Naughty Dog says The Last of Us multiplayer needs “more time”

Update 5/27/23: In a report released in the wake of Naughty Dog’s statement, Bloomberg’s Jason Schreyer said shed extra light In the behind-the-scenes decision-making process currently affecting The Last of Us multiplayer.

According to Schreier, development on the long-running title “slowed” in the works after Destiny developer Bungie — which has been individually evaluating several “games as a service” projects from Sony since acquiring it last year — raised concerns about The Last of Us multiplayer’s “capability.” Players keep players engaged for a long period of time.”

As a result of these comments, the Naughty Dog team working on the Last of Us multiplayer project is said to have been “downsized”, leaving only a “small group” on the project while Sony reassesses its direction. Bloomberg’s sources say the game wasn’t canceled, but many of its developers have now been moved on to other projects.

Original story 5/26/23: Naughty Dog shared an update on The Last of Us multiplayer, saying that they “realized that what was best for the game was to give it more time.” Also impressive is the “brand new single player experience” currently in the works.

Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us multiplayer project was initially planned to be part of The Last of Us Part 2, but the studio announced it was separating the two halves in 2019. Since then, updates on the game’s multiplayer have been sporadic, with Naughty Dog popping up to confirm ” We’re working on that” in 2021, and then, last year, more will be revealed in 2023.

Naughty Dog’s Neil Druckmann reiterated the studio’s intention to share more about the game “later this year” in January, but a new statement from the developer indicates that its plans to reveal more in 2023 may be currently on hold.

Naughty Dog Books in Shared statement on Twitter. “We’re very proud of the work our studio has done so far, but as development continued, we realized what was best for the game was to give it more time.”

“Our team will continue to work on the project, as well as our other games in development, including a brand new single player experience; we look forward to sharing more soon.”

So far, Naughty Dog has said little about what it’s working on aside from The Last of Us multiplayer, but fans have speculated that some mysterious, fantasy-inspired artwork found on one of the walls in The Last of Us Part 1 from the studio might offer clues. on it. Next project. Only time will tell if this is the “single player experience” the studio has now confirmed.

Today’s statement from Naughty Dog follows the studio’s apparent absence from Sony’s recent PlayStation Showcase. As Eurogamer’s Tom Phillips argued after it aired, the lack of big hitters outside of Insomniac’s Spider-Man made for a somewhat underwhelming showing.