Sony and Naughty Dog have suffered an enormous blow this week, saying the cancellation of The Last of Us Factions, or The Last of Us Online, as they had been calling it. The challenge has been in growth for years and years, with multiplayer developed partly alongside The Last of Us Part II, which started manufacturing in 2014.
Now, all these years and the time and money spent seem like wasted. Naughty Dog finally realized that to really launch and help the sport as a stay service providing, it might take the eye of your entire studio. As in, no extra of the one participant video games it’s been recognized for, at the least for the indefinite future.
But I discover myself questioning, is there something that could possibly be salvaged from this mess?
One constant problem that’s come up throughout this entire factor is that every one any participant needed from Naughty Dog right here was a TLOU2 sequel to TLOU1’s Factions multiplayer mode, a surprisingly good hooked up MP shooter mode that appeared ripe for growth within the sequel. Instead, Sony and Naughty Dog bought far out over their skis, taking that concept and blowing it up into some sprawling, seasonal, battle pass-infused, microtransaction-having stay service recreation that might preserve pumping out new content material. That was when it turned too unwieldy to stay.
I preserve occupied with Overwatch, how that recreation rose from the ashes of a a lot bigger idea, Project Titan, and have become its personal factor that (for at the least a short while at launch) ended up as probably the most thrilling factor in multiplayer gaming.
Here, and whereas I perceive that is type of being the ultimate armchair dev, I’m questioning if as a substitute of some big, infinite stay recreation, if there’s something from the multiplayer fight right here that could possibly be made into you realize, simply Factions 2. Not stay, not infinite. Just a smaller scale multiplayer addition to TLOU2 that everybody needed within the first place. Players would get what they initially needed, and Naughty Dog wouldn’t must throw away what, 5 plus years of labor fully?
Again, we don’t know if what The Last of Us Online turned would certainly be capable of convert over right into a extra normal Factions multiplayer. There had been indications there have been issues like an precise battle royale mode, amongst different additions. But it simply looks like a disgrace to scrap what Naughty Dog devs themselves were saying was incredibly fun multiplayer. Again, the issue right here was the size, the stay service of all of it. It doesn’t seem like “oh they couldn’t make a fun to play MP shooter.”
This could also be totally unattainable, I acknowledge that. But we’ve seen different video games salvaged from larger messes, and with much less time invested within the unique challenge. Perhaps that is “cope,” however I’ve to imagine there may be one thing that could possibly be dug out of this mess to signify the work Naughty Dog has executed on this for half a decade, relatively than 100% of it by no means seeing the sunshine of day.
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