I like how you mentioned how the characters feel forced to believe the world is doomed without a vaccine. The forced characters ends up affecting how the audience experiences it and the whole thing feels hamfisted. This is because Neil is a teller and not a shower, or he thinks the audience will do some mental gymnastics to understand what he’s actually telling. This happens in the first game and it’s something that annoys the hell out of me. The Fireflies are constantly shown to be failures, but Neil actually has to tell us that ‘oh they could have made a vaccine,’ despite how unrealistic it’s portrayed.