Both suffer bullet wounds before falling down a hill. Sarah and Joel continue to make their way out of Austin, but they’re stopped by a soldier who’s ordered to fire on them. However, they’re quickly separated as Tommy deals with a group of the infected. Along the way, they meet up with Joel’s brother, Tommy. Joel and Sarah quickly make it out of their house and onto the streets to head across the quarantine line. Cars crash, buildings crumble, and gunshots sound as the military forces its way into suburban Austin to find and exterminate anyone who’s outside of the quarantine zone. Joel, a single father in his late 20s, is celebrating his birthday with his daughter, Sarah, when alarms start going off.
Our story opens in 2013 in a small house in Austin, Texas, where we meet a single father and his 12-year-old daughter. government abolishes its structure in favor of a civilian government that’s closely watched by the military. When the World Health Organization isn’t able to produce a vaccine, the U.S. CBI is first discovered in 2013 before it quickly spreads and infects over 60% of the world’s population. The Last of Us is based around a fictional pathogenic fungus that causes Cordyceps Brain Infection (CBI). We’ll talk more about the Fireflies throughout our plot summary, but just know that they’re paramount to the narrative. government, the Fireflies joined arms to find a cure for the infection and restore the three branches of the U.S. In a revolutionary response to the militaristic state imposed by the U.S. Fireflies Sony Interactive EntertainmentĪt the center of The Last of Us is a paramilitary group known as the Fireflies. Once a part of nature, the fungus will distribute airborne spores to infect others. Finally, in the fifth stage, the human host is used up by the fungus, and it grows into the environment. Without eyesight, clickers, as they’re referred to in the game, use echolocation to find more hosts.īeyond that, we have bloaters, which grow armor-like plating and distribute infectious spores through grenade-like projectiles. In the third stage, the infected lose their eyesight as the fungus creates a wedge in the center of the skull. Those in the second stage of infection are called stalkers. The second stage is mostly the same, though the fungus grows more heavily over the face. These zombies still maintain their eyesight but will stop at nothing to infect others.
In the first stage, the host loses all control over their body and becomes a runner. The infected in The Last of Us are infected with a similar pathogenic fungus, one that was able to make its way to humans. The premise of The Last of Us is based on a fungus known as ophiocordyceps unilateralis. This fungus, predominantly found in tropical forests, hijacks the bodies of ants and alters their behavioral patterns. Sure, they’re zombies, but their roots are more grounded in reality than you may think. Throughout your journey, you’ll have multiple encounters with the infected. The infected Sony Interactive Entertainment We’ll talk about the characters as they’re introduced in the story, but a few of them run the length of the plot. Further readingīefore diving into the overall story, there are some names you should be aware of. It should go without saying, but there will be spoilers in this article, so you’ve been warned! We’re going to talk about every detail in The Last of Us. We won’t, however, discuss any of the leaks for The Last of Us Part II. This primer is aimed at those who haven’t played the first game, as well as those who played it all the way back in 2013 and need a refresher.