Sure, Days Gone might be less linear in its game design, incorporate a motorbike for traversal and feature much more frequent combat, but the crossover with The Last Of Us is still obvious. Both titles transcend the zombie genre, a genre that is still firmly the zeitgeist of the times. Clickers, walkers, freakers; call them what you want, give them whatever degree of intellect, bill them as infected or mentally ill, it’s all essentially the same. Similarly, you can expect familiar narrative themes like morality, ethics, family and gender intertwined in a story that explores sociology in a world devoid of law and order. These are themes we’ve not only explored in The Last Of Us but others post-apocalyptic video games as well, not to mention movies, television and comics.
So, beyond mere commentary on the obvious similarities of the two games and the slightly tired but still ever popular zombie genre, how does any of this impact The Last Of Us 2? Certainly, we’re pretty sure that Neil Druckman and co. are working on the sequel, not least because we’ve had several slips of the tongue from industry insiders and voice actors such as Nolan North regarding future workings on the title. More importantly, however, Druckman previously stated that he and Bruce Straley were throwing ideas around for a sequel prior to being asked to work on Uncharted 4, and it’s that information that perhaps provides an interesting case study in regards to studio direction.
As a publisher, Sony has control over the direction of their first part studios, and while a sequel is highly likely (Sony would be mad to walk away from the potential earnings of such a massively popular IP), one shouldn’t be surprised if the game was put heavily on the backburner so it doesn’t detract attention from Days Gone.
[zergpaid]Indeed, the two titles are so similar in genre it seems unlikely that Sony would want either of them launching anywhere near each other. Perhaps the most the alarming news for those eagerly anticipating news on The Last Of Us 2 is that Days Gone isn’t as far through development as many people had expected. In fact, when quizzed about the release date for Days Gone, the game’s lead director, John Garvin stated that it was not safe to assume that it would launch in 2017. In light of that information, Days Gone’s long development period is likely to push a sequel from Naughty Dog to 2019 or possibly 2020.
It seems likely that Naughty Dog won’t be encouraged by Sony to divert too many resources to a sequel title to The Last Of Us. Indeed, while it’s possible the game is in a pre-alpha state already, you’d wager that Naughty Dog are busy giving attention to other projects such as Uncharted 4’s single player DLC. It’s also unclear how much time Druckman is being allocated to assisting with The Last Of Us movie. We’ve heard rumours that the film adaptation isn’t going smoothly, with Druckman himself commenting that he’s only been involved briefly as the script is being finalized. Yet, you’d have to imagine his involvement would ramp up once filming is underway, if that ever occurs.
We’ve waited a long time for Bend’s new IP, and the studio can probably be satisfied with the interest the teaser trailer piqued at E3, but equally as many eyebrows were raised when presented with yet another zombie post-apocalyptic genre of video game. Of course, The Last Of Us’s overwhelming popularity sets it apart from generic zombie titles and the same eyebrows might not have been raised if that had been the announcement at E3, even despite its extremely similar premise.
Unfortunately, those who were hoping for a quick post Uncharted 4 announcement and then a speedy turnaround time between release dates as per Uncharted 2 to the original The Last Of Us should probably taper that expectation. It would be mad to ignore that Days Gone might well seriously impact when we’re likely to see a sequel for The Last Of Us. Indeed, while its pleasing to finally get a glimpse of what the talented team at Bend have been working on, it’s a shame that it likely comes at the expense of a sequel to Naughty Dog’s masterpiece and arguably PlayStation’s best ever game.
