Naughty Dog released The Last of Us nearly eight years ago, yet some players are just now stumbling across a well-hidden Cordyceps Easter egg that pops up early in-game. Both entries in The Last of Us series are chock-full of neat Easter eggs. In the first game, players will run into PlayStation 3 consoles a handful of times. Meanwhile, The Last of Us Part 2 features at least one PlayStation Vita Easter egg.
That fans are still able to find previously unseen, or at least very rare, Easter eggs in the original installment seems to be a testament to Naughty Dog's noted attention to detail. Such a trend is likely to continue as time gets away from The Last of Us 2's June 2020 release, though players have been diligent in searching every nook and cranny for even the subtlest of teases. Just recently, in fact, someone unearthed a neat Supernatural Easter egg in TLoU2.
Anthony Caliber, a YouTuber and speedrunner who specializes in The Last of Us, recently shared a video wherein he unlocks a rare Cordyceps Easter egg found in the franchise's first installment. The Easter egg was brought to Caliber's attention by a Discord user, but some fans claim this particular detail has surfaced in the past. Evidently, it's not widely known. Players can find the Easter egg in question early in TLoU, after Sarah wakes up and starts searching for Joel. It seems tricky to trigger, however.
According to Caliber, players can either start a new game or use chapter select on any difficulty (barring TLoU's Grounded Mode). After selecting a save file, getting to Sarah's playable section is the next step, followed by ignoring Joel's room and walking downstairs. Once the distant explosion goes off outside, which Sarah usually sees from Joel's window, an automatic checkpoint is triggered. Players should then quit the game, head to the main menu, and select "Continue." Reloading into the game puts Sarah back at the bottom of the staircase. From there, players can go back up, enter Joel's bedroom, and spot a Cordyceps-infected ant on the TV screen.
As Caliber notes, it's a very specific set of circumstances that must be reached to trigger the infected ant. Still, this is a cool nod to what inspired TLoU's in-universe apocalypse. Whether or not a similar Easter egg appears in TLoU2 remains to be seen. If one does exist, it probably won't be found on a functioning TV screen like in The Last of Us. Who knows, maybe in seven years, fans will randomly find a NatGeo-like magazine in Part 2 with a Cordyceps-infected grasshopper on it.
Source: Anthony Caliber/YouTube