The Last of Us development team, GDCA 2014 (cropped)

The Last of Us ''The Last of Us'' is a 2013 action-adventure game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment. Players control Joel, a smuggler tasked with escorting a teenage girl, Ellie, across a post-apocalyptic United States. ' ...

'' is a 2013

action-adventure game The action-adventure genre is a video game hybrid genre that combines core elements from both the action game and adventure game genres. Typically, pure adventure games have situational problems for the player to solve to complete a story ...

developed by

Naughty Dog Naughty Dog, LLC (formerly JAM Software, Inc.) is an American first-party video game developer based in Santa Monica, California. Founded by Andy Gavin and Jason Rubin in 1984, the studio was acquired by Sony Computer Entertainment in 2001. Gav ...

and published by

Sony Computer Entertainment Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE), formerly known as Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE), is a multinational video game and digital entertainment company wholly owned by multinational conglomerate Sony. The SIE Group is made up of two legal co ...

. Players assume control of

Joel Joel or Yoel is a name meaning "Yahweh Is God" and may refer to: * Joel (given name), origin of the name including a list of people with the first name. * Joel (surname), a surname * Joel (footballer, born 1904), Joel de Oliveira Monteiro, Brazili ...

(

Troy Baker Troy Baker (born April 1, 1976) is an American voice actor and musician. Baker is known for his video game roles, including Joel Miller in ''The Last of Us'' (2013) and its sequel (2020), Booker DeWitt in ''BioShock Infinite'' (2013), Samuel ...

), escorting the young

Ellie Ellie, or Elly, is a given name, usually feminine. The name stands on its own or can be a shortened form of any of the numerous female names beginning with the syllable El-, in particular Eleanor or Elizabeth and Elvira. It can also be a short fo ...

( Ashley Johnson) across a

post-apocalyptic Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction is a subgenre of speculative fiction in which the Earth's (or another planet's) civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; astro ...

United States. The game's development was led by

Bruce Straley Bruce Straley is an American game director, artist, designer, and studio director. He previously worked for the video game developer Naughty Dog, known for his work in the video games ''The Last of Us'' and '' Uncharted 4: A Thief's End''. Stra ...

and

Neil Druckmann Neil Druckmann ( he, ניל דרוקמן; born December 5, 1978) is an Israeli-American writer, creative director, designer, and programmer who has been co-president (alongside Evan Wells) of the video game developer Naughty Dog since 2020. He ...

, as game director and creative director, respectively. The game was officially announced on December 10, 2011, and was widely anticipated. It was awarded Most Anticipated Game from PlayStation Universe, receiving a nomination in the same category at the

2012 File:2012 Events Collage V3.png, From left, clockwise: The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia lies capsized after the Costa Concordia disaster; Damage to Casino Pier in Seaside Heights, New Jersey as a result of Hurricane Sandy; People gather ...

Spike Video Game Awards The Spike Video Game Awards (in short VGAs, known as the VGX for the final show) was an annual award show hosted by American television network Spike from 2003 to 2013 that recognized the best computer and video games of the year. Produced by ...

. Following its previews at the

Electronic Entertainment Expo E3 (short for Electronic Entertainment Expo or Electronic Entertainment Experience in 2021) is a trade event for the video game industry. The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) organizes and presents E3, which many developers, publisher ...

, the game won numerous awards, including Best of Show from several

gaming publications Video game journalism is a branch of journalism concerned with the reporting and discussion of video games, typically based on a core "reveal–preview–review" cycle. With the prevalence and rise of independent media online, online publicat ...

. It was released worldwide on June 14, 2013, for the

PlayStation 3 The PlayStation 3 (PS3) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment, Sony Computer Entertainment. The successor to the PlayStation 2, it is part of the PlayStation brand of consoles. It was first released on Novemb ...

, and in July 2014 for the

PlayStation 4 The PlayStation 4 (PS4) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Announced as the successor to the PlayStation 3 in February 2013, it was launched on November 15, 2013, in North America, November 29, 2013 in ...

Review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

assigned the game a normalized score of 95 out of 100, indicating "universal acclaim", based on 98 reviews. Within three weeks of its release, ''The Last of Us'' sold approximately 3.4 million copies, and seven million by July 2014, becoming one of the

best-selling PlayStation 3 games This is a list of video games for the PlayStation 3 video game console that have sold or shipped at least one million copies. As of March 31, 2019, a total of over 999.4million copies of PlayStation 3 software had been sold worldwide. List ...

. ''The Last of Us'' garnered awards and nominations in a variety of categories with particular praise for its story, sound and music, graphical and artistic design, and the acting of its cast. At the 10th British Academy Video Games Awards, the game received ten nominations and went on to win five awards: Best Game, Action & Adventure, Audio Achievement, Performer and Story. The game earned thirteen nominations at the 17th Annual

DICE Awards The D.I.C.E. Awards (formerly the Interactive Achievement Awards) is an award show in the video game industry started in 1998 and commonly referred to in the industry as the "video games Oscar". The awards are arranged by the Academy of Intera ...

, winning ten, including Game of the Year. At

IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...

's Best of 2013, the game garnered thirteen nominations and went on to win ten awards, including Game of the Year, Best Overall Action-Adventure Game and Best Overall Sound. At the 14th Annual

Game Developers Choice Awards The Game Developers Choice Awards are awards annually presented at the Game Developers Conference for outstanding game developers and games. Introduced in 2001, the Game Developers Choice Awards were preceded by the Spotlight Awards, which were ...

, ''The Last of Us'' won Game of the Year, Best Design and Best Narrative. The game received seven nominations at the Spike VGX, with Troy Baker winning the award for Best Voice Actor and Ashley Johnson winning the award for Best Voice Actress. At the

Game Audio Network Guild Awards The Game Audio Network Guild Awards (shortened to the G.A.N.G. Awards) is an award show that celebrates excellence in video game audio. The awards, which started in 2004, are arranged by the Game Audio Network Guild and held annually during the ...

, it received nine nominations, of which it won four: Audio of the Year, Sound Design of the Year, Best Audio Mix, and Best Dialogue. The game also appeared on several year-end lists of the best games of 2013, receiving Game of the Year wins from ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was fo ...

'', '' Good Game'',

Kotaku ''Kotaku'' is a video game website and blog that was originally launched in 2004 as part of the Gawker Media network. Notable former contributors to the site include Luke Smith, Cecilia D'Anastasio, Tim Rogers, and Jason Schreier. History ...

, and VideoGamer.com, among many others.

Accolades

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Accolades received by The Last of Us, List of Last of Us, The The Last of Us