Another Last Of Us Multiplayer Game In The Works?
Recent Naughty Dog job postings have hinted that two The Last of Us multiplayer games may be in the works.
During our previous discussion on the fate of the Uncharted gaming franchise, we mentioned that the next entry in The Last of Us franchise probably wouldn’t be The Last of Us 3, whose narrative is already outlined, but an online multiplayer experience. Now, we learned that the game’s developer, Naughty Dog, has two multiplayer games in development— another The Last of Us multiplayer, perhaps?
As reported by GameRant, Naughty Dog posted job listings looking for QA Testers to work on the company’s first standalone multiplayer project, as well as quality assurance and development support of the company’s multiplayer titles—”titles” being a keyword. The testers that apply need to be able to identify, log, and do bug regression testing; have a working knowledge of the current PlayStation ecosystems; have the agility to accept additional responsibilities when necessary, and more.
However, the job listing doesn’t mention any gaming title the referred project might be related to. And the keyword we previously pointed out might be intentional ambiguity or perhaps a typo. But in case the statement is correct, it might be a reference to at least two multiplayer games in preproduction/active development, which coincides with our previous report regarding Uncharted 3. Unfortunately, the details are quite scarce, so we don’t actually know if The Last of Us multiplayer is currently cooking in Naughty Dog’s kitchen.
It’s important to note that this is hardly the first mention of The Last of Us multiplayer game. Originally, The Last of Us Part 2 was scheduled to release with a multiplayer component, which was ultimately cut from the game. Naughty Dog explained that both the single-player and multi-player components of the game were so ambitious that they couldn’t be implemented simultaneously. The best possible approach seems to be a separate The Last of Us multiplayer game, which, unfortunately, never came to be. Until now?
Fans have been waiting on the update regarding The Last of Us Part 2 multiplayer component ever since the game launched, but the studio changed its focus on bringing the games to newer platforms, such as PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5, so The Last of Us multiplayer only saw slight development work. Parts of it were uncovered by data miners about a year ago, indicating that some content was developed before the multiplayer was put on hold for an unspecified amount of time.
At the time, Naughty Dog also stated that the game would probably be a standalone entry, detached from the core story.
With everything said, Naughty Dog is one of Sony’s first-party studios, and Sony Interactive Entertainment has already revealed its plans to release 10 live-service games by 2026 and aim some 30 percent of its titles toward the PC gaming market. So, it’s entirely possible that Naughty Dog’s current projects are part of those plans. Whether or not that also entails The Last of Us multiplayer game remains to be seen, but the sales of the original game jumped by more than 230 percent (not a typo) after the television show launched.
