You haven’t yet seen the last of them!
This might be the guiding principle of developer Naughty Dog recently, because, as of yesterday, there’s a whole new way of experiencing the story of The Last of Us Part II: Remastered.
There’s a new, free update to TLoU2 which introduces the Chronological Mode restructuring the way the game’s story is told. Instead of non-linear, flashback-intensive plotting, this new mode will, well, do exactly what it promises, putting the events in the order they actually took place.
Naughty Dog’s blog post about this new update mentions how they hope this new structure will change the reception of the story, highlighting close calls, emphasizing certain strings of cause and effect, and more. It certainly feels like an interesting experiment, especially for a game as strongly story-driven as The Last of Us 2.
The blog admits that reshaping how the stories of Ellie and Abby flow together wasn’t easy. For the accomplishment, it gives credit to both the developers working internally for Naughty Dog and to Nixxes, the development studio specialized in making PC ports of PS games.
This new mode is the latest method the Naughty Dog studio uses to keep the series fresh and accessible. On the video game front alone, both entries received remasters (the latest being The Last of Us Part II Remastered from January 2024) and ports to PC, bringing in a whole new audience to the previously PlayStation-exclusive license.
The sequel also received an infinitely replayable roguelike survival mode No Return, recontextualizing familiar locations and setpieces as lethal challenges remixed, given new objectives, and playable as different characters.
Speaking of the No Return mode, if you complete the game in Chronological, you’ll unlock two skins for Joel and Tommy, dressing them up as Nathan and Sam Drake (respectively) from ND’s Uncharted series.
There’s also, of course, the warmly received TV show produced by HBO, which counts as not just one of the best video game adaptations in recent memory, but also as a great show in its own right, making more people interested in the series. There are two seasons already available, and the third is currently in the works.
As the Naughty Dog nears its 40th anniversary, this kind of care for its lasting legacy does make a whole lot of sense.
For now, the Chronological Mode is currently available for both PS5 as of Patch 2.1.0, as well as PC (Steam and Epic) via Patch 1.5. The patches also include some technical fixes, for good measure.