The original The Last of Us debuted on the PS3 in 2013 and was remastered for the PS4 just a year after that. Less than a decade from its debut, the game is already being transformed.
The newly christened The Last of Us Part I takes that original experience, which helped make Naughty Dog one of gaming’s most revered studios.
It makes it feel comfortably at home on the PS5; the new version makes the game look and plays much like its controversial sequel.
The Last of Us Part I seems excessive in some ways, given the reasonably young age of the actual, which is still very accessible. So it’s not like the PS4 remaster doesn’t hold up. But after spending some time with the remake — it’s also the best way to experience this classic.
The basics of the contest remain the same as always. It starts with Joel’s harrowing introduction to the zombie — sorry, meaning “infected” — apocalypse before fast-forwarding two decades when he’s introduced to a young girl named Ellie and, after a long trek through hell, forced to make an impossible choice. That story and the standalone prequel Left Behind remain intact in the remake.
If you played the original, there are no surprises here. The gameplay is still a mix of stealth combat, lots of shootouts, and navigating environmental puzzles with plenty of conveniently placed ladders and wooden planks.
But there are significant changes. The most obvious are visual ones. Part I has the kind of graphics you’d expect from a great blockbuster in 2022: incredible water reflections and disturbing gruesome death sequences. In addition, there’s a camera mode, so you can zoom in on Joel’s face and see the attributes of his impressive beard.
The main characters have been narrowly redesigned to seem more lifelike, and the added layer of detail makes the environments a lot more fun to explore as you wring the ruins for supplies, knowing a clicker could pop out at any time. As with most PS5 games, you can also choose between two modes, one of which prioritizes a smooth frame rate, another with an emphasis on visual fidelity.
Even if you don’t care about counting frame rates or more realistic foliage, many changes make the experience feel much more in line with The Last of Us Part II. Which is to say — not dramatically different but a welcome improvement. The controls and UI have been streamlined slightly so that combat isn’t quite so clunky. Though it’s not smooth, there were plenty of times when you fumbled around swapping guns, and you may keep accidentally triggering the photo mode in the middle of hectic fights. But it’s more manageable than the original. Our main advice is to stick to stealth as much as possible, where things work much better than the busy shootouts.
There are lots of other changes, and the ones that stood out the most to us during our playthrough were: the faster load times, which made restarting after a death nearly instant, something you had to do a lot during some of the more intense sequences; the DualSense controller’s adaptive triggers make using the bow in particular very satisfying, though the haptic vibrations felt pretty standard; the 3D audio is so spooky you had to play without headphones on because you might not take the scary clicking sounds; perhaps most significant, Part I features a similarly robust set of accessibility features as the sequel. There’s also a new speedrunning method and more demanding difficulty, but you might not have played around with those yet.
The PlayStation 5 is a video gaming console for home-generated by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Declared in 2019 as the successor to the PlayStation 4, the PS5 was released on November 12, 2020, in New Zealand, North America, Australia, Japan, and South Korea, with a global release following a week later. The PS5 is a portion of the ninth generation of video game consoles, with Microsoft’s Xbox Series X and Series S consoles released in the same month.
The base model comprises an optical disc drive compatible with Ultra HD Blu-ray discs. The Digital Edition lacks this drive, permitting it to serve as a lower-cost model for those who prefer to buy games through digital download. The two variants were launched simultaneously.
The PlayStation 5’s main hardware features include:
- A solid-state drive is customized for high-speed data streaming to improve storage performance significantly.
- An AMD GPU is capable of a 4K resolution display at up to 120 fps.
- Hardware-accelerated ray outlining for realistic lighting and reflections.
- The Tempest Engine allows for hardware-accelerated 3D audio outcomes.
Other features contain the DualSense controller with haptic feedback and backward compatibility with most PlayStation 4 and PlayStation VR games.
If you didn’t like TLOU in the first place, this remake wouldn’t change your mind. It’s still gruesome and dark, a mix of a heart-rending post-apocalyptic story and a sometimes awkward video game. However, the core is the same as always. What this remake does, though, is smooth the transition between the two games in the franchise. Think of it like sanding away the game’s rough edges.
That will likely be important to those who played Part II before the original or the hypothetical brand-new audience that will be introduced to The Last of Us through HBO’s live-action adaptation next year or the standalone multiplayer experience coming. The Last of Us is now a franchise. A remake so early makes a lot of sense within that framework.
Sony has announced a new line of InZone gaming products, which includes monitors and headsets made in the same design as the PlayStation 5, but they are focused not only on console players but also on computers.
The flagship of the new line is the InZone M9 monitor. It is a 27-inch model with an IPS panel, 4K resolution, and a refresh rate of 144 Hz. Response time is 1 ms, and there is support for adaptive frequency technologies for both consoles and PCs. The monitor is compatible with NVIDIA G-Sync. The InZone M9 can receive video signals via DisplayPort, HDMI 2.1, and USB-C.
The monitor has 96-zone local dimming and DisplayHDR 600 certification. The InZone M9 also supports HDR tonal adjustment for automatic image adjustment when connected to the PS5. In addition, the monitor can automatically switch to movie mode when watching videos on streaming services or Blu-ray and return to game mode with minimal input delay when the game session begins.
The InZone M9 should go on sale this summer, with a suggested retail price of $899. It’s a bit strange, but Sony has decided not to complete the monitor with video cables. So the user, in her opinion, will buy the best rope they like.
In addition to monitors, the InZone line also includes gaming headsets. The H9 is a top model, large overhead headphones that can work via a 2.4 GHz wireless connection or Bluetooth. The design of the InZone H9 is not similar to the Pulse 3D. A headset was announced at the same time as the release of the PS5, but the new model looks like a more traditional gaming headset. Sony promises up to 32 hours of battery life and support for digital noise reduction.