Naughty Dog has had many announcements lately, and one of them was the release of a stand-alone multiplayer version of their “Factions” multiplayer mode in The Last of Us. So when will The Last of Us Factions be released? Let’s take a look.
The Last of Us Multiplayer – Factions
It is not fully clear if the new multiplayer standalone will be called Factions or not, but the new multiplayer game, which was once cryptically announced in 2020, has been delayed as of June 2023. Neil Druckmann, Naughty Dog Co-President, took to Twitter back in 2020 to announce it in a teasing way, saying that the game was going to be worth it.
In a separate tweet back in June of 2023, Naughty Dog Tweeted that even though they know players are excited to learn more about their new game, it would need to be delayed as the team is still working on the development.
So when exactly will the game be ready? Well, to stay on the theme of being cryptic, Naugty Dog is doing a great job so far. In 2023, the studio published its first blog entry, which added some fresh information. First off, as developers are still prioritizing new “stories [and] characters” through the Factions release, we know to expect a deeper multiplayer experience than usual. It’s unclear exactly how these stories will be conveyed, but perhaps we can expect a seasonal approach with ongoing stories that develop over time, similar to Apex Legends and Fortnite.
The blog post read “We’ll have some fun surprises for you along the way, but later this year we will begin to offer you some details on our ambitious The Last of Us multiplayer game. With a team led by Vinit Agarwal, Joe Pettinati, and Anthony Newman, the project is shaping up to be a fresh, new experience from our studio, but one rooted in Naughty Dog’s passion for delivering incredible stories, characters, and gameplay. We first shared concept art of the project with you last year, and we hope this new piece of concept art below further excites you for what our team is working on.”
Druckmann continued on, writing “It has been an unbelievable 10 years, and to know the journey of our characters has meant so much to so many of you moves our team. Thank you for your support and appreciation for the work our teams do. We hope you’ll continue to follow us along this road, just don’t forget to pack a brick or bottle. Until next time, endure and survive. Neil”
Back in May, Bloomberg had written an article confirming that when Bungie, a company now owned by Sony, was requested to evaluate Naughty Dog’s work, they gave it a bad rating. As a result, several developers reportedly switched to other projects, and the project as a whole was trimmed back. So it is very possible that we will wait more than a year before the game might even be finished, especially with Naughty Dog confirming that they needed more time.
Looks like we’ll need to be extra patient on this one.
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