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Speaker 1: Get in text with technology with tech Stuff from half

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Speaker 1: staff works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff.

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Speaker 1: I am your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer

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Speaker 1: here at how Stuff Works, and I love all things

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Speaker 1: tech and we are going to continue the story about

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Speaker 1: Naughty Dog Games. When we left off in our last episode,

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Speaker 1: the game studio had just shipped Crash Bandicoot and that

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Speaker 1: was their first title for the brand new Sony PlayStation console.

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Speaker 1: And it was also a bold move to try and

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Speaker 1: sneak in and create a de facto mascot for the company. Now,

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Speaker 1: due to the complicated intellectual property ownership status, Crash would

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Speaker 1: never become an official mascot of PlayStation, partly because Universal

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Speaker 1: Studios had a stake in the property. Universal Studios had

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Speaker 1: made a deal with Naughty Dog a few years earlier

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Speaker 1: to develop three games together, and Crash Bandicoot was the

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Speaker 1: first of those three. But there's no question that Sony

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Speaker 1: was able to take advantage of crashes innovative gameplay design

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Speaker 1: and the you know, no nonsense attitude that the little

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Speaker 1: creator gave off in promotional materials. Actually it was more

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Speaker 1: like all nonsense, all the time attitude. It was nineties attitude,

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Speaker 1: which is probably the most irritating attitude ever. I lived

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Speaker 1: through it. I know what I'm talking about. Well. In

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Speaker 1: the thirtieth anniversary documentary that was based on Naughty Dog

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Speaker 1: is a great documentary. It's available on YouTube. I I

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Speaker 1: highly recommend checking it out. Andy Gavin said that the

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Speaker 1: success of Crash Bandicoot exceeded their expectations, even though everything

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Speaker 1: went quote exactly as according to plan end quote. So

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Speaker 1: in other words, the team had set out to make

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Speaker 1: a successful game with a protagonist that gamers would connect with,

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Speaker 1: but they didn't expect it to take off the way

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Speaker 1: it did. The development process had been a grueling one.

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Speaker 1: If you listen to the last episode, you know about that.

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Speaker 1: Most of the folks on staff were young and single,

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Speaker 1: and so they spent long hours in the office, sometimes

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Speaker 1: not even going home in order to get the game

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Speaker 1: to ship on time. And people worked every single day

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Speaker 1: of the week, including holidays. It was already time for

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Speaker 1: them to get back to work on Crash two though,

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Speaker 1: for the next project, so they couldn't really take any

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Speaker 1: time to appreciate what they had done. According to Jason Rubin,

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Speaker 1: one of the two co founders of the company. He

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Speaker 1: worked three hundred sixty four days in He only missed

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Speaker 1: one day that whole year, and that was because he

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Speaker 1: had a cold so bad he could not come into work.

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Speaker 1: He said he believed that Andy Gavin, his fellow co founder,

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Speaker 1: had actually worked every single day that year for an

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Speaker 1: average of sixteen hours a day. That would remain true

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Speaker 1: throughout the process of creating all three of the Crash

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Speaker 1: Bandicoo games, and that took its toll on both of

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Speaker 1: the founders, not to mention everybody else in the company.

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Speaker 1: The two sequels are called Crash Bandicoot to Cortex Strikes

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Speaker 1: Back and Crash Bandicoot Warped. According to the founders, the

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Speaker 1: team went from one crunch time on producing a game

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Speaker 1: directly into the other, and then into another. It was

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Speaker 1: an exhausting slog to get through everything. They also hired

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Speaker 1: on more people to join the team, so each game

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Speaker 1: took a little less time but more people to complete.

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Speaker 1: The business of developing games was going through an evolution

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Speaker 1: at this stage. So in the early days of computer games,

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Speaker 1: you could be a generalist, or perhaps you could specialize

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Speaker 1: in one very large general area such as game engine

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Speaker 1: development or game art and That's exactly how Andy Gavin

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Speaker 1: and Jason Rubin had been working together. Gavin did all

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Speaker 1: the major programming and Reuben did all the art in

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Speaker 1: their early games. But at this point, game development was

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Speaker 1: starting to get more complicated and required people with narrower

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Speaker 1: but hyper developed set of skills, so things like lighting

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Speaker 1: and shading stuff that took very specific abilities. You couldn't

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Speaker 1: just be an artist and do it all. You really

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Speaker 1: had to have people who focused just on one aspect

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Speaker 1: of the game. With each Crash Bandicoot game, the development

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Speaker 1: team grew. Crash three marked the final game produced through

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Speaker 1: this partnership between Naughty Dog and Universal Studios. Now they

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Speaker 1: had initially agreed to produce those three games as part

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Speaker 1: of the deal, and that number had now been reached

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Speaker 1: and the relationship had actually soured quite a bit over time. Initially,

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Speaker 1: Universal had provided the resources that Naughty Dog needed to

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Speaker 1: develop games on a larger scale than what they had

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Speaker 1: been doing, which was that two man operation of Jason

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Speaker 1: Rubin and Andy Gavin. But by Crash three, things have

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Speaker 1: changed significantly. According to Jason Rubin, Universal's part in Naughty

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Speaker 1: Dog's operations had dwindled to almost nothing when it came

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Speaker 1: to day to day operations, Sony was providing the money

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Speaker 1: for development and production of titles. The team at Naughty

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Speaker 1: Dog was doing all the work, and even their executive

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Speaker 1: producer Mark Sarney, who had originally worked with Universal Studios,

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Speaker 1: had left Universal and now was working with Naughty Dog

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Speaker 1: as an independent contractor. So Reuben said that Universal wasn't

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Speaker 1: really doing anything at all except cashing checks because they

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Speaker 1: owned the intellectual property of Crash Bandicoot. This rubbed Ruben

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Speaker 1: and many others at Naughty Dog the wrong way. They said,

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Speaker 1: why should the developers split so much of their money

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Speaker 1: with a company that's not really doing anything to provide

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Speaker 1: for the success of our titles. Jason Ruben said in

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Speaker 1: an interview with Games Industry Dot biz that he and

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Speaker 1: Andy had decided not to renew the agreement with Universal

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Speaker 1: Interactive while the team was still working on Crash three,

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Speaker 1: so they hadn't even finished, uh delivering the game that

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Speaker 1: would conclude the agreement when they had said, you know what,

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Speaker 1: we're not gonna do this again. He said they were

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Speaker 1: unwilling to split that revenue with Universal, and he also

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Speaker 1: said that the it was it was just getting really

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Speaker 1: hard to deal with people at Universal is increasingly difficult

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Speaker 1: to work with executives there, and they were making it

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Speaker 1: a habit of taking credit for success of the Crash

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Speaker 1: Bandicoot series, even though no one at Universal had really

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Speaker 1: had a role to play in the later development of

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Speaker 1: those games. According to Reuben, he and his team were

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Speaker 1: moved into temporary spaces in the hallways at Universal Studios

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Speaker 1: as offices. They couldn't be turned out in the street

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Speaker 1: because the deal that Naughty Dog had signed with Universal

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Speaker 1: guaranteed them work space in return for developing the three

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Speaker 1: Crash Bandicoot games, But Ruben said the folks at Universal

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Speaker 1: made sure that things were not easy or pleasant for

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Speaker 1: Naughty Dog once it was clear they weren't going to

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Speaker 1: renew their arrangement. Reuben said they even had to Jerry

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Speaker 1: Riggan air conditioner for their servers because Universal would turn

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Speaker 1: off the A C in the evenings. Their workspace was

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Speaker 1: on the thirty fourth floor of a building and they

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Speaker 1: were told they could not bring in portable A C

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Speaker 1: units into the hall. They were concerned not just for

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Speaker 1: their own for it, but for their servers that were

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Speaker 1: getting up to a hundred thirty degrees fahrenheit so they

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Speaker 1: decided they would do their best. They rigged up a

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Speaker 1: bucket of ice and a fan, a regular oscillating fan

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Speaker 1: to blow air over the ice and cool their servers

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Speaker 1: down so that they didn't go critical. Eventually, they were

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Speaker 1: able to sneak in a portable a C unit up

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Speaker 1: to their space, disguised as a small refrigerator. The day

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Speaker 1: the team handed off Crash three, they left the Universal lot.

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Speaker 1: They did not waste time. They relocated to a new

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Speaker 1: headquarters in Santa Monica, California, and they got to work

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Speaker 1: on a cart racing game. Jason Rubin said that the

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Speaker 1: initial thought was games were going to become more cinematic,

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Speaker 1: They were going to incorporate live action sequences, and they

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Speaker 1: were going to require the talents cultivated by the film

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Speaker 1: industry in particular. Full motion video was still a thing

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Speaker 1: at this point and had not quite become the joke

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Speaker 1: many people associate with it these days, and so they

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Speaker 1: chose to stay close to Los Angeles, thinking they would

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Speaker 1: be really close to all of those assets, rather than

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Speaker 1: relocate to a place like San Francisco or Austin, Texas. Now,

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Speaker 1: according to Ruben, that decision ended up having advantages and disadvantages.

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Speaker 1: The big disadvantage was that these other cities, you know,

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Speaker 1: San Francisco in Austin in particular, had a lot more

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Speaker 1: game development studios in them, and it was a lot

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Speaker 1: easier to attract talent to a studio because there was

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Speaker 1: already a culture there. Los Angeles didn't have that many

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Speaker 1: game development studios, so it was harder to attract talent.

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Speaker 1: But by being a big player in a town that

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Speaker 1: did not have many game development studios, Naughty Dog could

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Speaker 1: more easily hold onto the talent it cultivated. So once

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Speaker 1: they got someone, they weren't likely to easily leave the company.

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Speaker 1: There there wasn't the likelihood of another company coming in

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Speaker 1: and sniping out an employee out from under Naughty Dog

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Speaker 1: because they weren't in the same town. Naughty Dog then

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Speaker 1: reached out to Sony and said, hey, we have a

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Speaker 1: game we're working on. It's right now, a bunch of

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Speaker 1: nondescriptive people on these go kart like racers. But we'd

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Speaker 1: really love to make this a crash bandicoot racing game.

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Speaker 1: Only there's a problem. See, we are not all We're

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Speaker 1: not gonna talk to anyone over at Universal. We kind

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Speaker 1: of hate their guts and they kind of hate our

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Speaker 1: guts and we don't want to deal with that. So,

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Speaker 1: because Universal owns the intellectual property for crash Bandicoot, if

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Speaker 1: we want to make this a crash Bandicoot game, could

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Speaker 1: you guys over at Sony go to Universal and work

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Speaker 1: things out for us? And Sony said sure, and they

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Speaker 1: jumped in and they negotiated the rights to use Crash

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Speaker 1: Bandicoots intellectual property and create this racing cart game, Crash

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Speaker 1: Team Racing. So that was Naughty Dog's first post Universal game,

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Speaker 1: the Crash Bandicoot Crash Team Racing cart game for the PlayStation,

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Speaker 1: which came out in now. As most of the team

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Speaker 1: focused on building out Crash Team Racing, Andy Gavin began

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Speaker 1: to work with Stephen White and Mark Sarney to plan

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Speaker 1: for a new game engine to run on top of

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Speaker 1: the next generation of Sony hardware. The PlayStation two was

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Speaker 1: poised to come out in the spring of two thousand

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Speaker 1: and Gavin wanted to make sure that Naughty Dog was

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Speaker 1: ready to transition to develop games for this new hardware.

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Speaker 1: They also wanted to create an all new intellectual property

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Speaker 1: title that would be under the control of Naughty Dog itself.

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Speaker 1: So while they were no longer a small, scrappy independent

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Speaker 1: developer the way they had been in the eighties and

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Speaker 1: early nineties, they were determined to chart their course as

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Speaker 1: if they still were a very small team. The intellectual

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Speaker 1: property would turn into a series of games featuring a

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Speaker 1: pair of protagonists named Jack and Daxter. As for Crash,

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Speaker 1: that i P would remain with Universal. Eventually, the Vendi Universal,

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Speaker 1: which evolved from Universal Interactive, would merge with another company,

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Speaker 1: that being Activision, and the rights to Crash Bandicoot ultimately

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Speaker 1: would pass to this new merged company. There have been

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Speaker 1: twenty games to feature Crash Bandicoot as either the main

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Speaker 1: protagonist or a playable character. Only four out the twenty

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Speaker 1: were actually developed by Naughty Dog Game Studio. The goal

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Speaker 1: Naughty Dog had with Jack and Daxter wasn't just to

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Speaker 1: make a new franchise. It was to push their approach

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Speaker 1: to game development and try to incorporate more story and

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Speaker 1: plot into an adventure game. That had been the original

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Speaker 1: intent for Crash Bandicoot, but the team found out while

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Speaker 1: they were developing it for the PlayStation that the limitations

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Speaker 1: of that console made it impractical, if not impossible, to

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Speaker 1: develop such an ambitious style of game, so they had

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Speaker 1: high hopes that the PlayStation two would be up to snuff.

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Speaker 1: The company also took it on faith that they would

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Speaker 1: works out, you know, a publishing deal with Sony somewhere

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Speaker 1: down the line, so they were concentrating on building Jack

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Speaker 1: and Daxter and left all that contract stuff for later.

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Speaker 1: So I actually started building a game before there was

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Speaker 1: any ink signed to have that game published, which is

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Speaker 1: sort of a repeat of how Gavin and Rubin had

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Speaker 1: made Way of the Warrior a few years earlier. That

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Speaker 1: was the game that got them the initial deal with Universal,

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Speaker 1: and Naughty Dog was making decent money from Crash bandicoot royalties,

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Speaker 1: so there weren't as many economic pressures in play as

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Speaker 1: there could have been. At this stage, Jason Reuben instituted

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Speaker 1: a new rule at naughty Dog. Development had reached a

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Speaker 1: point where multiple people would be working on the same assets,

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Speaker 1: so you would have multiple people creating a single character,

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Speaker 1: for example. But naughty Dogs policy up to this point

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Speaker 1: was to allow people to kind of come in at

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Speaker 1: different times things that were suitable to their own schedules.

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Speaker 1: So some folks would pull a twelve hour day starting

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Speaker 1: from six am, going to six pm. Others were still

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Speaker 1: pulling a twelve hour day, but they started four pm

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Speaker 1: and they clock out it four am. Now, Ruben saw

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Speaker 1: this as a problem. It meant that people who were

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Speaker 1: handling the same assets in the game had very little

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Speaker 1: time to actually work together because some of them would

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Speaker 1: come in two hours before the other person was leaving.

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Speaker 1: It really limited any sort of collaboration, so he created

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Speaker 1: a policy in which all Naughty Dog employees were required

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Speaker 1: to be at the company for several core hours. The

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Speaker 1: reaction from employees was less than enthusiastic. In fact, two

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Speaker 1: team members left after those changes took effect. However, they

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Speaker 1: would eventually become industry standards across the video game world.

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Speaker 1: Ruben and Gavin had also noted the effect of all

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Speaker 1: that work was taking its toll on their employees. People

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Speaker 1: had families now, so they weren't as eager to spend

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Speaker 1: day after day working eighteen hours at the office, and

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Speaker 1: they were getting tired, and so they created another new policy.

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Speaker 1: At the end of every project, everyone would get a

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Speaker 1: month vacation. Effectively, the company would shut down for a

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Speaker 1: full month and then as soon as you got back,

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Speaker 1: you have to go right back into work. On the

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Speaker 1: next project. However, this policy did not cover the co

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Speaker 1: founders Reuben and Gavin, because they would continue holding meetings

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Speaker 1: and giving interviews during that month hiatus. In other words,

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Speaker 1: they didn't stop working. Back to Jack and Dexter, Naughty

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Speaker 1: Dog wanted an action adventure game in which as much

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Speaker 1: of the story could be incorporated directly into the game

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Speaker 1: as possible. They also wanted a large, open world environment

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Speaker 1: without having any long loading times between zones, so that

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Speaker 1: you could walk from one side to the other and

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Speaker 1: you would never have an annoying loading screen. In the end,

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Speaker 1: they were able to create cut scenes to insert into

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Speaker 1: the action and advance the story, but they found it

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Speaker 1: difficult to integrate plot and action more seamlessly. It was

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Speaker 1: a step beyond what crash Bandicoot could do, but it

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Speaker 1: was still far short of what their end goal was now.

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Speaker 1: The title characters are Jack, which is kind of a

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Speaker 1: young and an elf like creature who serves as the

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Speaker 1: playable character for the first game, and Daxter, who used

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Speaker 1: to be another young elf like creature but then got

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Speaker 1: turned into a critter called an otsul, part otter, part weasel,

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Speaker 1: and he's often the comic relief in the games Jack

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Speaker 1: and Daxter, the precursor Legacy, launched in two thousand one.

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Speaker 1: The following year, two thousand two, Andy Gavin and Jason

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Speaker 1: Rubin made a big decision. They decided that they were

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Speaker 1: going to sell the company to Sony and that they

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Speaker 1: would retire from their leadership roles. I'll talk more about

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Speaker 1: that decision in just a moment, but first let's take

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Speaker 1: a quick break to thank our sponsor. The co founder's

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Speaker 1: decision to retire didn't exactly come out of the blue.

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Speaker 1: Jason Rubin has said that he and Andy Gavin were

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Speaker 1: at a nightclub in Tokyo with a couple of other people,

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Speaker 1: including Kelly Flock, and Kelly was the head of Sony's

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Speaker 1: game division in the United States at the time, and

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Speaker 1: Flock had said that Naughty Dog was effectively at the

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Speaker 1: top of the video game business, which sadly meant it

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Speaker 1: had nowhere to go but down, and that just meant

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Speaker 1: that there was no way to climb higher than the top.

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Speaker 1: When you're at the top, that's where you can be.

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Speaker 1: You can try and stay on the top as long

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Speaker 1: as you can, but eventually you're gonna go down if

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Speaker 1: things don't, you know, consistently evolved, and Garrety Rubin began

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Speaker 1: to give thought to selling the company because the idea

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Speaker 1: of having to keep reinventing the company over and over

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Speaker 1: in order to maintain that top spot when they hadn't

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Speaker 1: had a vacation in years seemed a little too overwhelming.

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Speaker 1: But even then, when they started thinking about the possibility

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Speaker 1: of selling the company, it didn't happen right away. When

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Speaker 1: the first Jack and Daxter game went live, the whole

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Speaker 1: company went on vacation except for the two co founders,

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Speaker 1: who continued to work, but the grind really was getting

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Speaker 1: to them. The company was nervous about how their new

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Speaker 1: game was going to be received, because really they had

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Speaker 1: been known for Crash Bandicoot at this point would they

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Speaker 1: actually find acceptance with Jack and Daxter. Fortunately, the game

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Speaker 1: got good reviews and sales were doing quite well, so

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Speaker 1: when everyone came back a month later, they immediately launched

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Speaker 1: into developing the sequel to Jack and Daxter, conveniently titled

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Speaker 1: Jack two. By two thousand two, Gavin and Rubin had

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Speaker 1: decided it was a good time to change things up.

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Speaker 1: They wanted to sell the company. They were going to

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Speaker 1: sell it to Sony. It would become a wholly owned

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Speaker 1: subsidiary of Sony Entertainment, and then they were going to

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Speaker 1: step away from the company. But they didn't plan to

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Speaker 1: just abandon Naughty Dog with no warnings, so instead they

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Speaker 1: drew up a two year transition plan in which they

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Speaker 1: would both gradually handoff duties and responsibilities to their chosen successors,

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Speaker 1: and at the end of that in two thousand four,

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Speaker 1: they would complete the handoff and then they could go

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Speaker 1: and right off into the sunset, virtually speaking. Now, a

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Speaker 1: lot changed between those first two Jack and Dexter games.

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Speaker 1: The second game had a more serious tone and a

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Speaker 1: different approach to navigating the world and progressing through the story.

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Speaker 1: Behind the scenes, people at Naughty Dog weren't really sure

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Speaker 1: what the future would bring. There were some worries about

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Speaker 1: how the transition with Ruben and Gavin stepping away, how

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Speaker 1: that could affect work, not to mention how an acquisition

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Speaker 1: could change things. Would the company be able to maintain

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Speaker 1: its philosophy and work culture, or which things changed so

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Speaker 1: dramatically when Sony took charge that it wouldn't even be

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Speaker 1: the same company anymore. That two year plan helped settle

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Speaker 1: fears quite a bit. Ruben and Gavin began grooming Evan

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Speaker 1: Wells and Stephen White to take over the leadership positions

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Speaker 1: at Naughty Dog. They would effectively be co presidents. Gradually,

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Speaker 1: Ruben and Gavin stepped back from their roles, with Wells

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Speaker 1: and White taking on more of those responsibilities as time

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Speaker 1: went on. This would often be cited as one of

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Speaker 1: the more successful executive transitions in any industry, let alone

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Speaker 1: in the video game industry. Eventually, Evan Wells and Stephen

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Speaker 1: White would become co presidents of the company, and Andy

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Speaker 1: Gavin and Jason Jason Rubin left Naughty Dog in October

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Speaker 1: two thousand four. That was the same year that Jack

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Speaker 1: three came out. Stephen White would end up leaving the

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Speaker 1: company a few years later, and a programmer named Christoph

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Speaker 1: Blestra took over as the new co president alongside Evan Wells.

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Speaker 1: At that point. That was around two thousand seven. Jumping

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Speaker 1: back just a bit. While much of the team transitioned

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Speaker 1: to work on a racing title for Jack and Daxter

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Speaker 1: that would come out in two thousand five, another early

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Speaker 1: project began to take form. They had a creative writer

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Speaker 1: on staff named Amy Hennig who had joined naughty Dog

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Speaker 1: after working in the video games industry since nineteen nine,

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Speaker 1: so she had had more than a decade's worth of

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Speaker 1: experience in the world already, and she had a concept

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Speaker 1: for a new game that she felt would be a

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Speaker 1: good fit for the next generation of consoles. The PlayStation

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Speaker 1: three was not set to launch until November two thousand six,

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Speaker 1: but Hennig believed that Naughty Dog needed to start to

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Speaker 1: focus on something that could be a defining game for

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Speaker 1: that new console. Hennig started by striking off things on

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Speaker 1: the list she did not want to make. She did

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Speaker 1: not want to go with a dark, gritty, first person

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Speaker 1: style games set in a post apocalyptic world. She said

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Speaker 1: there were already other games that were doing that. She

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Speaker 1: didn't want the game to be super serious, but she

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Speaker 1: also did not want to create a game that was

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Speaker 1: cartoonish that featured animated characters jumping all around the screen,

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Speaker 1: and considering that Jack and Daxter and Crash Bandicoot kind

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Speaker 1: of fell into that category, this would mean a big

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Speaker 1: departure for naughty Dog. What she wanted to do was

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Speaker 1: create a game that had realistic graphics, compelling animation, really

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Speaker 1: great acting, both from the voice over actors, and from

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Speaker 1: the in game characters themselves and great action sequences, and

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Speaker 1: it also just had to be fun to play, not

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Speaker 1: dour and depressing. The closest analog to what she had

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Speaker 1: in mind was tomb Raider, but at that time the

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Speaker 1: tomb Raider franchise had sort of faded into the background.

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Speaker 1: Hinnigg's project had a code name, Project Big. It wasn't

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Speaker 1: called anything particular because they were still deciding what it

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Speaker 1: was going to be. It turned out that Project Big

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Speaker 1: was a bit of an understatement. Not only had Hennig

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Speaker 1: and her team not yet figured out what form it

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Speaker 1: was going to take, they were also going to have

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Speaker 1: to program a game for an all new console that

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Speaker 1: had a drastically different microchip architecture. The PlayStation three had

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Speaker 1: a lot of power at its disposal, but it also

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Speaker 1: was not designed like earlier iterations of the PlayStation. Developers,

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Speaker 1: not just Naughty Dog developers, but throughout the entire industry

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Speaker 1: found it challenging to build games for this new console.

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Speaker 1: At first, Naughty Dog was not alone in this. It

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Speaker 1: was all uncharted territory. And yeah, I made that same

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Speaker 1: joke in the last episode, but I'm making it again

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Speaker 1: now because Project Big would of course, evolve into the

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Speaker 1: hit game series Uncharted. One of the earliest ideas they

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Speaker 1: played with was to create a game set in an

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Speaker 1: underwater complex with underwater mechanics and physics and all sorts

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Speaker 1: of cool ideas, but ultimately they felt like this setting

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Speaker 1: wasn't really in line with what the company did best.

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Speaker 1: They thought going with something that was so clustrophobic probably

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Speaker 1: wasn't going to end up being fun, so they decided

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Speaker 1: to explore other ideas, and later on they were really

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Speaker 1: thankful that they changed direction because when Bioshot came out,

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Speaker 1: they realized that that game was really incredible and probably

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Speaker 1: better than what they would have done given a similar setting,

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Speaker 1: so they were kind of glad they had decided not

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Speaker 1: to go down that route, even though they had developed

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Speaker 1: a lot of assets, art and other assets for such

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Speaker 1: a game. Uh Naughty Dog was instead going to explore

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Speaker 1: or other options for a project Big. So another idea

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Speaker 1: they looked at was to set the game in the

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Speaker 1: future and they would have a protagonist essentially what would

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Speaker 1: turn into Nathan Drake, the protagonist of the Uncharted series,

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Speaker 1: who is part treasure hunter, part archaeologist, kind of an

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Speaker 1: Indiana Jones style character, although more on the treasure hunter

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Speaker 1: side than the person wanting to preserve everything side. They thought, well,

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Speaker 1: in this version, Nathan Drake is going to be in

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Speaker 1: the future and he's searching for relics of the past,

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Speaker 1: which would actually be stuff from our present day. So,

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Speaker 1: in other words, it would take place in sort of

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Speaker 1: a post apocalyptic world. But again, this didn't seem like

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Speaker 1: it was going to be a good fit, and even

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Speaker 1: though they did develop some ideas around this, they never

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Speaker 1: pushed it to the point where it would become part

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Speaker 1: of the Uncharted series. More changes and experiments followed. Maybe

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Speaker 1: it would be a game with lots of high tech

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Speaker 1: gadgets and weaponry. Maybe it would take place in a

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Speaker 1: steampunk world with flying cars. Maybe it would involve super

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Speaker 1: spies and double crosses. Now gradually it evolved into a

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Speaker 1: pulp adventure kind of story based game. One of the

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Speaker 1: big goals was to finally achieve what Naughty Dog had

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Speaker 1: been trying to do for years, incorporating action sequences and

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Speaker 1: story sequences together effectively. The goal was to create playable

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Speaker 1: cut scenes. Naughty Dog wanted the gameplay to look just

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Speaker 1: as good as other games. Unplayable cut scenes had turned

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Speaker 1: out to be that would be too much for Uncharted one,

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Speaker 1: but it would be something they would strive for again

431
00:24:31,200 --> 00:24:34,760
Speaker 1: and Uncharted two. The story for Uncharted one took a

432
00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:38,440
Speaker 1: really long time to coalesce, and it went through a

433
00:24:38,480 --> 00:24:43,440
Speaker 1: ton of different changes. The development process for the engine, likewise,

434
00:24:43,520 --> 00:24:47,679
Speaker 1: took an extremely long time. Sony, the parent company, allowed

435
00:24:47,760 --> 00:24:50,439
Speaker 1: Naughty Dog to operate as if it were truly independent,

436
00:24:50,520 --> 00:24:53,560
Speaker 1: so no Sony executives were knocking on the door and

437
00:24:53,600 --> 00:24:56,600
Speaker 1: asking to see pitches or concepts. They didn't demand to

438
00:24:56,720 --> 00:25:00,480
Speaker 1: sign off on story elements or game assets. There was

439
00:25:00,520 --> 00:25:03,240
Speaker 1: a level of trust the company put in the team,

440
00:25:03,480 --> 00:25:06,920
Speaker 1: which both gave the developers freedom and added to their

441
00:25:06,920 --> 00:25:11,479
Speaker 1: sense of responsibility to deliver a really compelling experience. The

442
00:25:11,520 --> 00:25:14,800
Speaker 1: protagonist of the game series, Nathan Drake, is sort of

443
00:25:14,840 --> 00:25:18,520
Speaker 1: like Hans Solo and Indiana Jones combined into a treasure

444
00:25:18,600 --> 00:25:22,320
Speaker 1: hunting scalawag. So Harrison Ford on his best days as

445
00:25:22,400 --> 00:25:26,520
Speaker 1: a young man, he wasn't dressed in a particularly distinct way.

446
00:25:26,680 --> 00:25:29,359
Speaker 1: He had a dirty T shirt and jeans that was

447
00:25:29,440 --> 00:25:32,600
Speaker 1: his to go outfit, and in fact, most people felt

448
00:25:32,640 --> 00:25:35,280
Speaker 1: that this put the game a disadvantage because how do

449
00:25:35,280 --> 00:25:38,160
Speaker 1: you market a hero who just looks like a normal guy.

450
00:25:38,600 --> 00:25:41,360
Speaker 1: It was a challenging concept to put forward as an

451
00:25:41,560 --> 00:25:45,520
Speaker 1: iconic character, but Naughty Dog kept on going and working

452
00:25:45,560 --> 00:25:48,119
Speaker 1: on the story and the game engine, and as it

453
00:25:48,160 --> 00:25:52,199
Speaker 1: turns out, this design, while simple, was necessary because it

454
00:25:52,240 --> 00:25:55,359
Speaker 1: meant less stuff for the team to have to animate

455
00:25:55,720 --> 00:25:58,840
Speaker 1: to bring to life. When the game finally came together,

456
00:25:59,400 --> 00:26:03,080
Speaker 1: this turned to be a nightmare of a project. Blestro

457
00:26:03,160 --> 00:26:06,920
Speaker 1: would later respond to the question what was hard about

458
00:26:07,000 --> 00:26:12,919
Speaker 1: making Uncharted, and his answer was everything. The decision to

459
00:26:12,960 --> 00:26:15,440
Speaker 1: make the game cinematic meant the company had to developed

460
00:26:15,480 --> 00:26:19,760
Speaker 1: new animation tools and styles while working on unfamiliar hardware.

461
00:26:20,440 --> 00:26:23,679
Speaker 1: Now Cerny said that it took Naughty Dog about six

462
00:26:23,720 --> 00:26:26,840
Speaker 1: months to get up to speed for the PlayStation two,

463
00:26:27,000 --> 00:26:29,320
Speaker 1: but it took more than a year to get up

464
00:26:29,320 --> 00:26:33,160
Speaker 1: to speed with PlayStation three, and even then there really

465
00:26:33,320 --> 00:26:37,720
Speaker 1: wasn't a full mastery of the hardware. They had a

466
00:26:37,840 --> 00:26:41,679
Speaker 1: rough build of some gameplay mechanics, and not everything was

467
00:26:41,720 --> 00:26:44,600
Speaker 1: working properly. It was a far cry from a playable game,

468
00:26:45,080 --> 00:26:47,440
Speaker 1: and it was really tough work, and for some people

469
00:26:47,480 --> 00:26:51,800
Speaker 1: at Naughty Dog it was truly demoralizing. It didn't help

470
00:26:52,160 --> 00:26:54,240
Speaker 1: that the needs of this game were well outside the

471
00:26:54,240 --> 00:26:57,879
Speaker 1: comfort zone of the established teams at Naughty Dog. The

472
00:26:57,920 --> 00:27:02,240
Speaker 1: animators there were used to more hand drawn styles and approaches,

473
00:27:02,720 --> 00:27:05,399
Speaker 1: but that technique was not going to work if they

474
00:27:05,440 --> 00:27:09,520
Speaker 1: wanted to have realistic motion and effects in Uncharted. The

475
00:27:09,560 --> 00:27:12,000
Speaker 1: company made the decision that they were going to experiment

476
00:27:12,040 --> 00:27:15,359
Speaker 1: with motion capture, which was met with some resistance from

477
00:27:15,400 --> 00:27:17,800
Speaker 1: the animation department. It was totally new and they were

478
00:27:17,800 --> 00:27:20,880
Speaker 1: worried about getting replaced. What's more, no one was really

479
00:27:20,920 --> 00:27:23,560
Speaker 1: familiar with the technology, so the company actually had to

480
00:27:23,680 --> 00:27:27,119
Speaker 1: hire people familiar with that tech to come in and

481
00:27:27,240 --> 00:27:30,159
Speaker 1: figure out how to take the data that it generated

482
00:27:30,640 --> 00:27:33,560
Speaker 1: from motion capture and make it usable within a game.

483
00:27:33,960 --> 00:27:36,720
Speaker 1: As time went on, it became clear that the strategies

484
00:27:36,760 --> 00:27:39,360
Speaker 1: the team was using just we're not working, and so

485
00:27:39,720 --> 00:27:43,360
Speaker 1: they made the tough call to scrap everything and start

486
00:27:43,720 --> 00:27:47,480
Speaker 1: over developing new tools. But that meant all the people

487
00:27:47,480 --> 00:27:51,720
Speaker 1: whose work depended upon the tools couldn't actually do anything,

488
00:27:52,119 --> 00:27:55,560
Speaker 1: so artists and animators and others were left with nothing

489
00:27:55,600 --> 00:27:58,880
Speaker 1: to do. As programmers tried to build this new set

490
00:27:58,920 --> 00:28:02,680
Speaker 1: of tools, there was very real danger that Uncharted could

491
00:28:02,680 --> 00:28:06,239
Speaker 1: turn into vapor were akin to Duke Nukem Forever. There

492
00:28:06,240 --> 00:28:08,560
Speaker 1: were even people who were saying this might be the

493
00:28:08,720 --> 00:28:12,400
Speaker 1: end for naughty Dog. Several people weren't content to wait

494
00:28:12,440 --> 00:28:14,159
Speaker 1: around to see if the ship was ever going to

495
00:28:14,280 --> 00:28:16,920
Speaker 1: right itself, and a few were concerned about the new

496
00:28:16,920 --> 00:28:20,359
Speaker 1: direction of the company. Uh They thought that a realistic game,

497
00:28:20,520 --> 00:28:24,000
Speaker 1: even one meant to be funny and charming, was a

498
00:28:24,160 --> 00:28:27,920
Speaker 1: huge departure from the more cartoonish platformers and action adventure

499
00:28:27,920 --> 00:28:30,879
Speaker 1: games that they had built their reputation upon, and that

500
00:28:30,960 --> 00:28:33,440
Speaker 1: no one would accept a new style of game from

501
00:28:33,480 --> 00:28:36,080
Speaker 1: the studio. There were also people in the company who

502
00:28:36,119 --> 00:28:38,720
Speaker 1: felt that Uncharted was very much not a Naughty Dog

503
00:28:38,760 --> 00:28:41,000
Speaker 1: style of game at all, and so for the first

504
00:28:41,040 --> 00:28:45,160
Speaker 1: time in the company's history, more people were leaving then

505
00:28:45,200 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 1: the company was hiring on a month to month basis.

506
00:28:48,360 --> 00:28:52,040
Speaker 1: Naughty Dog was actually getting smaller. Those who remained with

507
00:28:52,080 --> 00:28:54,480
Speaker 1: the company began to double down on their conviction that

508
00:28:54,560 --> 00:28:57,280
Speaker 1: they could put out a game that they had envisioned.

509
00:28:57,480 --> 00:29:00,200
Speaker 1: They worked hard to get those tools in place, and

510
00:29:00,240 --> 00:29:03,120
Speaker 1: then to put the tools to use in constructing a game.

511
00:29:03,440 --> 00:29:05,360
Speaker 1: They also let go of the notion that the company

512
00:29:05,400 --> 00:29:07,960
Speaker 1: had to develop all the tools itself as a result

513
00:29:08,000 --> 00:29:10,880
Speaker 1: of the pains that they went through during the development

514
00:29:10,920 --> 00:29:14,080
Speaker 1: of Uncharted one, so for Uncharted two they ended up

515
00:29:14,080 --> 00:29:17,640
Speaker 1: paying a license for the Havoc game engine that's published

516
00:29:17,640 --> 00:29:21,480
Speaker 1: by an Irish software development company. This was a difficult

517
00:29:21,480 --> 00:29:24,240
Speaker 1: time for Naughty Dog, but the game was slowly coming

518
00:29:24,280 --> 00:29:28,560
Speaker 1: together despite all those setbacks. The team created a demo

519
00:29:28,800 --> 00:29:32,200
Speaker 1: for the two thousand and six E three conference. It

520
00:29:32,320 --> 00:29:35,760
Speaker 1: was all built on PC because at that stage the

521
00:29:35,840 --> 00:29:39,080
Speaker 1: studio didn't have any PlayStation three developer kits on the

522
00:29:39,120 --> 00:29:42,680
Speaker 1: studio floor itself, they only had access to one developer kit.

523
00:29:43,320 --> 00:29:47,160
Speaker 1: Taylor Kurasaki told I g N that that one PS

524
00:29:47,240 --> 00:29:50,200
Speaker 1: three developer kit they had access to was the size

525
00:29:50,240 --> 00:29:53,040
Speaker 1: of a refrigerator. At the time, there were a limited

526
00:29:53,120 --> 00:29:56,080
Speaker 1: number of PS three developer kits available in the world,

527
00:29:56,600 --> 00:29:59,719
Speaker 1: and because Uncharted was not scheduled to be a launch title,

528
00:30:00,120 --> 00:30:03,080
Speaker 1: it made more sense to save those kits for developers

529
00:30:03,120 --> 00:30:04,800
Speaker 1: who were working on games that were meant to be

530
00:30:04,800 --> 00:30:09,160
Speaker 1: playable on the PlayStation three launch day. The demo over

531
00:30:09,160 --> 00:30:12,080
Speaker 1: at E three went over really well, but what didn't

532
00:30:12,120 --> 00:30:15,120
Speaker 1: go over so well was sporting the game to PS three.

533
00:30:15,200 --> 00:30:18,400
Speaker 1: Once they finally got access to those developer kits, it

534
00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:21,280
Speaker 1: became clear that not all the functionality they had put

535
00:30:21,320 --> 00:30:23,320
Speaker 1: into the game was going to make it to the

536
00:30:23,360 --> 00:30:26,320
Speaker 1: final title because the PS three just was not able

537
00:30:26,320 --> 00:30:28,120
Speaker 1: to handle it. It It was going to require too much

538
00:30:28,240 --> 00:30:31,800
Speaker 1: changes in code, and in fact, later on developers would

539
00:30:31,840 --> 00:30:33,480
Speaker 1: say that if you were to look at the code

540
00:30:33,480 --> 00:30:36,560
Speaker 1: for Uncharted, you would just see a massive mess that

541
00:30:36,640 --> 00:30:40,800
Speaker 1: was practically incomprehensible. The game did come out just before

542
00:30:40,840 --> 00:30:44,840
Speaker 1: Thanksgiving in two thousand seven. That same year, Christoph Bilester

543
00:30:45,000 --> 00:30:47,600
Speaker 1: became the new co president of the company along with

544
00:30:47,680 --> 00:30:51,960
Speaker 1: Evan Wells, and Uncharted had undergone some last minute changes

545
00:30:52,040 --> 00:30:55,320
Speaker 1: at the two thousand seven E three. The build they

546
00:30:55,360 --> 00:30:58,520
Speaker 1: showed off featured an auto aim function similar to what

547
00:30:58,760 --> 00:31:01,600
Speaker 1: was found in Tomb Reader games, but the team decided

548
00:31:01,640 --> 00:31:04,520
Speaker 1: that that wasn't really a fun mechanic for their game,

549
00:31:04,800 --> 00:31:07,160
Speaker 1: so they switched it to a cover based system in

550
00:31:07,200 --> 00:31:09,680
Speaker 1: which you'd guide Nathan Drake from one bit of cover

551
00:31:09,760 --> 00:31:13,760
Speaker 1: to another while returning fire on enemies. It did well,

552
00:31:14,000 --> 00:31:16,000
Speaker 1: but the company was eager to give it another go.

553
00:31:16,280 --> 00:31:18,640
Speaker 1: They didn't win the awards they were hoping to win,

554
00:31:18,800 --> 00:31:20,680
Speaker 1: and a lot of the stuff they wanted to put

555
00:31:20,720 --> 00:31:23,920
Speaker 1: into Uncharted they couldn't because they had spent so much

556
00:31:23,960 --> 00:31:26,520
Speaker 1: time just getting those tools fixed and learning how the

557
00:31:26,520 --> 00:31:30,440
Speaker 1: PlayStation three would actually work. The development process for Uncharted

558
00:31:30,480 --> 00:31:34,000
Speaker 1: one had spanned three years, but less than a year

559
00:31:34,000 --> 00:31:36,560
Speaker 1: of that was actually spent on the real guts of

560
00:31:36,560 --> 00:31:40,320
Speaker 1: the game. Everything else was just getting the foundation in place.

561
00:31:40,640 --> 00:31:43,280
Speaker 1: Now that they had done that, the team was eager

562
00:31:43,320 --> 00:31:46,120
Speaker 1: to go back to the drawing board and create a sequel,

563
00:31:46,440 --> 00:31:49,560
Speaker 1: so work started an Uncharted two. Now, this time they

564
00:31:49,600 --> 00:31:52,600
Speaker 1: really wanted to push themselves. They wanted a huge action

565
00:31:52,680 --> 00:31:55,040
Speaker 1: sequence that looked like a cut scene but was really

566
00:31:55,040 --> 00:31:57,720
Speaker 1: a playable moment in the game, and they quickly settled

567
00:31:57,800 --> 00:32:00,400
Speaker 1: on an idea that appealed to the entire team. It

568
00:32:00,440 --> 00:32:03,920
Speaker 1: was a cool action sequence involving a moving train. It

569
00:32:04,040 --> 00:32:07,840
Speaker 1: become the big opener for Uncharted two, and it also

570
00:32:07,920 --> 00:32:10,960
Speaker 1: became one of the hallmark moments in Naughty Dog games

571
00:32:11,040 --> 00:32:13,360
Speaker 1: as a whole. One thing the studio decided to do

572
00:32:13,480 --> 00:32:16,959
Speaker 1: is change how they captured performances and Uncharted they had

573
00:32:16,960 --> 00:32:19,680
Speaker 1: an actor playing a character for the purposes of motion capture.

574
00:32:20,040 --> 00:32:22,520
Speaker 1: Then they would have an actor, sometimes not even the

575
00:32:22,560 --> 00:32:25,959
Speaker 1: same one do the voiceover, but for Uncharted two, they

576
00:32:26,000 --> 00:32:29,880
Speaker 1: wanted to go a step further to performance capture. They

577
00:32:29,920 --> 00:32:33,400
Speaker 1: wanted the same actor to produce the movements and voiceover

578
00:32:33,520 --> 00:32:37,480
Speaker 1: for cut scenes. During the same shoot, actors would perform

579
00:32:37,520 --> 00:32:39,480
Speaker 1: their roles as if they were in a film or

580
00:32:39,520 --> 00:32:42,000
Speaker 1: a play. They would move, they would emote, they would

581
00:32:42,040 --> 00:32:45,480
Speaker 1: speak in real time, with those performances making their way

582
00:32:45,600 --> 00:32:48,280
Speaker 1: into the final build of the game, and this became

583
00:32:48,320 --> 00:32:51,520
Speaker 1: the approach Naughty Dog would use for its next several titles.

584
00:32:51,760 --> 00:32:55,280
Speaker 1: The developers were still tweaking nearly every element of the

585
00:32:55,320 --> 00:32:58,160
Speaker 1: game itself, from AI to the physics of the world

586
00:32:58,360 --> 00:33:00,560
Speaker 1: to the way you could fight off enemy, and they

587
00:33:00,560 --> 00:33:03,840
Speaker 1: were using the Havoc game engine as a foundation. But

588
00:33:03,880 --> 00:33:06,880
Speaker 1: the groundwork for the characters had already been done, so

589
00:33:06,960 --> 00:33:10,120
Speaker 1: that helped a lot. Uncharted had already established who these

590
00:33:10,280 --> 00:33:13,080
Speaker 1: characters were, so they just were able to flesh that out.

591
00:33:13,160 --> 00:33:15,719
Speaker 1: More So, while Uncharted two was still a big effort,

592
00:33:15,880 --> 00:33:18,920
Speaker 1: it wasn't marked with the same turmoil as its predecessor.

593
00:33:19,280 --> 00:33:22,040
Speaker 1: What's more, when it did come out in two thousand nine,

594
00:33:22,520 --> 00:33:26,320
Speaker 1: it won awards like a lot of them, like almost

595
00:33:26,360 --> 00:33:29,880
Speaker 1: all of them. Everyone and Naughty Dog was relieved and

596
00:33:29,960 --> 00:33:32,520
Speaker 1: more than a little surprise at how well received the

597
00:33:32,560 --> 00:33:35,440
Speaker 1: game was. They've been hoping for a hit, and it

598
00:33:35,480 --> 00:33:38,320
Speaker 1: turned out. The game resonated with critics and players. It

599
00:33:38,360 --> 00:33:41,120
Speaker 1: became one of the most popular exclusive titles for the

600
00:33:41,120 --> 00:33:44,360
Speaker 1: PlayStation three, and of course, as soon as the game

601
00:33:44,400 --> 00:33:46,960
Speaker 1: came out, Naughty Dog began to look at what to

602
00:33:47,040 --> 00:33:49,960
Speaker 1: do next, and this time it would try doing two

603
00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:55,680
Speaker 1: big projects simultaneously. What were they, Well, I'll tell you,

604
00:33:56,520 --> 00:33:58,600
Speaker 1: but only after we take a quick break to thank

605
00:33:58,640 --> 00:34:10,920
Speaker 1: our sponsor. So decisions at the highest levels, including at

606
00:34:11,000 --> 00:34:14,360
Speaker 1: Sony itself, had led to Naughty Dog taking a different

607
00:34:14,400 --> 00:34:20,239
Speaker 1: tactic post Uncharted two. First, there was an Uncharted three team.

608
00:34:20,239 --> 00:34:23,719
Speaker 1: No big surprise there, Uncharted had done well, Uncharted two

609
00:34:23,920 --> 00:34:26,880
Speaker 1: was already getting buzz so clearly they were already going

610
00:34:26,920 --> 00:34:29,799
Speaker 1: to start on a sequel, and they put the same

611
00:34:29,920 --> 00:34:32,160
Speaker 1: leaders in place who were going to oversee the development

612
00:34:32,239 --> 00:34:36,320
Speaker 1: to Nathan Drake's next adventure. They had a pretty heavy

613
00:34:36,360 --> 00:34:41,760
Speaker 1: burden to carry because Uncharted two had really raised expectations significantly.

614
00:34:42,400 --> 00:34:46,040
Speaker 1: Now at the same time, they formed a second team

615
00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:50,360
Speaker 1: that would share the same resources available to the Uncharted

616
00:34:50,400 --> 00:34:53,200
Speaker 1: three projects. So if you think of the whole company

617
00:34:53,239 --> 00:34:56,760
Speaker 1: as a talent pool. That talent pool was being shared

618
00:34:56,840 --> 00:34:59,800
Speaker 1: between two major projects at the same time. The second

619
00:34:59,800 --> 00:35:02,960
Speaker 1: team was led by Bruce stray Ley and Neil Druckman,

620
00:35:03,520 --> 00:35:06,680
Speaker 1: and they had taken some ideas that had been pitched

621
00:35:06,760 --> 00:35:10,160
Speaker 1: for the Uncharted series before it finally kind of coalesced

622
00:35:10,200 --> 00:35:13,600
Speaker 1: into that pulp action adventure game, and they talked about

623
00:35:13,680 --> 00:35:17,400
Speaker 1: setting their game in a post apocalyptic world, one that

624
00:35:17,600 --> 00:35:22,200
Speaker 1: had been affected by a terrible catastrophe, and most of

625
00:35:22,320 --> 00:35:24,800
Speaker 1: the story of the game would take place well after

626
00:35:24,800 --> 00:35:28,279
Speaker 1: that catastrophe, and you'd have these overgrown cities. So a

627
00:35:28,360 --> 00:35:30,440
Speaker 1: lot of ideas that were going to go into an

628
00:35:30,480 --> 00:35:33,560
Speaker 1: early build of Uncharted but never went past kind of

629
00:35:33,560 --> 00:35:38,080
Speaker 1: that brainstorming phase or the initial asset phase. Now, over

630
00:35:38,160 --> 00:35:41,160
Speaker 1: time they decided that they had to define what is

631
00:35:41,200 --> 00:35:44,840
Speaker 1: this catastrophe, what is it that caused this post apocalyptic world,

632
00:35:44,920 --> 00:35:48,719
Speaker 1: And they decided upon a fungus that infects humans and

633
00:35:48,800 --> 00:35:51,920
Speaker 1: turns them into crazed cannibals. So this is kind of

634
00:35:51,920 --> 00:35:56,440
Speaker 1: a variation on the zombie motif, only these humans have

635
00:35:56,520 --> 00:36:01,400
Speaker 1: become hosts to a parasite rather than turned two undead creatures.

636
00:36:01,800 --> 00:36:06,160
Speaker 1: The game's name eventually became the Last of Us. Both

637
00:36:06,239 --> 00:36:10,440
Speaker 1: Uncharted three, Drake's Deception and The Last of Us would

638
00:36:10,480 --> 00:36:13,319
Speaker 1: use people from that same pool of talent. On the

639
00:36:13,360 --> 00:36:17,040
Speaker 1: development side, some people were committed to one game more

640
00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:20,840
Speaker 1: than the other, but during various stages of development, everyone

641
00:36:21,239 --> 00:36:23,680
Speaker 1: was expected to lend a hand to one or the

642
00:36:23,719 --> 00:36:26,760
Speaker 1: other of the titles, depending upon whichever one needed it most.

643
00:36:26,840 --> 00:36:32,000
Speaker 1: At that time. Uncharted three would build Uncharted two, including

644
00:36:32,080 --> 00:36:36,400
Speaker 1: fleshing out the multiplayer aspect that two had introduced, but

645
00:36:36,719 --> 00:36:41,000
Speaker 1: upon its launch it would receive, let's be nice, slightly

646
00:36:41,160 --> 00:36:45,359
Speaker 1: less praise than the second Uncharted game had earned. Some

647
00:36:45,840 --> 00:36:48,480
Speaker 1: outlets still said it was an amazing game. Someone gave

648
00:36:48,480 --> 00:36:52,239
Speaker 1: it a perfect score, but others felt like it wasn't

649
00:36:52,360 --> 00:36:56,240
Speaker 1: quite a worthy successor for Uncharted two. Folks at Naughty

650
00:36:56,280 --> 00:36:58,640
Speaker 1: Dogs seemed to feel the game was a good one,

651
00:36:59,160 --> 00:37:02,520
Speaker 1: but perhaps not as great as the second one. It

652
00:37:02,640 --> 00:37:04,800
Speaker 1: wasn't a game to be ashamed of by any stretch

653
00:37:04,840 --> 00:37:07,480
Speaker 1: of the imagination. It's just that when a game comes

654
00:37:07,480 --> 00:37:12,760
Speaker 1: out and wins all the awards, expectations can reach unrealistic levels.

655
00:37:13,040 --> 00:37:15,480
Speaker 1: So Uncharted three came out in two thousand eleven at

656
00:37:15,520 --> 00:37:18,120
Speaker 1: that time, the Last of Us was still in development.

657
00:37:18,680 --> 00:37:23,160
Speaker 1: That process had also been really slow because they weren't

658
00:37:23,440 --> 00:37:28,480
Speaker 1: really sure how to make the game. Should it be

659
00:37:28,719 --> 00:37:32,160
Speaker 1: super narrative heavy, How do you balance out the gameplay

660
00:37:32,280 --> 00:37:36,239
Speaker 1: versus the story. How much story should there be? What

661
00:37:36,400 --> 00:37:39,120
Speaker 1: perspective should the game take? But there was a sequence

662
00:37:39,160 --> 00:37:41,720
Speaker 1: and uncharted two that kind of acted as a guide.

663
00:37:41,880 --> 00:37:45,319
Speaker 1: In that sequence, Nathan Drake works with another character in

664
00:37:45,360 --> 00:37:49,239
Speaker 1: an area, and that the whole experience created a really

665
00:37:49,280 --> 00:37:53,000
Speaker 1: interesting dynamic. It transformed the game from a purely solo

666
00:37:53,160 --> 00:37:57,040
Speaker 1: effort to something more akin to a cooperative experience, even

667
00:37:57,080 --> 00:37:59,920
Speaker 1: though one of the characters is controlled by AI. They

668
00:38:00,040 --> 00:38:03,080
Speaker 1: decide the Last of Us would be similar, and they

669
00:38:03,080 --> 00:38:06,839
Speaker 1: decided to create an older male protagonist as the controllable

670
00:38:06,960 --> 00:38:12,080
Speaker 1: character and create a young female protagonist as the secondary

671
00:38:12,160 --> 00:38:16,280
Speaker 1: AI character, and then create a relationship between these two.

672
00:38:16,680 --> 00:38:19,319
Speaker 1: They started working on creating the story beats that would

673
00:38:19,320 --> 00:38:23,000
Speaker 1: take this shape and become the Last of Us and

674
00:38:23,040 --> 00:38:25,920
Speaker 1: make it a really impactful experience now here and how

675
00:38:25,960 --> 00:38:29,439
Speaker 1: stuff works. The Last of Us is often brought up

676
00:38:29,480 --> 00:38:33,520
Speaker 1: as an example of a phenomenal game that elevates the genre.

677
00:38:34,120 --> 00:38:37,920
Speaker 1: There's a frequent debate in the game sphere and beyond

678
00:38:38,040 --> 00:38:42,040
Speaker 1: about whether or not video games should count as art. Now.

679
00:38:42,080 --> 00:38:44,480
Speaker 1: I don't plan on going into that debate here, but

680
00:38:44,560 --> 00:38:47,920
Speaker 1: I will say that if you think that video games

681
00:38:47,960 --> 00:38:50,839
Speaker 1: are art, the Last of Us has to be one

682
00:38:50,880 --> 00:38:54,880
Speaker 1: of the games that qualifies as that distinction. My coworker

683
00:38:54,920 --> 00:38:57,600
Speaker 1: Joe McCormick feels very much the same way. We would

684
00:38:57,600 --> 00:39:00,480
Speaker 1: spend ages talking about the story yell months of the

685
00:39:00,560 --> 00:39:03,279
Speaker 1: Last of Us, the pacing of the game, and how

686
00:39:03,320 --> 00:39:06,120
Speaker 1: we found it to be a really appealing experience. And

687
00:39:06,160 --> 00:39:09,440
Speaker 1: I'm being a bit vague about the details here because

688
00:39:10,000 --> 00:39:12,759
Speaker 1: some of you may not have yet played this or

689
00:39:12,800 --> 00:39:16,760
Speaker 1: watched a playthrough of Last of Us. I highly recommend

690
00:39:16,800 --> 00:39:18,960
Speaker 1: checking it out. If you're not a gamer, you may

691
00:39:18,960 --> 00:39:21,120
Speaker 1: want to see if there's a good play through to watch,

692
00:39:21,719 --> 00:39:24,160
Speaker 1: because I think it's quite well done. It's a really

693
00:39:24,239 --> 00:39:28,720
Speaker 1: good story. The Last of Us was a mature title,

694
00:39:28,880 --> 00:39:31,920
Speaker 1: the first mature title for Naughty Dog, and had a

695
00:39:32,000 --> 00:39:34,960
Speaker 1: much more gritty and dark world than the previous Naughty

696
00:39:35,000 --> 00:39:38,840
Speaker 1: Dog games. It was also less playful and less funny

697
00:39:38,880 --> 00:39:42,480
Speaker 1: than previous titles, which meant it was very different and

698
00:39:42,840 --> 00:39:47,000
Speaker 1: we know about different things. People don't like different things.

699
00:39:47,400 --> 00:39:50,399
Speaker 1: Specifically the development team, there were people at naughty Dog

700
00:39:50,480 --> 00:39:54,640
Speaker 1: who resisted this whole idea. They felt that it was

701
00:39:54,840 --> 00:39:57,799
Speaker 1: so totally different from the previous games from naughty Dog

702
00:39:57,920 --> 00:40:00,239
Speaker 1: that again, it may not have been a naughty Dog tame.

703
00:40:00,440 --> 00:40:04,520
Speaker 1: But ultimately, as this game began to take shape, the

704
00:40:04,520 --> 00:40:08,200
Speaker 1: team won over most of the other employees, convincing them

705
00:40:08,200 --> 00:40:12,359
Speaker 1: that no, this really is a compelling, interesting idea and

706
00:40:12,400 --> 00:40:16,239
Speaker 1: we should really push it. Early play tests didn't go

707
00:40:16,440 --> 00:40:19,160
Speaker 1: so well. The team kept putting in and pulling out

708
00:40:19,239 --> 00:40:22,759
Speaker 1: various mechanics to tweak the experience, from the way that

709
00:40:22,840 --> 00:40:27,239
Speaker 1: you did combat to how well Ellie the female protagonists

710
00:40:27,239 --> 00:40:30,319
Speaker 1: could be spotted or could be hidden. But towards the

711
00:40:30,440 --> 00:40:33,600
Speaker 1: end of the development process, about a month out, playtesters

712
00:40:33,640 --> 00:40:36,160
Speaker 1: were coming back to the team with questions that had

713
00:40:36,239 --> 00:40:39,000
Speaker 1: nothing to do with the mechanics. They wanted to know

714
00:40:39,040 --> 00:40:42,680
Speaker 1: what happened to the characters. So this wasn't about glitches

715
00:40:43,040 --> 00:40:46,279
Speaker 1: or bugs or exploits or anything like that. This was

716
00:40:46,320 --> 00:40:50,520
Speaker 1: about plot and narrative. People were connecting with those characters

717
00:40:50,600 --> 00:40:53,399
Speaker 1: in the game, and they didn't like having to leave

718
00:40:53,480 --> 00:40:56,200
Speaker 1: them behind without seeing what the end of the story was,

719
00:40:56,800 --> 00:40:59,080
Speaker 1: which was a big clue to the company that they

720
00:40:59,120 --> 00:41:02,799
Speaker 1: had a hit, They had a successful storyline, they had

721
00:41:02,880 --> 00:41:07,359
Speaker 1: something that was resonating with playtesters. It was definitely on

722
00:41:07,400 --> 00:41:09,600
Speaker 1: the right track. The Last of Us launched in two

723
00:41:09,640 --> 00:41:12,759
Speaker 1: thousand thirteen, which was late in the life cycle of

724
00:41:12,800 --> 00:41:16,600
Speaker 1: the PlayStation three. Now, by the rules of consoles, it

725
00:41:16,719 --> 00:41:19,480
Speaker 1: probably shouldn't have sold that many copies because people were

726
00:41:19,520 --> 00:41:23,200
Speaker 1: looking ahead to the next iteration of the PlayStation. Everyone's

727
00:41:23,600 --> 00:41:26,640
Speaker 1: waiting for the PlayStation four. Why buy more games for

728
00:41:26,760 --> 00:41:29,600
Speaker 1: an old console when the new ones right around the corner.

729
00:41:30,239 --> 00:41:34,839
Speaker 1: And yet the reception was overwhelmingly positive. It became the

730
00:41:34,920 --> 00:41:40,080
Speaker 1: fifth highest rated PlayStation three game on the aggregator service Metacritic,

731
00:41:40,400 --> 00:41:44,320
Speaker 1: and sales figures were also very high. Since the Last

732
00:41:44,360 --> 00:41:47,160
Speaker 1: of Us, Naughty Dog has worked on more sequels and

733
00:41:47,280 --> 00:41:50,520
Speaker 1: some remasters. In fact, one year after the Last of

734
00:41:50,600 --> 00:41:53,560
Speaker 1: Us came out for the PS three, Naughty Dog released

735
00:41:53,600 --> 00:41:57,600
Speaker 1: a remastered version for the PS four. There are numerous

736
00:41:57,640 --> 00:42:00,720
Speaker 1: PlayStation gamers out there who will own up to buying

737
00:42:01,120 --> 00:42:04,239
Speaker 1: both versions of the game. The company, Oh, by the way,

738
00:42:04,360 --> 00:42:07,480
Speaker 1: I'm one of those people. The company also released Uncharted

739
00:42:07,480 --> 00:42:11,400
Speaker 1: for a Thief's End, which was a uh the final

740
00:42:11,560 --> 00:42:14,920
Speaker 1: chapter of the Nathan Drake saga, and they released a

741
00:42:15,000 --> 00:42:21,319
Speaker 1: spinoff standalone game called Uncharted The Lost Legacy. So, now

742
00:42:21,360 --> 00:42:25,440
Speaker 1: that Nathan Drake stories over, the company has addressed what

743
00:42:25,560 --> 00:42:29,560
Speaker 1: a lot of gamers said, we're tough questions. They said,

744
00:42:29,600 --> 00:42:33,200
Speaker 1: why are you abandoning Nathan Drake? The company said, well,

745
00:42:33,239 --> 00:42:36,880
Speaker 1: the narrative had reached a natural conclusion. Nathan Drake was

746
00:42:36,920 --> 00:42:41,399
Speaker 1: at the natural end of his story. And also from

747
00:42:41,440 --> 00:42:45,120
Speaker 1: a technical standpoint, they were finding it increasingly difficult to

748
00:42:45,120 --> 00:42:48,880
Speaker 1: create games that were set in a grounded universe that

749
00:42:49,040 --> 00:42:53,080
Speaker 1: somehow would outdo their predecessors. So, for example, and Uncharted too,

750
00:42:53,520 --> 00:42:56,880
Speaker 1: you have this big train sequence that includes a train

751
00:42:56,920 --> 00:43:00,759
Speaker 1: wreck and climbing up a train that's dangling off the

752
00:43:00,760 --> 00:43:03,760
Speaker 1: side of a cliff. This is a big action moment.

753
00:43:04,239 --> 00:43:06,759
Speaker 1: But if your protagonist is a human who does not

754
00:43:07,000 --> 00:43:11,400
Speaker 1: possess superpowers or crazy spy gadgets or any other things

755
00:43:11,440 --> 00:43:14,719
Speaker 1: that augment their abilities, at some point you run up

756
00:43:14,760 --> 00:43:18,920
Speaker 1: against barriers that push believability too far. As it stands,

757
00:43:19,280 --> 00:43:22,880
Speaker 1: Nathan Drake must have insane stamina to be able to

758
00:43:22,920 --> 00:43:26,839
Speaker 1: scale walls endlessly without his arms giving out. So what

759
00:43:26,880 --> 00:43:29,760
Speaker 1: they were saying is we can't have it both ways.

760
00:43:30,040 --> 00:43:34,160
Speaker 1: We can't set the world in a grounded universe and

761
00:43:34,239 --> 00:43:37,120
Speaker 1: continue to outdo what we have already done, because we've

762
00:43:37,160 --> 00:43:40,279
Speaker 1: already pushed our character to the point where anything more

763
00:43:40,320 --> 00:43:45,719
Speaker 1: than that stresses believability too far. In co president Christoph

764
00:43:45,840 --> 00:43:49,640
Speaker 1: Blestra announced he was retiring from the company. He had

765
00:43:49,680 --> 00:43:52,719
Speaker 1: worked at Naughty Dog for fifteen years, with a decade

766
00:43:52,719 --> 00:43:55,920
Speaker 1: of that being in the position of co president. Evan

767
00:43:56,000 --> 00:43:59,240
Speaker 1: Wells remains at Naughty Dog. He's now the sole president

768
00:43:59,320 --> 00:44:02,759
Speaker 1: of the company. Amy Hennig, the lead writer for the

769
00:44:02,840 --> 00:44:06,200
Speaker 1: Uncharted series, had left Naughty Dog in two thousand fourteen.

770
00:44:06,560 --> 00:44:09,920
Speaker 1: She had joined e A's Visceral Games, which was focusing

771
00:44:09,920 --> 00:44:12,600
Speaker 1: on Star Wars games at the time. I find that

772
00:44:12,719 --> 00:44:16,000
Speaker 1: interesting because in the early nineties, Hennig had worked for

773
00:44:16,080 --> 00:44:20,080
Speaker 1: e A before. Back then, but she left e A

774
00:44:20,520 --> 00:44:24,080
Speaker 1: to go join a different company called Crystal Dynamics, because

775
00:44:24,280 --> 00:44:26,400
Speaker 1: at least in part, she found the idea of working

776
00:44:26,400 --> 00:44:29,279
Speaker 1: for a small start up more appealing than a giant company.

777
00:44:29,320 --> 00:44:31,239
Speaker 1: But then she leaves Naughty Dog and goes back to

778
00:44:31,280 --> 00:44:36,600
Speaker 1: e A for Visceral Games. Also well in e A

779
00:44:36,760 --> 00:44:40,040
Speaker 1: shut down Visceral Games and canceled the development of those

780
00:44:40,040 --> 00:44:44,719
Speaker 1: Star Wars titles, So her current role is up in

781
00:44:44,760 --> 00:44:47,480
Speaker 1: the air. She might have a good idea of what

782
00:44:47,560 --> 00:44:50,920
Speaker 1: she's doing, but based on my research, I don't. Bruce Straley,

783
00:44:50,920 --> 00:44:53,200
Speaker 1: who was one of the leads on the Last of Us,

784
00:44:53,239 --> 00:44:56,480
Speaker 1: also left Naughty Dog in two thousand seventeen, and there

785
00:44:56,560 --> 00:44:59,640
Speaker 1: was also a troubling story that developed late in twenty

786
00:44:59,719 --> 00:45:03,640
Speaker 1: seven team that involved an ex employee named David Ballard.

787
00:45:03,920 --> 00:45:07,120
Speaker 1: He alleged that he was fired after he had filed

788
00:45:07,160 --> 00:45:11,359
Speaker 1: allegations saying that he was the target of sexual harassment

789
00:45:11,520 --> 00:45:15,320
Speaker 1: from a senior team member over at Naughty Dog. Naughty

790
00:45:15,320 --> 00:45:18,319
Speaker 1: Dog has released a statement that said they found no

791
00:45:18,440 --> 00:45:21,919
Speaker 1: evidence that Ballard had ever filed such a claim. So

792
00:45:22,400 --> 00:45:25,000
Speaker 1: that was the last I heard on that particular matter,

793
00:45:25,080 --> 00:45:27,560
Speaker 1: but it is a troubling one. As for what is next,

794
00:45:27,800 --> 00:45:30,600
Speaker 1: the gaming world is eagerly anticipating the release of The

795
00:45:30,680 --> 00:45:33,360
Speaker 1: Last of Us two, which is rumored to have a

796
00:45:33,400 --> 00:45:37,799
Speaker 1: release date sometime in twenty nineteen. The company has, as

797
00:45:37,800 --> 00:45:41,880
Speaker 1: of this recording, not announced an official release date. Just

798
00:45:41,960 --> 00:45:45,240
Speaker 1: a few days before I recorded this episode, Neil Druckman

799
00:45:45,280 --> 00:45:48,319
Speaker 1: posted an image on Twitter of a dog wearing a

800
00:45:48,360 --> 00:45:53,320
Speaker 1: mo cap suit. Yep, a real living furree doggie wearing

801
00:45:53,360 --> 00:45:56,120
Speaker 1: a mo cap suit. So it's possible the next Last

802
00:45:56,120 --> 00:45:58,960
Speaker 1: of Us will have a canine companion for part of

803
00:45:59,000 --> 00:46:01,240
Speaker 1: the game that come, and he has been quiet about

804
00:46:01,320 --> 00:46:04,839
Speaker 1: those release dates, possibly to offset any disappointment that might

805
00:46:04,880 --> 00:46:08,640
Speaker 1: happen should development take longer than they had planned. If

806
00:46:08,719 --> 00:46:11,359
Speaker 1: you never announce a release date and you miss it,

807
00:46:12,120 --> 00:46:14,319
Speaker 1: no one else knows, and you can just keep on

808
00:46:14,360 --> 00:46:17,120
Speaker 1: doing what you're doing, Whereas if you announce a release

809
00:46:17,200 --> 00:46:19,640
Speaker 1: date and then miss it, everyone gets on your case.

810
00:46:19,880 --> 00:46:22,360
Speaker 1: Naughty Dog has released a couple of teasers for the

811
00:46:22,400 --> 00:46:24,880
Speaker 1: Last of Us to One of them shows an older

812
00:46:24,920 --> 00:46:29,240
Speaker 1: Ellie playing guitar, and another teaser shows some new characters

813
00:46:29,360 --> 00:46:35,160
Speaker 1: in a particularly grizzly scene which was super dark even

814
00:46:35,239 --> 00:46:38,160
Speaker 1: for the Last of Us. Beyond that, people at Naughty

815
00:46:38,200 --> 00:46:41,319
Speaker 1: Dog have largely remained quiet on what they're working on

816
00:46:41,520 --> 00:46:44,000
Speaker 1: at the company. Perhaps in the near future we'll see

817
00:46:44,040 --> 00:46:47,759
Speaker 1: some new intellectual property coming out from the studio. They

818
00:46:47,800 --> 00:46:50,560
Speaker 1: may once again redefine the work of a company that

819
00:46:50,600 --> 00:46:53,240
Speaker 1: has its roots in a knockoff of Punch Out. Who's

820
00:46:53,280 --> 00:46:57,160
Speaker 1: to say and that concludes the Naughty Dog story so far.

821
00:46:57,600 --> 00:46:59,640
Speaker 1: I look forward to seeing what games they produced in

822
00:46:59,680 --> 00:47:02,239
Speaker 1: the future. Sure, I have played several of their more

823
00:47:02,280 --> 00:47:04,840
Speaker 1: recent titles. I was not a PlayStation owner in the

824
00:47:04,920 --> 00:47:08,120
Speaker 1: early days, so Crash Bandicoot and Jackson Dexter or jack

825
00:47:08,160 --> 00:47:11,480
Speaker 1: and Dexter both kind of passed me by. But I've

826
00:47:11,480 --> 00:47:14,200
Speaker 1: definitely played the Uncharted series and The Last of Us,

827
00:47:14,239 --> 00:47:17,120
Speaker 1: and I love those games quite a bit. If you

828
00:47:17,160 --> 00:47:19,840
Speaker 1: guys have suggestions for future topics I should cover on

829
00:47:19,920 --> 00:47:23,319
Speaker 1: tech Stuff, maybe it's another company, maybe it's a personality,

830
00:47:23,360 --> 00:47:26,320
Speaker 1: maybe it's a specific type of technology. Maybe there's someone

831
00:47:26,400 --> 00:47:29,080
Speaker 1: you think I should interview for this show. Send me

832
00:47:29,080 --> 00:47:31,520
Speaker 1: a message let me know. The email address is tech

833
00:47:31,600 --> 00:47:34,960
Speaker 1: Stuff at how stuff works dot com, or you can

834
00:47:35,040 --> 00:47:37,560
Speaker 1: drop me a line on Twitter or Facebook. The handle

835
00:47:37,560 --> 00:47:40,000
Speaker 1: it both of those is tech Stuff h s W.

836
00:47:40,520 --> 00:47:42,880
Speaker 1: Don't forget we have an Instagram account. Make sure you

837
00:47:42,920 --> 00:47:46,160
Speaker 1: go out and follow that and I record these shows

838
00:47:46,440 --> 00:47:49,560
Speaker 1: live on Wednesdays and Friday's and you can watch me

839
00:47:50,080 --> 00:47:54,279
Speaker 1: stumble my way through these tech topics by going to

840
00:47:54,360 --> 00:47:57,600
Speaker 1: twitch dot tv slash tech Stuff. The schedule is up there.

841
00:47:57,880 --> 00:47:59,880
Speaker 1: There's a chat room you can join it and you

842
00:48:00,040 --> 00:48:04,320
Speaker 1: can also join me in welcoming our new super producer Torii,

843
00:48:04,480 --> 00:48:08,600
Speaker 1: who joins the show for the first time today. That

844
00:48:08,719 --> 00:48:12,400
Speaker 1: was tor and I will talk to you guys again.

845
00:48:13,480 --> 00:48:21,720
Speaker 1: Releasing for more on this and thousands of other topics.

846
00:48:21,960 --> 00:48:33,080
Speaker 1: Is it how stuff works dot com