In an anniversary announcement on Twitter earlier this day, Naughty Dog stated that they have now sold over 17 million copies of the game. The game was first released in the US 5 years ago and made a huge splash on the market. The game was well-received due to its fantastic storytelling and relentless gameplay.
Today is the 5th Anniversary of The Last of Us’ release. Over 17 million of you have taken this journey with us and your love, support, and fandom for these characters and their story has been incredible. We can’t wait to continue it with Part II. pic.twitter.com/dES9bBDa4W
Advertisement— Naughty Dog (@Naughty_Dog) June 14, 2018
The game first came out on the PlayStation 3, which sounds like ages ago. The game became a huge hit and sold 7 million copies within its first year. After the PS4 came out, the game was ported to the PS4 as a remastered version where it continued selling copies. It’s pretty crazy for a game to sell an additional 10 million copies after the first year that it came out. For most games, the first year often defines how well a game will do. While selling 7 million copies in the first year is definitely not bad, 17 million is a whole other story.
The bump in sales most likely occurred due to multiple reasons. First of all, The Last of Us remastered came pack in with the PS4 as a must play title. This meant that players that bought the PS4 + The Last of Us version would immediately be able to play the game. Another reason was the announcement of the second game in 2016. Often when sequels to games gather a huge amount of hype on the internet, people who never played the first part tend to check it out for themselves. I wouldn’t be surprised if a large number of players decided to pick up the game after seeing trailers for the sequel.
