According to the franchise’s former designer, Naughty Dog should adopt a slightly different approach.
Naughty Dog has undeniably been the biggest missing piece in the PlayStation ecosystem this generation. Aside from releasing a few remakes, the developer has not been able to make an impact among PlayStation 5 players, as it has not released a single brand-new title in the past six years. The situation at Naughty Dog is so dire that even Sony has expressed dissatisfaction with the studio; the upcoming Intergalactic, despite its $600 million budget, will not be released in 2026. Now, a former designer has offered the studio advice regarding one of its biggest in-house franchises, Uncharted.
In a new interview with FRVR, Benson Russell, designer of the first three Uncharted games, advised Naughty Dog to create an entirely new game in the series rather than remaking the original titles. The former Naughty Dog employee stated that remaking the Uncharted trilogy would not make sense since the games are already available on modern consoles. Russell believes that Naughty Dog should apply the lessons learned from Uncharted 4 to create a new game set in the past — or wherever the story calls for.
He also said that the older titles would need to be rewritten to reflect the slow, emotional tone of modern Naughty Dog games. Some key scenes may need to be omitted for the remakes to be successful. For this reason, Russell believes that remaking the Uncharted series would ruin the spirit of the original games. Instead, he encouraged the studio to create a new Uncharted game set in Nathan Drake’s past, similar to certain parts of Uncharted 4.
Rumors have been circulating for several months that a new Uncharted title is in development, and multiple sources have confirmed that Naughty Dog is working on the series again. With the series director also hinting at something related to the games, we can only hope that Nathan Drake will return in a new project soon.
Source: Tech4gamers, FRVR
