We already knew about The Last of Us Part II thanks to last E3’s trailer and the PlayStation Experience announcement from 2016. At this year’s PlayStation E3 2018 conference, we were treated to a lengthy 10-minute plus demo featuring actual gameplay. But the most talked about thing from the demo (and possibly all of E3) is The Kiss.
The stealth-action demo is book-ended with an older Ellie (Ashley Johnson) enjoying a quiet moment at a social dance. It’s revealed that she’s in a relationship with another young woman, Dina (Shannon Woodward).
It cuts to Ellie in a harrowing encounter with a group out in the wilds, using stealth, evasion, and dodging to survive. The violence is brutal, with detailed and bloody attack animations. Human enemies are much more advanced, using communication to spread-out and check possible hiding spots, like Ellie under a truck. Interestingly we still haven’t seen anything of the Clickers, the fungal zombies that caused the end of the world.
The demo returns to the scene between Ellie and Dina, and the two share a romantic kiss, causing Ellie to blush and grin. The level of detail, realism, and human emotion is far more compelling here than any of the violent action.
Not only did Sony kick off their press conference by showing two women kissing, but it was incredibly well done.
The Last of Us Part II still doesn’t have a release date, so expect 2019 at the earliest. As a Sony published title, it will remain a PlayStation 4 exclusive.
