How The Success of HBO's "The Last of Us" Could Benefit Gaming Overall

HBO’s Sunday night slot has traditionally been reserved for their biggest, most impactful titles. The Sopranos, Game of Thrones, and other culturally inescapable properties. The shows we spend an entire week discussing in the office or within our social circles in anticipation of the next episode. They are shared cultural events that hold a special place within the zeigeist. These are shows that have served as forerunners and cornerstones of the golden age of high-production television that we currently occupy. That brings me to HBO’s latest adaption of the highly acclaimed PlayStation classic: The Last of Us. It is already being heralded as the greatest video game adaptation of all time. But, if we’re being honest, that bar wasn’t set very high in the first place.

Video games have informed so much of the way I view and understand storytelling, and there are many games I’ve played throughout my life that I would put up against the very best of modern cinema. But you don’t have to be an experienced gamer to know that adaptations are often poorly executed. Whether it be writing, visual effects, or any of the numerous other things that can wrong with a production on that scale, they typically always fall flat. Part of this is because there are many things that don’t translate well between the two mediums. A majority of the biggest storytelling moments in a video game are wrapped in a player’s participation. This is an obvious but important distinction. A cinematic experience can invite you to observe a world or a story, but you are never allowed the opportunity to engage with it actively. Conversely, video games require action in order for the story to move forward, and many story beats happen in subtle ways over dozens of hours of gameplay. Naughty Dog’s 2013 Playstation exclusive, The Last of Us, is a brilliant example of what video games are capable of accomplishing as a medium for storytelling. Co-creators Neil Druckmann and Bruce Straley, along with the entire team at Naughty Dog, developed an incredibly dark, engrossing, and powerful narrative that is only elevated by semi-survival horror. It is considered by many in the gaming community, myself included, to be one of the best, most groundbreaking gaming experiences of all time. It set a higher example for what we expect in story-driven games and was a big part of what helped give us better, more elevated narratives over the past ten years.  

So, when this HBO adaptation was announced, I’ll admit, I was hesitant for the aforementioned reasons. However, The Last of Us has thus far escaped the downfall of its predecessors, benefiting from HBO’s infamous production quality and devotion to good storytelling (with the omission of Season 8 of Game of Thrones). Its format also gives the story time to breathe. As television has quickly taken the reigns from the film industry, there have been more opportunities for projects to explore and develop their characters and develop a mature, cohesive narrative. Despite pushback on several casting decisions, the three episodes we’ve gotten so far have proven themselves faithful to the story we know and hold dear to our hearts. Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey have done a great job of capturing the spirit of the relationship between Joel and Ellie, which has earned enough trust and credibility for the writers and showrunners to further elaborate on things left unexplored in the game – like Bill’s backstory. Episode 3 is easily some of the most beautiful and moving television I’ve ever had the pleasure of witnessing. Feedback from fans and newcomers alike has been (mostly) overwhelmingly positive. So much so that HBO has already greenlit Season 2. This is important for a couple of different reasons, but I would be remiss if I didn’t call out the obvious reasoning behind Sony’s decision to adapt a widely-popular, near-perfect story for television: A) Money,  B) Money, and C) Money.

Now, as irritating as that might be on its face, it isn’t all bad. The way that revenue will be generated is by reaching a wider, untapped audience. Sales for the remastered version of TLOU for PS5 have shot up by 200+% since the premiere of episode one. If you work in advertising or are mildly observant, you know that’s by design. I have several friends, who have never played a modern video game, that have purchased a console for the sole purpose of playing TLOU. All because of their experience with three episodes of a television show. I don’t know what the breakdown is for returning fans and new players, but I still think that’s a powerful sentiment – one that I think bodes well for the gaming industry as a whole. Personally, it’s such a radical shift compared to the social experience I had growing up. Video games were never a cool or hot commodity, and the industry on continues to grow over time. 

Seeing so many people embrace the medium because of a single property is, in my personal experience, unprecedented. Having more eyes on more properties creates the potential for a much wider audience with an appetite for interactive stories. It feels like a net positive all around, and with the announcement of Amazon possibly bringing God of War (2018’s Game of The Year) to their platform. Assuming TLOU is able to deliver on the rest of Season 1, it stands to reason we could start to see additional adaptations of similar quality. Only time will tell. But, for right now, I’m just really excited about what the future holds for the crossover between gaming and television, and what each industry and their audiences stand to gain respectively.