In a busy several days of mixed messaging, we’ve been told by Naughty Dog CEO Neil Druckmann thatNaughty Dog is “moving on”from theLast of UsandUnchartedseries. Butwait, what’s this? A PS5 ad teasing a girl clearly doing a bit of tomb-raiding much in the way that old Nathan Drake used to in Uncharted? Of course, this could be an unrelated game, or perhaps an Uncharted spin-off going by a different name following,as some fans have suggested, Drake’s daughter. Or–weirdest of all–could it even be that Sony’s assigned a different studio to continue working on Uncharted while Naughty Dog goes off to do something new?
Whatever the case, I sincerely hope that Druckmann’s statement doesn’t come with some sort of switcheroo, like Uncharted continuing under a different name with a different character, or The Last of Us flipping over into a game set 100 years on called TheFirstof Us, or anything silly like that. No, The Last of Us and especially Uncharted have had their time–even outstayed their welcome–and Naughty Dog is right to move on and channel their magic into something new (y’know, like theyusedto do in the days of old).
As our Patrick Morris has astutely pointed out in his featuredeclaring Insomniac as Sony’s new #1 studio, Naughty Dog’s output since it released The Last of Us back in 2013 hasn’t exactly been prolific, defined far more by remakes and remasters than all-new releases. For that matter, it’s been 10 years since they’ve created a new IP, which is disappointing from a studio that used to be known as something of a generation-shaper. On the PS1, there was Crash Bandicoot, on PS2 there was Jak & Daxter trilogy, on PS3 there was the Uncharted trilogy and The Last of Us, while on PS4 and (so far) PS5, there have only remakes, remasters and sequels of IPs we’ve known since the PS3 days.
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Make no mistake. Uncharted and The Last of Us are two classic series, but both feel like they could be at a crossroads where one path sees them riding off into the sunset gracefully, while another takes them to a dead end. To really stretch that crossroads analogy, it’d be more apt to say that really, there is no crossroads, because both games have already reached their destinations. Their respective storylines came to pretty satisfying (if somewhat divisive) conclusions, but beyond that both series in their own ways feel like they’ve reached the natural end of their cycle.
With the ongoing TV show, The Last of Us has basically done what no game has done before, and that’s making the jump from a successful game into a prestigious primetime TV show while (thus far) using basically the same premise as the game. With this level of casting and production value,and on HBO,that’s pretty much unheard of. The show feels like a ‘passing of the torch’ for The Last of Us, and at this point it’s earned its time in the TV spotlight, during which it looks on track to honouring the game’s iconic story.
Druckmann himself has said “We have no plans to tell any stories beyond adapting the games. We won’t run into the same issue as Game of Thrones since Part II doesn’t end on a cliffhanger.” With a second season of the show confirmed, another single-player Last of Us game in the foreseeable future would be injecting itself right into the thick of an unfolding narrative; it’d be disruptive and, as already confirmed by Druckmann, wholly unnecessary. Of course, with all those remasters and remakes in recent years, Naughty Dog has proven it’s not above milking its IPs dry, but at this point a new Last of Us game could undermine the great momentum of the show.
Yes, there’s a Last of Us multiplayer game in the works, but that actually quite apt in the current context–a game that keeps people in that universe concurrently with the show, while not doing anything to mess with its narrative or continuity.
As for Uncharted? Well, this may be a bit of an outsider opinion, but aren’t Drake’s best days kind of behind him now? Doesn’t his affable brand of goofy tomb-raiding and perpetual ledge-hanging-by-the-fingertips feel a little ‘2010’ by now? Uncharted 4 felt conclusive, Lost Legacy felt thin, and the recently released double pack of those games on PC shows that the iconic series doesn’t quite hold the sway that it used to. Just let the the weary old tomb raider retire in peace.
Yes, it’d be nice to see Naughty Dog go back to some more cheery, lighter material than The Last of Us, but I for one am happy to see them doing this by looking forward to (presumably) all-new projects rather than backwards to Drake. Ever since Crash Bandicoot, Naughty Dog’s track record at creating new IPs and series has been impeccable, but after such a long break, have they still got that magic touch? I don’t know, but I’m way more intrigued to find out about that than I am about the prospect of another Uncharted or Last of Us game.
