Oh, The Clickers...

I started playing a new PS3 game a few days ago...well, okay, it's not really a "new" game, but it's new to me, darn it!

Last year, The Last of Us came out as a PS3 exclusive. The game received tons and tons of praise from critics and gamers alike...and of course, I had no idea it even existed until about a week ago. (I think this is probably a good moment to offer the disclaimer that I was too busy with more important things to keep up with the latest and breaking news in the gaming world...and it's at least quasi-true!)

Having just finished up Beyond: Two Souls, I decided it was finally time to look into getting a new game to play. I'm the sort of person that usually buys a game that looks like something I'd like to play, has a few good reviews online, or something that was recommended by a fried. But something happens from the time I leave the store with the game that I'm overly excited about and the the time that I get home...I hardly ever play the games that I buy! Make any sense? Yeah, it doesn't make sense to me either...

(By the way, the ending that I got for my first play through of Beyond was fantastic! I know that there are at least 24 possible endings, if you count character variations...really don't see myself playing the game through another 24 times...will definitely be looking for YouTube videos of them later though...)

The Last of Us showed up on several lists of games that are considered to be similar to Beyond and Heavy Rain...and my brother and gamer friends all said that they've heard that the game is fantastic. My brother said that he had watched someone play through a bit of the game and that it would be a good one for me to tackle next.

The brief rundown of  the story: you play as Joel in a post-apocalyptic, urban setting. Something has gone terribly awry, an unknown (at least unknown to me at this point) fungal invasion has taken place and all of the requisite chaos for a zombie apocalypse is all over the place. Eventually, you meet up with a young girl, Ellie, and you're tasked with escorting her to safety. 

At this point, my expectations are for a heavily story-based game with some aspects of horror that can't be avoided, due to the nature of the story. So, imagine my surprise when I'm just kind of bebopping around, checking out the mechanics of the game and learning the controls when...

Holy crapballs! What is that?!?

I kid you not, I jumped off my couch when this guy got a hold of me. 

Turns out that the fungal invasion does bad things, very bad things, to it's less than willing human hosts. After various stages of infection, the host turns into what the game refers to as "Clickers." AKA the embodiment of terror itself. On top of these guys looking grody, they can be quite the formidable foe to deal with. The nature of the fungal infection causes the host to eventually lose their sight (umm, yeah, I'm thinking that a gigantic mushroom protruding from you face could do that) and they navigate their world with echolocation. Yep. Like a bat...a horrifying, will om-nom-nom your face while you mess your pants, bat. 

This drastically changes my gameplay strategy (which is usually something like mashing all the buttons until the bad guy goes bye-bye)...one false step can bring a horde of these mushroomy nightmares running for the all-you-can-eat Joel buffet. It doesn't even have to be a step! The game's mechanics rely on sound so much more than any game I had played before, it takes some getting used to, but it's actually quite brilliant! In real life (please please please don't ever let there be a fungal monster invasion!) that's pretty close to how it would be, you would HAVE to be careful about how loudly you walked if you're being pursued by something that was as sensitive to sound as the Clickers appear to be. Did you accidentally break the glass in that rickety old trophy case? Bam! Your face just got eaten. Did you forget to turn off your flashlight earlier and decide to absentmindedly turn it off when you know there are half a dozen Clickers literally around the corner? Bam! Face sandwich. 

I'm probably a little over an hour into the game (I choose to not say how long it's actually taken for me to get this far in the game...I don't do well with shooters, or horror, or being scared in general) but I can't wait to see what happens as the game continues. If anyone has played it before and has any tips for a scaredy cat gamer, do share!!