The Last of Us Part II Remastered is a candidate worthy of your attention. Looking past its story (again, its story is incredible) and emotional power, there is enough additional content to warrant a full replay for existing owners. If you’re a new owner, this is no doubt the edition you should be securing to fully immerse yourself in Naughty Dog’s desolate future.
The Last of Us holds an incredibly special place in my heart. Last Christmas (2022), I played The Last of Us Part II on my PS5. My friend Gavin warned me that it would rip me apart and wanted updates after I completed each of its chapters.
He was right. It ripped me apart. By the time I got to the final scene I was inches away from putting down my DualSense because of how I was continuously surprised and shocked by each subsequent in-game event. I was afraid to continue because of how I assumed consequences would follow my actions. At times, Part II felt like the video game version of Casino Royale starring Daniel Craig. Every time I thought the story was done, Naughty Dog ripped the floor from under me. Then, when I finally encountered a rhythm, the game ended. I was left devastated. Everything I thought that would happen didn’t.
In fellow Chump Ben’s review of Part II in 2020, he praised Naughty Dog for crafting another game bursting at the seams with passion, defying player expectations and evolving its gameplay. It earned a perfect 10/10 from us in 2020. When I completed the game for the first time in 2022, I mentally envisioned this game earning a 10/10 from me in its current form. That was then, however.
I sit before you naught more than 32 years of age. Its storytelling is one of the best and emotionally raw I have ever experienced in video game format. In one year’s time, several of my friends have picked up and played The Last of Us Part II for the very first time, some being new converts thanks to the success of the HBO show that premiered in early 2023. For each friend, I was eager to hear their thoughts as they experienced the story and the “gotcha” moments that are frequently successful in reorienting their perspectives like the game did to my own.
I need not spend page space reviewing the story contents of The Last of Us Part II for its remaster, for my thoughts are the same as Ben’s. I would like to add that I remain firm in my belief that Abby Anderson is one of my most favorite video game characters of all time. Laura Bailey’s performance was stellar and her journey is fantastic.
But, there’s more to this review than me waxing poetic about The Last of Us Part II’s story. Let’s focus on the remastered content and any additions. The Last of Us Part II Remaster upgrades the base game, in all its emotionally gripping glory, fit for the PS5’s hardware and DualSense.
Let’s get this out of the way: The game is beautiful on the PS5. The lighting and graphics are better than I remember thanks to advancements to volumetric lighting and ray tracing. When playing in any of the rainy levels, my DualSense ever-so-lightly buzzed with the rain. Cutscenes felt interactive with major moments resonating throughout my controller. Each of my weapons utilized a different tension of the adaptive triggers. Frankly, this is one of the better DualSense implementations I’ve experienced in a hot minute. The remaster felt like it was truly harnessing the PS5’s hardware improvements, justifying its value as a remaster despite it being a few years old.
The major key difference in the remastered base game was its inclusion of commentary from the likes of Neil Druckmann, Halley Gross, Laura Bailey, and Ashley Johnson. If you followed along with HBO’s release of The Last of Us, you may already be familiar with its follow-along podcast hosted by Troy Baker. When I was watching the show, I listened to Craig Mazin and Druckmann discuss their decisions behind the scenes and explain finer details that I missed while watching the show. The commentary in The Last of Us Part II Remastered is quite similar.
I ported by previous completed game from the PS4 base version and replayed the game on New Game Plus (Moderate+ difficulty). During each cutscene, the audio was drastically reduced and replaced with commentary from Druckmann, Gross, and either Johnson or Bailey (depending on who was in the scene at the time). I enjoyed the actresses sharing their experiences on set and their processes in becoming the titles’ protagonists. Druckmann and Gross would often describe their intentions with the story beats, flagging symbols and other elements that I clearly missed when I first played the game. Thanks to the commentary, I learned MUCH more about their universe than attempting to read about it elsewhere online. I loved it during my New Game+ replay.
I know that The Last of Us is not the only cinematic adventure series out there. The Horizon and God of War series are narratively incredible. As is DEATH STRANDING. To my knowledge, these games do not contain commentary from the developers or cast of voice actors who play these roles. These games deserve commentary from those who created the game and breathed life into the stories for players to enjoy. After playing The Last of Us Part II Remastered with commentary enabled, I want all of these games to include commentary or even a documentary. For the case of the former, having that commentary would be a great driver to get me to replay the story and try out New Game +.
Other than the updated base game and commentary, The Last of Us Part II contains Lost Levels, a Guitar Free Play mode, and its No Return roguelike minigame.
When I first heard about the Lost Levels, I was under the impression that they would be included in the normal game or added to the New Game+ experience. This was not the case. In the EXTRAS menu, I was presented with three levels to explore on my own. There were also commentary that could play when I interacted with the multiple floating bubbles in these levels voiced by producers and developers.
The three lost levels were cool to see and experience, but definitely not enough to warrant recommending for existing owners who’re undecided on whether to upgrade or not. I personally enjoyed hearing the commentary and exploring them for the few minutes I could, but the content could be experienced in no more than ten minutes – far less if you turned off the commentary altogether. As someone who’s deeply intrigued in game design, the Lost Levels offer quite the unique glimpse behind the curtain of what was left on the cutting room floor. I’ve spent hours poring over content that was omitted from older SNES, N64, and PS2 games thanks to dataminers who’ve contributed to TCRF.
The Last of Us Part II includes a guitar minigame during Ellie’s chapters. The remaster has pulled that minigame and made it a standalone mode available from the menu for players to enjoy. I recently came across from covers of popular songs that were brought into The Last of Us Part II. I’m sincerely hoping that this mode births many more of those songs – especially since Naughty Dog has added some additional unlockable content in this mode.
The No Return mode is one of the larger standalone additions to The Last of Us Part II Remastered. It functions just like a roguelike you may have played prior to today – you survive multiple waves of enemies in randomized levels until you die or reach and defeat a final boss. When I first started, it felt like a simpler version of Call of Duty’s Zombie mode, but with less militant zombies and a set number of WLF, Seraphites, and Infected.
The mode is fun but quite difficult. As someone who completed New Game+ on Moderate+ (more difficult than Moderate), the mode challenged me in utilizing the scavenging and survival skills I had picked up from the past two base games but with a much smaller arsenal and even fewer perks. In between levels, I was rewarded with some supplements, workshop materials, and tokens to upgrade my perks and weapons and purchase equipment other than my starter pistol. If I died, I lost everything and would have to start over.
After a few unsuccessful runs, I quickly unlocked Gambits (temporary challenges that rewarded some additional currency) and once-unplayable characters. It was wild to play as the likes of Dina and Lev. Aside from feeling slightly different, each character has a specialty and innate perk that allows them to excel in a way that other characters cannot. It felt great to unlock the large cast of characters and test them out, but it took quite a while to meet the necessary criteria to unlock them.
I wasn’t bored by No Return, but I was punished. Sometimes I would screw up and attempt to melee a clicker because a Gambit gave me a bonus for killing someone with a melee weapon. Othertimes I would walk into a trap that was spawned by the level’s negative modifiers. I died a lot…and it didn’t feel like dying that much was worth it. I was unlocking new characters and aesthetic content in each run, but nothing was softening the crushing blow of consecutive losses that accompany the core roguelike gameplay loop. I got tastes of variance progression, but very little mastery progression.
No Return will not be the casual player’s cup of tea. As a roguelike player, I miss the permanent upgrades that make subsequent runs easier and balk at the amount of grinding required to unlock the additional characters and features. Put simply, it requires more investment than full-featured roguelike titles like RETURNAL and Hades. But, knowing that there are quite a few The Last of Us players who love tinkering with settings and using every inch of the world to repeatedly obliterate Infected. No Return will give The Last of Us pros their wants and wishes with a cast of playable characters that were unavailable in the base game.
Is No Return on its own worth the $10 upgrade for current owners? It depends. If you’re simply in it for the story, then I don’t think you’ll get much enjoyment out of The Last of Us in a roguelike setting. But, if you’re deeply invested in Naughty Dog’s universe and are down to stress test the world in a different way than before, there’s little doubt in my mind that you’ll be properly challenged and get countless hours out of this mode.
Now we come to the part of the review where we discuss the remastered aspect. Yes, I know, The Last of Us Part II is under four years old at time of writing. There are a number of folks who will rightfully question how long is “long enough” for a game to be remastered from its release. Should it be a full console generation? Two? Three? Should it be a set number of years?
Skyrim was remastered less than five years from its 2011 release. In the transition from the PS3 to the PS4 era, PlayStation owners were left to purchase Skyrim again. It had very little updates other than a slight graphics bump, an upgraded game engine, and mod support. For PlayStation owners, mod support remains lackluster. What’s worse is that its MSRP was $40. This meant that players were expected to pay for the game, in full, more than once. Sure, there are sales for patient gamers like me, but it stings to pay for something more than once in exchange for a slight bump in hardware and half-baked mod implementations. Despite getting hundreds of hours out of Skyrim, I’m disappointed that I didn’t get anything new from it. I was paying for the same game with a brighter sheen on it.
Skyrim is a fantastic game, don’t get me wrong. I just don’t feel that the remaster between the PS3 to PS4 generations was worth it.
I want to live in a world where remastered titles, no matter how old, are given additional attention, love, and content from the developers to make it worth the additional purchase for existing owners. I want things like unfinished excerpts that were left on the cutting room floor, next-gen polish, additional modes that might or might not be a novelty, and behind-the-scenes glimpses into the minds of those who lived and breathed the game during pre- and post-production. If a title is given any combination of that content at an affordable price point, I don’t see why a remaster is not worthwhile.
Naughty Dog has exceeded the standard in remastering The Last of Us II. Its graphical improvements make Seattle look more desolate and grungier than ever before. The game is near-fully utilizing the DualSense controller, quite near to the extent of RETURNAL and Astro’s Playroom. The cut content and commentary pull the curtain back into the inner workings of Naughty Dog’s development and design teams, letting players interact with partially complete levels alongside commentary from the powers that be who justify their design decisions and thought processes every step of the way. Its No Return roguelike mode is interesting, albeit difficult and great for an arcade-y Last of Us experience.
The best part of all of this? Existing owners can upgrade for…ten bucks. Yup. About the same cost as a fancy latte. From everything I’ve played for the past few weeks (actually, since mid-December!), I have invested another 30 or so hours into replaying the base game and its additional content. I sit before you a fan of Naughty Dog, sure, but I find it hard to believe that those who are fans of this game and willing to replay it will consider the content in this remaster to not be worth the time. If anything, the base game’s upgrades and commentary alone are worth the upgrade. The No Return mode will be icing on the cake!
If you have yet to get The Last of Us Part II, though, the remaster is undoubtedly the version of the game you should purchase for your PS5. Like its remastered predecessor (that was released on PC earlier this year), it offers what should be a standard PS5 experience in the form of DualSense utilization and the classic narrative prowess that SIE has hung their hat on offering players. Unlike The Last of Us Part I, though, the sequel stakes a claim in a darker territory in the heart of Seattle. When you finally reach the end credits, you will feel things. All of the things. Some of the things. One of the things. Pick an emotion out of a hat and you’ll feel it. I assure you, it’s one of the most human and raw stories told in a video game medium. You won’t be the same after playing it.
The Last of Us Part II Remastered is a candidate worthy of your attention. Looking past its story (again, its story is incredible) and emotional power, there is enough additional content to warrant a full replay for existing owners. If you’re a new owner, this is no doubt the edition you should be securing to fully immerse yourself in Naughty Dog’s desolate future.
A copy of The Last of Us Part II Remastered was provided by the publisher for the purpose of this review.
