The highly emotional hit game from 2013, starts filming this summer. Naughty Dog is fresh off of the sequel, The Last of Us Part II, and is supposedly in the midst of creating the 2020 game's multiplayer component, a follow up to the original's Factions game mode. Remaking TLOU was apparently a relatively small team's ion project within Sony before the reins were handed over to Naughty Dog itself.
The news comes as a bit of a head-scratcher, since TLOU seems like an odd choice to prioritize for a remake. Naughty Dog has a penchant for releasing games with incredibly high visual fidelity, and TLOU was no different when it launched in 2013, capping off the PlayStation 3 generation. Soon after the PS4 released, it received a face lift as The Last of Us Remastered, which included all DLC and the Factions multiplayer. When the PS4 Pro was released, TLOU Remastered was updated to 4K, and now has a graphics mode to target 60fps on the PS5. Albeit the graphics don't quite stack up to that of TLOU2, but they are far from needing a complete overhaul.
News of a TLOU remake comes from the original Uncharted game, but was told the project would be too expensive. Remakes are seen as a relatively safe bet for new development teams, and Naughty Dog is one of Sony's premier studios, so The Last of Us was settled on for its relatively low amount of work to remake and the potential for profit.
Naughty Dog Remaking The Last of Us is Unnecessary
Prior to The Last of Us Part II being released, the Visual Arts Service Group was brought in to help Naughty Dog put on the finishing touches. After that, Sony decided a team from Naughty Dog was going to be brought in to work on the original's remake. Soon the project was absorbed under Naughty Dog's budget, where developers who had actually worked on the original had more influence, and the Visual Arts Service Group was once again in a ing role.
Having Naughty Dog take control on a remake for The Last of Us feels like Sony adding more things to an already stacked plate. TLOU2 had to be delayed from 2019 to 2020, and while TLOU2's standalone multiplayer component allegedly became too ambitious to ship with the base game, the studio is also presumably helping advise the HBO series. Now, Naughty Dog has been handed the responsibility of remaking its own game from 2013 when another team was already hard at work on it - perhaps emphasizing the ludicrousness of it all.
There's a market for a remake of TLOU, and not many would balk at the chance to replay it with even better graphics, but given that a remaster and PS5 enhancements already exist, the game seems pretty unnecessary. There are older games, like the original Uncharted, that could use a remake even more. Regardless, Naughty Dog should have been left to create new, engaging narrative experiences while The Last of Us remake should've stayed with the Visual Arts Service Group.
Source: Bloomberg
