The Bibliographical Variants Between The Last of Us and The Last of Us Remastered

Abstract

Adopting Matthew Kirschenbaum’s terms for the description of born-digital texts and electronic records—layer, version, release, object, state, instance, and copy—I present a case-study of The Last of Us and The Last of Us Remastered that reveals some of the secretive publishing and manufacturing practices of the videogame industry, and suggest a potential way forward for the description and citation of PS3 and PS4 videogames released on Blu-ray discs and digital downloads through the PS Store. I only discuss the platform-specific knowledge of Sony Computer Entertainment and their PS3 and PS4 consoles and videogames, specifically the editions of The Last of Us and The Last of Us Remastered. However, in doing so I provide a close reading of The Last of Us texts that furthers our knowledge and discussion of the bibliography of videogames. Such an approach draws out the minutiae critical to developing a field of research around the bibliography of videogames that may not be as perceptible in a much larger macro analysis of born-digital texts and electronic records. However, such macro-analysis studies, or distant-reading projects, will be essential in the future if the field of bibliography is to develop systems of documentation for the bibliography of videogames and other born-digital texts and electronic records.