Uncharted 4 Was Almost Scrapped Because Naughty Dog Thought It 'Sucked'

An ex-Naughty Dog dev has revealed Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End almost never saw the light of day after higher-ups were unimpressed by its early build. Today, the end of the Nathan Drake saga stands as one of the most fondly remembered titles from the studio, but there was a time when it didn’t seem like the game would be able to reach such heights. If the team hadn’t reworked Uncharted 4 deep into its development, it may not have ever come out.

It’s been 10 years since the release of the last Uncharted game, but there are signs of movement around the franchise. While Naughty Dog is hard at work on Intergalactic: The Heretic Prophet, multiple sources say a new Uncharted project is also in the works, possibly a remake of the first game, a fifth entry, or perhaps both. Those reports are unconfirmed for now, but as the series has come back into the public eye, new details about the existing games have emerged.

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Naughty Dog Threatened to Pull Uncharted 4’s Funding Nearly 3 Years into Development

In a recent episode of the Kiwi Talkz podcast, former Naughty Dog artist Gabriel Betancourt explained how Uncharted 4 had to be redone after facing severe backlash from higher-ups. According to Betancourt, a director from another team held a meeting one day and told devs “this game sucks.” At the time, Uncharted 4 was already over two and a half years into development, so devs planned to ignore the criticism and proceed as usual, but then corporate shared the same feedback and threatened to pull funding if they didn’t “fix it.” This is ultimately why Uncharted 4‘s original director left the project and The Last of Us‘ Neil Druckmann and Bruce Straley took over.

Naughty Dog would successfully rework Uncharted 4 and eventually put the game out, but not every title at the studio has been so lucky. Another ex-employee recently revealed that a standalone Last of Us multiplayer game was 80% complete before it was scrapped, an unfortunate outcome that came as Naughty Dog had to choose between that game and Intergalactic amid shifting budgets. Thankfully for Uncharted fans, A Thief’s End managed to escape that fate, but as Betancourt explains, it wasn’t an easy process to get it across the finish line. It took harsh words from both corporate and the unnamed Naughty Dog director, as well as a change in leadership, for the team to avoid resting on the success of the previous three titles and put out the Uncharted 4 fans know today.

It’s worth noting that Betancourt never specifically said whether the game in this story was Uncharted 4. However, all signs point in that direction. Betancourt mentions that it was the fourth game in a series, and A Thief’s End is only the fourth title in a franchise to come out of Naughty Dog during his tenure there. His explanation of the original director being replaced by two others also lines up with Druckmann and Straley taking over the game, and Uncharted 4‘s five-year development time fits the timeline presented in the anecdote.

Fit the 9 games into the grid.

Despite the drama during development, the game would go on to be one of the studio’s biggest successes. A 93 on Metacritic means Uncharted 4 is one of the highest-rated Naughty Dog games of all time, which is no small feat for such a renowned developer. It’s unclear how much changed from the original build that leadership said “sucked,” as is whether it would’ve been able to reach the same heights had it not started over, but at least things ended well, even if they were dark for a moment.