I’ve never enjoyed fightingThe Last of Us' zombies nearly as much as I do its human enemies. Clickers are frustrating to deal with because they can one-hit kill you, and the rest of the undead crew move so erratically that it can be tough to gauge whether you’ll be able to take them down without breaking stealth. But strangely, tacklingThe Last of Us Part 2 Remasteredon hard for the first time, I’m finding my encounters with the Infected significantly easier than my bouts with the Wolves and Seraphites. Humanity is finally living up to its reputation as the most dangerous game.
About a week ago, I reached Ellie’s first encounter with the Seraphites. You know the one where a whistle pierces the night right before an arrow pierces Ellie’s flesh? The one where she has to pull the sharp projectile out of her skin and avoid making noise, all while evading her attackers' torchlight? It’s a stressful scene, but I made it through that bit fairly quickly, and was reminded how much more stressful it can be to navigate the level that follows.
The parking garage is one of the most memorable levels in the game, with four daunting stories of stealth, surrounded by shady plant life that the Seraphites rigorously patrol. On hard, getting into the building unseen feels like the stealth game equivalent of Saving Private Ryan’s storming the beaches of Normandy sequence. Every time Ellie lifts her head, you hear the threatening audio cue notifying you that someone is about to see you. Usually it isn’t immediately obvious who it is, where they are, or how to get out of their line of sight.
Playing on hard has forced me to lean into the “action” part of “stealth-action” more than usual. I typically play a game like The Last of Us Part 2 as a bit of a perfectionist, carefully assessing a combat situation before I fire my first arrow, then keeping things as low chaos as possible as I pick the rest off one-by-one. But lately I’ve been throwing bricks and bottles constantly, tossing Molotov cocktails, setting proximity mines in the paths of unsuspecting pooches, and writing checks that my ammo stashes can’t cash. The parking garage, more than any other section, forced me to go loud early. I tried it over and over, attempting to sneak an arrow into an unseen guard’s head, but the bushes seemed to have eyes. Every time I thought I had brought down a Seraphite out of sight, one of their buddies would materialize out of nowhere and start shooting at me.
Surprisingly, none of this has me wanting to knock the difficulty down to normal. Stealth games are one of the few genres where I actually believe in my ability to meet a challenge head on, and so far, I am. I made it past the Seraphite garage. It took me forever, but I did it. This is the rare case where I don’t mind flushing a few hours down the drain. In fact, it’s bringing me back to my first experience with The Last of Us back in 2016, when I was largely new to stealth games (and generally rusty after a few years off from gaming) and would end up tackling arenas dozens of times before I finally made it through. The mall, where Joel hands Ellie the rifle, is burned into my memory. I attempted it for hours before I finally triumphed.
I’m better at games now, especially stealth games, so that feeling is harder to come by. But, now that I have it, I don’t want to let it go. Even if it means taking twice as long to see the game through to the end.
