Monstrous Music & Games > RPGs and Gaming

The Last of Us - June 2013

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Jake:
The Last Of Us, due for release June this year, takes the survival-horror genre another step forward. Developed by Naughty Dog (Uncharted, Jak and Daxter, Crash Bandicoot) this 3rd-person shooter is set in a post-apocalyptic urban environment 20 years after a fungal plague.

(The fungus idea is not too improbable - it is based on the very real Cordyceps, a group of parasitic fungi containing which changes its victim's behaviour. The most well-known is the species which affects ants, making the ant climb up a stem and lock its jaws to keep it there. From this elevated vantage point the fungus's fruiting body grows out of the victim's body, allowing the spores to be more widely distributed by the wind.)

In the game, a variety of the fungus has infected humans. Nature has been reclaiming its land from abandoned cities. The military has the United States under martial law and is keeping everyone in quarantine zones to stay away from the infection. The quarantine zones have many checkpoints, giving body scans for any signs of fungi. Those found with even remote traces of the fungus are euthanized.

The main character, Joel, is a black market dealer within a quarantine zone.  An (as yet) unknown event occurs forcing Joel and  a young girl named Ellie to escape from the quarantine zone. The game follows them throughout the United States, pursued by the military, scavengers, hunters and "the infected."

Neil Druckmann, the creative director, has confirmed that The Last of Us will also contain multiplayer and it will be "very unique." 

Judging by the screens, and concept art, teased out so far, it looks as though the artists were heavily influenced by the History Channel's Life After People.

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