Hometown
Hometown is the prologue chapter of The Last of Us Part I, set in and around Austin, Texas, on the night the infection breaks out in September 2013. You play as Sarah Miller exploring her house, then as her father Joel as the family tries to flee the city with his brother Tommy.
- Type
- Story
- Region
- Austin
Storylines
Part 1 of 12 in Main story
Found in
- AustinAustin, Texas is where The Last of Us Part I begins: the Prologue of Hometown plays out on outbreak night in September 2013 as Joel, his daughter Sarah and his brother Tommy try to escape the city. It is the only region you visit before the 20-year time skip.
- Miller residenceThe Miller residence is Joel and Sarah's two-story house just outside Austin, and the first place you explore in Part I. You play as Sarah here at the start of Hometown, on the night of September 26, 2013, before the family flees with Tommy.
Good to know
- Chapter 1 of 12 in the main story, with a single section: the Prologue.
- This is the only time in the game that Sarah is playable.
- There are no collectibles here, so nothing can be missed on a collectible run.
- Enemies are runners, the first infected you meet.
- The chapter ends with the title screen and opening credits.
Sections in order
Hometown has one section, the Prologue.
Playing as Sarah
Before bed Sarah gives Joel his broken watch, now repaired. Later a phone call from Tommy wakes her and cuts out. You walk her through the dark house: a birthday card for Joel in her room, a newspaper in the bathroom about hospitals filling up, a news broadcast on the TV in Joel's room that ends in an explosion, and Joel's phone downstairs full of missed calls and texts from Tommy.
The drive out of town
Tommy picks the two of them up. From the back seat Sarah watches a farm burning and a family begging for a ride that Joel will not stop for. The highway bridge is sealed by police, so Tommy turns back through town until another car slams into the truck and flips it.
Playing as Joel
Sarah's leg is hurt, so you take control of Joel carrying her through streets full of fire, crashes and panicking people. Tommy covers you in an alley and splits off at a bar, promising to meet at the highway, and Joel runs on with runners closing in behind him. Mashing the prompt when an infected grabs you matters here.
Details worth spotting
The house plants things that pay off later: a photo of Joel and Sarah on her wall, a toy giraffe, a guitar, and a painting above Joel's bed. Two copies of the arcade game The Turning sit on her shelf.
How the night endsSpoilerShow
A soldier stops Joel near the highway, gets an order over the radio and opens fire. Tommy shoots the soldier, but Sarah has been hit and dies in Joel's arms. The credits then cover the next years through news reports: quarantine zones, martial law, and the rise of the Fireflies, whose leader Marlene urges people to look for the light.
- Jimmy CooperHe is the first infected you see in the game, during the outbreak night in Hometown.
- Joel MillerJoel Miller is the man you play for almost all of The Last of Us Part I. A hardened smuggler in the Boston quarantine zone, he takes a job escorting 14-year-old Ellie out of the city, and the drop-off turns into a year-long trip across the country to find the Fireflies.
- Rose GrahamRose Graham is the KATX Channel 2 News reporter Sarah watches on Joel's bedroom TV in Hometown. Her live report from downtown Austin is the first real sign that the riots are something worse.
- Sarah MillerSarah Miller is Joel's 12-year-old daughter and the character you control at the start of The Last of Us Part I. In Hometown you walk her through the family house near Austin on the night the infection breaks out, before Tommy drives the family into the chaos.
- Tommy MillerTommy Miller is Joel's younger brother, a former Firefly who now helps run the settlement at Jackson, Wyoming. He drives Joel and Sarah through the chaos of the prologue, and twenty years later Joel tracks him down at a hydroelectric dam in the chapter Tommy's Dam, hoping he will take Ellie to the Fireflies.
Related missions
- Story
Tommy's Dam
Tommy's Dam brings Joel and Ellie to Jackson County, Wyoming, months after Pittsburgh, where they find Joel's brother Tommy helping run a hydroelectric plant for his wife Maria's settlement. It is a short chapter built around a reunion and two fights with bandits, one at the dam and one at an old ranch house.
- Story
Bill's Town
Bill's Town brings Joel and Ellie to Lincoln, Massachusetts, a small town that Joel's paranoid contact Bill has rigged with traps to keep the infected out. Bill owes Joel a favor, so you team up with him to find a working car, which means a trip through a clicker-filled graveyard and an infected high school.
Image: Naughty Dog / PlayStationStoryBus Depot
Bus Depot opens in the spring of 2034 as Joel and Ellie walk into Salt Lake City, aiming for the Fireflies at Saint Mary's Hospital. The route runs along a highway full of dead cars, through the Logan James bus station and an abandoned quarantine zone, and down into a flooded tunnel full of infected.
- Story
Jackson
Jackson is the short closing chapter of the main story: you play as Ellie, walking through the woods with Joel toward Tommy's settlement in Wyoming in the spring of 2034. It has one section, the Epilogue, and one collectible, the comic Singularity.