Naughty Dog Is Beefing Up Staff For A Big Multiplayer Project
The announcement that The Last of Us: Part 2 would not have multiplayer came as a disappointment for many, but fear not: it looks like the developers at Naughty Dog are working on some kind of multiplayer experience. A recent job posting was promoted by lead game designer Vinit Agarwal, who said on Twitter, "Join us. We've got big ambitions and need you to help make it a reality."
What could those big plans be? The much-anticipated and unfortunately delayed sequel to The Last of Us will be a strictly single player experience. And earlier this year, Naughty Dog shut down its multiplayer servers for the PlayStation 3, bidding goodbye to support for Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception, The Last of Us, and The Last of Us: Left Behind. Ever since, we haven't heard anything about the future of multiplayer from the company. Until now.
The job posting calls for an Online Systems Programmer: someone "who is passionate about online games and is willing to jump into a variety of systems including server technologies, core game networking, matchmaking, player data storage, and virtual store transactions while maintaining a high standard for reliability and information security." Fans have interpreted this as an indication that maybe, just maybe, Naughty Dog is working on an online multiplayer experience similar to Factions, the multiplayer mode from The Last of Us.
Until we have an official announcement from Naughty Dog, though, we're left to speculate what's happening behind closed doors. Could this be a whole new game? Naughty Dog is relatively late to the party when it comes to adopting the very popular, very lucrative "games as a service" model that other developers like EA and Epic Games have embraced. By creating games that live online, where they are free to continually update and change, developers can make much more money than a traditional "one-and-done" release.
We'll keep you posted on any further developments concerning whatever multiplayer experience Naughty Dog is keeping hush hush.