The Last of Us PS5 PlayStation 5 1

We’re getting déjà vu, because once again The Last of Us series is subject to another damaging leak. How this keeps happening to Naughty Dog’s flagship franchise is hard to understand, but the very real reality is there’s well over a month until The Last of Us: Part I launches, and we’ll have probably seen the release in its entirety by then. At least there can be no spoilers this time around.

No, in fact, it certainly appears that revisiting The Last of Us Remastered will provide you with much the same experience, because based on the several minutes of gameplay we’ve seen thus far, this is stretching the definition of a “remake”. The Californian developer has spoken at length about “modernised gameplay”, with some staffers exclaiming on social media that the action now matches The Last of Us 2.

Does it really, though?

To be fair, we’re seeing a very sloppy leaker fumble through some early combat sequences from what may not be the final build, so we shouldn’t draw too many conclusions from it. But the dodge and dive mechanics from the sequel don’t appear to exist, and frankly we’re not seeing a massive difference in the AI or encounter design. Honestly, it looks the same – even down to Ellie carelessly running around.

The Last of Us PS5 PlayStation 5 2

We’re willing to continue to give Naughty Dog the benefit of the doubt until it presents the game properly, but we’re beginning to worry now. It always felt curious how Sony led with cutscenes from the supposed remake, as they don’t exactly impress next to the pre-rendered footage from the original game. But the team kept reiterating on Twitter that this has been a huge endeavour and that the gameplay has been upgraded, so we remained optimistic.

But now, with these leaks, we’re beginning to ponder whether the developer has been keeping actual combat footage quiet because it’s not the leap forward it has led us to believe. It still has over a month to state its case, of course, and a confident and assured presentation could help the developer wrestle back control and put many of these concerns to bed. But the race is now on; at this rate, we’re probably going to end up with full-length livestreams within weeks.

The Last of Us PS5 PlayStation 5 3

The game does look better, there’s no doubt about that – footage of Tess, in particular, is visually striking. But with an eye-watering £69.99/$69.99 asking price, and multiplayer removed from the original release – well, we’re not all that impressed overall. Not at all. We just hope that these leaks aren’t representative of the final product, otherwise those “not a cash grab” quotes are going to come back to bite the developer in the butt.

And hard.

How are you feeling about these The Last of Us: Part I leaks? Were you expecting the gameplay to look a lot different, or does the footage align with what you anticipated all along? See if you can survive the comments section below.