The Last of Us Part 2’s exploration of Seattle from the perspectives of Ellie and Abby is filled with a lot of instances where characters must determine how to traverse environments. Abby doesn’t necessarily have the city mapped out by heart despite residing in Seattle. Otherwise, she probably would’ve known better about the Seraphites’ shortcuts and passageways, or which areas were occupied by infected. Still, Ellie’s three-day Part 2 adventure in Seattle is certainly entertaining as she’s bravely wading into lush greenery without knowing precisely how to get around the Washington Liberation Front or the infected that lurk in Seattle’s subway tunnels.
Day 3 for Ellie in The Last of Us Part 2 is highly climactic as she and Jesse part ways, foreshadowing that she’ll be unable to relinquish her quest for revenge at the cost of a close relationship, and on her lonesome she endeavors to rob the Wolves of their speedboat in the middle of a flooded mall and pursue Abby at the aquarium. Naughty Dog’s Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet may not necessarily share a lot of the same DNA with The Last of Us, but if it’s thinking of inheriting some of its gameplay features at all there is likely an ideal way it could adapt Part 2’s speedboat and give it a fantastical sci-fi makeover.
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The Last of Us Part 2’s Speedboat Sequence is a Boon for Exploration
Carving through each Wolf or choosing to sneak by, particularly via pockets of deep water players can swim through to circumnavigate or flee, Ellie eventually reaches the speedboat. Like the generator players had to fill with fuel from the courthouse garage to enter the East 2 checkpoint gate on Day 1, the speedboat’s engine is turned on with the same mini-game of well-timed triangle inputs before riding out into flooded streets that now behave like raging rapids in Seattle’s forecasted storm.
There are a couple of ‘docks’ players can hop out at for optional loot (including a tucked-away safe), and there’s a suspended train players can climb into for a sniper’s vantage point on a group of Seraphites. Then, players reach an arcade and discover a bloater there feasting on another infected. This whole speedboat sequence is quite dynamic, heightening exploration beyond the moseying around that they’ve been doing in Seattle, and such exploration via something comparable should find a way to segue into Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet.
Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet Could Ditch a Ship for a Speeder
Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet’s Jordan A. Mun has a Porsche spaceship that reportedly doesn’t last long before it crash-lands on Sempiria. So, with space flight seemingly out of the picture and Intergalactic possibly adhering to Uncharted and The Last of Us’ action-adventure linearity, Naughty Dog’s newest IP may have Jordan exploring the rich environments of a mysterious planet via the shoelace express.
That said, if Intergalactic has wider zones like in The Last of Us Part 2’s Seattle Day 1 or even simply wants to make linear exploration more dynamic, it could realistically take The Last of Us’ speedboat mechanics and repurpose them for something in the same vein as a landspeeder or hovercraft.
Jordan’s ship is shown to house a ton of amenities, and it wouldn’t be surprising at all if she has stashed a bike-esque vehicle on it that she could then ride around on. Such a gameplay feature could even lean more toward the speeder Kay Vess rides in Star Wars Outlaws, and perhaps it wouldn’t be accessible in every environment to ensure that players are still strolling leisurely and are aware of tiny details, let alone any scattered note artifacts that Naughty Dog is sure to litter Sempiria and Intergalactic at large with.
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 89 /100 Critics Rec: 90%
- Released
- January 19, 2024
- ESRB
- M for Mature: Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Nudity, Sexual Content, Strong Language, Use of Drugs
- Developer(s)
- Naughty Dog
- Publisher(s)
- Sony Interactive Entertainment
WHERE TO PLAY
- Engine
- Proprietary Engine
- Franchise
- The Last of Us
- PC Release Date
- April 3, 2025
- PS5 Release Date
- January 19, 2024
- Genre(s)
- Action-Adventure
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 5
- OpenCritic Rating
- Mighty
- PS Plus Availability
- N/A
