11 Fast Facts You Need to Know About The Last of Us Part II

As we inch ever closer to the exciting release of The Last of Us Part II, Sony and Naughty Dog have given us an extended look at the game and an idea of what we can expect from Ellie’s upcoming adventure. Here is a list of quick facts about The Last of Us Part II that we picked up from this week’s State of Play livestream.

• Horses will play a much bigger role in the game: The first game only featured a couple of proper ‘horse segments’ in the Fall and Winter chapters, which were also mainly used to get from one point to another in a linear fashion. With The Last of Us Part II, however, horses will be a lot more involved in the gameplay. It’s still a linear experience, but with larger areas available for exploration, horses become an important mode of transport, and could even be used to escape enemy encounters.
• You can climb walls and use ropes to get around: There were little ledges you could climb over in the first game, and The Last of Us Part II is taking it to another level. Climbing ropes are a new gameplay mechanic added to the sequel, and they add a whole new layer of thought when it comes to exploring environments.
• There are boats: Boats! Speaking of traversal, rowboats will also be available as a mode of transportation at certain points in the game.
• The game will feature seasons again: While it’s not clear what the timeline of the sequel is, the latest State of Play stream did suggest that we’d go through fall and winter in different locales.
• Most of the game takes place in Seattle: While Ellie’s journey starts in Jackson where Tommy’s community is, you’ll spend a lot of time in Seattle and the Pacific Northwest.
• You can pit enemies against each other: Somewhat surprisingly, the first game didn’t really feature any scenarios like this one, but The Last of Us Part II will put you in situations where you have to handle both the infected and human enemies. Instead of going up against both factions, you can use distractions to get them to attack each other.
• The Seraphites are the main religious cult you’ll be fighting: We got a glimpse of them in one of the earlier trailers, but we finally have a name for the group of human enemies Ellie will be fighting in the game. Known as the Seraphites or the Scars, this is a group of religious zealots that’s out to kill Ellie.
• The infected have evolved: The Shambler is a brand new type of infected enemy introduced in The Last of Us Part II. It looks a lot like the Bloater, but is well-equipped with even more armor.
• You’ll have to kill dogs: Human enemies will be accompanied by guard dogs, which can sniff out your scent and even find you when you’re in hiding.
• You can re-establish stealth even after being spotted: Whether this actually works as intended remains to be seen, but if it does, this would be a massive improvement over the first game where all the enemies seemed to share a hive mind once you were spotted and could immediately converge to your location without fail.
• Weapon upgrades are more detailed now, and you can craft suppressors: Whenever you add an upgrade or enhancement to your weapon, it’ll be visible in-game. Not only that, you can now craft suppressors to fire off silenced shots. However, suppressors only last three shots, as seen from the UI in the State of Play stream.

From what we’ve seen so far, The Last of Us Part II is shaping up to be even bigger and more ambitious than its predecessor, and these gameplay changes are only going to help make it feel more dynamic. The game is set to be released exclusively for the PS4 on June 19.