Naughty Dog backtracked by giving up on Last of Us Online

With the advice of Bungie, the developer of the Destiny and Halo series, Naughty Dog avoided a big risk at the last minute by canceling the Last of Us Online project and choosing to focus on single-player stories. Let’s take a look at the details together.

Last of Us Online project was canceled

Naughty Dog avoided a big risk by canceling the Last of Us Online project, and this decision was made in line with Bungie’s recommendations. Bungie stated to Naughty Dog that Last of Us Online may not attract the attention of players for a long time. This feedback led Naughty Dog to decide to scale back the project and use the studio’s resources more efficiently.

Game According to journalist Jason Schreier, Bungie reviewed Last of Us Online at Sony’s request and stated to Naughty Dog that this project may not be sustainable in the long term. Taking this advice into consideration, Naughty Dog decided to continue the project with a smaller team and directed its main team to other projects. One of the main reasons behind this decision was that the resources required to support Last of Us Online would hinder the studio’s focus on its other single-player narrative games.

In Naughty Dog’s official statement, it was stated that while Last of Us Online was entering the full production phase, the scope of the project was very large and supporting this project would seriously affect the development of other games. Therefore, the studio had to make a choice between two paths: either they would focus entirely on live service games, or they would continue their single-player story-driven games.

In response to a fan’s question on Twitter, Jason Schreier stated that Bungie’s feedback was very valuable to Naughty Dog and that the decision to not focus entirely on the live service game was a very smart one. Schreier emphasized that this decision was the best for Naughty Dog, reminding that single-player game studios turning to live service games had bad results in the past.

Naughty Dog’s decision to cancel Last of Us Online is considered the right move for the future of the studio. Because you know the fate of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League and the Avengers before that. What are you thinking? Please don’t forget to share your thoughts with us in the comments section below.