Beginner’s Guide#
What You Are About to Start#
The Last of Us Part I is Naughty Dog’s full remake of the 2013 original, launched on PS5 on September 2, 2022 and on PC on March 28, 2023. You are Joel, a smuggler tasked with escorting Ellie — a teenage girl immune to the fungal infection — across a post-outbreak America. This is not an open-world game and there is no gear-farming system — it is a carefully staged linear journey that tests resource decisions and stealth patience. This page walks you through every setup decision before you begin.
How to Pick Among the Six Difficulties#
| Difficulty | Positioning | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Very Light | Pure story experience | Most generous resources |
| Light | Relaxed experience | The blade master skill is included free |
| Moderate | The standard experience | Recommended for a first playthrough |
| Hard | Resources tighten | Choose this if you know the genre |
| Survivor | Listen Mode off by default | The intel system is fundamentally changed |
| Grounded | The highest difficulty | Listen Mode off, HUD stripped, resources nearly gone |
Three pieces of advice:
- Pick Moderate for your first playthrough. This game’s narrative pacing is its greatest value, and getting stuck on retries seriously damages the experience.
- The core change on Survivor is that Listen Mode is off by default — it is not just fewer resources; the intel system itself is taken away, making the play logic completely different from other difficulties.
- Beyond the six tiers there is a custom difficulty that adjusts resources, enemy damage, and other parameters individually — use it for anything between two presets.
New Modes in Part I#
The two modes added by the remake have nothing to do with trophies; use them purely by interest:
| Mode | Rules |
|---|---|
| Permadeath | Can be set to restart by whole game / act / chapter; manual saving disabled; quitting to the menu counts as death |
| Speedrun mode | A built-in timer for speedrun players |
Permadeath by chapter is the acceptable tier for most players — restarting the entire game is extreme-challenge territory. Neither mode has trophies.
Beyond these, the remake also ships an upgraded photo mode (with three-point lighting and frame-by-frame advance) and a model viewer; after clearing the game on any difficulty, the extras menu unlocks cosmetics, filters, and a set of gameplay modifiers — infinite ammo, slow motion, 8-bit audio rendering, and similar toggles live there. None of it affects the core playthrough; ignore it all on a first run and come back afterward to play.
Basic Controls (Controller)#
| Action | Button | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Move / camera | Left stick / Right stick | Basic movement and view |
| Aim / fire | L2 / R2 | Ranged attacks |
| Melee | Square | Melee weapon or fists |
| Crouch | D-pad down | The basis of stealth |
| Listen Mode | R1 (hold) | See enemy outlines through walls |
| Interact | Circle | Loot, shiv, climb over, etc. |
| Quick craft | D-pad up | Open the crafting menu quickly in combat |
The PC version supports keyboard-and-mouse and the DualShock 4 pad, with remappable bindings. Button layouts are an experience description; the in-game settings screen is authoritative.
Listen Mode Basics#
Hold the listen key and the environment visuals strip away, leaving enemies as outlines — this is the game’s most important intel mechanic. Four basic disciplines:
- Scan with Listen Mode when entering a new area; confirm enemy count and positions before moving
- Your movement speed drops sharply while listening — do not hold it in open ground
- Lootable interactables also highlight; use it while sweeping rooms
- It is unavailable on Survivor/Grounded; never build your playstyle on top of it
Listen range can be upgraded with supplements (3 tiers; costs per the original’s figures are 20/30/50 supplements — whether Part I matches item-for-item was not separately verified). The game publishes no meter figures for Listen Mode; claims like “15m/40m” have no source.
How to Spend Skill Supplements#
Supplements are the currency for skill upgrades; maxing all six skills takes roughly 800 supplements, so a first playthrough should not chase everything:
| Skill | Levels | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Maximum health | 2 | Directly raises your margin for error; first priority for beginners |
| Listen range | 3 | Unavailable on Survivor/Grounded |
| Crafting speed | 3 | Shortens the menu animation mid-fight |
| Healing speed | 3 | Shortens how long bandaging exposes you |
| Weapon sway | 2 | Steadier ranged aim |
| Blade master | 2 | Included free on Light difficulty |
For a first playthrough, prioritize maximum health and healing speed — the game has no XP system, and supplements plus workbench parts are the only two growth lines: supplements cover body and perception, parts cover weapons. The latter totals about 1,620 in a first playthrough’s levels against 2,510 needed to max every weapon, so the shortfall waits for a second run; the tradeoff logic is on the Weapons and Upgrades pages.
Looting Priorities#
Looting is the source of the whole resource economy; clear rooms in this order:
- Drawers, cabinets, tabletops — the main sources of ammo, materials, and supplements
- Bodies — human enemies can be searched for matching ammo
- Kitchens, pharmacies, tool rooms — rich zones for alcohol, rags, and blades
- Dead ends and side rooms — collectibles hide outside the critical path
The full looting checklist is on the Collectibles page.
Crafting Basics: Only Six Recipes#
The single-player crafting list is exactly six items, with materials grouped into alcohol, rags, bindings, blades, explosives, and sugar — ammo is not among them. Being unable to craft ammo is the foundation of the entire resource design; every bullet must be found in the world:
| Recipe | Materials | Use |
|---|---|---|
| Health kit | Alcohol + rag | Restores health |
| Molotov cocktail | Alcohol + rag | Area fire damage |
| Shiv | Binding + blade | Opens shiv doors; consumed on stealth kills |
| Melee upgrade | Binding + blade + melee weapon | Improves a melee weapon’s durability and damage |
| Nail bomb | Blade + explosive | A trap-style explosive that wounds on landing |
| Smoke bomb | Sugar + explosive | Blinds enemies and covers escapes |
The classic beginner mistake is spending all alcohol on Molotovs. Health kits and Molotovs share alcohol and rags — a safe health bar always comes first; recipe details are on the Crafting page.
The Collectibles Panorama#
Part I has ten collectible types including Left Behind; full collection does not affect the story, but several trophies depend on them:
| Type | Total |
|---|---|
| Artifacts & notes | 97 (14 in Left Behind) |
| Firefly pendants | 30 |
| Comics | 14 (1 granted automatically at the start; 13 to collect manually) |
| Training manuals | 12 |
| Optional conversations | 54 |
| Shiv doors | 13 |
| Workbenches | 11 |
| Ellie’s jokes | 6 |
| Workbench tools | 5 |
| Safes | 4 |
The only type with a miss risk is the 5 workbench tools — they must be gathered within a single playthrough to unlock their trophy; everything else can be recovered via chapter select, so a miss never requires rolling back. Locations one by one are on the Collectibles page.
Recommended Starting Settings#
| Setting | Advice |
|---|---|
| Difficulty | Moderate for a first run; pick Very Light/Light to watch the story first and adjust later |
| Subtitles | Simplified Chinese subtitles are supported; leaving them on is fine |
| Custom difficulty | Resources, enemy damage, and more can be fine-tuned individually — the tool for anything between presets |
| Controller / K&M | PC supports keyboard-mouse and DualShock 4; pick whichever feels natural |
PC Opening Notes#
The PC version’s graphics features are not identical to console, and two things are worth knowing before you start:
- Official upscaling features are FSR 2.2 and DLSS, with 21:9 and 32:9 ultrawide support; the PC port’s reputation suffered at launch over optimization (a Metacritic critic average of just 59), so update your GPU drivers and system before starting
- Steam Deck users need the June 2023 v1.1.0 patch to reach Verified status; do not start on an older build
Both keyboard-mouse and DualShock 4 bindings are remappable on PC; console uses the DualSense pad.
Opening Survival Advice#
| Topic | Advice |
|---|---|
| Stealth first | Stealth executions cost nothing — the free replacement for every weapon |
| Ammo discipline | Ammo cannot be crafted; if you can avoid shooting, avoid it |
| Crafting timing | When you see alcohol and rags, think health kit first — a safe health bar is always priority one |
| Melee upkeep | Melee weapons break; spend blades on reinforcement, not on frivolous swings |
| Saving habits | Checkpoints autosave; under Permadeath, quitting to the menu counts as death — be careful |
Death and Checkpoints#
Checkpoints are generous on lower difficulties — death restarts you at the most recent one; on higher difficulties they space out further and a single mistake costs more. Permadeath restarts at whatever granularity you chose (whole game / act / chapter). There are no other penalties — the game has no gear drops or XP, so death’s only price is time and composure.
How Long Is the Campaign#
The main story runs about 12-15 hours across a prologue plus 10 chapters: Quarantine Zone, The Outskirts, Bill’s Town, Pittsburgh, The Suburbs, Tommy’s Dam, The University, Lakeside Resort, The Bus Depot, and The Firefly Lab. It is fully linear with no side-quest system; collectibles sit along the main path and its side rooms, so following the story covers them; the chapter-by-chapter route and collectible spread are on the Areas page.
Difficulty and Trophies#
Part I’s trophy list is a brand-new design of 29 trophies, and none of them are difficulty-gated — the Platinum only requires clearing one playthrough on any difficulty, estimated at 10-15 hours. Beginners chasing the Platinum never need to touch Survivor/Grounded: enjoy the story on Moderate, grab collectibles as you go, and decide on extreme difficulties afterward. The full trophy list is on the Achievements page, and the extreme-difficulty special is on the Grounded page.