Playing Part 1 again – seeing Joel and Ellie find comfort in each other and grow closer throughout the horrors they witness – with the knowledge of what happens to these characters in the sequel is heartbreaking.ĭivisive … The Last of Us Part 2 Photograph: PlayStation In Part 2, Ellie and the rest of the cast grow harder, more callous, more deadened to each others’ humanity with every hour that passes.

I found it riveting – it’s far from subtle, but I’ve never played a game that went to such lengths to examine the violence that people do to each other, and to humanise the “enemy” and their motivations. Released in 2020, its unpleasant storyline about cycles of retribution did not land with some players and critics, who thought it was a needlessly violent and dispiriting spectacle. He’s not a good man we know this long before the ending. This time around, I related a little more to Joel, as the parental figure in this story.

(I’d forgotten how funny this game can be, but Ashley Johnson plays Ellie so brilliantly and with such superb light sarcasm.) Back then, I thought Joel was a typical gruff male video-game protagonist: he was a foil, and most of the time I wished that I could be playing Ellie instead. And after having experienced a real pandemic, the whole setup hits differently.įirst time around, I related powerfully to Ellie, the traumatised but openhearted and wryly hilarious teenager who shares this adventure with Joel. I wasn’t a parent when I first played those jaw-droppingly awful opening scenes, in which Joel’s young daughter dies in the first hours of the fungal zombie pandemic that devastates the world. Personally, playing it again has made me think about how the world (and my own life) have changed in the last decade.

It really does look and feel like a modern game. People have praised Naughty Dog’s dedication and attention to detail on this remake. (If you haven’t played it, or the 2020 sequel: I’ll be talking about them in some detail, so best to skip this section if you want to avoid spoilers.) There’s been a lot of justified grumbling about whether a nine-year-old game – which has already been remastered for the PlayStation 4 – can justifiably be sold again for £70 for most players, no graphics upgrade could ever be worth that much. I ’ve been playing The Last of Us Part 1 this week, a PlayStation 5 remake of Naughty Dog’s landmark horror classic, first released in 2013.

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