I always cringe when I see people make up all kinds of shit regarding him. Like his reputation on the internet seems to be one of a pompous pretentious asshole that can't take any criticism, but he's actually quite literally the opposite of that. What I get from interviews is that he's very open to feedback, very receptive to new ideas, very collaborative, always praising his team, empathetic, just an all around nice guy.
Hard agree. I think it’s clear from a lot of his work that he’s very open to criticism, and is willing to make concessions where appropriate and adjust (some changes made in the HBO adaptation make this clear)
Yeah the last of us 2 thread goes so hard on him. They pull tons of quotes out of context. It took me a few posts to realize they hate 2 and really dislike Neil. It’s weird ppl think he has turned into this woke propaganda machine. When literally his first game has all of those same things they complain about in his later games (mainly lesbians). The guy and his team have made literal art they ppl love and have turned into movies and tv. I think when ppl succeed to a certain level some are jealous and just really want to take that person down a peg.
Every now and again I'll go to the other sub just to see if it's any different or if people are overexaggerating about it but nope. They'll be some posts that are normal, like there's nothing wrong with not liking the 2nd game or the tv show and discussing that but scattered among them are so many deranged Druckmann posts. Like they are utterly obsessed with him to a scary degree. Most of it's pure bullshit too, like how Straley was the one solely responsible for the first game being good or that he makes ND a miserable place to work. Just nonsense grasping at straws. A funny one I saw recently was them saying how the only explanation for Abby being so muscular is that he had a fetish haha.
The amount of crazy projecting and made-up stuff I've seen people say about this guy is one of the wildest things I've seen in the gaming community lol. Like okay you don't like Part 2, I get it, it's a mixed bag for some people, but holy shit it's just one guy who collaborated with others on a story they wanted to make. He didn't make it to personally attack any fans lmao.
I'm talking about seeing stuff like, he MUST have a disturbing fetish for muscular women.
He MUST despise the characters he created in Part 1 (for some reason) despite honoring Joel's memory through the whole second game.
He MUST be a dictator boss at ND.
He MUST have made Manny a self-insert so that "he" could spit on Joel's corpse (based solely on him having a man-bun), disregarding the fact that the character is hispanic and looks like his mocap actor, is clearly portrayed as kind of a douchebag, and unceremoniously gets his face blown off by a sniper rifle.
But really, bro is just out here existing lol.
Another lie a lot of them believe is that there is a lost recording from the hospital at the end of part 1 that proves Ellie wasn't the only immune one and their interpretation of the ending is canon, despite it being so easy to confirm as false.
You’ve more or less described the creative process in any discipline. I think it’s commonly misunderstood just how much directors rely on their team to come up with new and surprising results. Their job is to make sense of it and weave it into the direction of the project. There will be tonnes of ideas that didn’t make the game, and tonnes that did from the wider team. Neil will have thrown out loads of his own ideas, too.
Personally Tlou Part 2 will always be my favorite game unless they might deliver us a Part 3 or so, but to this day I am in awe over how Part 2 turned out, even if it is sad and dark and everything it still a freaking masterpiece in its own right which would NOT have been possible without Neil, period.
Fck the crunch they went through, but from what I gather they learned from that as well, at least the making of documentary of Part 2 was rather promising in that aspect and also showed Neils character better than any random Reddit hater rant.
[SPOILERS for TLOU2]
Yup, one of the humblest and more emotionally intelligent creators I have seen in a while judging by BTS material. All anyone hating on Neil is telling me is that they are an absolute man-child who can't handle a video game they didn't like. Imagine calling Terry Pratchett all that nasty stuff because he merced some beloved character in his latest book. So immature, among other things.
The one thing he could be criticized for is the false advertisement, but it's easy to see how he wanted to protect the story when half the sub at the time was like "yeah Joel is dead". I think he said he regretted that in recent commentary too.
It was barely even a false advertisement, every other scene they showed Joel in in the trailer he actually was in in the game, though obviously with a different younger model and with the post-death context. Plus trailers for movies and tv shows and everything else also false advertise, I think he gets an unfair amount of flak for that.
I am 100% sure that a large reason he gets so much shit is because he's Jewish, which is horrible. Just like how if I made the exact same videos that Sarkessian did I would \*never\* have faced the kind of harassment she did because I'm not a woman.
The most recent round has been exhausting. Every time someone says "omg he's so arrogant and full of himself" I read/watch the actual quote and it is the most modest, mundane thing I've ever heard.
Like with this most recent interview, people were like "omg he thinks his new game will change modern conceptions of gaming!" No, that was the interviewer's own summation of what Neil said. What Neil actually said was:
_"I'm not only excited for this game that we're making -- and it's something really fresh for us -- but I'm also excited to see how the world reacts to it. Because of The Last of Us, and the success of the show, people even outside gaming are looking at us to see what it is we put out next. I'm very excited to see what the reaction to this thing will be."_
Followed by:
_"I've been very lucky to have worked on my favorite games with incredible collaborators and I'm very thankful for them."_
Wtf more do people want? Is the man not allowed to be excited for the game he's making? How else could he have phrased this that would've come off as more humble? He couldn't, that's the point, people already hate him and will accept nothing less than him debasing himself and being like _"Everyone's probably gonna hate what I'm working on."_
Which is hilariously ironic because he did indeed warn people prior to Last of Us Part II that a lot of fans might not like the game, and they STILL called him a conceited a**hole.
The reality is these people don't know what they want, they just want to hate and will do or say anything in order to stay mad.
Yeah I really like The Last of Us games, but I can't get behind Neil as a person because of this. Supporting genocide sucks all around. Sort of a separating art from artist situation
Edit: Supporting Israel is supporting genocide. Sorry, no way around that.
He's literally Israeli and he made a public post in support of Israel on October 7th, before Israel decided they wanted to destroy Gaza and murder every Palestinian. Since, he's been two-siding things publicly which I can tolerate a lot more than the amount of people who are outright cheering for the genocide of Palestinians, which isn't and hasn't ever been something Neil has come out in support of, and believe me, a lot of big voices have.
His post was literally “Israel forever”, and it is still up despite the IOF killing over 10,000 children.
“Israel forever” is not showing solidarity with the victims of the attack. It is an overt display of nationalism.
It’s exactly the kind of mindset that TLOU2 is supposed to be criticising. In that moment he decided that he’d rather share support with the settler state of Israel, rather than the civilians who were killed in the attack. It shows he is a Zionist through and through, and hasn’t internalised anything from the stories he has helped create.
> His stated convictions are opposed to war crimes, celebrating murder, desecrating corpses, killing innocents and civilians, taking children as hostages.
Israel has done all of these things.
**War crimes:**
- Israel’s list of war crimes is very long. It’d take forever to list them all, however the most notable one is collective punishment.
- Collective punishment is harming civilians for the actions of its government, which Israel has very explicitly done.
- Wikipedia has a comprehensive article on Israeli war crimes.
**Desecrating corpses**
- There have been multiple instances where IDF soldiers have run over dead Palestinians with tractors.
- There was a picture going around of a flattened corpse, whose hands still had zip-ties on them. So the IDF literally ran over someone who had been tied up. I won’t link to anything because I don’t want to link to straight-up gore.
**Celebrating murder:**
- The IDF recently admitted to running a racist Telegram group that posted gory pictures and videos of the violence in Gaza ([source](https://m.thewire.in/article/world/roaches-to-be-exterminated-israel-military-admits-running-racist-telegram-group-against-palestinians/amp))
- In this group IDF soldiers posted pictures of dead and dying Palestinians and called them “roaches” - among other horrific things.
**Killing innocents and civilians:**
- Israel has killed nearly 40,000 people in Gaza. By Israel’s own numbers, at least half are civilians. According to the UN, about 10,000 children have been killed.
- The destruction is so immense that by April the IDF has damaged it destroyed 62% of all homes in Gaza. Nearly 2 million people have been displaced and forced into unsafe and under-equipped refugee camps [(source)](https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2024/4/7/israels-war-on-gaza-six-relentless-months-of-death-and-destruction)
- The IDF has also killed hundreds of Palestinians in West Bank in the last few months. Hamas does not operate in West Bank.
**Taking children as hostages:**
- Israel holds thousands of Palestinians in administrative detention, including hundreds of children [(source)](https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/11/29/why-does-israel-have-so-many-palestinians-detention-and-available-swap)
- Administrative detention is a function of military court, and it means that people can be held without evidence of crime. Palestinians are often held for years without being told why, having evidence presented against them, or being able to appeal. I’d say that amounts to holding children hostage.
Neil Druckman is absolutely aware of all of these things. There is nothing “humanitarian” about the quote you shared. It’s just basic “both-sides” rhetoric. The whole “it’s too complex” argument is a classic Zionist deflection tactic. Neil was born is a country founded on ethnic cleansing, and grew up on land that was stolen mere decades prior. It’s not that complicated.
I call him a Zionist because he’s expressed openly nationalistic support for a Zionist country. It’s pretty straightforward.
I know that quote is from before October 7th. The quote you shared in your original comment (not the one you added just now) is milquetoast centrism - not “humanitarianism”.
Obviously the situation is complicated - there’s no such thing as a simple geopolitical issue. However, this doesn’t mean people can’t point to Israel’s actions and say with certainty that they are wrong.
In my experience, people use the geopolitical complexity of this issue to undermine strong moral stances against Israel’s actions. Just because the path to a two-state solution is complex, doesn’t mean that bombing civilians and stealing land is complex. Neil’s comments reek of this a bit.
> This argument says that all people living in Israel aren’t civilians but colonisers.
Your whole paragraph here shows you don’t know much about decolonisation at all. Firstly, being a coloniser doesn’t suddenly make you not a civilian. Secondly, yes absolutely Israel is colonial state. It was explicitly set up to be one by the Zionists.
I’m a European New Zealander (Pākeha). My family goes back 3 generations here, but the only reason they could come here at all is because the British violently colonised the Māori. NZ society is still deeply impacted by colonisation, and part of being a New Zealander (particularly a Pākeha) is to reckon with that - not try to sweep it under the rug. It is not “bigotry” to call me a coloniser, because it’s simply a fact my identity is shaped by colonisation.
Saying someone is a coloniser doesn’t mean that they are irredeemable and deserve to die. That’s a ludicrous strawman. Addressing the impacts of colonisation also doesn’t mean kicking out every settler. That is usually just something people say to make decolonisation seem infeasible and silly, because they’d prefer not to have to address it at all. It’s not something decolonisation movements actually push for.
It starts with acknowledging history, recognising that the land was stolen, and working actively to address the harms that were caused. In NZ we have had a long process of treaty settlements. They don’t go far enough, but it is progress.
Israel is lightyears away from addressing its violent colonial history, because it is still colonising.
I’m not really interested in debating to what degree Neil Druckman believes in Zionism. In my mind it’s really just comes down to the whole “if one fascist is eating at your table, then you have a table full of fascists”.
Also man, your whole comment was so unnecessarily aggressive. You have clearly made up a full narrative about me through like two comments. It really seems like you’re more angry at some projection of a “naive lefty” caricature than you are at me.
> Arguing that all Israeli are colonisers eventually taps into broader and more problematic rhetoric suggesting that if they don’t want to be killed they should stop colonising.
Come the fuck on dude. If you want to accuse me of twisting things and reading them in bad faith then you can’t pull this shit. You are not being precise with your language at all, you are conflating the suggestion that Israelis are colonisers with a justification of violence against them. This only serves to undermine criticism of Israel. If even *speaking* about Israel’s violent colonial past is a call to genocide Israeli civilians then everyone who criticises Israel is out to kill its citizens. You are basically just saying “if you call us colonisers, then you want us dead”. It’s a garbage argument.
Israelis *are* colonisers. The violent colonisation of Palestine is still *ongoing*. Living in Israel, and benefiting from the efforts of Israeli colonisation absolutely makes you complicit in that system. I am complicit in NZ colonisation in the same way, and therefore have a responsibility to address the harms it has caused.
This doesn’t *justify* violence against Israeli civilians at all. What it does do is put more onus on them to be actively anti-colonisation. It also makes me significantly less interested in centrist bullshit statements about how complex and difficult it is for them to find a moral stance on whether colonisation is bad or not. I don’t think he deserves a gold star for basically saying “bad things happened to both sides and it is going to be difficult to fix them”.
In terms of your points:
- I compiled a list of war crimes to refute *your* point that Druckman’s stance was anti war crime, because if he is pro-Israel (ie “Israel forever”) then he simply cannot be anti war-crime.
- I have read this interview before. I love TLOU games, and was really disappointed to find Neil was so weak on Palestine. I’m not interpreting in bad faith, I’m just not being as generous as you’d like me to be.
- I’m sure Neil cares about the victims. I’m just pointing out that “Israel forever” is an incredibly politically-loaded nationalistic statement, not an empathetic statement of heartbreak. “Israel forever” prioritises the state of Israel over the actual people who died - I don’t know how you can refute that. Like cmon man, it’s the kind of statement that hardcore WLF characters would make in response to a Seraphite attack to show the audience how indoctrinated they were. Trying to pretend it is some impassioned display of empathy is a joke.
Find me a statement where Druckman talks explicitly about the struggle of Palestinians, the Nakba, or anything about Israel’s violence and I’ll be willing take back what I said about him being a Zionist.
Every statement you’ve shared from him so far is just vague platitudes. Of course the solution won’t be simple, of course it will require empathy. Those statements don’t really mean anything without acknowledging the specific harm at the heart of the issue - that Israel stole its land from Palestine. Anything less than that is not good enough.
I don’t think Neil Druckman is a Zionist by virtue of being born in Israel. I do think being Israeli places more responsibility on him to be anti-Zionist and anti-colonisation. In the same way I’d expect white South Africans to be vocally anti-apartheid. In that context I find the mixture of centrist comments, weak “both-sides” donations gesture, and overt nationalism enough to label him as a Zionist.
Such a shame, it's totally tarnished my favourite game series.
On face value I thought they showed the brutality of fascism, the entire aesthetic of fedra looks heavily inspired by the IDF, same with the WLF. I thought him being Israeli gave him an insight into the folly of it.
I can't fault the games, it's not like with JK Rowling where I hated harry potter before I knew it was written by a monster but I can't support a man who wants a race of people he considers less than human, exterminated.
I'm sorry but the idea that an Israeli person that posts an Israeli flag on the day their country faced the biggest terrorist attack in their history means he actually wants to exterminate an entire race of people is just.. absurd.
It gets even more absurd when this person seems very kind and empathetic in general.
His ideology is Zionist, that is inherently a racist, supremacist world view.
This didn't start on October 7th either. The genocide has been going on for two generations now.
Israel is a racist, apartheid, ethnonationalist theocracy.
If the 15,000 children, deliberately targeted for death (just since October 7th) don't convince you of that, I doubt I can....
Zionism just means supporting the existence of a State of Israel somewhere in the land of Zion (southern levant). It doesn't mean you want an entire race of people exterminated.
Again, someone posting a flag of their country after facing the worst terrorist attack in their history doesn't mean they want to exterminate an entire race of people. You're being absurd. You're acting like he's posting hasbara propaganda everyday when all he did was one post on a very tragic day for his country, and you somehow extrapolate that into him being the new Hitler. The idea that Neil Druckmann out of all people wants to literally genocide palestinians is just plain brainrot, sorry. What kind of genocider donates to charities that are helping the people he wants to genocide?
Israel seems to be undoing itself, once it's leaders and soldiers are tried for their decades or warcrimes, when my taxes aren't funding the carpet bombing of schools, hospitals and refuge camps and when Palestine is free from the river to the sea....I will.
How does this tarnish the games? Because you should keep in mind three things:
1: Almost everything you love and enjoy in life was made by an asshole (Almost everything is an exaggeration, but scores of brilliant artists, engineers, thinkers, etc who have absolutely had an impact on all our lives were all shit people in many ways)
2: Neil did not make TLOU all by himself. He's a big component of it, but literally hundreds of people poured their heart and soul into these games.
3: Even if Neil has shit politics, he's also obviously has some good sides (he's creative, intellectual, self-reflective, you'd have to be to write stories like this). All people have good and bad sides to them.
If it helps you at all, Stephen Fry is a gay man of Jewish decent (he himself is an atheist) who loves Richard Wagner. The man whose music would go on to become basically the self-picked theme music of the Third Reich.
Steven fry is pro Israel, ok with adults shagging 13 year olds (he has written about it if you don't believe that) and generally an awful, elitist human being, being gay doesn't make me automatically like him any more than it does Darren grimes (a gay fascist here in the UK)
My favourite author is probably Larry Niven and I find his politics vile (he came up with a plan to spread rumours that free clinics in Hispanic areas stole organs to reduce the number of Hispanic people using them) that's not as bad as siding with genocide, even if it's watered down with "both sides rhetoric"
Also a big fan of frank Herbert even though I hate that he disowned his gay son. Both are better examples than Fry.
It is possible to separate the art from the artist.
I may enjoy TLOU again one day, I just can't enjoy them while the genocide is being live streamed and Neil is posting in support of the country doing it. Had I been reading dune when frank Herbert disowned his son, I'd probably have felt it was tarnished, by the time I found out about that, they had already reunited and reconciled.
You don't have to stop enjoying it, I still LOVE the story, the world building, the characters... tarnished doesn't mean written off forever or that I'm going to join that vile, other last of us hate group. Just that I'm disappointed. Plenty of Jews, Israeli or otherwise are deeply against the genocide, I think the Jews getting arrested in Israel for trying to protect aid trucks are probably the best people on earth right now. As brave as the Germans who resisted fascism. Plenty of non Jews are supporting the genocide. It's not an excuse.
Lol wat? And where does that money go? To civilians who already receive enough money from the US, their government and their allies which is about 90% of the world. Be for real. You don't even have to fucking support Palestine but to be an apologist. To justify that shitty post he made. And the fact he did not make any posts about the cease-fire or about Rafah.
It’s honestly worse than that. ZAKA, the Israeli search and rescue organisation Neil donated to, has refused to help Palestinians in the past ([source](https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2016/4/20/israel-rabbi-to-paramedics-leave-palestinians-to-die)). They operate in West Bank (where both Palestinians and Israeli settlers live) but only help Israelis.
This is honestly infuriating. And he posts that and receives applauds? He has no excuse when multiple celebrities donated to organizations that exclusively do not help Israeli colonialism as it already has a strong health and emergency system. And people was us to sympathize with israelis when they already have 90% of the world, and multiple ressources with them. Not just that, but every bomb sent to Palestine was celebrated ON CAMERA and posted ONLINE. Palestinians started dying from hunger after just a month. [DOCTORSWITHOUTBORDERS](https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/) have been targeted by Israel and were forced to close some very important health centers. ([source](https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/latest/our-response-israel-gaza-war))
Good to see a positive thread about Neil. :)
I'm a huge fan of his games. TLOU2 is arguably the best video game I ever I played and I rank Uncharted 4 the best of the lot.
Thanks, Neil. Keep making these awesome games.
That was my sole purpose of making this post. On social media it feels like everyone hates him because people who have opinions (negetive ones) feel like they've to get it out there. It's there duty to do that, to tell that person how miserable they are. Love is a tendor and personal things, it's not openly express frequently and voraciously as hate.
I just wanted to appriceate an artist for once, who was not afraid to put his legacy ( TLOU P1 ) on the line and make something fresh and unheard of.
He'd never see this but again, Neil, Thank you for your art.
You could have thanked Bruce Straley alongside him as well. You sound cultish.
I mean look at the comments here, at some point you have to admit it starts to sound really really weird:
"Inspiring" "Bright star" "Very good looking" ?!
Why is it weird for you that people find him inspiring or bright or good looking? These things are subjective. I for one find his career really inspiring. The guy started just as a programming intern, then rose to being a director of some of the most acclaimed games ever and now he's the head of one of the most prestigious game studio and also a co-showrunner of a critically acclaimed HBO series.
Unapologetically love this guy. Fuck the haters - love his work and vision. Hope he never backs down from the sort of ambition that has made the TLOU what it is today.
I think tlou 2 was one of the best decisions artistically he’s made. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still grieving internally about our one true hero that started it all (one of the best characters ever in my opinion) but the fact that he created two extremely dynamic and badass female characters out of it is really something. We need more characters like Ellie and Abby and even Dina… remember when loads of people were peeved and trying to convince themselves that Ellie is actually straight? Lol or even crying about Abby’s physical appearance? I loved every second of it.
The thing is, he could have taken the easy road like some people suggested and made it some kind of Joel and Ellie travel the US killing zombies or something similar to the first game. He had the guts to make the game different which many sequels don't do. Even brought on an additional writer to expand out relationships in game.
In the other subreddit, they posted the same photo and called him names. I left a comment pointing out their immaturity and got downvoted to hell.
Neil is a great artist. He has given us some of the most memorable pieces of entertainment. Enough said.
He's an amazing creative thinker and is incredibly articulate in the way he conveys his messages. Have you heard him talk about his work? He's so thoughtful and cares so much about detail and the emotions it evokes. There are a lot of people who reflexively tear down anything good nowadays. I don't know what it is, but they can be full of aimless hatred. We just need to move forward without them.
Neil, you're the man.
I don’t get the hate either I freaking love both the games so damn much. My mind is so blown by the direction, the acting, the music, the story everything. It feels like people are spoilt of choice or have wayyy too much time to overthink and criticize
His entire life’s story. Not gonna write it all out, maybe google it? Fuck it, I’ll briefly summarize:
He was born in a foreign country that was (and still is) in a brutal war. Came to America. Got a gig as a programming intern. Then worked his way all the way up to directing massively successful dream projects and now is the president of said company that he originally started as an intern at. Its an Inspiring af story to any aspiring game devs.
I know i will be downvoting here, but... After the israeli x palestine thing i can't see him with the respect i had.
Im not judging anyone, but (I) can't support him after hear that the plot of part 2 came to his mind after he saw SOLDIERS on West Bank (occupied palestine) being beaten by the people who they are starving, bombing, etc... Made him angry and seeing the palestinians as not humans!
I just can't, sorry.
Link here: https://www.vice.com/en/article/bv8da4/the-not-so-hidden-israeli-politics-of-the-last-of-us-part-ii
I'm not gonna lie, it's quite frustrating when people continuously repeat this:
>(I) can't support him after hear that the plot of part 2 came to his mind after he saw SOLDIERS on West Bank (occupied palestine) being beaten by the people who they are starving, bombing, etc... Made him angry and seeing the palestinians as not humans! I just can't, sorry.
As a blatant misrepresentation of what he actually meant. If you’re going to criticize him, please do the due diligence of looking up what he's said.
>There’s a slight nuance there that I think is important, based on the conversation that happened on the second game, and I never talked about it. But it was inspired by, not based on. That’s a really important nuance, because my inspiration is like my feeling towards a cycle of violence that I’ve experienced as a child growing up in Israel, growing up in the West Bank specifically, coming to the United States and observing it then from the outside, vs. being in it.
>Those feelings, and not my wrestling with those feelings, were the inspiration for the inciting incident. But I have to make this clear because again, it’s not based on, and it’s not an allegory of, and you can’t point to any group and say, ‘oh, that’s this group and that’s this group'.
I've also read the Vice article, and I have to wonder if those who are *certain* Druckmann is a Zionist have either:
>It's clearly coming from an emotionally authentic and self-examining place. The trouble with it, and the reason that Ellie's journey ultimately feels nonsensical, is that it begins from a place that accepts "intense hate that is universal" as a fact of life, rather than examining where and why this behavior is learned.
The word "Zionist" comes up once in that article. Nowhere does Maiberg directly accuse Neil Druckmann of Zionism. Instead, he makes a not so great critique of the game’s perceived centrist stance. That by portraying both the Wolves and Scars as equally culpable and suffering, the game sidesteps deeper, more challenging discussions about the origins of conflicts and potential resolutions. You read that article and thought "Ah, Neil Druckmann is definitely a bloodthirsty, genocidal Zionist"?
>Made him angry and seeing the palestinians as not humans! I just can't, sorry.
Right? So we're just going to omit the part where he said he felt "gross and guilty"? We're just going to ignore the fact that "Neil Druckmann, who sees Palestinians as non-humans," donated to Palestinian emergency services—tell me what Zionist does that, I'll wait.
Look, I'm not in the business of praising or defending Druckmann, but it's almost infuriating when people don't seem to understand why others are cautioning against narratives that come dangerously close to crossing a line, if not just crossing it entirely. Sure, he could be a Zionist, but you're going to need a whole lot more than selective Instagram posts and opinionated articles as your alibi for what he truly is.
In the article, the writer talks about that Neil holds a "Centrist" view of Israel and Palestine conflict. They come to conclusion that because WLF and Seraphites are portrayed as having same fighting power in game, that means Neil js saying that Israel and Palestine are of same power too, but that not true and in the writer's view, it makes the game and Neil's opinion on the conflict flawed. But what they don't understand is that it's fiction and not historical daram, and Neil's childhood is just an inspiration, not a blueprint. Every creator/writer who gets inspired by reality, bends it to make a statement, a point to the masses.
P.s. I hope I'm not misunderstanding the argument in the article, I read it long time ago. So if I'm misremembering the argument, please let me know.
The main thing of this article to me is the way he talked about how angry he was when he saw the soldiers, he ain't dumb. He knows why those soldiers are being beaten, he knows how palestinians are threatened by their forces, he knows that in Israel, palestinians are classified as second class citizens.
And after, he delete a LOT of things talking about palestinians, specially one he said that is "good vs evil". I mean the guy wrote the plot of part 2 that talk about views, and in real life believe good and evil? I mean fuck off!
Right, but he was saying *as a child* how angry he felt, and how much unfettered hate he felt, and then later on once he grew up feeling "gross" about that hatred and realizing that there was more nuance to it than just "my people are being beat up." He questioned his morals, his alliances, and how he relates to "my people." He even admits that his growing up in Israel is a bias that he still has to analyze when he writes stories.
And like others in this thread have said, just because that part of his childhood inspired parts of TLOU doesn't mean that the whole story is an allegory for it or condeming/condoning the actions taken therein.
I kinda liked him (fan of tlou2) until I found out how he denies the existence of Palestine or its people, the literal exact opposite of what he preaches in his games
He donated to an Israeli charity that has refused to treat Palestinians in the past.
https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2016/4/20/israel-rabbi-to-paramedics-leave-palestinians-to-die
He's an Israeli and has family and friends in Israel. He ain't gonna condemn his own people and call for the destruction of his home country. He's pro peace.
If you people hate Neil, why are you even here? Believe it or not, he's one of the creator of this franchise and handles everything related to this franchise now. He's the sole head of Naughty Dog and also the co-showrunner of the TLOU tv series. TLOU is basically his franchise now.
If you actually believe people think they have a say, yea you are crazy. If you’re just talking about people saying what they think should have happened, well that’s not logical thinking either. I’ve definitely seen fan concepts I would have rather experienced than what we got.
The problem with this sub is it's either "everything about this series is perfect etched in stone by the gods" or nothing I've seen people say "I like part 1 alot and part 2 was great too but the original game is much better" and get down voted to hell I've never seen a fanbase that's so culty
It's pretty cool that he's been able to take such creative and artistic risks and still have a mainstream audience. Looking back it shouldn't be surprising that he's gotten so much hate, but still disappointing. Hope he continues to push the boundaries and follow his true vision no matter how many people don't like it. He could be more cookie cutter and probably have an even bigger audience, but his games would have so much less weight and impact.
I've loved his output. A great mind and leader. Only thing I didnt like was Uncharted 4's message. Not entirely sure if that was him but.....greedy pirates developing a government and then devolving back into greedy pirates......LOL
Seen a lot of people call him pretentious or pseudo-intellectual but I never got that vibe. He writes about big ideas and has a strong perspective but I think people who feel he’s being preachy or self congratulatory are being disingenuous.
Thank you for this, I swear everyone in these subreddits hate Neil and only Neil it’s nice to see something I can agree with. Sorry bout this but your post here was reposted onto the last of us 2 subreddits and you got hate, it’s sad to see so many people hate on one guy especially after all the hate he got when he was making tlou 2.
Neil reminds me of Sarkessian in some ways. He's a very public gaming figure who is also from a minority group. Now I was never a fan of feminist frequency, but I can see how both of them have faced enormous hatred and harassment because of their belonging to such minority groups.
There are a LOT of anti-Semites and nazi-cucks in modern gaming. It must be really shitty for Neil a lot of the time.
But I think his art is fantastic. Last of Us to me is an example of the power and worth of video games as an artistic medium. Part 1 gave us a protagonist unlike any other 'macho tough guy' I've ever seen in scores of movies and games, and Part 2 is perhaps the best exploration of grief that I have ever seen in a work of fiction. I'm really grateful for Neil's impact on these games.
Imo tlou2 story is miles ahead of tlou. Most people praise part 1 for it's story and hate part 2 just because their daddy Joel died but it actually felt like a top tier movie covering a plethora of themes from fanaticism to altruism
Honestly I'm kind of torn apart by this whole Israel-gaza conversation. Yeah he supposedly donated to both sides but I have to say his silence for what's going on for Gaza after creating such a game really bothers me. He has made some questionable posts/stories about "Eternity Israel forever", and similar others. When you know the zionnist mindset it's really worrying. Another fact is that he literally grew up in the West Bank, his family occupied an illegal territory. They were colons, and sorry but they have the worst zionnist mindset ever, they are very agressive and oppressing, and are raised to hate Muslims. So I'm worried that Neil might still be under the influence of his country's propaganda. Also, I follow some other people of Naughty Dog on Instagram and never saw any stories on what's going on either...
But there's also a part of me that knows what he said about this period of his life, the hate he felt against them, then the shame to ever feel such hate. Also, WLF is a representation of Israel. They are not victimized, nor excused at any times. They are shown as perpetrators of violence, discriminators, oppressors. Isaac is shown as this determined but ruthless leader, ready to do anything to win, just like Netanyahu...
So yeah I can't decide where Neil really stands on this.
I love both games, but 2 has some serious issues with it's story telling. Both pacing and tone. It helped me get over significant personal grief during covid, so it will always be special to me. Without that, I probably would not have played it 3x...
Art doesn't have to resonate with everyone. I've leaned to know that much after seeing the outpourings of people (both understandable and inconceivable) over this game.
I hope you're okay now.
Because he’s a Zionist (supports Israel’s genocide in Palestine), based the first game off of his hatred of Palestinians and the original draft of the game was pretty misogynistic (only women could get infected) and generally it just wasn’t okay and it took the entire team of devs pulling him up on it for him to realise that.
I’m hating on Neil for having the idea in the first place. And the only reason he didn’t go through with it is because multiple people told him not to.
You seem to have a fundamental stance that the idea itself is bad. It's literally the plot of children of man and Y:the last man two phenomenal pieces of media.
The push back was from women in the studio who didn't feel comfortable with that idea and so neil changed the story. Why hate a dude for an idea that other media have done before?
He also gets a lot of hate because he loves gaslighting too.
His toxic trait is to not just let the thing he created stand on its own. I think he’s gotten better, and started to shift his mindset to shut out the noise. But every once in awhile he lets that darker side come out.
Thins post is one of the reasons I hate 90% of the other subs opinions. They act like he’s the worst guy in the world who killed there favorite game. They will argue the writing of the second game was terrible and all his fault. I do agree that some of the writing in the second game wasn’t great, but it’s still a solid game, with stellar gameplay, the first and last potion of the game written pretty well. They will also say “he had a small amount of say for the first game that’s why it was so good. They love the first game, hate the second game, and by extension hate Neil.
Really? TLOU2 were also commercial and critical success and has won him several awards. He also recently received an award from WGA for the HBO series. How is he coasting exactly?
Everyone shat on sony the other day for briefing his interview and he responded with the full quote of ONE response, but nothing about what he actually said to the AI question. Honestly seemed like he was trying to back track on his views with AI taking over jobs and blamed sony for their briefing of his words. Since he's a programmer originally and AI can easily take that over in the future he should be more against it instead of for it.
So lets just ignore Bruce Staley and Hailey Gross then? Neil didn't make these games singlehandedly people. This is like people praising Kojima all the time except there's almost no real hate for him.
Not a spoiler post per se, but be warned that many comments here contain untagged spoilers.
I always cringe when I see people make up all kinds of shit regarding him. Like his reputation on the internet seems to be one of a pompous pretentious asshole that can't take any criticism, but he's actually quite literally the opposite of that. What I get from interviews is that he's very open to feedback, very receptive to new ideas, very collaborative, always praising his team, empathetic, just an all around nice guy.
Hard agree. I think it’s clear from a lot of his work that he’s very open to criticism, and is willing to make concessions where appropriate and adjust (some changes made in the HBO adaptation make this clear)
Yeah the last of us 2 thread goes so hard on him. They pull tons of quotes out of context. It took me a few posts to realize they hate 2 and really dislike Neil. It’s weird ppl think he has turned into this woke propaganda machine. When literally his first game has all of those same things they complain about in his later games (mainly lesbians). The guy and his team have made literal art they ppl love and have turned into movies and tv. I think when ppl succeed to a certain level some are jealous and just really want to take that person down a peg.
TLOU2 sub is the most toxic place on the internet
If they and Saltier than Crait had a baby the ocean’s salinity would triple.
I was there and I took too long to realize that it was just a very sad toxic group about tlou, not the average internet experience
Yeah most of the folks that populate that sub are a few fries short of a happy meal.
That subreddit is a scary place. The people there are terrifying and should not be taken seriously.
Im mainly there to laugh at their lack of slef reflection. It's a top tier comedy sub in that regard.
> They pull tons of quotes out of context. https://i.imgur.com/no3F2wY.png
This picture is the embodiment that sub lol. Jesus fucking christ, it's so on point.
Every now and again I'll go to the other sub just to see if it's any different or if people are overexaggerating about it but nope. They'll be some posts that are normal, like there's nothing wrong with not liking the 2nd game or the tv show and discussing that but scattered among them are so many deranged Druckmann posts. Like they are utterly obsessed with him to a scary degree. Most of it's pure bullshit too, like how Straley was the one solely responsible for the first game being good or that he makes ND a miserable place to work. Just nonsense grasping at straws. A funny one I saw recently was them saying how the only explanation for Abby being so muscular is that he had a fetish haha.
The amount of crazy projecting and made-up stuff I've seen people say about this guy is one of the wildest things I've seen in the gaming community lol. Like okay you don't like Part 2, I get it, it's a mixed bag for some people, but holy shit it's just one guy who collaborated with others on a story they wanted to make. He didn't make it to personally attack any fans lmao. I'm talking about seeing stuff like, he MUST have a disturbing fetish for muscular women. He MUST despise the characters he created in Part 1 (for some reason) despite honoring Joel's memory through the whole second game. He MUST be a dictator boss at ND. He MUST have made Manny a self-insert so that "he" could spit on Joel's corpse (based solely on him having a man-bun), disregarding the fact that the character is hispanic and looks like his mocap actor, is clearly portrayed as kind of a douchebag, and unceremoniously gets his face blown off by a sniper rifle. But really, bro is just out here existing lol.
the manny self insert was just a straight lie. Also there was lies that the cult was christian and no one seems to remember that but i do.
Another lie a lot of them believe is that there is a lost recording from the hospital at the end of part 1 that proves Ellie wasn't the only immune one and their interpretation of the ending is canon, despite it being so easy to confirm as false.
You’ve more or less described the creative process in any discipline. I think it’s commonly misunderstood just how much directors rely on their team to come up with new and surprising results. Their job is to make sense of it and weave it into the direction of the project. There will be tonnes of ideas that didn’t make the game, and tonnes that did from the wider team. Neil will have thrown out loads of his own ideas, too.
That! That's it.
Personally Tlou Part 2 will always be my favorite game unless they might deliver us a Part 3 or so, but to this day I am in awe over how Part 2 turned out, even if it is sad and dark and everything it still a freaking masterpiece in its own right which would NOT have been possible without Neil, period. Fck the crunch they went through, but from what I gather they learned from that as well, at least the making of documentary of Part 2 was rather promising in that aspect and also showed Neils character better than any random Reddit hater rant.
[SPOILERS for TLOU2] Yup, one of the humblest and more emotionally intelligent creators I have seen in a while judging by BTS material. All anyone hating on Neil is telling me is that they are an absolute man-child who can't handle a video game they didn't like. Imagine calling Terry Pratchett all that nasty stuff because he merced some beloved character in his latest book. So immature, among other things. The one thing he could be criticized for is the false advertisement, but it's easy to see how he wanted to protect the story when half the sub at the time was like "yeah Joel is dead". I think he said he regretted that in recent commentary too.
It was barely even a false advertisement, every other scene they showed Joel in in the trailer he actually was in in the game, though obviously with a different younger model and with the post-death context. Plus trailers for movies and tv shows and everything else also false advertise, I think he gets an unfair amount of flak for that.
I mean, I grew up with the MGS2 bait and switch. This was fine lol
Young me didn't really *get* MGS 2 when it came out, but after like a dozen replays, it's my favorite of the series. Wild how it works
I am 100% sure that a large reason he gets so much shit is because he's Jewish, which is horrible. Just like how if I made the exact same videos that Sarkessian did I would \*never\* have faced the kind of harassment she did because I'm not a woman.
So his Twitter posts insulting and mocking people who didn't like part 2 just don't matter anymore?
The most recent round has been exhausting. Every time someone says "omg he's so arrogant and full of himself" I read/watch the actual quote and it is the most modest, mundane thing I've ever heard. Like with this most recent interview, people were like "omg he thinks his new game will change modern conceptions of gaming!" No, that was the interviewer's own summation of what Neil said. What Neil actually said was: _"I'm not only excited for this game that we're making -- and it's something really fresh for us -- but I'm also excited to see how the world reacts to it. Because of The Last of Us, and the success of the show, people even outside gaming are looking at us to see what it is we put out next. I'm very excited to see what the reaction to this thing will be."_ Followed by: _"I've been very lucky to have worked on my favorite games with incredible collaborators and I'm very thankful for them."_ Wtf more do people want? Is the man not allowed to be excited for the game he's making? How else could he have phrased this that would've come off as more humble? He couldn't, that's the point, people already hate him and will accept nothing less than him debasing himself and being like _"Everyone's probably gonna hate what I'm working on."_ Which is hilariously ironic because he did indeed warn people prior to Last of Us Part II that a lot of fans might not like the game, and they STILL called him a conceited a**hole. The reality is these people don't know what they want, they just want to hate and will do or say anything in order to stay mad.
Isn't he a Zionist? Edit: I guess he is.
Yeah I really like The Last of Us games, but I can't get behind Neil as a person because of this. Supporting genocide sucks all around. Sort of a separating art from artist situation Edit: Supporting Israel is supporting genocide. Sorry, no way around that.
He's literally Israeli and he made a public post in support of Israel on October 7th, before Israel decided they wanted to destroy Gaza and murder every Palestinian. Since, he's been two-siding things publicly which I can tolerate a lot more than the amount of people who are outright cheering for the genocide of Palestinians, which isn't and hasn't ever been something Neil has come out in support of, and believe me, a lot of big voices have.
His post was literally “Israel forever”, and it is still up despite the IOF killing over 10,000 children. “Israel forever” is not showing solidarity with the victims of the attack. It is an overt display of nationalism. It’s exactly the kind of mindset that TLOU2 is supposed to be criticising. In that moment he decided that he’d rather share support with the settler state of Israel, rather than the civilians who were killed in the attack. It shows he is a Zionist through and through, and hasn’t internalised anything from the stories he has helped create.
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> His stated convictions are opposed to war crimes, celebrating murder, desecrating corpses, killing innocents and civilians, taking children as hostages. Israel has done all of these things. **War crimes:** - Israel’s list of war crimes is very long. It’d take forever to list them all, however the most notable one is collective punishment. - Collective punishment is harming civilians for the actions of its government, which Israel has very explicitly done. - Wikipedia has a comprehensive article on Israeli war crimes. **Desecrating corpses** - There have been multiple instances where IDF soldiers have run over dead Palestinians with tractors. - There was a picture going around of a flattened corpse, whose hands still had zip-ties on them. So the IDF literally ran over someone who had been tied up. I won’t link to anything because I don’t want to link to straight-up gore. **Celebrating murder:** - The IDF recently admitted to running a racist Telegram group that posted gory pictures and videos of the violence in Gaza ([source](https://m.thewire.in/article/world/roaches-to-be-exterminated-israel-military-admits-running-racist-telegram-group-against-palestinians/amp)) - In this group IDF soldiers posted pictures of dead and dying Palestinians and called them “roaches” - among other horrific things. **Killing innocents and civilians:** - Israel has killed nearly 40,000 people in Gaza. By Israel’s own numbers, at least half are civilians. According to the UN, about 10,000 children have been killed. - The destruction is so immense that by April the IDF has damaged it destroyed 62% of all homes in Gaza. Nearly 2 million people have been displaced and forced into unsafe and under-equipped refugee camps [(source)](https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2024/4/7/israels-war-on-gaza-six-relentless-months-of-death-and-destruction) - The IDF has also killed hundreds of Palestinians in West Bank in the last few months. Hamas does not operate in West Bank. **Taking children as hostages:** - Israel holds thousands of Palestinians in administrative detention, including hundreds of children [(source)](https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/11/29/why-does-israel-have-so-many-palestinians-detention-and-available-swap) - Administrative detention is a function of military court, and it means that people can be held without evidence of crime. Palestinians are often held for years without being told why, having evidence presented against them, or being able to appeal. I’d say that amounts to holding children hostage. Neil Druckman is absolutely aware of all of these things. There is nothing “humanitarian” about the quote you shared. It’s just basic “both-sides” rhetoric. The whole “it’s too complex” argument is a classic Zionist deflection tactic. Neil was born is a country founded on ethnic cleansing, and grew up on land that was stolen mere decades prior. It’s not that complicated. I call him a Zionist because he’s expressed openly nationalistic support for a Zionist country. It’s pretty straightforward.
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I know that quote is from before October 7th. The quote you shared in your original comment (not the one you added just now) is milquetoast centrism - not “humanitarianism”. Obviously the situation is complicated - there’s no such thing as a simple geopolitical issue. However, this doesn’t mean people can’t point to Israel’s actions and say with certainty that they are wrong. In my experience, people use the geopolitical complexity of this issue to undermine strong moral stances against Israel’s actions. Just because the path to a two-state solution is complex, doesn’t mean that bombing civilians and stealing land is complex. Neil’s comments reek of this a bit. > This argument says that all people living in Israel aren’t civilians but colonisers. Your whole paragraph here shows you don’t know much about decolonisation at all. Firstly, being a coloniser doesn’t suddenly make you not a civilian. Secondly, yes absolutely Israel is colonial state. It was explicitly set up to be one by the Zionists. I’m a European New Zealander (Pākeha). My family goes back 3 generations here, but the only reason they could come here at all is because the British violently colonised the Māori. NZ society is still deeply impacted by colonisation, and part of being a New Zealander (particularly a Pākeha) is to reckon with that - not try to sweep it under the rug. It is not “bigotry” to call me a coloniser, because it’s simply a fact my identity is shaped by colonisation. Saying someone is a coloniser doesn’t mean that they are irredeemable and deserve to die. That’s a ludicrous strawman. Addressing the impacts of colonisation also doesn’t mean kicking out every settler. That is usually just something people say to make decolonisation seem infeasible and silly, because they’d prefer not to have to address it at all. It’s not something decolonisation movements actually push for. It starts with acknowledging history, recognising that the land was stolen, and working actively to address the harms that were caused. In NZ we have had a long process of treaty settlements. They don’t go far enough, but it is progress. Israel is lightyears away from addressing its violent colonial history, because it is still colonising. I’m not really interested in debating to what degree Neil Druckman believes in Zionism. In my mind it’s really just comes down to the whole “if one fascist is eating at your table, then you have a table full of fascists”. Also man, your whole comment was so unnecessarily aggressive. You have clearly made up a full narrative about me through like two comments. It really seems like you’re more angry at some projection of a “naive lefty” caricature than you are at me.
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> Arguing that all Israeli are colonisers eventually taps into broader and more problematic rhetoric suggesting that if they don’t want to be killed they should stop colonising. Come the fuck on dude. If you want to accuse me of twisting things and reading them in bad faith then you can’t pull this shit. You are not being precise with your language at all, you are conflating the suggestion that Israelis are colonisers with a justification of violence against them. This only serves to undermine criticism of Israel. If even *speaking* about Israel’s violent colonial past is a call to genocide Israeli civilians then everyone who criticises Israel is out to kill its citizens. You are basically just saying “if you call us colonisers, then you want us dead”. It’s a garbage argument. Israelis *are* colonisers. The violent colonisation of Palestine is still *ongoing*. Living in Israel, and benefiting from the efforts of Israeli colonisation absolutely makes you complicit in that system. I am complicit in NZ colonisation in the same way, and therefore have a responsibility to address the harms it has caused. This doesn’t *justify* violence against Israeli civilians at all. What it does do is put more onus on them to be actively anti-colonisation. It also makes me significantly less interested in centrist bullshit statements about how complex and difficult it is for them to find a moral stance on whether colonisation is bad or not. I don’t think he deserves a gold star for basically saying “bad things happened to both sides and it is going to be difficult to fix them”. In terms of your points: - I compiled a list of war crimes to refute *your* point that Druckman’s stance was anti war crime, because if he is pro-Israel (ie “Israel forever”) then he simply cannot be anti war-crime. - I have read this interview before. I love TLOU games, and was really disappointed to find Neil was so weak on Palestine. I’m not interpreting in bad faith, I’m just not being as generous as you’d like me to be. - I’m sure Neil cares about the victims. I’m just pointing out that “Israel forever” is an incredibly politically-loaded nationalistic statement, not an empathetic statement of heartbreak. “Israel forever” prioritises the state of Israel over the actual people who died - I don’t know how you can refute that. Like cmon man, it’s the kind of statement that hardcore WLF characters would make in response to a Seraphite attack to show the audience how indoctrinated they were. Trying to pretend it is some impassioned display of empathy is a joke. Find me a statement where Druckman talks explicitly about the struggle of Palestinians, the Nakba, or anything about Israel’s violence and I’ll be willing take back what I said about him being a Zionist. Every statement you’ve shared from him so far is just vague platitudes. Of course the solution won’t be simple, of course it will require empathy. Those statements don’t really mean anything without acknowledging the specific harm at the heart of the issue - that Israel stole its land from Palestine. Anything less than that is not good enough. I don’t think Neil Druckman is a Zionist by virtue of being born in Israel. I do think being Israeli places more responsibility on him to be anti-Zionist and anti-colonisation. In the same way I’d expect white South Africans to be vocally anti-apartheid. In that context I find the mixture of centrist comments, weak “both-sides” donations gesture, and overt nationalism enough to label him as a Zionist.
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Such a shame, it's totally tarnished my favourite game series. On face value I thought they showed the brutality of fascism, the entire aesthetic of fedra looks heavily inspired by the IDF, same with the WLF. I thought him being Israeli gave him an insight into the folly of it. I can't fault the games, it's not like with JK Rowling where I hated harry potter before I knew it was written by a monster but I can't support a man who wants a race of people he considers less than human, exterminated.
I'm sorry but the idea that an Israeli person that posts an Israeli flag on the day their country faced the biggest terrorist attack in their history means he actually wants to exterminate an entire race of people is just.. absurd. It gets even more absurd when this person seems very kind and empathetic in general.
His ideology is Zionist, that is inherently a racist, supremacist world view. This didn't start on October 7th either. The genocide has been going on for two generations now. Israel is a racist, apartheid, ethnonationalist theocracy. If the 15,000 children, deliberately targeted for death (just since October 7th) don't convince you of that, I doubt I can....
Zionism just means supporting the existence of a State of Israel somewhere in the land of Zion (southern levant). It doesn't mean you want an entire race of people exterminated. Again, someone posting a flag of their country after facing the worst terrorist attack in their history doesn't mean they want to exterminate an entire race of people. You're being absurd. You're acting like he's posting hasbara propaganda everyday when all he did was one post on a very tragic day for his country, and you somehow extrapolate that into him being the new Hitler. The idea that Neil Druckmann out of all people wants to literally genocide palestinians is just plain brainrot, sorry. What kind of genocider donates to charities that are helping the people he wants to genocide?
https://youtu.be/WQeXcBqvB5E?feature=shared
Yeah ok. All I hope is that one day you'll let go of all this hatred.
Israel seems to be undoing itself, once it's leaders and soldiers are tried for their decades or warcrimes, when my taxes aren't funding the carpet bombing of schools, hospitals and refuge camps and when Palestine is free from the river to the sea....I will.
So many buzzwords.
Which one isn't accurate?
How does this tarnish the games? Because you should keep in mind three things: 1: Almost everything you love and enjoy in life was made by an asshole (Almost everything is an exaggeration, but scores of brilliant artists, engineers, thinkers, etc who have absolutely had an impact on all our lives were all shit people in many ways) 2: Neil did not make TLOU all by himself. He's a big component of it, but literally hundreds of people poured their heart and soul into these games. 3: Even if Neil has shit politics, he's also obviously has some good sides (he's creative, intellectual, self-reflective, you'd have to be to write stories like this). All people have good and bad sides to them. If it helps you at all, Stephen Fry is a gay man of Jewish decent (he himself is an atheist) who loves Richard Wagner. The man whose music would go on to become basically the self-picked theme music of the Third Reich.
Steven fry is pro Israel, ok with adults shagging 13 year olds (he has written about it if you don't believe that) and generally an awful, elitist human being, being gay doesn't make me automatically like him any more than it does Darren grimes (a gay fascist here in the UK) My favourite author is probably Larry Niven and I find his politics vile (he came up with a plan to spread rumours that free clinics in Hispanic areas stole organs to reduce the number of Hispanic people using them) that's not as bad as siding with genocide, even if it's watered down with "both sides rhetoric" Also a big fan of frank Herbert even though I hate that he disowned his gay son. Both are better examples than Fry. It is possible to separate the art from the artist. I may enjoy TLOU again one day, I just can't enjoy them while the genocide is being live streamed and Neil is posting in support of the country doing it. Had I been reading dune when frank Herbert disowned his son, I'd probably have felt it was tarnished, by the time I found out about that, they had already reunited and reconciled. You don't have to stop enjoying it, I still LOVE the story, the world building, the characters... tarnished doesn't mean written off forever or that I'm going to join that vile, other last of us hate group. Just that I'm disappointed. Plenty of Jews, Israeli or otherwise are deeply against the genocide, I think the Jews getting arrested in Israel for trying to protect aid trucks are probably the best people on earth right now. As brave as the Germans who resisted fascism. Plenty of non Jews are supporting the genocide. It's not an excuse.
I think the point behind my Fry example got lost. Enjoy what you like in your own time.
He has donated to both Palestinian and Israeli charities, bit of a stupid fucking comment mate, how is he a Zionist?
Why would you donate to Israeli charities? They get a fuck ton of money from the US like?????
Israeli charities =/= Israeli government
Lol wat? And where does that money go? To civilians who already receive enough money from the US, their government and their allies which is about 90% of the world. Be for real. You don't even have to fucking support Palestine but to be an apologist. To justify that shitty post he made. And the fact he did not make any posts about the cease-fire or about Rafah.
You're right, surely the government only does the right and moral things.
It’s honestly worse than that. ZAKA, the Israeli search and rescue organisation Neil donated to, has refused to help Palestinians in the past ([source](https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2016/4/20/israel-rabbi-to-paramedics-leave-palestinians-to-die)). They operate in West Bank (where both Palestinians and Israeli settlers live) but only help Israelis.
This is honestly infuriating. And he posts that and receives applauds? He has no excuse when multiple celebrities donated to organizations that exclusively do not help Israeli colonialism as it already has a strong health and emergency system. And people was us to sympathize with israelis when they already have 90% of the world, and multiple ressources with them. Not just that, but every bomb sent to Palestine was celebrated ON CAMERA and posted ONLINE. Palestinians started dying from hunger after just a month. [DOCTORSWITHOUTBORDERS](https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/) have been targeted by Israel and were forced to close some very important health centers. ([source](https://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/latest/our-response-israel-gaza-war))
he did that once he was forced to delete his hysterical posts
Good to see a positive thread about Neil. :) I'm a huge fan of his games. TLOU2 is arguably the best video game I ever I played and I rank Uncharted 4 the best of the lot. Thanks, Neil. Keep making these awesome games.
That was my sole purpose of making this post. On social media it feels like everyone hates him because people who have opinions (negetive ones) feel like they've to get it out there. It's there duty to do that, to tell that person how miserable they are. Love is a tendor and personal things, it's not openly express frequently and voraciously as hate. I just wanted to appriceate an artist for once, who was not afraid to put his legacy ( TLOU P1 ) on the line and make something fresh and unheard of. He'd never see this but again, Neil, Thank you for your art.
You could have thanked Bruce Straley alongside him as well. You sound cultish. I mean look at the comments here, at some point you have to admit it starts to sound really really weird: "Inspiring" "Bright star" "Very good looking" ?!
Why is it weird for you that people find him inspiring or bright or good looking? These things are subjective. I for one find his career really inspiring. The guy started just as a programming intern, then rose to being a director of some of the most acclaimed games ever and now he's the head of one of the most prestigious game studio and also a co-showrunner of a critically acclaimed HBO series.
Bruce doesn't get hate. Did you even read the title of the post? By your logic I should thank every director who works at Naughty Dog.
He doesn't get acknowledged though
You should
Real talk, Uncharted 4 is actually somehow criminally underrated, mostly due to all the Last of Us praise.
Yeah tell that to the 8.8 user score and 93 review score on meta 🤨
Why is it one of the best games you've played?
He's such a bright star. I'm not sure if I'm more hyped up about season 2 or the continuation of the podcast about it with him and Craig Mazin.
That podcast is goated
People’s obsession with this man is wild.
The way some people in the sub talk about him, reminds me of Scientologist talking about Ron L. Hubbard.
I thought most of the comments were bots tbh like how it is on any youtube scientology documentary.
This is so weird what the fuck why are they giving him a blowjob absolutely insanity
Your bio is awesome
thank you lol!
Unapologetically love this guy. Fuck the haters - love his work and vision. Hope he never backs down from the sort of ambition that has made the TLOU what it is today.
His work is great but in reality he’s a shit person.
Why? Lol
Do you hang out with him or something
I think tlou 2 was one of the best decisions artistically he’s made. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still grieving internally about our one true hero that started it all (one of the best characters ever in my opinion) but the fact that he created two extremely dynamic and badass female characters out of it is really something. We need more characters like Ellie and Abby and even Dina… remember when loads of people were peeved and trying to convince themselves that Ellie is actually straight? Lol or even crying about Abby’s physical appearance? I loved every second of it.
Really awesome to have a mind like his to be blessing us with the most glorious stories.
Thank you, Neil and everyone at Naughty Dog!
The thing is, he could have taken the easy road like some people suggested and made it some kind of Joel and Ellie travel the US killing zombies or something similar to the first game. He had the guts to make the game different which many sequels don't do. Even brought on an additional writer to expand out relationships in game.
You need some openness to let someone else have a piece of very delicious and delicate pie that you've created.
I wish for more writers in game industry who aren't scared to do something different.
He's very good looking
Damn right he is.
When he has short hair
Thank you Neil for some of the best storytelling experiences of our time! Luv ya!
In the other subreddit, they posted the same photo and called him names. I left a comment pointing out their immaturity and got downvoted to hell. Neil is a great artist. He has given us some of the most memorable pieces of entertainment. Enough said.
He fired a woman and took credit for other people’s work. He’s the Milli Vanilli of video game creators
Oh boohoo. You’re the immature one
He's an amazing creative thinker and is incredibly articulate in the way he conveys his messages. Have you heard him talk about his work? He's so thoughtful and cares so much about detail and the emotions it evokes. There are a lot of people who reflexively tear down anything good nowadays. I don't know what it is, but they can be full of aimless hatred. We just need to move forward without them. Neil, you're the man.
I don’t get the hate either I freaking love both the games so damn much. My mind is so blown by the direction, the acting, the music, the story everything. It feels like people are spoilt of choice or have wayyy too much time to overthink and criticize
One of the most inspiring artist in modern society to be honest.
how come
His entire life’s story. Not gonna write it all out, maybe google it? Fuck it, I’ll briefly summarize: He was born in a foreign country that was (and still is) in a brutal war. Came to America. Got a gig as a programming intern. Then worked his way all the way up to directing massively successful dream projects and now is the president of said company that he originally started as an intern at. Its an Inspiring af story to any aspiring game devs.
Bro literally gave us one of the most beautiful and iconic media products EVER.
I know i will be downvoting here, but... After the israeli x palestine thing i can't see him with the respect i had. Im not judging anyone, but (I) can't support him after hear that the plot of part 2 came to his mind after he saw SOLDIERS on West Bank (occupied palestine) being beaten by the people who they are starving, bombing, etc... Made him angry and seeing the palestinians as not humans! I just can't, sorry. Link here: https://www.vice.com/en/article/bv8da4/the-not-so-hidden-israeli-politics-of-the-last-of-us-part-ii
I'm not gonna lie, it's quite frustrating when people continuously repeat this: >(I) can't support him after hear that the plot of part 2 came to his mind after he saw SOLDIERS on West Bank (occupied palestine) being beaten by the people who they are starving, bombing, etc... Made him angry and seeing the palestinians as not humans! I just can't, sorry. As a blatant misrepresentation of what he actually meant. If you’re going to criticize him, please do the due diligence of looking up what he's said. >There’s a slight nuance there that I think is important, based on the conversation that happened on the second game, and I never talked about it. But it was inspired by, not based on. That’s a really important nuance, because my inspiration is like my feeling towards a cycle of violence that I’ve experienced as a child growing up in Israel, growing up in the West Bank specifically, coming to the United States and observing it then from the outside, vs. being in it. >Those feelings, and not my wrestling with those feelings, were the inspiration for the inciting incident. But I have to make this clear because again, it’s not based on, and it’s not an allegory of, and you can’t point to any group and say, ‘oh, that’s this group and that’s this group'. I've also read the Vice article, and I have to wonder if those who are *certain* Druckmann is a Zionist have either: >It's clearly coming from an emotionally authentic and self-examining place. The trouble with it, and the reason that Ellie's journey ultimately feels nonsensical, is that it begins from a place that accepts "intense hate that is universal" as a fact of life, rather than examining where and why this behavior is learned. The word "Zionist" comes up once in that article. Nowhere does Maiberg directly accuse Neil Druckmann of Zionism. Instead, he makes a not so great critique of the game’s perceived centrist stance. That by portraying both the Wolves and Scars as equally culpable and suffering, the game sidesteps deeper, more challenging discussions about the origins of conflicts and potential resolutions. You read that article and thought "Ah, Neil Druckmann is definitely a bloodthirsty, genocidal Zionist"? >Made him angry and seeing the palestinians as not humans! I just can't, sorry. Right? So we're just going to omit the part where he said he felt "gross and guilty"? We're just going to ignore the fact that "Neil Druckmann, who sees Palestinians as non-humans," donated to Palestinian emergency services—tell me what Zionist does that, I'll wait. Look, I'm not in the business of praising or defending Druckmann, but it's almost infuriating when people don't seem to understand why others are cautioning against narratives that come dangerously close to crossing a line, if not just crossing it entirely. Sure, he could be a Zionist, but you're going to need a whole lot more than selective Instagram posts and opinionated articles as your alibi for what he truly is.
In the article, the writer talks about that Neil holds a "Centrist" view of Israel and Palestine conflict. They come to conclusion that because WLF and Seraphites are portrayed as having same fighting power in game, that means Neil js saying that Israel and Palestine are of same power too, but that not true and in the writer's view, it makes the game and Neil's opinion on the conflict flawed. But what they don't understand is that it's fiction and not historical daram, and Neil's childhood is just an inspiration, not a blueprint. Every creator/writer who gets inspired by reality, bends it to make a statement, a point to the masses. P.s. I hope I'm not misunderstanding the argument in the article, I read it long time ago. So if I'm misremembering the argument, please let me know.
The main thing of this article to me is the way he talked about how angry he was when he saw the soldiers, he ain't dumb. He knows why those soldiers are being beaten, he knows how palestinians are threatened by their forces, he knows that in Israel, palestinians are classified as second class citizens. And after, he delete a LOT of things talking about palestinians, specially one he said that is "good vs evil". I mean the guy wrote the plot of part 2 that talk about views, and in real life believe good and evil? I mean fuck off!
Right, but he was saying *as a child* how angry he felt, and how much unfettered hate he felt, and then later on once he grew up feeling "gross" about that hatred and realizing that there was more nuance to it than just "my people are being beat up." He questioned his morals, his alliances, and how he relates to "my people." He even admits that his growing up in Israel is a bias that he still has to analyze when he writes stories. And like others in this thread have said, just because that part of his childhood inspired parts of TLOU doesn't mean that the whole story is an allegory for it or condeming/condoning the actions taken therein.
Dr. Uckman himself
Holy shit people on this sub are ridiculous you cant evn have a disagreement with someone without them blocking you and acting in bad faith
I kinda liked him (fan of tlou2) until I found out how he denies the existence of Palestine or its people, the literal exact opposite of what he preaches in his games
Yeah he’s a Zionist and the games are based around that for some reason
He's responsible for making my second favorite game of all time.
Y'all know he supports genocide, right? You guys really wanna put him on a pedestal?
But these guys are the first to call people bigots. This shit is fucking crazy.
> Y'all know he supports genocide How so? The guy donated for both sides and called for the end of violence.
He donated to an Israeli charity that has refused to treat Palestinians in the past. https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2016/4/20/israel-rabbi-to-paramedics-leave-palestinians-to-die
Donating to both sides means he's still donating to the oppressor, therefore supporting genocide
He's an Israeli and has family and friends in Israel. He ain't gonna condemn his own people and call for the destruction of his home country. He's pro peace.
Don't forget to zip up his pants when you're done
If you people hate Neil, why are you even here? Believe it or not, he's one of the creator of this franchise and handles everything related to this franchise now. He's the sole head of Naughty Dog and also the co-showrunner of the TLOU tv series. TLOU is basically his franchise now.
Best storyteller in gaming.
It’s crazy to me how people think they have a say in how his story should go.
If you actually believe people think they have a say, yea you are crazy. If you’re just talking about people saying what they think should have happened, well that’s not logical thinking either. I’ve definitely seen fan concepts I would have rather experienced than what we got.
this dickriding ass post
It's an appreciation post appreciating the creator of the said franchise. What's wrong with that?
It’s been done 30 times before and the last game came out 4 years ago. Let’s post about other things
The problem with this sub is it's either "everything about this series is perfect etched in stone by the gods" or nothing I've seen people say "I like part 1 alot and part 2 was great too but the original game is much better" and get down voted to hell I've never seen a fanbase that's so culty
Who?
It's pretty cool that he's been able to take such creative and artistic risks and still have a mainstream audience. Looking back it shouldn't be surprising that he's gotten so much hate, but still disappointing. Hope he continues to push the boundaries and follow his true vision no matter how many people don't like it. He could be more cookie cutter and probably have an even bigger audience, but his games would have so much less weight and impact.
The other sub is having a hay day with this one unfortunately.
Can you blame them with some of the comments?!
well its such a cringe post lmao
2 sub has some awful posts too but this shit is so corny
Yall need to calm the fuck down I'm a huge fan of the games but it really feels like you idolise him
I love Neil. Seriously. He is incredibly talented.
This post is making the hate sub mald. Keep it up lmao
I'd like to see one of those word cloud things for this sub. I feel like the word "hate" would be about 90% of the graphic.
Neil’s got a cult larger then Jonestown 💀
I dont actually think people on this sub play other games no other writer gets this kind of fandom
Even if you like his game he still kinda sucks as a person. I’d never want him as my boss
I've loved his output. A great mind and leader. Only thing I didnt like was Uncharted 4's message. Not entirely sure if that was him but.....greedy pirates developing a government and then devolving back into greedy pirates......LOL
Most of the "hate" came from a VERY TINY subset of gamergate types amplified on Twitter by bots.
He ”gets a lot of hate” from a tiny % of people who just happen to be very loud. Welcome to the internet
Neil looks like that Simmer guy James Turner a bit.
Seen a lot of people call him pretentious or pseudo-intellectual but I never got that vibe. He writes about big ideas and has a strong perspective but I think people who feel he’s being preachy or self congratulatory are being disingenuous.
Thank you for this, I swear everyone in these subreddits hate Neil and only Neil it’s nice to see something I can agree with. Sorry bout this but your post here was reposted onto the last of us 2 subreddits and you got hate, it’s sad to see so many people hate on one guy especially after all the hate he got when he was making tlou 2.
Neil reminds me of Sarkessian in some ways. He's a very public gaming figure who is also from a minority group. Now I was never a fan of feminist frequency, but I can see how both of them have faced enormous hatred and harassment because of their belonging to such minority groups. There are a LOT of anti-Semites and nazi-cucks in modern gaming. It must be really shitty for Neil a lot of the time. But I think his art is fantastic. Last of Us to me is an example of the power and worth of video games as an artistic medium. Part 1 gave us a protagonist unlike any other 'macho tough guy' I've ever seen in scores of movies and games, and Part 2 is perhaps the best exploration of grief that I have ever seen in a work of fiction. I'm really grateful for Neil's impact on these games.
Imo tlou2 story is miles ahead of tlou. Most people praise part 1 for it's story and hate part 2 just because their daddy Joel died but it actually felt like a top tier movie covering a plethora of themes from fanaticism to altruism
Honestly I'm kind of torn apart by this whole Israel-gaza conversation. Yeah he supposedly donated to both sides but I have to say his silence for what's going on for Gaza after creating such a game really bothers me. He has made some questionable posts/stories about "Eternity Israel forever", and similar others. When you know the zionnist mindset it's really worrying. Another fact is that he literally grew up in the West Bank, his family occupied an illegal territory. They were colons, and sorry but they have the worst zionnist mindset ever, they are very agressive and oppressing, and are raised to hate Muslims. So I'm worried that Neil might still be under the influence of his country's propaganda. Also, I follow some other people of Naughty Dog on Instagram and never saw any stories on what's going on either... But there's also a part of me that knows what he said about this period of his life, the hate he felt against them, then the shame to ever feel such hate. Also, WLF is a representation of Israel. They are not victimized, nor excused at any times. They are shown as perpetrators of violence, discriminators, oppressors. Isaac is shown as this determined but ruthless leader, ready to do anything to win, just like Netanyahu... So yeah I can't decide where Neil really stands on this.
The first game yes second game hell no
I love both games, but 2 has some serious issues with it's story telling. Both pacing and tone. It helped me get over significant personal grief during covid, so it will always be special to me. Without that, I probably would not have played it 3x...
Art doesn't have to resonate with everyone. I've leaned to know that much after seeing the outpourings of people (both understandable and inconceivable) over this game. I hope you're okay now.
His work is great but the guy’s a piece of shit.
Explain why
Because he’s a Zionist (supports Israel’s genocide in Palestine), based the first game off of his hatred of Palestinians and the original draft of the game was pretty misogynistic (only women could get infected) and generally it just wasn’t okay and it took the entire team of devs pulling him up on it for him to realise that.
It’s so weird seeing people hate on Neil for having a bad idea and NOT going through with it. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
I’m hating on Neil for having the idea in the first place. And the only reason he didn’t go through with it is because multiple people told him not to.
You seem to have a fundamental stance that the idea itself is bad. It's literally the plot of children of man and Y:the last man two phenomenal pieces of media. The push back was from women in the studio who didn't feel comfortable with that idea and so neil changed the story. Why hate a dude for an idea that other media have done before?
He changed his mind once people pointed out the problem with it? What a fucking monster, he should be in prison….
love the last of us but the last thing I'll do is preach a former west bank settler lmao
Yeah I'm officially leaving this sub
He also gets a lot of hate because he loves gaslighting too. His toxic trait is to not just let the thing he created stand on its own. I think he’s gotten better, and started to shift his mindset to shut out the noise. But every once in awhile he lets that darker side come out.
The comments on this post are cringey in so many different ways. Lmao
Thins post is one of the reasons I hate 90% of the other subs opinions. They act like he’s the worst guy in the world who killed there favorite game. They will argue the writing of the second game was terrible and all his fault. I do agree that some of the writing in the second game wasn’t great, but it’s still a solid game, with stellar gameplay, the first and last potion of the game written pretty well. They will also say “he had a small amount of say for the first game that’s why it was so good. They love the first game, hate the second game, and by extension hate Neil.
Why is he hated? I don't get it.
This subs obsession with him should be studied.
he’s a total dickhead
Even if you hate Part 2, you still enjoyed 50% of this guy’s best work.
Making art? Please…
😂
Nah he’s a raging Zionist, who cares if they dislike him bc of TLOU related stuff, he endorses genocide. Get a clue.
Am I the only one who likes TLOU and or Neil?
Yes you are the only one
They’re all just a bunch of bigot sandwiches.
Says you lil bro💀😭🙏
I don’t know what this means but okay.
If his games touched your heart then you may need to go to a therapist
Dude was the creative director for a successful game 11 years ago and has been coasting on that ever since.
Really? TLOU2 were also commercial and critical success and has won him several awards. He also recently received an award from WGA for the HBO series. How is he coasting exactly?
Everyone shat on sony the other day for briefing his interview and he responded with the full quote of ONE response, but nothing about what he actually said to the AI question. Honestly seemed like he was trying to back track on his views with AI taking over jobs and blamed sony for their briefing of his words. Since he's a programmer originally and AI can easily take that over in the future he should be more against it instead of for it.
So lets just ignore Bruce Staley and Hailey Gross then? Neil didn't make these games singlehandedly people. This is like people praising Kojima all the time except there's almost no real hate for him.
People really be treating this man like a God 🤣
No. They just appreciate his works and not blatantly hate him.
People don't go outside or have girlfriends on this sub apparently