The last of us 2 info
“Something we've always had in our melee combat is kind of a connection with the environment,” Newman said. “This time, we're pushing that even further. Traditionally we had a very animation-based melee system. Now we're kind of keeping a lot of the stuff that made it so cinematic and had that fidelity, but we're adding in collision-based mechanics. You'll see a pickaxe guy swing his hammer at you. If he misses, he actually collides with the environment and sends stuff flying
Then we've added this evade mechanic that adds much more depth to the melee combat because now you have a defensive option. You have to figure out when to go in, when to hang back. Just like a lot of our other melee, that also contextualizes with the environment. So if you evade out of the way of something and something is in your way, you'll slam against that. If that thing can move, it will jostle and stuff.
The player and the enemies all can use the same melee weapons,” Margenau added. “Some are smaller one-handed weapons, some are bigger two-handed weapons. Some are really big. The pickaxe thing, that kind of changes the behavior and how they use them. So the way those weapons interact with each other when an enemy has a two-handed [weapon] and you have a machete, that interacts differently than if you have a hammer or a really big pickaxe. There's a lot more depth and strategy to how you engage in combat based on the weapons people are equipped with, and obviously the environment around you.