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Naughty Dog devs suffer layoffs, reportedly impacting Last of Us multiplayer spinoff

By Tomas Franzese Published October 3, 2023

A new report revealed that Naughty Dog has ended several contracts it had with developers early, laying off around 25 developers. This had a negative impact on The Last of Us multiplayer game but, more importantly, is chillingly just the latest batch of layoffs in a rough couple of months for the video game industry.

These contracted developers were informed that their contracts were ending prematurely at the end of October and that they’d get no severance afterward, according to the report at Kotaku. Reportedly, most of these layoffs at Naughty Dog, PlayStation’s darling studio that employs over 400 developers, come from the quality assurance, art, and production teams. According to Kotaku, Naughty Dog asked its developers to keep quiet about it. That didn’t happen, though, with developers telling Kotaku not only about the layoffs but that the multiplayer The Last of Us game “while not completely canceled, is basically on ice at this point.”

The second piece of The Last of Us multiplayer concept art shows two players walking toward a beached yacht. — Concept art for Naughty Dog’s Last of Us multiplayer title. Naughty Dog

These layoffs are unfortunate but sadly not uncommon for the game industry. Throughout the last few weeks, studios like Ubisoft, Creative Assembly, Ascendant Studios, and Epic Games have all laid off people. Epic, in particular, cut a whopping 16% of its workforce despite the fact that Fortnite is one of the most popular video games. Then, there are studios like Saints Row’s Volition, support studio Puny Human, and Boomerang X’s Dang are closing entirely.

Although 2023 has been a year full of fantastic games like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Street Fighter 6, and Baldur’s Gate 3, it’s unfortunate that it has been so rough for the developers who actually make the games in this gigantic industry. It’s clear something needs to change.

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Gaming Staff Writer

Tomas Franzese is a Staff Writer at Digital Trends, where he reports on and reviews the latest releases and exciting…

Gaming

Even HBO’s The Last of Us can’t fully master the video game adaptation

Pedro Pascal with his finger to his mouth telling someone to be quiet in a scene from The Last of Us on HBO Max.

There's a pretty good chance that your favorite video game will be made into a movie or TV show.

Thanks in no small part to efforts by PlayStation Productions and the success of movies like Sonic the Hedgehog and TV shows like Arcane, there will only be more adaptations of your favorite video games coming. We’ve come to a sort-of apex with The Last of Us on HBO, a prestige TV take on one of gaming's most celebrated titles. It has legitimate stars, a big budget, Chernobyl’s showrunner at the helm, and is raking in viewers. Only three episodes have aired at the time of this writing, but it’s already poised for success, both in terms of viewership and critical accolades.

Gaming

New art for The Last of Us multiplayer spinoff teases its seaside setting

The second piece of The Last of Us multiplayer concept art shows two players walking toward a beached yacht.

Naughty Dog reaffirmed that it will share more details about The Last of Us' multiplayer game this year and released new concept art for it. The image gives a better sense of its setting, with a massive boat serving as a key set piece.
The new image shows two players as they approach a giant beached yacht. Rusted vehicles, palm trees, and a flooded street surround them, suggesting that this is in some sort of seaside town. Earlier concept art for the game seemed to indicate a San Francisco setting, though it's unclear if the new image is from the same location.
While Naughty Dog hasn't commented on exactly what exactly this concept art is supposed to show, it seems like this is one of the maps where players will be able to fight the Infected and potentially other players. It also looks reminiscent of some of the final areas of The Last of Us Part II.
This reassurance of its development and concept art came as part of a blog post on Naughty Dog's website today meant to kick off the series' tenth anniversary. "With a team led by Vinit Agarwal, Joe Pettinati, and Anthony Newman, the project is shaping up to be a fresh, new experience from our studio, but one rooted in Naughty Dog’s passion for delivering incredible stories, characters, and gameplay," Neil Druckmann writes in the blog post.
This multiplayer game has been a long time coming, as it was originally meant to release alongside The Last of Us Part II but was separated to become a standalone release. We haven't heard that much about it since then, only getting some concept art at Summer Game Fest 2022. As this new concept art looks like it's from a very different location than the previous art, it seems like this multiplayer game could have multiple maps.
While it still doesn't have a release window, we should hear more about it by the end of 2023.

Gaming

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