Jonathan Lightfoot looks into how you iterate on a good thing
The story in part 3 of Sony Interactive Entertainment and Naughty Dog's The Last of Us series may explore a "congregation of immune people."
Former Naughty Dog artist Gabriel Betancourt explains why the "sweet spot" for game teams is under 200 people and how AAA "factories" kill creativity.
There’s definitely some truth to this. When teams get too large, coordination starts to outweigh creativity—layers of approval, risk aversion, and tight deadlines can turn bold ideas into “safe” ones. Keeping a team under ~200 people sounds ideal for maintaining clear communication and a shared vision. That said, massive AAA projects also come with huge technical demands and expectations, so scaling up isn’t always avoidable. The real challenge is figuring out how to keep that small-team creativity alive inside big studio structures.
More than that, it's logistically untenable. Inevitably, when teams get too large, how do you keep tabs on accountability? I suspect this massive team size is a consequence of the perfectionism streak Naughty Dog has.
I wish we could have so many people working on something and it turns out great because I'm all for collaboration in spirit - the problem is too many people as part of the larger team and smaller units. Suppose for example that you have too many people in the art department; you will very often come up against fiercely competing visions for how things should look. That competitive vision will cause friction between team members, team doesn't work as a unit, the back and forth can further delay parts that the other departments are waiting for, etc etc.
A 200-person team says, to me, that we need to scale back game development. Even if it means we go back to PS2 era costs and scale, why not? Those games are still great fun, the budgets were in check, and you could literally break the 200-man team into like 10 20-man teams working on different projects.
Red Dead Redemption hits 3.3 million Netflix downloads on mobile, underscoring how subscription access drives reach over paid sales.
More like people don't play these type of games on their phone normally and don't try them out. Not like the places where people do play these games haven't crushed those numbers easily.
How many people actually played more than an hour of the game or came close to finishing it on mobile is the real question. If people aren't playing the games to a point that is purposeful, then why try when a subscription that is behind a streaming service isn't a sign of success but just curiosity.
I downloaded it because I already have a Netflix sub.
I am not going to buy it for $40 or whatever it costs on Google Play.
I tried it out and will be sticking to the PC version, but it's not bad.
Having said that, this is the issues I see vs the PC version:
1. Greatly reduced texture resolution.
2. Massive downgrade ALL lighting quality (this includes water, shadows, etc).
3. Stutter and heat. Prolonged play leads to both.
On the plus side, we have:
4. This thing is like 6GB vs the 12 on Steam.
Great way to try the game, but not the best way to play it.
They should build a production that includes members behind the True Grit remake and Hell on Wheels from AMC. Both were perfect for wild west vibes.
Enough to actually be a sequel and not just an expansion of the base game.
A sequel shouldn't be radically different, else why call it a sequel? It should refine what worked previously and add a few interesting new elements.