The numbers are out and not only is The Last of Us Part II is one of the most significant video game releases of the past few years, but it’s also the best selling PS4 launch title of all time in the U.K.
Physical copies of the game in the U.K. have outsold every title ever for the Playstation 4 console, and it broke the previous record for launch copies sold by another Naughty Dog game — Uncharted 4, which was released in 2016. According to sales charts reported by GI.biz, The Last of Us Part II beat the previous record by 1%.
Those numbers do not take digital downloads into account, so the total figure could be different. It also makes The Last of Us Part II the best selling game of the year in the U.K., beating out Animal Crossing: New Horizons on the Nintendo Switch by 40%.
The sales are indicative of the popularity of the franchise as a whole, and the first game in the series is widely considered a modern masterpiece. Its popularity doesn’t just exist in the video game world, either. There’s a Last of Us podcast and an HBO series in development from Johan Renck, who directed Chernobyl.
The new game is also much darker than the first, but fans are still eager to continue the story of protagonist Ellie, and Joel, her grizzled father figure in the story.
Digital Trends gave the game a 5-star review and named it an Editors’ Choice title.
“The Last of Us was lauded for its emotional narrative that left players reeling, and Naughty Dog’s sequel finds a way to expand on that. The Last of Us Part II is a gut punch in the best way,” the review notes.
The game has not been without controversy, and several spoilers were leaked before its release, involving various plot points and the ending. The Last of Us Part II has also faced review-bombing on the aggregation site Metacritic.
Many users spammed the site with negative reviews hours after its release, which dragged down its user score. The game has a 95 rating and is considered a “must play” on the reviewer side, but the negative reviews outweigh the positive ones by almost 10,000 on the user side.
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