Across the generations, the first-party exclusive ‘prestige game’ has become an important part of the console ownership experience. These large, expensive projects are designed to push the medium to its limits, offering players new experiences with top-tier production values and state-of-the-art technology. Within the upper echelon of studios charged to deliver these halo titles, Naughty Dog has cemented itself as one of the best. The Last of Us Part 2 is the studio’s latest creation and perhaps its most stunning. Beneath its decaying façade lies a gorgeous, beautifully realised experience; it’s a game that applies the multitude of hard lessons learned from prior releases, culminating in delivering Naughty Dog’s largest, most ambitious project to date – but what does that really mean in the context of this game?
Well, when I describe the game as the culmination of the studio’s efforts to date, that’s exactly what I mean. From a technical perspective, it’s difficult to isolate brand new techniques or technologies we’ve never seen before. What you are getting is exemplary execution, right down to the tiniest detail, plus a more thorough exploration of earlier concepts the developers has experimented with in the past. For example, something we couldn’t show in pre-launch embargoed materials is one of the most important concepts that underpins this new game. The Last of Us Part 2 features the largest environments in a Naughty Dog game to date, taking a page from the more open-ended design of Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, but taking the idea to the next level. Character and world rendering have been improved across the board while significant changes have been made to the underlying mechanics enabling a smoother, more enjoyable experience all around.
The original The Last of Us, like Uncharted before it, is a highly cinematic game driven by set-piece moments – it was designed to appear open but it was still ultimately a series of ‘tunnels’. In part, this is also true of the sequel, but the main difference lies in the city itself. Seattle serves as a sort of central pillar around which the game’s more cinematic moments are constructed. Basically, it’s almost akin to a hub, just not in the typical open world sense. At various points throughout the game, your objective involves finding a specific location, but you’re never explicitly told how to get there, nor are you funneled down a specific path.
This is where the game differs from the original – you now have the option to take different streets, explore different buildings and generally experience more of the world at you own pace. There are a lot of places you aren’t required to visit on your journey to the objective, but you will uncover useful supplies and encounters that you could have easily missed. Meanwhile, simple objectives turn into hour-long quests simply by virtue of how open the world is. It’s this aspect that helps the world feel more like an actual place rather than a ‘tunnel’ and it also brings us to our first visual focus – the world itself.
From the smallest details to the largest structures, The Last of Us Part 2 is remarkably dense. Indoors, the game leans on Naughty Dog’s exceptional approach to pre-calculated indirect lighting. The game seems to utilise a probe system combined with light maps and realistic physically-based materials off which the light plays very naturally. The result are most keenly felt in dimly lit interiors that feel remarkably realistic. It’s not perfect, as interactive objects don’t always blend with the baked lighting, but it works overall – most objects sit realistically in the scene with natural ambient shadowing. This is coupled with a supremely high level of detail with a large selection of prop objects crafted and placed around each room, all of the intricately detailed.