John-ShepardNaughty Dog is an ambitious developer. They only want to produce masterpieces; at this point, anything less is a disappointment, right?
So it's no surprise to learn that they overextended themselves a little in the making of their latest masterful title, The Last Of Us . In speaking during a recent podcast , game director Bruce Straley and creative director Neil Druckmann explained why the game was delayed to June, and why they needed to borrow "a bunch of people" from other internal teams. The game was just too big.
They had to alter the ending a little (no spoilers here, don't worry), and here's another interesting tidbit- they were gonna have a dog join Joel and Ellie. But that was "cut pretty early" because it was just over-the-top and in fact, "one of the programmers just freaked out" due to the technical challenges involved. Oh, I can just picture it now: "A dog…?! A fu*&()& DOG?! Oh, that's it. I quit. I QUIT."
They also talked about Ellie's resemblance to actress Ellen Page, leading people to believe that it was in fact Page who would be voicing the character. The Naughty Dog guys admitted that they just didn't see that, so they worked to include more of the actual actress – Ashley Johnson, who does a superb job, by the way – in the virtual Ellie's features.
In our estimation, The Last Of Us is one of the very best games ever made. If you don't play it, you're missing out.
Related Game(s): The Last Of Us
