With Naughty Dog’s recent success in series like Uncharted and The Last of Us, it’s reasonable to think that Naughty Dog might be under some pressure from Sony to produce another hit game that could be turned into a multimedia franchise. Naughty Dog’s co-president, Neil Druckmann was recently asked about the potential pressure from Naughty Dog’s owners on the Kinda Funny podcast.
Druckmann noted that successes like The Last of Us and Uncharted have allowed the studio to work on projects they were genuinely passionate about. “I joined a studio that was already so successful that we could be kind of prima donnas and just do whatever we want. I know not everybody has that privilege but it’s not something I take lightly” he said. “So at the end of every project, we purposefully explore several different projects. Some of them might be a sequel and then a bunch of new ideas, and then we really feel like, ‘where do our passions lie?’ Because that’s the fire that has to sustain for years to come.”
Druckmann specifically focused on the passion aspect of creating new projects and was quick to conclude that the real creator of “mediocre anything” was down to a loss of passion and excitement from a team.
“And if you pick the wrong project and then you burn out from that idea because you weren’t that passionate about it, two years into a four-year project, you’re fucked. That’s how you, I think, make mediocre anything – if you lose your excitement from it.”
While Naughty Dog is currently working on developing a standalone The Last of Us multiplayer game fans have been yearning for any information on a potential The Last of Us Part 3 given the success of the adaptation of the first game on HBO. While it’s still unclear what Naughty Dog’s next project is Druckmann didn’t say if it was The Last of Us Part 3.
“I know the fans really want Last of Us Part 3,” he said. “I hear about it all of the time and all I can say is that look, we’re already into our next project, so the decision has already been made. I can’t say what it is, but that’s the process we went through, that there was a lot of consideration of different things, and we picked the thing we were most excited for.”
Despite the huge success of The Last of Us, Durckmann noted that Sony hasn’t been pressuring Naughty Dog to continue the series.
“They have supported us every step of the way to follow our passions — meaning that just because something is successful, people think there’s all this pressure and we have to make a sequel. That’s not the case.”
