The Last of Us

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The Last of Us
TheLastOfUs.jpg
The Last of Us cover art
Developer(s) Naughty Dog
Publisher(s) Sony Computer Entertainment
Director(s) Bruce Straley
Neil Druckmann
Designer(s) Jacob Minkoff
Programmer(s) Travis Mcintosh
Jason Gregory
Artist(s) Erick Pangilinan
Nate Wells
Writer(s) Neil Druckmann
Composer(s) Gustavo Santaolalla
Engine In-house engine[1]
Havok (physics)
Platform(s) PlayStation 3
Release date(s)
  • WW June 14, 2013
  • JP June 20, 2013
Genre(s) Action-adventure, survival horror
Mode(s) Single-player, multiplayer
Distribution Blu-ray Disc, download

The Last of Us is a survival horror action-adventure game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment exclusively for the PlayStation 3. It was officially revealed on December 10, 2011 during the Spike TV Video Game Awards and released worldwide on June 14, 2013. It was released in Japan on June 20, 2013.

The player takes control of Joel (voiced and motion captured by Troy Baker), who is trekking across a post-apocalyptic United States in 2033, in order to escort the young Ellie (voiced and motion captured by Ashley Johnson) to a friendly resistance group, the Fireflies, who believe Ellie may be the key to curing an infection that has ravaged the world. The player defends the characters against zombie-like creatures infected by a mutated strain Cordyceps fungus, as well as hostile humans such as bandits and cannibals, employing the use of firearms and stealth aided by capabilities such as a visual representation of sound in order to listen for locations of enemies. The player can also craft weapons or medical items by combining items scavenged in the world.

The Last of Us received critical acclaim, with reviewers praising multiple aspects, including its choice-enabling gameplay, realistic action, emotional depth in the plot, sound design, and environments. Many publications gave the game perfect scores, hailing it as one of the significant titles of the seventh console generation. The Last of Us scored the biggest video game launch of 2013 so far, selling over 1.3 million units in its first week. As of July 2013, the game has sold 3.4 million units, making it the fast-selling PlayStation 3 game after 3 weeks.

Gameplay

The Last of Us uses third-person perspective and players take control of Joel, while Ellie is controlled by the AI for the majority of the game, although the player switches control in the later sections of the game. The game involves gun fighting, melee combat, and a cover system with no preset cover locations, only crouching near objects and navigating normally. The player fights off the Infected and the Survivors—humans that are not infected, but are hostile towards Joel and Ellie. A feature the developers call "dynamic stealth" allows for many different types of strategies and techniques that the player can use at any given time as they approach a new situation, to which enemies will react differently.

A player creating an item
The real-time crafting system, which can be accessed in the backpack[2]

Throughout their journey, Joel and Ellie use multiple ranged and melee weapons to help them defeat their enemies and continue through the levels. These include long weapons like a bolt action rifle, shotgun, bow, flamethrower, and assault rifle, as well as short-barreled guns like the pistol, revolver, scoped revolver-like handgun called the "El Diablo", and a sawed-off one handed shotgun called the "Shorty". There are also many different degradable melee weapons that can be scavenged from the environment like metal pipes, planks, baseball bats, machetes, and hatchets. Items like empty bottles and bricks can be picked up and thrown to distract or stun enemies, as well as be used as simple melee weapons.[3]

Along with regular weapon and equipment slotting, the game also features a crafting system. By going into the backpack, the player can use recipes introduced throughout the game to forge useful supplies like Molotov cocktails from once useless consumables such as liquor, discarded towels, and broken razor blades.[4] To force the player to make tough decisions based upon their current circumstance, all of the items created require some of the same consumables that can be used for another producible item. For example, the Molotov cocktail and health-kit items both require alcohol and rags to produce. Another aspect of the crafting system is that it happens in real-time, meaning that the game does not pause while crafting, forcing the player to choose their crafting time effectively in order to avoid being taken advantage of by enemies while busy.[4]

The player is also able to collect toolboxes and parts, in the form of gears, to help upgrade their arms at an array of workbenches set throughout the game. Things like the number of weapon holsters, fire rate, clip capacity, reduced recoil, and range can be increased.[4] Training manuals can be collected to increase the effectiveness of crafted items as well. For instance, the durability of crafted shivs can be increased, as can the radius of a Molotov explosion. Joel's physical abilities are upgradable too. The player can do things like improve his health-bar size or increase his crafting speed by collecting pills and medicinal plants throughout the game.[5]

The game also features periods of no fighting, where the player can explore the environment and engage in non-combat oriented actions. These sections often involve conversation between the characters, either automatic or optional via prompt, where they discuss their current situation, surrounding environment, make jokes, and so on.[6][7] Along with that, there are a multitude of collectibles that can be scavenged from the environment and stored/viewed in the backpack. Objects like notes, posters, maps, can be collected to provide the player extra knowledge on their current environment and its former or current inhabitants. Firefly pendants, with the inscribed names of their former owners, and a series of comics titled "Savage Starlight" can be found as well.[8] The player must also solve simple platforming dilemmas that the characters come across while traversing the levels. These involve boosting each other up, using floatable planks to get Ellie (who cannot swim) across bodies of water, and finding ladders or dumpsters to climb upon to reach higher areas.[9]

The game features an AI system called "Balance of Power".[10] This new system allows enemies to react realistically to any combat situation they are placed in by taking cover if they see the player, calling for help if they need it and even taking advantage of the player's weaknesses, such as when Joel runs out of ammunition, is distracted, or when he is being attacked by other enemies.

Multiplayer

The Last of Us includes a separate multiplayer component called "Factions", a mode that adds to the world the single-player story established. From the beginning, the player is allowed to pick a faction, either Hunters or Fireflies, to become a part of. The player has 12 weeks to hold out by keeping their clan alive through collecting supplies during the matches, with each match counting as a day. By surviving to the end of the 12 weeks, the player has completed a journey and is allowed to chose their faction again.[11] The focus of multiplayer play in The Last of Us is Clan growth and survival. Scavenging supplies is the way to accomplish these goals. Supplies are gained based on how well the player do in the match. Killing an enemy, assisting in a kill, reviving allies, and crafting items all earn a player's parts. At the end of the match, these parts are converted into supplies. Enemies also drop supplies when they die, which can be looted. While the player can populate their Clan with random non-player characters, they can also populate the Clan with their friends' names via Facebook. This personalizes the player's Clan and doesn't post to their Facebook wall. To further aid player's immersion, there are special events which allow the player to rescue his/her characters friends' names, among other things. Linking up with Facebook also gives the player access to three boosters.[12] The mode also features a crafting system identical to that of the single-player, where the consumables can be found in certain supply box set throughout the maps.

Factions also lets the player customize loadouts to suit the player's playstyle. There are four customizable loadout slots. Each loadout has two weapon slots, four survival skill slots, and one purchasable equipment slot. When the player starts a Clan, it begins with eight loadout points to distribute into these slots. As the player's Clan's overall store of supplies grows, the player can eventually earn up to 13 loadout points. The amount of loadout points that the player gets is directly related to many how many supplies they earn throughout the life of the Clan.[13]

The component features two game modes of eight players max: Supply Raid and Survivors. Both offer unique challenges to the Clan's survival and count towards the Clan's progression.[14] Supply Raid is a standard Deathmatch, where the team who runs out of respawns first loses. Survivors is a no respawn mode where teams win rounds by killing off the entire enemy team or ending the round with more players, and win the match by winning four rounds. Crafting ingredients and producible items do not carry over between rounds. The multiplayer characters are also customizable of which their hats, helmets, masks, and emblems can be personalized.[15]

Plot

The Last of Us takes place in United States, twenty years after a spore-based infection rapidly spread across the globe, wiping out a vast majority of the population by warping its hosts’ brains and turning them into deadly predators capable of killing with a single bite. The majority of the world’s population has been reduced to either struggling survivors or ravenous infected. The game features several locations across United States, including in Boston, Lincoln, Pittsburgh, and Salt Lake City.

Characters

The two main characters are Joel, a brutal survivor of a fungal pandemic that has devastated civilization (voiced by Troy Baker). Joel operates as a black market smuggler, dealing in contraband, taking numerous de-humanizing jobs over the years to survive after the infections happen and Ellie, a fourteen-year-old orphan that has grown up after the spread of the fungal pandemic (voiced by Ashley Johnson). Other characters include Tess (Annie Wersching), Joel's smuggler partner; Marlene (Merle Dandridge), Leader of the Fireflies and a friend of Ellie’s mother; Robert (Robin Atkin Downes), An arms dealer; Sarah (Hana Hayes), Joel's daughter; characters that Joel and Ellie met along the way — Bill (W. Earl Brown), a skilled mechanic; The other survivors Henry and Sam (Brandon Scott and Nadji Jeter, respectively); Joel's brother, Tommy (Jeffrey Pierce) and his wife Maria (Ashley Scott); David (Nolan North), a leader of a group of survivors; James (Reuben Langdon), David's partner.[16]

Story

Joel is a single father living in Texas with his twelve-year-old daughter Sarah. On the early morning after his birthday, a sudden outbreak of a mutant Cordyceps infection ravages the United States, which changes its human hosts into rabid, cannibalistic monsters. As Joel, his brother Tommy, and Sarah flee the initial chaos, Sarah is shot by a soldier and dies in Joel's arms.

In the 20 years that follow, much of civilization is destroyed by the infection, with pockets of survivors living in either heavily-policed quarantine zones, independent settlements, or nomadic groups. Joel now lives in a quarantine zone in Boston, working as a smuggler alongside his friend Tess. Joel and Tess hunt down Robert, a local gangster, to recover a cache of weapons stolen from them. Before they kill him, Robert reveals that he traded the goods to the Fireflies, a rebel group fighting against the authorities governing the quarantine zones. Joel and Tess encounter the Fireflies' leader, Marlene, who promises them double their stolen cache in return for smuggling a teenage girl, Ellie, to Fireflies hiding outside quarantine. Joel, Tess, and Ellie sneak out in the night, but after an encounter with a patrol Ellie is revealed to be infected. Full infection normally occurs in under two days, but Ellie asserts she was infected three weeks ago, and that her immunity may lead to a cure. The trio fight their way out of the quarantine zone to the drop-off point, but find that the Fireflies there have been killed. Tess reveals she was bitten during an encounter with the infected, and chooses to sacrifice herself against approaching military soldiers to give the pair a chance to escape, believing in Ellie's importance as a cure.

Joel and Ellie trek westwards across the country, meeting temporary allies along the way as they struggle through abandoned cities and towns teeming with infected and violent bandits. In the fall, the two finally find Tommy (a former Fireflies member) in Wyoming, where he has assembled a fortified settlement near a hydroelectric dam. Joel contemplates leaving Ellie with Tommy, but after repelling bandits and being confronted by Ellie about Sarah, he ultimately decides to stay with her. Tommy directs them to a Fireflies enclave at the University of Eastern Colorado. The two find the place abandoned, but learn that the Fireflies had moved to a hospital in Salt Lake City. They are attacked by bandits as they leave, who severely wound Joel during the escape.

In the winter, Ellie and Joel take shelter in the mountains. Joel is on the brink of death and relies on Ellie to care for him. After killing a large stag while hunting, Ellie encounters David and James, a pair of scavengers willing to trade medicine in exchange for the meat. While James goes to recover the medicine, Ellie and David are attacked by a horde of Infected, but manage to fend them off. Afterwards, David reveals that the bandits Ellie and Joel killed at the university were part of his group; he allows Ellie to leave with the medicine. David sends a posse to track Ellie the following morning, forcing her to lead them away from Joel and be captured. Ellie learns that David and his men are cannibals and escapes after refusing to join them, but David eventually corners her in a burning restaurant. Meanwhile, Joel recovers from his fever and sets out to find Ellie, fighting through David's gang to the restaurant. He reaches Ellie as she violently kills David in self-defense; Joel consoles her before they flee together.

In the spring, Joel and Ellie arrive in Salt Lake City. They make their way through the flooded highway tunnels but are caught in the rapids, with Joel barely rescuing Ellie from drowning. A patrol of Fireflies capture them. Joel awakens in the hospital and is greeted by Marlene. She informs him that Ellie is being prepped for surgery: to produce a vaccine for the infection, the Fireflies have to remove and examine Ellie's infected brain, killing her in the process. Joel escapes and battles his way to the surgery room, from where he carries an unconscious Ellie to the basement parking garage. There he confronts and kills Marlene to prevent the Fireflies from pursuing them. On the drive out of the city, Ellie finally awakens, and Joel lies to her about the events, telling her that the Fireflies had tried and failed to produce a cure with other immune candidates and had given up trying. The pair arrive on the outskirts of Tommy's settlement. Ellie expresses her survivor's guilt and asks Joel to swear that his story about the Fireflies is true; he does.

Development

Naughty Dog worked in secrecy on The Last of Us for two years after completing Uncharted 2: Among Thieves prior to announcement; with the game going gold on May 15, 2013.[17] To compensate for the goal of creating a new intellectual property (IP) as well as continuing the Uncharted series at the same time, Naughty Dog co-presidents Even Wells and Christophe Ballestra had ordered the splitting of the company into two teams, with one team going on to develop Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception and the other The Last of Us.[18][19] The specific number of employees who worked on the project (although suggested to be somewhere over 40 people) and the total cost of development were not specified.[20]

Stealth and cover mechanics are featured in the game. The concept art shows Joel and Ellie ducking behind a shop counter as other survivors search the place.

The announcement confirmed that the new project was being headed by studio game director Bruce Straley. Former lead designer on Enslaved: Odyssey to the West, Mark Richard Davies, also had been working at Naughty Dog on the game.[21] After Uncharted 2 shipped in 2009, some of the development team from the game formed the team for The Last of Us, while the remainder worked on Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception;[22] The Last of Us marked the first time that Naughty Dog had become a two-team studio.[23] It was also the first time the studio had introduced a second new IP in the same hardware generation.[24]

The concept for The Last of Us arose after watching a segment of the BBC nature documentary Planet Earth, which documented a Cordyceps fungus-infected ant, where the fungus takes over its brain and produces growths from its head; the idea that the fungus could infect humans became the initial idea for the game. GamesRadar pointed out the game's inspirations by the film version of The Road and the graphic novel and TV series versions of The Walking Dead, as well as by 28 Days Later and the film versions of Children of Men and The Day of the Triffids.[25] Other inspirations for the game included the non-fiction books The World Without Us and Polio: An American Story, the films True Grit and Road to Perdition, and the novels The Road, City of Thieves and The Last Town on Earth.[26]

Creative director Neil Druckmann stated that the team was highly influenced from a specific section from Uncharted 2, where protagonist Nathan Drake teams up with Tibetan guide Tenzin who does not know any English. Through a short period of gameplay time, the developers had managed to build a bond between Drake and Tenzin. This idea of building a complex bond between two characters through gameplay, although over the course of an entire game, is what lead to the creation of Joel and Ellie and their relationship. Druckmann also added when they were watching the film No Country for Old Men, they were struck by the lack of music in the soundtrack for the majority of the film. Druckmann noted that the lack of music in the film helped intensify the tension between the characters that was almost palpable.[27] Druckmann and Straley have studied films, books, and television shows with post-apocalyptic and dystopian settings, but soon found the real world to be a much more helpful source of inspiration. In studying the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, Druckmann learned about paranoia and man's need to protect himself when faced with the threat of extinction; the polio epidemic of the 1880s showed him how differences in class can color people's perceptions of blame in the face of a great disaster. Examining the history of human suffering also helped Druckmann answer the question of whether The Last of Us was the kind of game that needed a stereotypical bad guy.[28] Naughty Dog was also inspired by games like Ico and Resident Evil 4, who helped shape the game's story and character building. Designer Ricky Cambier stated that they wanted to create as realistic a survival game as possible, with actions that seemed realistic.[29]

On release of the initial trailer for the game Dead Island, the team was concerned that the two games would be largely similar, both exploring the human or emotional side to an apocalyptic event. While the gameplay of Dead Island not match up to that showed by the trailer, Druckmann felt that the initial trailer for The Last of Us was "very representative of what we're going for."[23] Druckmann also stated that he wanted the story in The Last of Us to raise the bar for other video game developers, as he felt the standard of storytelling was not as good as it should be within the industry.[30][31]

Naughty Dog requested the game be focus tested on female players as well as male, after the research firm it was working with was planning on running it by male gamers only. Druckmann explained how the studio stepped in after discovering the notion of polling female gamers for their take in the game was not on the table. He said that "another aspect that influences how a game is promoted is focus testing. Players are rounded up and are asked to view materials and answer some quantitative and qualitative questions about it." He added: "My big surprise during this process is that the research group wasn't planning on focus-testing female gamers - it's something we had to specifically request. I hope this is a relic of the past that will soon go away."[32]

Marketing

The game was first teased before the Spike Video Game Awards on November 29, 2011, with a billboard in Times Square mentioning a PlayStation 3 "exclusive you won't believe".[33] Initial trailers showed an apocalyptic event, including riots, epidemic, quarantine, and violence, as well as a clip of the BBC's Planet Earth showing an ant infected with Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, a dangerous parasitic fungus that usually kills insects such as ants. On December 9, 2011, players of Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception spotted an in-game reference to the aforementioned trailer with the newspaper headline "scientists are still struggling to understand deadly fungus".[34] Druckmann and Straley later said that Naughty Dog had actually meant to remove the cheeky clue from Uncharted 3, but simply forget it was there.[35]

Sony Computer Entertainment officially unveiled the game, a brand new intellectual property from Naughty Dog, created by a previously unpublicized Naughty Dog development team, at the Spike Video Game Awards 2011. A gameplay trailer, made up of in-game footage,[23] showed a man and a teenage girl fending off other survivors and what appeared to be people with unusual fungal growth before running out into a dilapidated city covered in greenery, reminiscent of the film I Am Legend.[36] Shortly after the unveiling, Naughty Dog co-president Evan Wells posted new details of The Last of Us on the PlayStation Blog:

The Last of Us is a genre-defining experience that blends survival and action elements to tell a character-driven tale about a modern plague decimating mankind. Nature encroaches upon civilization, forcing remaining survivors to kill for food, weapons and whatever they can find. Joel, a ruthless survivor, and Ellie, a brave young teenage girl who is wise beyond her years, must work together to survive their journey across what remains of the United States.[37]

At E3 2012 was the first publicly released gameplay demo for The Last of Us. It introduced a combat scenario to the audience, showing firsthand the tools of the trade Joel and Ellie must use to attempt to defend themselves from a small group of bandits, as well as how the bandits would coordinate and respond based on Joel's current situation and amount of bullets he had.[38] The first official television spot for the game was aired on the season finale of AMC’s The Walking Dead mon March 31, 2013.[39] On May 31, 2013, a playable demo was released via God of War: Ascension disc-owners. The demo features the Outskirts level of The Last of Us in which Joel and Ellie, along with Tess, encounter multiple Infected enemies.[40]

Release

The Last of Us was first officially released on June 14, 2013 worldwide, with the exception of Japan, which released on June 20, 2013.[41][42] Although first stated to be released on May 7, Druckmann later revealed via the PlayStation Blog that the studio had decided to push the release date five weeks ahead to June 14.

“ "The Last of Us is an ambitious project. In many ways it may be Naughty Dog’s most ambitious project to date – brand new universe and cast of characters, brand new tech, brand new genre, not to mention it’s easily the longest campaign Naughty Dog has ever made. As we entered the final phase of development for The Last of Us, we came to realize just how massive Joel and Ellie’s journey is. But instead of cutting corners or compromising our vision, we came to the tough decision that the game deserved a few extra weeks to ensure every detail of The Last of Us was up to Naughty Dog’s internal high standards. As a team we pride ourselves on setting a very high quality bar for every aspect of our games – gameplay, story, art, design, technology and more. We want to make sure The Last of Us raises that bar even further – for ourselves, and most importantly, for you, our fans.The extra wait will be very short and your patience will be rewarded. Update your calendars. You won’t even have to change seasons. The Last of Us will be available June 14th, 2013. Until then, know that we will be working extremely hard to deliver an experience that matches your high expectations."[43] ”

—Neil Druckmann, creative director

Retail editions

Contents of Post-Pandemic Edition

Exclusive to North America was the Survival Edition, which included a steelbook edition of the game, full-size hardcover artbook by Dark Horse Comics, and the first issue of the The Last of Us: American Dreams comic also published by Dark Horse. The Sights and Sounds DLC Pack and a Naughty Dog sticker sheet were included as well.[44]

Exclusive to GameStop locations in the United States was the Post-Pandemic Edition. It included a twelve-inch premium statue of Joel and Ellie by Project Triforce, a steelbook edition of the game, The Last of Us: American Dreams first issue comic, Sights and Sounds and Survival DLC packs, and a Naughty Dog sticker sheet.[44][45]

Exclusive to Europe was The Last of Us: Ellie Edition and the The Last of Us: Joel Edition. They came with character themed steelbook cases and Blu-ray Discs, screen print effect posters, DualShock 3 controller skins, and LittleBigPlanet player character costumes. Miniature The Last of Us artbook and first issue comic editions were included also, as well as the Sights and Sounds and Survival DLC packs.[46]

The Last of Us is also available in a digital edition, downloadable on the PlayStation Store. It features a unique download installer that let the player start the game only halfway through the download process.[47]

Downloadable content

There were two bonus downloadable content (DLC) packs that were included with certain pre-ordered editions. The Sights and Sounds Pack included the official game soundtrack composed by Gustavo Santaolalla, The Last of Us Dynamic Theme for the PlayStation 3, and two winter Joel and Ellie avatars. The Survival Pack featured bonus XP for the multiplayer, in-game cash for the multiplayer, special customizable items for the multiplayer, a multiplayer melee attack booster, and bonus skins for Joel and Ellie for after the singleplayer campaign is completed.[48]

On May 28, 17 days before release, community strategist Eric Monacelli of Naughty Dog posted on the PlayStation Blog showcasing the Season Pass. The pass includes reduced price access to three unreleased DLC packs, of which the first will be single-player, a first for Naughty Dog, with the other two for multiplayer maps and other expansions. It also gives the player access to a few helpful single-player bonuses for their firearm and physical abilities, as well as to the downloadable 90 minute developmental documentary Grounded: Making of The Last of Us.[49]

Comics

A four-issue comic book miniseries titled The Last of Us: American Dreams, written by Druckmann and illustrated by Faith Erin Hicks, was published by Dark Horse Comics. The comics serve as a prequel to the game taking place a year before the events in the game and chronicles the journey of a younger Ellie and another young survivor Riley.[50] The first issue was published on April 3, 2013.[51] In a show of demand for the comics and the game, the first issue sold out and a reprint was made available on May 29, 2013. The second issue of the comics was also published on the same day.[52][53] The third issue was published on June 26, 2013.[54] The fourth issue will be published on July 31, 2013.[55]

Soundtrack

The Last of Us (Video Game Soundtrack)
Soundtrack album by Gustavo Santaolalla
Released June 7, 2013 (2013-06-07)
Genre Soundtrack,Classical,Acoustic
Length 56:21
Label Sony Computer Entertainment

The music score was composed by the two-time Academy Award for Best Original Score winner composer Gustavo Santaolalla.[23] The team wanted to focus on emotion with the soundtrack rather than horror. The main theme is acoustic guitar-led, an arpeggiated figure in a minor key over tribal percussion, building to a dissonant climax of fiercely-strummed chords. The score has received critical acclaim since its release.[56] Many of the instruments in the score feature Santaolalla himself on guitar and other instruments. The orchestral portions of the score were recorded at Ocean Way Studios in Nashville by the Nashville Scoring Orchestra. It was released on iTunes on June 7, 2013[57] and it is included as pre-order DLC in The Last of Us' Sights & Sounds DLC Pack.[58]


Reception

Reviews

 Reception
Aggregate scores
Aggregator Score
GameRankings 95.12%[59]
Metacritic 95/100[60]
Review scores
Publication Score
Computer and Video Games 10/10[61]
Edge 10/10[62]
Electronic Gaming Monthly 9.5/10[63]
Eurogamer 10/10[64]
Famitsu 38/40[65]
Game Informer 9.5/10[66]
GameSpot 8/10[67]
GamesRadar 5/5 stars[68]
GamesTM 9/10 [69]
GameTrailers 9.8/10[70]
Giant Bomb 5/5 stars[71]
IGN 10.0/10[72]
Joystiq 5/5 stars[73]
Official PlayStation Magazine (UK) 10/10[74]
Polygon 7.5/10[75]
VideoGamer.com 10/10[76]
Destructoid 10/10[77]
Machinima.com 10/10[78]

The Last of Us received universal critical acclaim, with a total of 42 perfect scores from gaming publications, its surpassed the record of Uncharted 2 which had 39 perfect scores.[79][80] The game holds a score of 95 on Metacritic and a 95.05% on GameRankings.[59][60] The review aggregator Metacritic rated it as the best PlayStation 3 game of 2013, as well as being the third highest rated PlayStation 3 game (alongisde LittleBigPlanet, Red Dead Redemption and Portal 2), and behind 2008's Grand Theft Auto IV, 2009's Uncharted 2 and 2011's Batman: Arkham City. The Last of Us has also become the second highest rated PlayStation 3 title of 2013 at GameRankings, behind BioShock Infinite.

Edge gave the game a perfect 10/10 rating, stating that "Naughty Dog has delivered the most riveting, emotionally resonant story-driven epic of this console generation. At times it's easy to feel like big-budget development has too much on the line to allow stubbornly artful ideas to flourish, but then a game like The Last of Us emerges through the crumbled blacktop like a climbing vine, green as a burnished emerald."[62] Eurogamer gave the game a perfect 10/10 ratings, stating that "at a time when blockbuster action games are sinking into a mire of desperate overproduction, shallow gameplay and broken narrative logic, The Last of Us is a deeply impressive demonstration of how it can and should be done. It starts out safe but ends brave; it has heart and grit, and it hangs together beautifully. And it's a real video game, too. An elegy for a dying world, The Last of Us is also a beacon of hope for its genre."[64] Good Game's hosts Steven O'Donnell and Stephanie Bendixsen both gave the game a perfect 10/10, making it only the ninth game in the show's run (2006–present) to do so.[81]

Empire gave the game a perfect 5 out of 5 score, stating that "The Last of Us is not just the finest game that Naughty Dog has yet crafted and an easy contender for the best game of this console generation, it may also prove to be gaming's Citizen Kane moment, a masterpiece that will be looked back upon favourably for decades".[82][83] PlayStation Official Magazine also gave the game a 10 out of 10 score, calling the game "a work of art in which amazing sights and sounds fuel an emotionally draining, constantly compelling end of days adventure."[84] IGN's Colin Moriarty gave another perfect 10.0/10, calling The Last of Us "a masterpiece, PlayStation 3's best exclusive and an absolute must-play."[72] In a 10/10 review from Destructoid, Jim Sterling praised the game as a complete package, writing "there is more to The Last of Us than just combat and "emotional" story tropes... The Last of Us had achieved everything it needed to achieve in order to provide me with everything I wanted."[77]

Although overall positive, Polygon's Philip Kollar was more critical of the game, noting that the game restricted itself to the conventions of the third-person shooter genre, forcing players to clear all the enemies in area at certain points, which Kollar found to be jarring in comparison to the rest of the game. Kollar also described the combat as "messy" and that the player was constantly forced to restart from checkpoints.[75] GameSpot's Tom Mc Shea, giving The Last of Us 8/10, also criticized this final point, highlighting the way checkpoints were far too frequent, which spoiled the tension as the player never truly felt as though they were in jeopardy.[67]

Sales

In the United Kingdom, the game debuted at number one in the sales charts and has so far stayed there for six weeks straight, equaling records set by FIFA 12 and Call of Duty: Black Ops II.[85][86] The Last of Us also topped the charts in the United States, France, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Denmark, Spain and Japan.[87][88][89][90][91][92][93][94] The game sold 1.3 million copies in the first week,[95] and 3.4 million copies worldwide in three weeks,[96] making it the fastest-selling PS3 game of 2013.[97]

Awards

The Last of Us won multiple awards after the E3 2012 showing:

Honor Awards Presented by Date
Best PS3 Game Best of E3[98] IGN 02012-06-06June 6, 2012
Best of Show Best of E3 2012[99] PlayStation Universe 02012-06-11June 11, 2012
Most Anticipated Game
Best of Show Destructoid: Best of E3 2012[77] Destructoid 02012-06-06June 6, 2012
Best PS Game
Best of Show Best of E3 2012[100] Machinima.com 02012-06-12June 12, 2012
Best of E3 Best of E3 2012: Editor's Choice[101] GameSpot 02012-06-06June 6, 2012
Best PS3 Game Best of E3 2012[102] G4TV 02012-06-06June 6, 2012
Best Sony Exclusive Best of E3[103] Digital Trends 02012-06-06June 6, 2012
Best PS3 Exclusive Best of E3[104] Game Informer 02012-06-13June 13, 2012
Best of E3 Best of E3[105] The Electric Playground 02012-06-12June 12, 2012
Best of Show Best of E3[106] The Telegraph 02012-06-12June 12, 2012
Most Valuable Game Most Valuable Game of E3 2012[107] GamesRadar 02012-06-12June 12, 2012
Best of Show Best of E3 2012[108] Electronic Gaming Monthly 02012-06-11June 11, 2012
Best PS3 Game
Editors Choice Award:E3 2012 Editors Choice: E3 2012[109] The Verge 02012-06-12June 12, 2012
Best of E3 2012 Best of E3 2012[110] Yahoo! Games 02012-06-12June 12, 2012
GameRevolution: Best of E3 2012 Best of E3 2012[111] GameRevolution 02012-06-12June 12, 2012
Best Overall Game Best of E3 2012[112] Cheat Code Central 02012-06-11June 11, 2012
Most Anticipated Game
Best of Show Best of E3 2012[113] Game Critics Awards 02012-06-26June 26, 2012
Best Console Game
Best Original Game
Best Action/Adventure Game
Special Commendation for Sound

References

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External links
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Uncharted
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