I loved the ending. In many ways it reminded me of the open ended, yet controversial ending of the Sopranos. I appreciate the story teller leaving you to decide what happens to the characters after it ends.
My take is that Ellie knows that Joel is lying about what happened at the University, but she decides to ignore the truth in order to just keep going. Joel on the other hand I think couldn't take losing another person and that all that was keeping him together at that point - his only motivation to keep living in this terrible world was Ellie and he would do anything to keep living.
What happens to them after the game ends is anyone's guess, but the brilliance is that you can decide for yourself what became of them since it was never written in stone.
All in all the best game I've personally played, it's just such an experience.
