It sounds to me like you're unwilling to suspend disbelief for anything game play related at all, and are nitpicking the shit out of a video game you want to play your way when that directly conflicts with the game design that was chosen for it (for a reason).
When a game is peddling unusually high levels of realism as one of it's main selling points, I think it's fair to point out where it missed the mark. I'm totally fine with gameplay mechanics and resource management when it's compelling. I get that underneath it all, all games are systems designed with rules and checks and balances. I just don't think they designed them well here at all. I can suspend disbelief when it fits into a compelling set of rules in a gameplay system. But I don't see why I should just ignore that the AI runs around in the open and is invisible to enemies when it adds nothing to the game but disbelief and immersion breaking.
Take on 6 clickers the entire game? That was my point. There isn't much compelling resource management here. You get nothing for killing clickers, and you lose shivs. In addition, it's extremely easy to bypass them because they can't see anything. So it's not really a huge debate, you just skip them all unless you absolutely have to because it's much more rational to spend shivs on unlocking doors. And taking them on in other ways is not that satisfying either, because they run at you and one hit kill you. And the game encourages you to sit still to shoot more accurately, but then puts enemies in there that you can't sit still and shoot. Think of the behavior of the regenerators in RE4 and how that works with stop and shoot gameplay mechanics while being scary, and compare that to the design of the clickers in the TLoU, and how that impacts the gunplay. Even the chainsaw guys in RE4 have to stop to attack before they one hit kill you, and they are bigger and slightly slower so you have time to aim and shoot while the intensity is still maintained because it's quality monster design and quality monster AI.
I can suspend disbelief for some things, but this just seems like boring gameplay design. It's not compelling stealth for me to just walk as slow as possible with no regard for sightlines. Splinter Cell's stealth is much more involved. Even with no xp reward, I'd rather kill clickers at that point just so I could be free to at least explore the areas in anything but slow motion to avoid making any noises. It even makes the scavenging less enjoyable if they're in the area at all because you have to go so slow, but there's really no risk of being caught.
That's just the clickers. I could keep going, but I have to head out. Anyway, thanks for not accusing me of lying at least. I'm fine debating the gameplay design decisions and I know I'll be in the minority, but I just find it interesting that people are interpreting it so differently.
