The Last of Us Part 2 Remastered reveals that the snowball fight that Dina and Ellie have against some Jackson kids in the final release was originally supposed to be a game of "Clicker Tag".
Without a doubt, The Last of Us Part 2 is one of the darkest games to release in the past few console generations. Beloved characters die, relationships fracture, and families get absolutely ripped apart – that's not even counting the people literally being ripped apart by Clickers. It's not all doom and gloom, however, as there are a few memorable moments of levity that stop you from wanting to cry… until the next tragic thing happens.
One of the earliest and most memorable moments like this is very early on in the game when Ellie and Dina get into a snowball fight with a bunch of kids just as they're leaving Jackson. As it turns out, though, this scene was originally going to be something a bit darker – a game of Clicker tag that is apparently popular with kids in the world of The Last of Us.
This is revealed in the Jackson Dance Lost Level that is a part of The Last of Us Part 2 Remastered. While walking around the unfinished level, Ellie can see a bunch of kids running around and playing a game of Tag, with one major difference – one of the kids is pretending to be a Clicker, complete with a creepy slow walk and twitching limbs.
It's super creepy stuff that was originally going to replace the snowball fight that appears at the start of the game. This is revealed in developer commentary by Banun Idris, a game designer at Naughty Dog. In the commentary, Idris explains that the "Clicker Tag" game was originally going to be a tutorial section, and that it was moved to the front of the game when the Jackson Dance scene was cut.
"For me, it's character illuminating that not only does Ellie know this game, she plays along. There's a familiarity with the kids that's really nice to see, especially because it's such a difference from the Ellie we see later that has a sort of hollow normalcy that she's trying to get with JJ but kind of fails."
Unfortunately, because the scene doesn't actually tell you how to deal with Clickers, it was changed to the snowball fight that we all know and love, which does act as more of a tutorial for how combat works in the game. Still, even if the moment didn't make it, we do still have this super creepy version of it in the Lost Levels.
