Despite the runaway success of the TV show, Naughty Dog still won’t commit to a third The Last Of Us game, although technically they’ve said ‘no comment’.
Whether the HBO show was a hit or not, video game developer Naughty Dog has previously made it clear that there’s only a slim chance of them ever making The Last Of Us Part 3.
They do have a still unnamed multiplayer spin-off on the way, which may or may not be out this year, but the closest anyone’s ever got to confirming plans for a third mainline entry is confirmation, in 2021, that a story treatment for the game does exist.
At the time, Naughty Dog’s Neil Druckmann, who is also one of the key figures working on the show, suggested that the company’s next game would be either a new IP or The Last Of Us Part 3. However, it’s no longer certain that’s the case.
Talking to IGN, Druckmann implied that no work has begun on a third and that they haven’t necessarily settled on a story idea after all.
‘That is like a coded ‘Is there a Last Of Us Part 3?’ No comment,’ he said, when asked about the future of the franchise.
‘We have the multiplayer game coming out and we’re going to reveal more about that later this year. Beyond that, it’s the same prospect we’ve always had. We don’t do something that we’re not extremely passionate about. So unless we had a really good, compelling story to keep the story going, then it ends at Part 2.’
Does that mean he’s no longer passionate about the 2021 story treatment? Or perhaps he just forgot he mentioned that exists.
Either way, it suggests that even if they do make the game it’s not going to be out for a very long time, considering it takes around five years to make a title like that.
In a lot of these cases it’s not clear whether Naughty Dog is being coy or if plans keep changing, but the next game that isn’t the multiplayer spin-off will apparently be structured like a TV show, and yet won’t be sold episodically.
What that’s supposed to mean is also a mystery but the one thing you can be certain of is that, after the success of the HBO show, Sony is certain to give them all the time and money they need.
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