For a game to get all the attention it can get, publishers often choose to reveal it well in advance of release, with all the media exposure, stress, possible delays (and updates required by investors) following this process. However, it is a mistake that Naughty Dog no longer wants to make in the future.
It was discussed by the co-president Neil Druckmann who, interviewed by Comicbook in view of the debut of the HBO series dedicated to The Last of Us (which will do without the spores, as we told you) made it known that the company will reveal the next video games only when they are closer to the release, instead of what it did in the past.
As confirmed by the executive and director himself, in fact, early media exposure could be positive for the visibility of the works, but it did not help in managing the work environment:
«We announced Uncharted 4 and The Last of Us – Part II well in advance, but in reality this caused some of those problems of work-life balance that we sometimes had in our studio».
By “work-life balance issues” Druckmann refers quite clearly to issues related to crunch at Naughty Dog, which has also been talked about in the past (not always in laudable tones) and which the company had promised to solve for the future.
“By delaying the announcement a bit” continued Druckmann in the interview with the microphones of Comicbook, “we can play more with planning and we are more aware of how we are approaching production”.
Therefore, if we know one of the things that are boiling in the pot of Naughty Dog, there will be wait for the rest:
«There’s our multiplayer project on The Last of Us and there’s another project I won’t say anything about, except the fact that we ourselves we’re really very excited about it.”
We will therefore see what else Naughty Dog will pull out of its talented hat, with the time it will need to – as we hope – also ensure that the development team can work in a more serene and healthier way than it had emerged had to do in the past.
The company’s most recent original work, The Last of Us – Part II, arrived in 2020 (you can find it on Amazon for a few euros) marking an interesting new point of arrival for interactive storytelling , to the point of obtaining the game palm of the generation awarded by our editorial staff.
To find out who could possibly inherit that work, let’s make ourselves comfortable: we will have to wait. And that’s okay.
