[Nirolak]

Alright, I just finished reading through the magazine.

The Last Of Us Details:

-Releasing in "Late 2012". This date is listed by Game Informer at the start of the article. [Update: Sony says that is speculation.]

-The main campaign is singleplayer.

-There will be multiplayer:

The Online Question With all of these human factions scavenging through the cities, it's not that hard to imagine what online multiplayer could look like in The Last of Us. Though Naughty Dog isn't prepared to discuss specifics, game director Bruce Straley at least admits it exists. "We're going to have some sort of online component," he says. "we're working on a bunch of ideas, but we haven't nailed anything down. We definitely know it's going to be awesome."

-First described scenario: Joel and Ellie are driving in a pick-up truck and see a road that is blocked off into a single narrow passage. Someone clutching their stomach comes running up and asks for help. Ellie asks if they're going to stop and help, but Joel says they're actually looters who want to steal their stuff, so they try to drive on past them, causing the scavengers pull out guns and start shooting at them. Joel and Ellie almost get away, but just before they do, but their truck is hit with a city bus, knocking it into a storefront. Joel and Ellie get forcefully pulled out of the truck by the scavengers and a big fight erupts, and then the description just stops. This is presumably the hobo scene we seen in the screenshots.

-The second team came about due to constant requests from both internal and external studios to license their engine. However, the engine doesn't have a toolchain or documentatin set to facilitate that, so the only way to leverage their technology on a second game was to create a second team. The other reason was that they didn't want to lose their staff to other companies because of career ceilings or burnout from working on too many Uncharted games, so creating a second team let them promote a lot more people and let them work on something new. As such, the second team was created. Unlike many other multi team developers, Naughty Dog's teams are actually completely separate, so staff doesn't move between the two projects.

-The look of the game was inspired by "Ruin Porn", which is a branch of photography where people take pictures of ruins that have been overgrown by nature.

-Gustavo Santaolalla is composing. He worked on Brokeback Mountain and Babel.

-The second team was originally considering making a Jak & Daxter sequel along with some other unnamed ideas. The Jak & Daxter idea was explored quite extensively, and Game Informer will have more about it on their website. However, they felt the direction they wanted to go as a company would end up making a poor Jak game, so they ultimately shelved the project. I don't want to put this in the OP since it's about The Last Of Us, so I'll link to it here.

-The game is built around the idea of expanding the Drake/Tenzin relationship into a full game concept.

-The game's plot setup: Ellie is a 14 year old orphan who lives at a bording house in a military quarantine zone and is fascinating with relics of how the world used to be (like CDs and books), and constantly gets herself in trouble. Joel is in his late 40's and smuggles guns and drugs to and from the quarantine zone. The issue with this is that the zone is guarded by military checkpoints, and if you're found to have any signs of the fungus during one of their frequent body scan, you're executed immediately. The fungus also transfers by air, but it needs a high concentration of spores in a confined space to do so, which is why you don't see everyone wearing masks. The game starts with Joel agreeing to smuggle Ellie out of the safe zone for some unknown reason, but things go wrong and the military starts chasing him. He was going to abandon Ellie, but a dying friend asked him to escort her to safety, so he does. They try hiding, it fails, and thus start fleeing West across the entire country. Their relationship is supposed to be like the ones you see in True Grit or Road to Perdition.

-Second described scenario: They describe a combat scene which makes the game seem pretty melee heavy where you're primarily fighting with things like bricks, fists, and wood planks. Bullets are very scarce, but kill enemies in one shot. The weapons you have and the events of combat also effect the behavior of the AI, which is explained in a later bullet point. Plot wise, in this scene Joel and Ellie beat the scavengers who attacked them.

-The game sounds like a hard M rating. Here a snippet of what happened during that fight: "Joel elbows his attacker and turns the tables. He slams the man down on the glass shard and he comes up sputtering with blood pouring out of his throat."

-Everyone swears constantly during combat, especially Ellie. Expect to hear "motherfuckers", "fuck", "fuck face", and other such terms as often as you do in Battlefield 3, or perhaps even more.

-The game's plot is self contained, so were this game to bomb and the franchise die, you won't have to worry about a cliff hanger ending. They didn't directly rule out sequels though, but just said that they think about one game at a time. However, earlier in the article, they refer to this as a "new IP that we're definitelyl going to be supporting".

-The AI and game dynamic is explained a bit more. They want it to be like No Country For Old Men, so a single bullet will kill, but you have very few bullets to give it a "realistic" feel to the setting. The AI also uses a "balance of power" system, where they will stay in cover and try to flank you if you have a gun, but if they see you only have a melee weapon, they will rush you and try to overwhelm you with numbers. They also react based on other events that are happening. They get angry when their friends die, they warn each other when in danger, and they get frightened when they've lost the upper hand. Also, during combat you can do things like hitting people with a heavy object such as a thrown brick, which will stun them for a bit and let you get some melee hits in with something like a wood plank. This can also happen between the two characters, with Ellie throwing the brick to let Joel move in with the plank.

-The game has health packs and it takes time to use them, so the added lethality of your weapons goes both ways. This is to encourage you to avoid direction confrontation as much as possible.

-They're focusing on Ellie's AI a lot because they want her to be part of the combat. She gives you warnings and helps you out of jams, and her combat capabilities grow over time, though they didn't say how. Game Informer points out she has a gun on the cover. They're trying to make it so she doesn't become an escort question like burden though, as they feel no one would enjoy that.

-Third described scenario: After defeating their attackers, they find their resource stash behind a garage door. Ellie asks Joel how he knew this would be a trap, and Joel mentions that he's been on both sides of this ruse before (as in, he's jumped and killed people for resources himself with this trick). Ellie asks if he's killed a lot of innocent people, and Joel tries to dodge the question. Ellie says she'll take that as a yes, and he says to take that however she wants. Joel and Ellie then start walking toward a nearby bridge, which is the entry to a quarantine zone. They see tons of cars filled with bullet holes and dead bodies inside them. Ellie asks if it was more scavengers, but Joel says it was most likely the military, because they knew they couldn't let everyone inside the quarantine zone, and by killing all these people, they would have less infected to deal with.

-There will be platforming and puzzle solving in the final game. These were not seen in the demo, but will involve the dynamic of having two characters. However, these events will be grounded in reality, so you won't get wild jumping actions like Nathan Drake does.

-You will be facing humans more frequently than infected, as humans are the focus of the game. That's why none of the infected were shown in the demo.

-The game will also have (location-type and NPC-type spoilers) suburbs and rural areas. Also, not all humans you find will be hostile. Some will actually help you.

-They assert that once again the game is about the characters and their relationship, not the whole infected thing, which is why they showed the infected up front.

-They rest of the screenshots are very similar to things we've already seen, so I won't bother describing them. Just imagine the events described above in the same art style as the screenshots.

Here are the ones from the last thread since I'm locking that.

The Story And Environments Of The Last Of Us http://www.gameinformer.com/b/featur...ast-of-us.aspx Its a video interview btw.

Why Audio Matters In The Last Of Us

Throughout our month of coverage for The Last of Us, the team at Naughty Dog has stressed the importance of subtlety and intensity both in the story and gameplay. Phil Kovatz is the man responsible for setting that tone with the audio of the game. As the audio lead for The Last of Us, Phil plans on using audio not only to submerge players in the world but also to have a significant impact on how they engage the enemies of the game. Watch the video below to learn how Phil Kovatz's work on everything from God of War 3 to Flow has prepared him to take advantage of the new sound propagation tech to make sure that the audio for The Last of Us leaves a lasting impression.

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/featur...ast-of-us.aspx

[linko9]

"Everyone swears constantly during combat, especially Ellie"

That's unexpected...

Still not sure what to think about this game, but I guess it seems cool.

[Boken]

"Everyone swears constantly during combat, especially Ellie" That's unexpected... Still not sure what to think about this game, but I guess it seems cool.

Yeah I hope theres a point to that...

[Dresden]

I wonder if he's going to bunny drop that girl.

Looking forward to this. They could do some interesting things with online. Hopefully.

[Qwomo]

Game sounds great on paper, I have to admit.

edit: what's up with that truck in the last pic

[MotorbreathX]

Damn this looks like Uncharted. I know, I know. Same developer, but damn, character models all look almost the same.

Anyways, as long as it's good it don't matter, right?

[iNvid02]

i dont think there is anything that would make me not buy this now

[24FrameDaVinci]

Give it to me.....

[KareBear]

The premise of the infected but not quite zombie humans is similar to the comic series Crossed and the novel Biohazard has similar fungus infected humans aswell.

[Meisadragon]

-The game has health packs and it takes time to use them, so the added lethality of your weapons goes both ways. This is to encourage you to avoid direction confrontation as much as possible.

Now I'm very interested in the game. Also one hit kills are very welcome compared to the bullet sponge enemies of Uncharted- truly enhances the 'survival' feel.

Also, 2012 release!

[bigboss370]

they have ideas for multiplayer that they haven't nailed down yet, but the game is still expected to come out end of this year? interesting.

[Raonak]

good to hear about the scarcity of firearms.

feel a little dissapointed the infected arent the main focus, but i guess it'll make every encounter with them more freaky.
-much like in re4/5 the sheer amount of zombies you kill just made them seem like weak cannon fodder. while the early RE zombies didn't have numbers, so when you saw one, you took caution.


loved uncharted, so hype.

[Antioch]

"-Everyone swears constantly during combat, especially Ellie. Expect to hear "motherfuckers", "fuck", "fuck face", and other such terms as often as you do in Battlefield 3, or perhaps even more."

Everything except for this sounds great, can't wait for the E3 demo.

Also are they sticking with 2012 as a release date for now? They said it might be early 2013 before, didn't they?

[CoffeeJanitor]

Sounds pretty great. Hopefully ND can pull it all off in the final product.

Its probably going to be hard to pull off one shot death, though. They'll have to make the AI predictable.

[Nirolak]

"-Everyone swears constantly during combat, especially Ellie. Expect to hear "motherfuckers", "fuck", "fuck face", and other such terms as often as you do in Battlefield 3, or perhaps even more." Everything except for this sounds great, can't wait for the E3 demo. Also are they sticking with 2012 as a release date for now? They said it might be early 2013 before, didn't they?

That's what the Game Informer article lists.

They could be wrong.

[ULTROS!]

Hyped that Santaolalla is composing.

[chris.trejo]

Wow I really like the idea of little ammo and more melee combat and the fact that the infected aren't the main focus of the game.

Edit: Wait does this mean that people don't get infected by contact with other infected people and only through air borne spores?

[Instro]

I wonder if he's going to bunny drop that girl. Looking forward to this. They could do some interesting things with online. Hopefully.

I won't fall for your trap.

They are saving that for the sequel of course

[Antioch]

That's what the Game Informer article lists. They could be wrong.

I guess Sony would want this game out for the end of the year to boost their line-up going up against the Wii U and Halo 4.

[Anteater]

The AIs part sounds promising! I hope they can pull it off

[Kusagari]

Swearing part makes sense since they want to make this seem real.

People swear constantly in crazy and threatening situations.

[Snuggler]

Dang, sounds pretty great. I like that ammo is scarce, it'll keep the game from being too gun-focused.

[Antioch]

Swearing part makes sense since they want to make this seem real. People swear constantly in crazy and threatening situations.

I just hope they execute it well, if they botch it it'll sound bad and could ruin the experience somewhat.

[shadyspace]

One-shot kills sound really cool. That could be super satisfying, nothing ruins gun combat in games for me more than bullet sponges. Shit, I should get a PS3.

[Kaltagesta]

Sounds pretty great. Hopefully ND can pull it all off in the final product. Its probably going to be hard to pull off one shot death, though. They'll have to make the AI predictable.

Why's that?

[Leon Belmont]

And this is only for PS3?

[NBtoaster]

Ellie sounds a lot like Alyx (except age).

In concept at least. Helping with combat and obstacles, fighting zombies and military, constant companion with good AI..

Probably end up very different in the game though. *shrug*

[Nirolak]

And this is only for PS3?

Yeah, Naughty Dog is a wholly owned subsidiary of Sony.

[Leon Belmont]

Yeah, Naughty Dog is a wholly owned subsidiary of Sony.

OMG that's why the game looks AWESOME!!!

I'll buy on first day! :D

[John Dunbar]

i don't want ellen page to be a potty mouth. :(

[Natiko]

Sounds pretty good, glad to hear the shooting won't be a big focus as that's the worst aspect of Uncharted.

[Anteater]

Sounds pretty good, glad to hear the shooting won't be a big focus as that's the worst aspect of Uncharted.

Were the platforming and puzzles really that good in the uncharted games?

[Irish]

Sounds pretty damn interesting. I wonder if my new subscription will start with this issue or next one. I never should have let that run out.

[Antioch]

Is there any word on stealth elements? It would be cool if you could attempt to sneak past infected or scavengers if you don't have a good weapon available.

[Nirolak]

Is there any word on stealth elements? It would be cool if you could attempt to sneak past infected or scavengers if you don't have a good weapon available.

Um, if they exist, I didn't see it mentioned, but with the way the game is set up, it's quite possible.

What's in the OP though is a fairly complete description of the article, so if it isn't there, it most likely wasn't mentioned.

Well, that or it was part of the really lengthy description of the gameplay demo which mostly focused on conversation, detailing the areas they were in, and descriptions of beating people's faces in with planks.

I'll add the fact that you can throw and item to stun a person though and then go in for an attack.

[Callibretto]

One-shot kills sound really cool. That could be super satisfying, nothing ruins gun combat in games for me more than bullet sponges. Shit, I should get a PS3.

They said one bullet could kill, not that every hit will be one shot kill, even uncharted have one shot kill if you score a headshot.

That said, with focus on ai how enemies can get scared etc, it could be that you can disable enemies even if you didn't managed to score a headshot. Realistically, a guy wouldn't keep coming at you if they got shot at all

[Buckethead]

I love teen swearing.

It's my favorite.

Stand By Me, E.T., etc.

[Natiko]

Were the platforming and puzzles really that good in the uncharted games?

The puzzles were insignificant, easily done with little thought required. Uncharted is more of a thrill ride experience than a fundamentally good game.

[Anteater]

I hope the enemies won't have infinite ammos, would be interesting if enemies will actually try to get to you and get a clear shot of you and run away if they run out of ammos. (and if you still have a gun)

[TripOpt55]

Sounds really cool. Especially the combat. Really excited for this game.

I am curious to hear what else GI has to say about the Jak sequel they explored. That is my favorite series... was always hoping they might do another. Sorry that part is kind of off-topic, but it caught my eye.

[plainr_]

I'd smash my Vita to play this game early.

[gundamkyoukai]

Sound good so afar , can't wait to see a vid of gameplay for it .

[snack]

Tourettes confirmed.

[Carl]

-There will be multiplayer:

i look forward to pretending it doesn't exist.

Just make sure there are no online trophies

[Anastacio]

-The second team was originally considering making a Jak & Daxter sequel along with some other unnamed ideas. The Jak & Daxter idea was explored quite extensively, and Game Informer will have more about it on their website. However, they felt the direction they wanted to go as a company would end up making a poor Jak game, so they ultimately shelved the project.

Shoot me. =;(

Anyway, I'm excited for The Last Of Us, a lot!
Oh, and it sounds like everything I want a game to be.

[toddhunter]

All of that sounds good to me. One of the few games I'm interested in at the moment. Lets hope they deliver (and going by their past efforts I have faith they will)

[sevenchaos]

This all sounds really good. Although I think I'd rather have another Jak game. Oh well.

[Callibretto]

honestly, with the existence of military and Joel used to be smuggling guns in the past, you think there would be plenty of guns and bullet in this world, probably locked by the military sure, but seems obvious that Joel will have confrontation with military sooner or later therefore will have access to more guns whenever he managed to get one of them.

[Antioch]

Um, if they exist, I didn't see it mentioned, but with the way the game is set up, it's quite possible. What's in the OP though is a fairly complete description of the article, so if it isn't there, it most likely wasn't mentioned. Well, that or it was part of the really lengthy description of the gameplay demo which mostly focused on conversation, detailing the areas they were in, and descriptions of beating people's faces in with planks. I'll add the fact that you can throw and item to stun a person though and then go in for an attack.

"-The game has health packs and it takes time to use them, so the added lethality of your weapons goes both ways. This is to encourage you to avoid direction confrontation as much as possible."

Actually I think this sounds a bit like you can sneak past enemies. I guess it could be a whole 'player choice' kind of thing where you can tackle situations in different ways depending on your ammunition and health.

Everything sounds really promising, probably my most anticipated game at the moment.

[Replicant]

-You will be facing humans more frequently than infected, as humans are the focus of the game. That's why none of the infected were shown in the demo.

Not sure if I like that. It makes it sound more like Uncharted than survival horror, which is what I want this game to be.