him in order to get an answer out of him, and then shot him. They followed a firefly and I assisted in killing some more men before I stopped. This section taught me about being stealthy, in order to save bullets and cause little noise. I would creep up on these men, sometimes by diverting them, and then strangle them or shiv them. Is it unfair for me to do this, by not giving these men a fighting chance and just tricking them? I mentioned this last time, but I really gave it a second thought if it is very ethical to slowly strangle them, hit them with bricks, or another method, rather than ending their misery slowly. Something that the woman did that I wish the player had the choice in was the decision to torture and then kill Robert. This choice could make the game more dynamic and worth contemplation. A common practice seen as usually unethical is the physical torture of someone to get information from them. Should you spare them, kill them, or not even torture him at all? Is the moral framework in the game world say that in these circumstances, or it is simply a “dog eat dog world”? After that, we talked with the supposed queen of the fireflies, and attempted to negotiate a deal for them to help her in breaking the law and smuggling something out of the city. I don’t even know who the fireflies as a player, so should I trust them? Are they the “bad side” or are they simply a side where the government is the aforementioned “bad side”? Why should I help them, for personal gain or gain from them? Is smuggling this item going to be harmful to other people, and do they matter?
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| [January 21, 2017 12:44:56 AM]
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The Last Of Us, PS4, Game Log January 20th, 10:50-11:22 (32 minutes)
This session of game had myself and the woman attempt to find this “Robert” to “deal with him”. We took a bit of a shortcut through secret tunnels to find a market like area, where I eventually killed a few infected and some men working for Robert on the way. A few things had me questioning the ethical implications that the developers were trying to instill on the player. The first thing that could be seen as unethical is the premise of the mission, them using a shortcut that the government has most-likely seen as illegal. Using the principle of legality, the player is forced into doing something bad, even if it is good if they are using it as self-defense. The player also takes the self-defense to another level by killing infected and men along the way to get even with just one person. The men were not being threatening, they were just following orders. If it wasn’t even just to go on this journey, the character’s decision to find Robert through a shortcut could be seen as unethical. In my journey to where Robert supposedly is, I came upon a “spore room”. One man had become infected, and he pleaded me to shoot him. This was quite literally “assisted suicide” in an apocalyptic world. I really didn’t want to be the one to pull the trigger, but the struggling was quite traumatic. The game never taught me how to shoot a gun until this point, so the game was basically treating this infected person as a tutorial, instead of a grave decision. I attempted to see what would happen if I let the man live, but the game made it clear that I was the one to kill him in order to progress. I shot him in the head in the end, and I wasn’t sure if his blood was on my hands or not, because he might’ve not been infected yet. After shooting him, I was thrust into a room full of infected people. I had about a magazine in my gun, so I had enough to finish them all. The game is very careful in not giving the player very much ammo, so the woman I was with encouraged me to sneak up behind the person and strangle them to death. Can these infected still feel, and if they can, should I be taking that into consideration? Is there life worthless because of who they are that their pain is negligent to the situation? Should I opt for shooting them in the head for instant death, slowly strangling them, or should I attempt to avoid them and let them live as they were?
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| [January 19, 2017 08:17:53 PM]
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The Last Of Us, PS4, Game Log January 19th, 5:21-6:07 (46 minutes)
The Last Of Us was recommended to me by my friend back in 2013 by a close friend. He acclaimed the game because of its rich story and almost cinematic direction. I tried to play a few years ago, but now that I have restarted I feel like this is going to be a game that really gets me thinking. I’ve experienced the beginning before, but now that I am a bit older, it got to me. I started with his daughter and I ended just as the fireflies had attacked the soldiers after the title sequence. The first thing that impressed me about the game was that the daughter was being treated like an adult. I’d assume that the father had a strong relationship with her, because they joked about some adult themes. As news of the infection reaches them, they drive past a family in need of desperate help. They do not stop to help them because they feel they have their own problems to deal with. Why is your family’s lives more important than theirs? Is the little amount of trouble to go through in bringing them worth saving their lives? How would you feel if you were with your brother and little girl and someone just drove past you, left for dead? These were questions that I was keeping in the back of my mind as I continued looking at the ravished landscape. The next ethical problem I had with the game was when the brother (I’m sure his name will be ingrained in me the next few times I play) was driving through the street very fast as other citizens were trying to flee the city. It would have only taken seconds to let some people pass, but the brother still put their lives at risk. How are their lives worth more than the lives of the main characters? Later in the playthrough, the brother was killing these infected people willy nilly. He didn’t understand the virus yet, so why should he be shooting at them? What is human? Where is the line between a live worth saving and a life to be killed? The game has been very careful as to not use the term zombie, perhaps to make the player ponder about killing them. This game is much more than a “shoot em’ up” zombie game, and that is made clear from the get-go. As I had mentioned before, I ended the playthrough as they were in the safe zone. Should the father be in contempt with the government because they killed his daughter, or is he in a position where he can’t make a choice? Why are the fireflies being painted as bad, and the government isn’t if they are both killing healthy and infected? Hopefully many of these questions get answered the further I play, but I also hope that some stuff is open-ended so the player can decide what course of action to take. As far as my thoughts on the narrative of the game go, I would say that so far, this has been very emotionally investing to me. I wanted to do all I could to save the girl, even though it was just a cutscene. I assume that as I play I will be making decisions mostly on emotions, instead of logic, but only time will tell as I delve deeper and deeper into this supposed masterpiece.
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UltraVioletLlama's The Last of Us Remastered (PS4)
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Current Status: Playing
GameLog started on: Thursday 19 January, 2017
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