So far, this year likely hasn't gone to plan the way Sony and Naughty Dog originally pictured it. The road for The Last of Us 2 has been a long one marked with numerous struggles between multiple delays and a damaging report indicating the tough working conditions at the studio. Sony made the tough decision to indefinitely delay the game beyond it's Spring 2020 release as well as refunding digital pre-orders, leaving many fans wondering what's going on. Unfortunately, things continued to get worse for the highly anticipated title.
While Sony and Naughty Dog continue to work out a new release plan, the fear of most fans was realized recently as the story for The Last of Us 2 and some of its cutscenes have leaked online. Fans have been pushing Sony to release the game digitally since the initial delay, but this leak has left most players concerned and renewed the cries for a release sooner than later.
With the game's story now online, the chances of running into a spoiler have increased exponentially. This situation is a worse-case scenario for both Sony and Naughty Dog as years of hard work are now in jeopardy with these details threatening to ruin the experience for players or them losing interest after finding out what happens in the game. However, this situation could also push Sony into making a quicker decision on what to do with the game in an effort to minimize the leak's impact.
Naturally, the past few days have seen a massive uptick in community efforts to push Naughty Dog and Sony to release the game sooner than later. For others, they've resorted to muting nearly every phrase related to The Last of Us 2.
While there's plenty of concern around the internet, some have noticed how rough its been for Naughty Dog since the game was delayed indefinitely.
Some have even pointed out the huge success that Final Fantasy VII Remake had after it released digitally. Many theorize that The Last of Us 2 could also see similar success.
Shockingly, the recent turn of events is speculated to originate from a Naughty Dog employee who was disgruntled with the studio and its crunch mentality. In response, they posted a developer build of the game, leaking major plot points as well as the ending. If the rumor is true, this person stands to be in a lot of legal trouble if ever found out. With a release date not set, fans will likely be dodging spoilers for quite some time. Naturally, fans should be vigilant for spoilers which now may be frequently appearing on places like YouTube and other social media sites.
The Last of Us 2 is in development without a launch date.