The Last of Us 3 has a basic plot outline, creative director Neil Druckmann has revealed.
Speaking on the Script Apart podcast with fellow co-writer Halley Gross (and first spotted by IGN), Druckmann revealed that there's been "quite a bit" of discussion within developer Naughty Dog about The Last of Us 3. "I don’t know how much I want to reveal... [Halley Gross] and I did write an outline for a story, that we're not making – but I hope one day can see the light of day – that explores a little bit what happens after this game. We’ll see," the director said.
"We’ve now had two games that I feel speak to something universal as well as telling a very personal story for these characters. With one game, there’s no pattern of what a franchise is," Druckmann continued. "With two games, now there’s starting to be a pattern – now I feel like there are some structural and thematic themes you'd have to stick to if you're making a third game."
"After we finish one of our big titles, we take a long time to explore different ideas, whether it’s going to be Last of Us 3, whether it's something new, whether there's some old franchise we want to go back to. I like to fully explore all of those, then look at, like: okay, we have all of these ideas in front of us. As a studio, what do we want to commit to? Because it’s a huge commitment – monetary, time, passion, talent, so you think about all the opportunity costs that come with that," Druckmann concluded of the sequel talk.
The Last of Us 2 only launched last year in 2020, but a report earlier this year claimed that Naughty Dog is currently working on the multiplayer component of The Last of Us 2, as well as a remake of 2013's The Last of Us, which was originally initiated at another Sony-owned studio before being moved in-house to Naughty Dog.
There's also been talk of a new Uncharted project potentially being in development, albeit at another studio. Days Gone developer Bend Studio was reportedly working on a new Uncharted game, but were taken off the project at the developer's own request. Right now, it's not clear if the new Uncharted game has returned to Naughty Dog, or has been canceled altogether. For his part, Druckmann revealed earlier this year that the developer has "several cool things" to be revealed later on at some point in the future.
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