You probably already know this. Sony's 2013 stealth-action tearjerker "The Last Of Us Part 1" is not running well on the PC version. The performance issues are numerous and significant, and more than a week after its release, they persist despite two patches from developer Naughty Dog and a driver fix from Nvidia.

It shouldn't have been this different; the weight of the Bella Ramsey and Pedro Pascal meme spawned by the animated TV adaptation of The Last Of Us has the servers of the Internet reeling. The coincidental timing of the PC release should have been a chance to not only play the famous classic in its best form, but also to enjoy it as a companion piece to the much-talked-about HBO series.

Not so. Instead, it's a battle against a shader cache that takes longer to load than an unoptimized console emulator downloaded from a corner of a retro gaming internet forum. There is a review on the game's Steam page that says the two-hour refund period expired before it finished building the shaders, but this is no joke. Fortunately, Steam has made an exception and is offering refunds to players who purchased TLOU, no questions asked. This just goes to show how bad this launch situation is.

I installed this game three times on two different systems and the fastest I have seen TLOU complete a shader build was 40 minutes. The slowest was after the game's 1.0.1.6 patch, which took over 2 hours; I have seen users with RTX 4090s report that shader builds took over an hour.

What happens if you don't wait for the shaders to finish building" My experience is a Last Of Us flip book: with both the RTX 2080 TI and 3060, performance levels were very low and unplayable with incomplete shader caches. And even if the slower frame rate was tolerable, the graphical clutter across the screen was truly unbearable. In one cut scene, Joel's hair and eyebrows became square block colors. In another scene, Sarah's bedroom became a nightmare of floating objects. Once the shaders were compiled, I did not notice any visual glitches. Basically, waiting is essential.

On high graphics settings and above, this game is the best looking ever. However, the frame rate on medium settings on either system is inconsistent and, frankly, not very enjoyable during combat sequences. Switching between presets did little to alleviate the choppiness, and with the exception of the low preset, the frame rate did not improve dramatically.

What I did notice, however, was that my CPU was absolutely hammered while running the game. My 2080 TI was running at 100% system resource capacity, but more worryingly, my i7 9700K (hardly a 64-core monster, but rarely a bottleneck in the other games I play) was also running at 99% or 100% the entire time, as was system memory It was. This is a recipe for freezes and crashes. To be fair, I have only experienced CTDs during alt tab operations, but freezes are much more commonplace in the streets of Boston. Also, please don't get me started on load times.

All of this means that the game is technically playable at launch, but not enjoyable. In fact, with a few patches and driver updates it will be enjoyable.

Sony's other PC ports have been exemplary recently, and while the shaders in Horizon: Horizon: Zero Dawn are not particularly rushed to compile, the problem is not as pronounced as here. Given the fact that this PC port was specifically delayed to allow time for further optimization, it is, well, puzzling.

One can also see the detail and effort that went into this version. The audio settings are quite extensive in the game's options menu, and the adjustments to the graphics options are not as clear and immediate as the handy GDDR capacity counter in, for example, "Resident Evil 7: Resident Evil Village," but they are not lightweight parameter It is not a set. The problems occurred not because no one checked to see if the game worked properly, nor because the developers were not diligent and hardworking. Yet, here we are.

Let's talk about the game. When this game was released in 2013, I happened to be on staff at Official PlayStation Magazine UK; back in 2013, urban areas "regenerated by nature" were as ubiquitous as the bow and arrow. But what made it immediately stand out, nonetheless, was its focus on people, and the incredible effect it had on them.

The impact of TLOU's mature tone has waned in 2023, in part because Naughty Dog's dialogue scripting and performance capture style has become so influential. While that famous intro played, we all said to each other, "This could be a movie or a TV show." Sarah wakes up alone in her uniquely compelling house, pacing half-asleep amidst the sirens and strange noises outside. With hardly a word, "TLOU" stands on its real-world setting and assures us that there are no eyebrow-raising developments here like in "Uncharted."

Like another 2013 blockbuster, "BioShock Infinite," this is a study in paternity. Unlike the former, with its endless loops and bearded men playing their fathers, Joel's narrative is stripped down, raw and messy. That is what the apocalypse does best, as it sets the stage by stripping away all extraneous noise from life, leaving only the essentials. And most troubling of all, how to preserve our humanity.

Joel is grieving. He has used his grief to seal his emotions and do what he needs to do to survive. Until he is put in charge of smuggling a 14-year-old girl who reminds him of his daughter. Then his long dormant paternal love awakens and he and you are pulled in two directions. With each battle, you shed a little bit of your own humanity to protect Ellie.

You really have that feeling, both then and now. What is particularly striking is that while you can get so emotionally involved in the early stages of the game, the mechanical game offers little to nothing to entertain you. The first two hours of the game are spent walking from point to point with someone walking beside you, explaining the world and moving ladders into place. The game may have a BAFTA, but "Uncharted" entertains on a mechanical level.

When TLOU demands more than a deft forward tilt of the left stick, the combat gives you options. You can either charge in with your shotgun and wreak havoc, or you can scamper between cover, put a homemade shiv into someone's unprotected neck, and cause, well, more quiet chaos. Metal Gear Solid 5 is not, nor has it ever been, but the quality of the animation and the weapon and item crafting system elevate it above the typical meat-and-potatoes action game combat.

Of course, the fights were never stylish. You are not a doom guy flying around with elaborate melee moves synchronized to deathcore breakdowns. You are a guy in a stinky shirt doing what you are absolutely compelled to do by the situation in which you are placed. As such, the combat is never flashy and rarely particularly satisfying. And that, coupled with the unforgiving color scheme of "Manchester on a rainy Monday morning," made me distance myself from TLOU a little more than most.

It remains an important part of the game's history. This was a pivotal moment, a moment when the triple-A developer decided to tell the story in as cinematic and mature a manner as possible, while focusing on the subtleties of the performers. A slight break in the voices. A lingering gaze. Unspoken words. Truth be told, I didn't care much for fireflies, giraffes, or the long list of desperate survivors who betray Joel and Ellie. But I have always respected their consistent tone.

It's a shame that a review of "The Last of Us" has to be such a low point. It feels as if we are slamming "Citizen Kane" because its Blu-ray capabilities are not up to standard. But the state of the PC version is not merely disappointing or frustrating. Behind all the problems lies an all-timer, but on the current PC, this just doesn't click.