The Last of Us Developers Talk About Creating The Clickers

Written by Brandon Hofer on January 24, 2023

News: Get a behind the scenes look at how the Last of Us was created both in video game form and the adaptation on HBO.

In the second installment of Naughty Dog's new series, Building The Last of Us, the development team digs into some of the creation behind one of The Last of Us' most well-known enemies: the Clickers. Developers from Naughty Dog and PlayStation dive into the art, sound, animation, and origins of bringing the Clickers to life in The Last of Us, including insight into the iconic sound of Clickers, the way the Clickers move, and a look at never-before-seen Clicker concept art.

Additionally in episode 2 of Building The Last of Us, Blooming Terror, executive producers from HBO's adaptation of The Last of Us, Neil Druckmann and Craig Mazin, discuss the philosophy behind adapting action from the games into the live-action version of The Last of Us. Druckmann discusses his TV directorial debut with The Last of Us' second episode on HBO, and one of the original voices of the Clickers reflects on the enduring legacy of these foes as they make their live-action debut.

“When we started working on the [The Last of Us]…It was very clear you’re going to fight other factions, other humans as they’re trying to survive, and you will have competing goals. That was very clear. And then we’re like, ‘Do we even want the Infected?,’” Naughty Dog Co-President Neil Druckmann explained.

“We were always wary of how we differentiate ourselves from zombies, because there have been a lot of zombie movies, a lot of zombie games, and we could easily fall into that trap of just being one more zombie thing without having some fresh take on it,” Druckmann said, explaining that a specific piece of art during the concepting phase solidified where the team could take the Infected.

For those unaware, the Clickers don’t have any sight. The sounds they make are to understand their surroundings and track their prey, with an added side effect of terrifying the player/viewer.

“One of the most important things was to try to use human sounds as much as possible. We did not want to just make it very creature-y,” PlayStation Studios Senior Director of Sound and Lead Audio on the original The Last of Us Phil Kovats said of the entire Infected soundscape.”

If you want to go a bit more in depth about the Clickers and The Last of Us, you can check out the PlayStation Blog. The Last of Us Part 1 is currently available on PlayStation 5 and will be available on PC on March 3rd. The Last of Us airs on HBO and streams on HBO Max.

What do you think about the games? What did you think of the first two episodes of the series on HBO? Tell us in the comments section.