Naughty Dog Has Lost the Plot & They Are Spiralling

Naughty Dog used to be the crown jewel at PlayStation, a studio that could do no wrong, that created unforgettable experiences that millions loved. Then The Last of Us Part Two happened, and they've been picking up the pieces ever since. But the question remains, what happened to Naughty Dog? Why are they not releasing even a single game this generation? And more importantly, why are the egos of current-day Western game developers so fragile? There's a lot, but as seen here from GamesRadar, Intergalactic: Naughty Dog's next game is in a really tough spot right now. A former developer of Naughty Dog spoke openly about how the studio is currently operating with what they call an unsustainable schedule, which is putting it lightly. The last thing Naughty Dog had that came out was The Last of Us Part Two remastered in 2024, according to Benson Russell, who's the ex-Naughty Dog developer in this article. He's now a gaming consultant on major AAA and then some. And that is not a good thing at all. I mean, the whole Naughty Dog thing, not him being a consultant anyways.

And shows that Naughty Dog is drowning in its own destructive and really toxic ways when it comes to game development these days. Benson Russell calls Naughty Dog's game release schedule unsustainable and lethargic because this means that Intergalactic, their next game, might miss the PS5 generation completely at this point, making it the first time in Naughty Dog's history that they completely missed an entire generation of PlayStation consoles without a single new game coming out. As Russell puts it here, they're one of the key stakeholders that get PlayStation sold, right? So, when you think about it, they have not put an original IP out on this platform. The only thing they've done is the Last of Us remake, which he's right. The only newish game, I guess, is that remake of the first Last of Us, obviously, to release it in tandem with the HBO show's first season.

But Russell said more, as you can see there, that Intergalactic might be heading for another Last of Us 2 situation. And because of that, in Russell's opinion, Naughty Dog is going to have to edit the game down, which is going to cause even further delays. Russell also believes that Naughty Dog is biting off way more than they should with the space setting with Intergalactic as well, because obviously all of Naughty Dog's games for at least the past 10 years or so have been about rugged North American landscapes or, you know, treasure hunters like Nathan Drake traveling to the Himalayas or the desert, you know, actual places on planet Earth. Intergalactic is also said to have a robust melee combat system, which is, you know, something Naughty Dog isn't really known for. Most of their games outside of Crash Bandicoot are third-person shooters to some regard.

Uncharted is a great example of this. Uncharted, in my opinion, that is Naughty Dog at their best. I mean, they released all three Uncharted games in a timely manner of like two or so years between games while still offering graphical leaps and all the pulse-pounding action. I love that trilogy of games, dude. So great, and I would love to have that version of Naughty Dog again. Instead, we're left with a Naughty Dog where all the original directors and leaders like Amy Henig or Bruce Staley, who directed the first Last of Us game, are all gone now.

Naughty Dog has by and large kind of just become Neil Druckmann's prison island of sorts where Neil is just free to do whatever he wants to. It's not to say that Neil can't make good games somewhat. I mean, Uncharted 4 was directed by Neil Druckmann. Although that game's development was apparently, you know, nothing short of crazy since internally, it's already been well documented that Neil, Bruce, and Amy, they all clashed behind the scenes on Uncharted 4. Wow, who could imagine that one happening? And that it had led to people like Amy Henig leaving Naughty Dog altogether, as we all know. The other huge problem that plagued Naughty Dog post-Uncharted 4 was someone we know as Anita Sarkeesian. I did a whole mini documentary on Anita Sarkeesian recently on the channel, but there's a section in that video where I brought up how Neil Druckmann not only gave an award on stage to Anita in front of dozens of other game developers, but openly admitted that Anita's influences on Naughty Dog changed the studio as well for the better according to Neil Druckmann. And change it did since we all know what happened with The Last of Us 2's story and how absolutely divisive that game story and characters were, right? The male hero gutted an all-female playable cast, not to mention Uncharted ending insinuating that it too would follow Cassie Drake, the daughter of Nathan and Elena eventually. And of course, Intergalactic also having a female lead again in the form of Jordan Mun. This would now make every single Naughty Dog franchise now being led by female characters exclusively. And if there are any male characters on the roster, it's someone who's, you know, transgender, like the acolyte kid in Last of Us Part Two, which doesn't really make any sense to me at all. Like how is Lev, that's the name of the character, who's born female, now identifies as male, supposed to like make sense in that world? I mean, in the world of The Last of Us, right? Things like basic needs, food, medication are already near impossible to come across. Stuff like cough medicine even is effectively gold in that post-apocalypse. Yet, I'm supposed to believe that a random survivor who escapes some crazy religious cult is able to find what? Puberty blockers to handle their transition. In a post-apocalypse world that would not have that sort of medication readily available in any sort of amount and for it to even exist would likely be impossible, too. Didn't the world end in like the early 2000s in the Last of Us's world? How would Lev even transition their gender if such medicine wasn't even readily available or even developed until later? Anyways, like the whole thing doesn't make any sense. It's not even like being a bigot or anything. It's just logistically none of it could actually realistically happen given the circumstances of the game that it's operating within. But again, we have, you know, Anita Sarkeesian to blame for the degradation of Naughty Dog as a developer. I guess sure, they're a studio full of talented game developers who know how to make games. Well, then no one really questions that, right?

They have world-class designers, [snorts] artists, engineers, everything. But it's all being led by a crazy person with an ego the size of Jupiter and Neil Druckmann. So, it's no wonder why the Intergalactic game might miss the PS5 generation. Likely at this point, Intergalactic is going to be a PS6 launch title with a cross-gen version available on PS5 at least. But it still doesn't fix the fact that Naughty Dog is taking centuries to release a single game in this landscape when every other studio pretty much at their level is not only releasing games faster, but better too. FromSoftware has released Elden Ring, Elden Ring Night, and they will release the Dusk Blades. And they also had Shadow of the Eternals in a shorter time frame than Naughty Dog has released between Last of Us 2 and Intergalactic. This is why I trust what Benson Russell, that ex-Naughty Dog developer, is saying there in the article because he's worked on these games before. He knows their design philosophy. And even he's skeptical that Naughty Dog can nail melee combat with their next game. As Russell says it here, Naughty Dog has been trying to understand melee combat for years, but they knew that it would be a massive investment to get it right. So, they never really did it well. Well, anyways. But Benson still believes that this way of making games, the Naughty Dog way, it needs to be buried and left to rot.

Here's what he said in the interview. I genuinely think these seven-year projects, you c

key stakeholders that get PlayStation sold, right? So, when you think about it, they have not put an original IP out on this platform. The only thing they've done is the Last of Us remake, which he's right. The only newish game, I

guess, is that remake of the first Last of Us, obviously, to release it in tandem with the HBO show's first season.

But Russell said more, as you can see there, that Intergalactic might be heading for another Last of Us 2 situation. And because of that, in Russell's opinion, Naughty Dog is going to have to edit the game down, which is

going to cause even further delays. Russell also believes that Naughty Dog is biting off way more than they should with the space setting with Intergalactic as well, because obviously all of Naughty Dog's games for at least the past 10 years or so have been about

rugged North American landscapes or, you know, treasure hunters like Nathan Drake traveling to the Himalayas or the desert, you know, actual places on planet Earth. Intergalactic is also said to have a robust melee combat system, which is, you know, something Naughty

Dog isn't really known for. Most of their games outside of Crash Bandicoot are thirdperson shooters to some regard.

Uncharted is a great example of this. Uncharted, in my opinion, that is Naughty Dog at their best. I mean, they released all three Uncharted games in a timely manner of like two or so years between games while still offering

graphical leaps and all the pulse pounding action. I love that trilogy of games, dude. so great and I would love to have that version of Naughty Dog again. Instead, we're left with a Naughty Dog where all the original

directors and leaders like Amy Henig or Bruce Staley, who directed the first Last of Us game, are all gone now.

Naughty Dog has by and large kind of just become Neil Drman's prison island of sorts where Neil is just free to do whatever he wants to. It's not to say that Neil can't make good games somewhat. I mean, Uncharted 4 was

directed by Neil Duckman. Although that game's development was apparently, you know, nothing short of crazy since internally, it's already been well documented that Neil, Bruce, and Amy, they all clashed behind the scenes on Uncharted 4. Wow, who could imagine that

one happening? And that it had led to people like Amy Hen leaving Naughty Dog altogether, as we all know. The other huge problem that plagued Naughty Dog post Uncharted 4 was someone we know as Anita Sarkeesian. I did a whole mini

documentary on Anita Sarkeesian recently on the channel, but there's a section in that video where I brought up how Neil Duckman not only gave an award on stage to Anita in front of dozens of other game developers, but openly admitted

that Anita's influences on Naughty Dog changed the studio as well for the better according to Neil Duckman. And change it did since we all know what happened with The Last of Us 2's story and how absolutely divisive that game

story and characters were, right? the male hero gutted an all female playable cast, not to mention Uncharted ending insinuating that it too would follow Cassie Drake, the daughter of Nathan and Elena eventually. And of course, Intergalactic also having a female lead

again in the form of Jordan Mun. This would now make every single Naughty Dog franchise now being led by female characters exclusively. And if there are any male characters on the roster, it's someone who's, you know, transgender, like the acolyte kid in Last of Us Part

Two, which doesn't really make any sense to me at all. Like how is Lev, that's the name of the character, who's born female, now identifies as male, supposed to like make sense in that world? I mean, in the world of The Last of Us,

right? Things like basic needs, food, medication are already near impossible to come across. Stuff like cough medicine even is effectively gold in that post-apocalypse. Yet, I'm supposed to believe that a random survivor who escapes some crazy religious cult is

able to find what? Puberty blockers to handle their transition. in a post-apocalypse world that would not have that sort of medication readily available in any sort of amount and for it to even exist would likely be impossible, too. Didn't the world end in

like the early 2000s in the Last of Us's world? How would Lev even transition their gender if such medicine wasn't even readily available or even developed until later? Anyways, like the whole thing doesn't make any sense. It's not

even like being a bigot or anything. It's just logistically none of it could actually realistically happen given the circumstances of the game that it's operating within. But again, we have, you know, Anita Sarkeesian to blame for the degradation of Naughty Dog as a

developer. I guess sure, they're a studio full of talented game developers who know how to make games. Well, then no one really questions that, right?

They have worldclass designers, [snorts] artists, engineers, everything. But it's all being led by a crazy person with an ego the size of Jupiter and Neil Truckman. So, it's no wonder why the intergalactic game might miss the PS5 generation. Likely at this point,

Intergalactic is going to be a PS6 launch title with a crossgen version available on PS5 at least. But it still doesn't fix the fact that Naughty Dog is taking centuries to release a single game in this landscape when every other

studio pretty much at their level is not only releasing games faster, but better too. From Software has released Elden Ring, Elden Ring Night, and they will release the Dusk Bloods. And they also had Shadow of the Euransion in a shorter time frame than Naughty Dog

has released between Last of Us 2 and Intergalactic. This is why I trust what Benson Russell, that ex Naughty Dog developer, is saying there in the article because he's worked on these games before. He knows their design philosophy. And even he's skeptical that

Naughty Dog can nail melee combat with their next game. As Russell says it here, Naughty Dog has been trying to understand melee combat for years, but they knew that it would be a massive investment to get it right. So, they

never really did it well. Well, anyways. But Benson still believes that this way of making games, the Naughty Dog way, it needs to be buried and left to rot.

Here's what he said in the interview. I genuinely think these seven-year projects, you can get them back down to five. I think you could at least cut two years off of them, if not maybe a little more just by defining yourself, getting

that Northstar solid right in the beginning. And it's not a difficult thing to do. Again, this guy worked on Uncharted, Last of Us, and more, right?

He knows what he's talking about here. He was there for the very well doumented crunch times that Naughty Dog imposed on developers for their games. He probably was a part of it, too. Like how infamously Last of Us Part 2 had so much

crunch that developers were doing 100hour work weeks multiple weeks in a row just to get the game done on time which it then got leaked online to mean the whole game. I mean because again employees had enough of Naughty Dog's

horrible work life balance and then what happened happened. But it's interesting how Russell brings up the Northstar concept cuz it's actually a good way of looking at things. Most studios understand who they are and what they're making and they kind of just stick to

it. Again, let's use From Software as an example, right? Their northstar is Soulsbor games obviously because they created the entire concept themselves, right, with Demon Souls originally on the PlayStation 3. So naturally, every game you play, be it Dark Souls, Seiro,

Bloodborne, Elden Ring, even stuff like Armored Core, these games may differ in slight ways here or there, but the north star in this instance is they are by and large Soulsborne games at their core.

That's what they are. They are always melee focused explorationbased RPG video games. Even if in say Armored Cors case, you can shoot mounted cannons on your mech's shoulders. It's the same as as if like blasting your shotgun in Bloodborne

or shooting an arrow in Dark Souls. The core gameplay philosophy of a FromSoft game is still big scary enemy. You have the tools to fight it. Now do it while something epic happens. You understand that? You get that. That's the north

star. Even Rockstar, for example, they have their own Northstar, if you will, right? They know that GTA and Red Dead are thirdperson shooter games at their core. It's why it's simple to transition from playing GTA to Red Dead. I'm

shooting with an assault rifle in a sports car. Yeah, that transitions pretty nicely to Cowboy Revolver and Horse instead. It makes sense. You get it? With Naughty Dog, the problem here is with Intergalactic, according to Russell and such, is they don't really

have a north star because their star or direction keeps changing, right? It's like a ship in open sea, unable to determine where they need to go. and the captain has really no idea which way to pilot his ship until eventually after

months of open sea. The hungry crew will cry mutiny and throw their captain overboard. And I mean, who can really blame them? That's sort of what Naughty Dog feels like right now. Intergalactic is taking too long. That game has to now

be the greatest game ever made pretty much in the history of that studio in order to justify its insane developer cycle. But the problems that plague this is, will it though? Because ultimately the game is being led by none other than

Neil Duckman of all people. The same guy who, like I said, allowed Anita Sarkeesian to completely ruin the design philosophy of stories and characters with her modernity feminism nonsense that we're still dealing with to this day. Intergalactic, even in its first

trailer, to me, it looks dated as it can get. I don't mean graphically either. I mean in the main character's design. The bald-headed gruff woman who is better than anyone around her. Even the eye patch snake bliskin-like woman on the TV

talking to Jordan Munley. She's a gender bent escape from New York knockoff design concept. It all screams this is the sort of game that Anita Sarkeesian would lose her collective mind over if she was to play it right now. But we

know what Anita wants is not what sells nor what people want. All that happens when you chase what Anita Sarkeesian wants is well oblivion. And Naughty Dog needs a win, a really big one.

Otherwise, Neil Duckman might be cooked, guys. But I'm already skeptical considering the fact that his big brain idea for intergalactic is what if religion was bad. But we all know he's only going to target one specific kind of religion and leave all the other ones

alone as they always do. But there was another big reason for why Naughty Dog hasn't released anything of note for so long. It's because of live service slop and Sony being absolute morons who don't understand what their fan base even

wants this generation. You see, Naughty Dog was working on a live service Last of Us game called Last of Us Factions or Last of Us Online. If you played the original game, which you probably did, The Last of Us launched with a pretty

great and interesting multiplayer component that was surprisingly fun to do. You would go into these matches, hunt other players for resources, and depending on how well you did, your camp of people would either grow or dwindle based on your performance. And the idea

was the better that you got, the more lives that you would save. Obviously, it would be crushing if you got slapped around only to find out that half of your camp got cooked cuz you suck and could in security medical supplies.

Anyways, the idea was to take this mode and blow it up into a huge live service game. And on paper, seems like a great idea, an actual live service game from Sony that both made sense thematically within the context of the world it took

place in and could have been something interesting to play. But instead, Naughty Dog and Sony axed the entire game. Cancelled it quite literally at the last minute before it was meant to be revealed. And that House of Cards

came tumbling down soon after. Well, it turns out this is another big reason why Naughty Dog hasn't released anything either. Because you see, it wasn't just a small French team at the studio working on this game. It was uh actually

the majority of Naughty Dog itself that was working to make this game a reality.

I'm not even kidding. Look at this from massivelyopole op.com. There was a report here based on Bloomberg that confirms just that. So what happened exactly? Well, it's another big FU in Sony's live service slaughter cuz after part two in 2020, the majority of

Naughty Dog shifted to this Last of Us Online as Bloomberg called it, they cited that this game was meant to be a living breathing version of the Last of Us's post-apocalypse that you could exist in. The idea was to have players

team up, hunt each other. I think Arc Raiders, but you know, Last of Us.

Obviously, the problem was this game was allocating way too many resources at Naughty Dog, and the idea was the scope and energy that was needed to keep this sort of thing alive would have turned Naughty Dog into a live service studio

over, you know, what it originally was, a single player one. So, the game, like I said, was cancelled right before it was meant to be announced officially.

But the stupid part was that because of Last of Us Online, Naughty Dog had barely anybody working on Intergalactic.

Yeah, I know. So, technically speaking, when this game was cancelled, which was years after part two, by the way, and millions were already spent, Naughty Dog didn't actually start real true development on Intergalactic until after Last of Us Online was already cancelled.

So, for us as players looking for the next Naughty Dog game, we're thinking, "Wow, it's been six whole years since Last of Us Part Two. I wonder where Naughty Dog's next game is." And what we're realizing is if Last of Us Online

was never green lit because of Sony's stupid live service nonsense, Intergalactic would very likely be out already or coming out soon at least. We don't even have a release window for Intergalactic right now. Some sites claim it's 2028, but nothing's really

concrete. My question is, why not just take this Last of Us Online game, move it to a support studio if the bulk of the development was already done? Why waste it? I understand now making Naughty Dog into a live service studio.

Yeah, that would be stupid. I get this. But surely to have all of that work already done. God knows how many guns were modeled levels and then some. And then to just not use it, I that seems like a wasted opportunity to me. Sure.

Yes. Okay. Concord, bad idea. Nobody wanted that. But people love The Last of Us. They would actually want to play something like that where they could hunt others and build clans and all that sort of stuff and their own settlements

and whatever. And it's so bizarre to me that Sony green lights and releases live service games for the most part that people just don't want. but they cancelled the ones that actually seem interesting. Outside of Hell Divers 2,

nothing Sony has done live service-wise is really worth the squeeze that it takes to enjoy it. Marathon is dead. I mean, look at the Steam charts here.

What do you mean? Bungie's $300 million live service gamble has only 2,166 players on Steam right now with a 24-hour peak of not even 3,300 players.

Like, pull the plug already. What are we doing? Yeah, Destiny 2, as you can see there via Steam charts, is almost at 20,000 users right now with a 24-hour peak of almost 30,000 users. So, that's almost like 10 times the users on

Destiny 2, a game Bungie added support for over Marathon, the game they're actively still working on despite nobody playing it. Tell me why, like, I'm a 5-year-old kid, that Marathon is allowed to exist, but a Last of Us Online

Extraction PVPVE game isn't. Like, please. Okay, I'm all ears. Tell me how this was not the move to go with. And before anyone says, "Nah, he's lying.

There's no way Naughty Dog was ruined by a side project like Last of Us Online." Okay, well, here's IGN on screen confirming it, too. There you go. Use your eyes. It wasn't a side project. It was their main focus for years. If you

want to know how much time and effort was wasted on this Last of Us Online game, as IGN says it here, the game was in development for 7 years and was already 80% finished by the time it was

canceled completely. I want you to understand how bad that is. They spent longer developing this canceled live service game than it took for Naughty Dog to create and release the entire Uncharted trilogy on PlayStation 3. That is baffling to me. But this is what I

mean. This is why Naughty Dog and really every Sony studio needs to stop these live service ambitions. Why is this something they think that it can work?

It can't. We should have been seeing trailers for the game after Intergalactic by now. Probably Last of Us 3. And by the looks of it, by the time we get a Last of Us part 3, it's going to be somewhere closer to like

2035 if we're lucky. You used to get a new Uncharted game every 2 years. The way things are going, you'll be lucky to get a new Uncharted game every like 10 years now. This is not sustainable.

Like, you know, Guerilla Games: The Horizon. People ever wonder where Horizon 3 is? Well, it's the same situation as Naughty Dog as game industry.Biz showed it here. Horizon Hunters Gathering, the live service version of Horizon, is being rebooted

essentially after severe negative feedback from players who have played it. Now, the game will remove its live service elements have a story mode and reduce its scope because the parts that Sony cared about. You know, the battle pass microtransaction nonsense wasn't

working at all for them. Wow, really? Another live service pivot from Sony that didn't work? Um, well, I am just shocked by that. Well, you see the report from Bloomberg said, as you can see there, the overhaul reportedly began

in June, and staff were told they have until December to meet the next milestone and show progress to executives. So, that's December 2026.

Great. The game will still have multiplayer apparently, but it will instead now be a single player game with multiplayer added. Wow. Almost like what it should have been in the first place, Sony. That game is ran every Sony just

ran by idiots, man. Like, just get Herman Hol out of there already. But the crazier part was in the report. It was also confirmed that just like Naughty Dog with Last of Us Online. This Horizon Hunters game was in the same situation.

After Horizon Forbidden West, the majority of Guerilla games were not in fact working on Horizon 3, but this multiplayer spin-off game instead. So now the game is apparently DOA until unless they like pivoted into like a single player game, which will cost more

resources and time. It'll also mean a potential Horizon 3, which is an active development, but not fully cuz again, everybody is working on the stupid multiplayer game. Well, you're going to have to wait even longer now for that

one, guys. Whoops. Sorry. Our bad. Like, come on, right? We're just a bunch of people here at Sony. We make mistakes.

You know, the exact same mistakes over and over and seemingly never learn from it one bit. But we make mistakes, okay?

It's okay. You're going to get your Horizon 3 intergalactic one day in maybe 5 years. And that's being generous. But his game industry died a bit as it here.

The opportunity cost of Sony going towards live service is horrific. Naughty Dog especially has been ruined by this design philosophy as well. The problem is this design philosophy which has failed is everywhere. So many AAA studios have released duds thanks to

this live service pivot. And it's ruined the release schedule of so many cuz every single company wants their own Fortnite. But they can't cuz Fortnite is uniquely what it is. And nobody can reasonably create what Epic has with

Fortnite without just being called a Fortnite clone. The very idea that Naughty Dog of all people, who is known for realism and grittier games, actually sat in a boardroom and went, "What if we made The Last of Us, but it's like

Fortnite?" Logistically, it could work in a way, I guess. But by and large, eventually the game would still start falling apart. Like, what happens when you start adding like weapon skins and such to the game? How are people in the

apocalypse fashioning guns after, I don't know, PlayStation icons? Why does some survivor have a gun with Daxter from the Jack and Daxter series on their AK-47? Eventually, you just have to realize that these things don't make any sense. And maybe it's just better to

move on. Look, I've been saying this forever. This whole era of live service nonsense need to be buried under the headquarters forever. The entire PlayStation 5 generation has been nothing but blunders 95% of the time because of Sony's stupid leadership

believing that they could replicate Fortnite somehow. And what annoys me with Naughty Dog especially is they were known for not just making great games, but defining the console generations that they were made on. Jack 3 is still amazing. The Uncharted games are great.

Last of Us one, awesome. Part two onwards is where the wheels began to fall off, but it's not even that Last of Us 2 has bad gameplay or or world design or voice acting. No, no, no, no, no.

Those are all great. It's like always the writing and the characters that are not good at all. But the answer here was not to turn this all into a live service game. Imagine if they had Ellie show up

in this Last of Us faction game and she's like an NPC at your camp and she's like, "Wow, I'm Ellie. Thanks for being here. Please take this orange gun that does more damage." Like, just brutal to think what could have happened, man. But

the answer here really is just to return to basics, right? Go back to what worked. Not try to turn everything into NBA 2K or something. The Last of Us as a franchise has been re-released, by the way, in some format on PS5 around nine

times since 2020. That's egregious. That's a studio hurting for money that needs any sort of revenue coming in because they haven't made anything new in forever. But that's a symptom that is all over Western AAA development, too.

Longer cycles, budgets that are out of whack, projects cancelling, burnout around every corner. And on top of all of that, you have this industry that struggles to separate genuine criticism from personal attacks, too. Like, these developers in the studios are very

fragile with their egos, and they no longer seem to care about making the best possible games, but just the biggest production instead. as if that matters. Uncharted 2 can be beat in like 10 hours. And guess what? It's freaking

amazing. It doesn't need to be 60 hours long. Instead, they're making people wait lifetimes for a single game. And it's obviously not a good idea because nobody benefits when talented developers are just burning themselves out every single time they have to make something.

Like, they're making something great should not always require this unhealthy working condition to make it happen. But modern AAA has created that huge pressure with these six or seven. Oh my god. 6767. You get the idea. Okay, development cycles, it's just getting

out of hand, man. But the fact that Last of Us Online took thousands of developer hours and it was wasted is just proved that there is no northstar at Naughty Dog anymore. And what are you getting in its wake? Layoffs and studios closing,

right? The industry expanded like crazy during 2020 cuz game studios thought it was the future until it wasn't. Now they're getting rid of everybody and it's just causing more problems. But now you have a bunch of developers who

believe criticism means it's personal now, too. Like the relationship between studios and devs and audiences has become more hostile now. Sure, developers deserve respect, but there's a difference between harassment and criticism. If a player invests time, money, emotions into these things,

they're going to have opinions, right? Healthy studios learn from that. Unfortunately, stuff like social media amplifies the negativity. Everything becomes more emotional and personal.

While it doesn't really help the developers, it doesn't help the players either when these studios continue to self-sabotage and do things that people are sick of seeing. Intergalactic is already hated because of the bald-headed woman main character, but Neil Drugman

doesn't seem to care because I need a Sarkeesian likes it. Great, the woman who married herself. How can this go wrong? But Neil and his studio are at a pivot point here where this one release genuinely could make or break their

studio going forward. I don't think Naughty Dog has suddenly forgotten how to make great games, the talent is still there, but it's become very clear that the production model in which Naughty Dog and others exist within is not

sustainable and it will fall apart unless things change in the future. How can one studio spend the better part of almost a decade on one release? How can any publisher justify those costs? And more importantly, how can the audience

who keeps the lights on by buying these games remain patient when everything moves at a snail's pace? I know it's not just Naughty Dog, but they are one of the biggest examples here. But this affects the entire AAA industry, and

Naughty Dog might think its legacy is secure. But legacy alone is not going to pay the bills or solve these modern development challenges. Crunch is bad.

Cancel life service games are another big warning. The longer dev time is another. Taken individually, maybe each issue seems manageable, but together they tell the story of an industry searching for a more sustainable way to build games and it doesn't seem to have

cracked the code yet. Even though they already knew how to do all of this 20 years ago without fail, now it's as if it's like lost technology or knowledge at this point. But whatever happens next, the lesson shouldn't be that

bigger is always better. The greatest achievement isn't building the largest game imaginable every single time. It's about building a game that people actually enjoy without asking developers to sacrifice years of their lives or asking fans to wait nearly an entire

console generation for the next adventure to arrive. So, I hope that Naughty Dog figures their problems out.

I really do. Same goes for Guerilla and Sony as well. But, as it stands right now, if the gaming industry as a whole had a north star is clear to me, there is no direction. And every studio right

now is a ship in a vast sea heading towards the end of the world, not knowing what awaits them in the endless abyss they're about to lead their teams into. So, we need to change course. We need to stop doing things the way

they're being done before it's too late. Otherwise, by the time we get the next Naughty Dog game, we're all going to be 50 years old with two kids and arthritis. And Neil Duckman will be a corpse hooked up to a computer to keep

him alive cuz he takes so long to make anything anymore. But what do you think?

What is the northstar of modern gaming development to you? Is Naughty Dog cooked? Or are they two heading towards complete oblivion as well? Thanks for being subscribed if you want to and I'll see you guys next time.