The Last Of Us Online cancellation saw ‘heads rolling at Sony’ in live service game backlash

GameCentral

Published August 13, 2024 7:20pm Updated August 14, 2024 12:48pm

The Last Of Us Online concept art — The Last Of Us Online – how costly was its cancellation? (Naughty Dog)

A reliable source suggests the cancellation of The Last Of Us Online was not a ‘bloodless endeavour’ but it’s unclear how high up the list of victims goes.

It’s been widely suggested that Xbox’s uncertain stance on multiformat releases is because there’s been something of a civil war at Microsoft, between those that want everything to stay exclusive and those that don’t.

What’s less widely acknowledged – because Sony makes so few public announcements nowadays – is that the same thing seems to be happening at PlayStation, only there the conflict is between proponents of live service games and those that resent the apparent new focus on them.

We say apparent because it’s not clear what Sony’s current policy is on them, especially after suggestions that the cancellation of The Last Of Us Online was not a ‘bloodless endeavour.’

The remark was made by respected Bloomberg journalist Jason Schreier, speaking on the Friends Per Second podcast, where he suggested that, ‘The list of games that have been pivots from single-player studios to trying to make service online games, that just turned out to be debacles is very, very long.’

Back in 2022, Sony announced it would publish 12 live service games by 2026, all of which would be made by its various first party studios. This implied that most, if not all, of its internal studios would be pivoted from primarily single-player games to multiplayer titles, including Naughty Dog.

As of right now, Sony still hasn’t released a single game (although Concord is out later this month) and in 2023 they admitted the target was being reduced from 12 to six.

Given the total lack of explanation from Sony, it’s impossible to tell what’s going on, with some suggesting that they’ve now pivoted back towards single-player games.

‘The cycle is ‘single-player studio super successful, pivots to live service. Spends seven years making a live service game nobody wants. Live service game comes out, it’s a debacle’, said Schreier.

Schreier, while discussing the recent layoffs at Bungie, also described Sony’s obsession with live service games as ‘trend chasing.’

Rather than being told to make a multiplayer game out of the blue, The Last Of Us Online was originally an evolution of the Factions mode from the first game, since The Last Of Us Part 2 does not have any online mode.

‘Naughty Dog’s Factions game was in development for something like four years with a team in the hundreds. That is an expensive proposition for something that was a miss,’ said Schreier. ‘That getting cancelled, was not a bloodless endeavour. There were some heads rolling at Sony as a result of that one.’

What Schreier means by this is unclear, especially since Naughty Dog is technically Sony as well, but the implication seems to be that some higher-ups at Sony Interactive Entertainment lost their jobs as a result of the enormous amount of wasted time and money.

Schreier may be referring to head of internal production Connie Booth, who after decades at PlayStation made an unceremonious exit from the company in October 2023 – only a few weeks after the announced departure of PlayStation boss Jim Ryan.

A few months later and Naughty Dog announced the cancellation of The Last Of Us Online, all of which is some very suspicious timing.

However, there’s nothing in Schreier’s comments that suggest the fallout was quite that severe and no obvious reason he wouldn’t just say if that was the reason.

Wasting an entire generation forcing developers to make live service games, that neither they nor most players want, and then wasting even more time reversing the decision is certainly a reason to get rid of senior executives, but it’s unclear whether we’ll ever know what really went on behind the scenes.

At the moment, Sony’s release schedules remain as barren as ever and after the release of Astro Bot in early September they have nothing else with a scheduled release date and only Lego Horizon Adventures, Wolverine, live service game Fairgame$, and the remake of Until Dawn that is even announced.

As for Naughty Dog, they are apparently working on ‘multiple’ single-player games, and no multiplayer ones. Although it’s unclear what any of them are.