Naughty Dog is mostly know for it's Playstation exclusive trilogies, Jak and Daxter, Crash Bandicoot and Uncharted. All of which these games tend to have subtle serious tones with jokes pouring out left and right. Well, if you're looking for this, don't play The Last of Us.This game is as serious as it gets and pulls at all of the emotional heartstrings, while providing some humor and intense gameplay.
For most of the game you play as Joel, a grizzled old man who's life was turned upside-down by a mysterious outbreak that would tear the only family he had left apart. The meat and bones of this game is protecting Ellie, the only known survivor after contracting this mysterious illness.
Now don't take this as a simple zombie survival game, it is so much more than that. The infected are based off of a real like fungal infection that is only known to be found in certain ants. This fungus is called Cordyceps and in this game, creates some very interesting "zombies". I say don't count this as a typical zombie survival game, because the infection is only a plot element, the real meat of this games plot is the father-daughter relationship that occurs between Ellie and Joel throughout this game. The way that Naughty dog has pulled off this relationship between the characters is dynamic. It is not your typical "Oh isn't that cute" kind of touchy-feely story, no they have found a way to tell an amazing story through excellent use of camera editing, dialog and game play. You feel invested in the characters and you feel everything that you would feel as if you really were Ellie or Joel.
The gameplay itself is kind of rinse and repeat, but the way it's done the fights still seem intense and all of the puzzles are done in interesting ways. The fighting either involves, sneaking, shootouts or a rampage of infected. The game encourages the use of stealth, so you can save your ammo, however that is not always the case. sometimes you'll screw up or you won't really have to option to be sneaky. Sometimes it seems like the AI knows where you are for no reason, however this happens very rarely, you need to be very careful. You are almost always accompanied by an AI, who will, more times than not, run out and around and not do things that would typically make sense. This can pull you out of the immersion of the game, however they don't pull the attention of the enemies, if they did the game would be ridiculously difficult. So, I guess the real question is, why not just have it so she hides in the back or something?
All in all I would say, so far, this game is a major candidate for Game of the Year. (I'm hoping for something amazing from Beyond Two Sous!) Looking over the few odd issues, the gameplay is great, the puzzles are challenging enough and the story and plot are just utterly amazing, I say this about very few games. If you own a PS3 then get this game, The Last of Us is a must for every game collection.
