Chapter Review – Uncharted 4

Naughty Dog

In the second chapter of Blood, Sweat, and Pixels, they take a look at the studio Naughty Dog. Naughty Dog, an old company, is responsible for several games such as Crash Bandicoot and Jak & Daxter founded in 1984. In the year 2001, Naughty Dog was acquired by Sony, enlisting them in making a new game for the PlayStation 3. This new game series would be the Uncharted series. A stark contrast to their previous games, Uncharted took on an Indiana Jones theme as the player controlled the main character, Nathan Drake. In 2011, the popular game series had already had two more installations, Uncharted 3 releasing in November as The Last of Us began productions. While The Last of Us was being produced, Uncharted 4 was in the works as well. A studio attempting to make 2 very large games at once is bound to cause problems.

Overflow

While The Last of Us was receiving amazing reviews, and their work on an expansion for the game was beginning, Uncharted 4 was having struggles in not only its story, but in its workforce. As The Last of Us was being produced, more and more employees were being stripped from Uncharted to work on the new post-apocalyptic project. Eventually a meeting was called between the two studios to fix the workforce issue, and not too long after, many of the higher-up, including Naughty Dog’s copresident and team leader for Uncharted 4, Amy Hennig, left the studio. With a void in the leadership position, Neil Druckmann and Bruce Straley were called to fill in the space as the lead developers on The Last of Us. With tons of deadlines to fill and being pressured to release just a year later, Druckmann and Straley got to work.

To Make the Game

At this point, Uncharted 4 had been in development for 2 years. With only 1 more year to go before its delayed launch, Straley and Druckmann were faced with a difficult decision. Do they stick with the storyboard that the game had already been rested in, voiced and recorded, or do they rewrite for a stronger story and a more fitting conclusion for Nathan Drake. Along with a plethora of other reasons, it was enough to force their hands, and they began to work again on the game, basically from scratch. This caused a massive rush in the story and gameplay sides of production as the studio kicked into overdrive to produce this game. Many of those who had worked for this for 2 years were gravely hurt as their assets were taken out, even while Straley and Druckmann tried to keep as much as they could of the original game while switching up and reinforcing the new story. During the last years, they had spent time greyboxing most of the space, with tons more work needing to be done. Over the next year, the team worked tirelessly needing to spend almost all of their time overworked in the studios to release the game on time, staying until 3 am some nights before coming back into work at 8. Everyone at the team was extremely driven to complete the game, and even with a slight delay to their schedule, they continued to press on. In the end, they were able to complete the game, Uncharted 4 being released May 10, 2016.

My Thoughts

While both Uncharted and The Last of Us have proved to be amazing, beloved games by so many, along with all the other releases from Naughty Dog, it is clear that in trying to work on 2 games at the same time, especially with such a small studio, promoted chaos and disorder. To avoid those problems from happening again, I believe focusing on one game at a time is a healthier option for your company to avoid these time crunches. One of the main reasons they ended up having to go into a time-crunch is also because they decided to scrap so much of the previous project. While this ended up saving the game, it shouldn’t be taken as a sign of what to do in your own productions. If you are behind, its better to make the changes later or stick with your original idea. The patches they did to its release is a pretty standard thing in the industry these days. With rushes happening normally in the working space, it’s a worry workers will have to get used to. I myself don’t know how I will react when it happens in my future, but I will have to just get to work and get past the work stress, as it happens in my school life. While the story of Naughty Dog is as inspirational as last week’s, it is also a warning to those going into the working force on game development.