The History of Naughty Dog

NAUGHTY DOG

Sam Sennett, 2024

When PlayStation and/or Sony come up in the discussion of video games, Crash Bandicoot, Jak and Daxter, Uncharted, or The Last of Us are bound to come up. All of these are franchises started and cultivated by Naughty Dog. Naughty Dog is a developer that is widely known for pushing boundaries in any way they can when it comes to video games. Ever since the PS1, all of their games have had a massive impact on the industry, earning rave scores across the board, and sold millions of copies throughout their lifetime. Naughty Dog is and has been one of my favorite developers to engage with for the last decade of my life, and I have always been interested in learning the philosophies of this wild developer.

 Naughty Dog started off as simply two teenagers wanting to express their love of games and programming, the two teenagers being Andy Gavin, and Jason Rubin. They made multiple games just by themselves, such as Ski Crazed, Dream Zone, and Keef the Theif, all made for computers of the 80's such as the Apple II. After acquiring a partnership with Electronic Arts, they were able to make more games that potentially would've been too big for them. These being Rings of Power, an RPG for the Sega Genesis, and was also Naughty Dog's first game on consoles, and Way of the Warrior, a fighting game similar to Mortal Kombat for the 3DO.

After moving to California and starting to make games for Universal, Naughty Dog expanded to around 10 people. At this point they had started development on what would become Crash Bandicoot, using a development kit of the PS1. This game would end up being the thing that put Naughty Dog on the map for many people, and really showed off the power of the PS1 in a cool way. The game itself was 3D, but was structured, and played like a game in 2D, just with the camera being positioned behind Crash as he ran forward. The group jokingly called it Sonic's Ass Game for a while, before eventually settling on Crash Bandicoot, with the intention of replicating the same cutesy design of a relatively unknown animal. 

Crash Bandicoot released on Sep 9, 1996 with a budget of $1.7 mil, and sold 6.8 million copies as of November 2003, according to Gamasutra. The game received rave review scores, with the main criticism being the lack of innovation in the structure sense, as this is mainly a 2D game played from a 3D perspective.

Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back released on Oct 31, 1997 with a budget of $2 mil, and received even higher review scores than the original. The more innovative gameplay mixed with the more refined controls, smoother animations, and better graphics solidified Crash Bandicoot as the unofficial mascot of PlayStation at the time.

Crash Bandicoot: Warped followed essentially in the same steps of the original. $2 mil budget, spooky scary Halloween (1998) release date, and higher review scores than the original. The game was praised for not getting too comfortable with the formula that Cortex Strikes Back set up, and went off to try and innovate as many gameplay mechanics as they could, while also sticking with the theme of jumping and platforming between different locations, and periods in history.

Naughty Dog also released their first and only spinoff of the Crash series, being Crash Team Racing, as sort of a send-off to the marsupial. The game had a budget of $2.4 mil, and released on Oct 19, 1999 to positive reviews. The game was very similar to Diddy Kong Racing for the N64, which featured a story mode as well as 4-player split screen multiplayer.

As Sony was getting ready to release the PlayStation 2, Naughty Dog knew that they had to come out swinging with a massive showcase for what the PS2 could do, be it with Crash Bandicoot, or with something new. However, since Naughty Dog didn't really feel like working through Universal anymore to release Crash games, they decided to go in a whole new direction for the studio, which proved to be very stressful on the development team. Jak and Daxter was what came of this stress, a game that flaunted big world to collect items in, all without any loading screens.

Jak and Daxter released on Dec 4, 2001 with a $14 mil budget, and received very positive reviews from people who were awed by the scale of the world Naughty Dog created, paired with the fun and fluid gameplay. By July of 2006, the game sold over 1.7 mil copies, and made $49 mil in the United States.

Naughty Dog, noticing the success of games like GTA, released Jak II on Oct 14, 2003 with a budget of around $10 mil. Critics were largely a fan of the switch to a more GTA style of open world, with maximum player freedom, compounded by a darker story and tone. If there's one thing Naughty Dog has proved at this point, it is that they aren't content just finding something that works. They feel the need to keep innovating and switching up gameplay as much as they can, and it's clear this strategy is working.

Jak 3 was a very similar case to Jak II, launching on Nov 9, 2004 to very positive reviews. Reviewers noted the the addition of guns as being very fitting for this new tone Jak had gone for, and made it fun in a similar way to Jak's sister series on PlayStation, Ratchet and Clank.

Similar to Crash Team Racing, Jak X: Combat Racing was a swansong for Naughty Dog's tenure with the Jak and Daxter franchise. The game launched on Oct 18, 2005 and received fairly high reviews, though not quite as high of Naughty Dog's other Jak and Daxter titles, likely because it wasn't your typical Jak fare.

With a newfound want to tell more grounded, and human stories the team started their work on their next new IP for the PlayStation 3. However, due to the funky hardware present on the PS3, Naughty Dog had a hard time adjusting, and trying to figure out how to actually develop for the PS3. Mark Cerny said Naughty Dog took 6 months to learn the hardware of the PS2, but it took almost double the time for the PS3, so it was certainly a struggle for them. The pressure to stay as one of the most innovative developers was also stressing everybody out, and all the new technology was almost too much to handle. The team pushed through however, and decided on making a game to invoke the same feeling of a playable Indiana Jones. Uncharted is what came of this desire, and since then, it has become one of the PlayStation's flagship franchises.

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune released as Naughty Dog's first PlayStation 3 game on Nov 19, 2007 to unbelievably positive reception from critics. While this game didn't stand out with anything new or innovative, what Uncharted did was refine everything about its gameplay into a package that looked absolutely stunning for the time. That combined with the stellar story, and Naughty Dog's first attempt to use motion capture animation to bring their characters to life meant that Uncharted resonated very heavily with audiences.

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves released on Oct 13, 2009 to even higher, near perfect review scores from critics and fans, and was nominated for over 200 Game of the Year awards. Players were absolutely enraptured by Naughty Dog's ability to somehow polish everything about Uncharted, an already very refined game (for the time) to a perfect sheen. Naughty Dog amped up essentially everything from graphics, to gameplay pacing, to storytelling, and even adding a multiplayer mode to make sure that Uncharted 2 was the poster child for how to create a game that emulated the feeling of being in a blockbuster movie. Uncharted 2, even today is still regarded as one of the greatest games of all time by many.

Following up Uncharted 2 must've been a daunting task for Naughty Dog, but they stepped up to the challenge when they released Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception on Nov 1, 2011. Uncharted 3 managed to recreate the same sense of adventure that resonated so well with people with the previous game, which earned Uncharted 3 its own batch of amazing review scores. However, many people don't look back as fondly at Uncharted 3 as 2, because even though this game is incredible, people think this game just captured the Uncharted 2 feeling again, while not really adding much of its own identity into the mix. Regardless, Uncharted 3 was a fantastic swansong for the franchise on PlayStation 3.

While the team still had plenty of Uncharted fire in their blood, as evidenced by the fact that they were still developing for the series, Naughty Dog's ambition to tell a grounded story grew even more. Taking aspects from the lessons they learned from the storytelling of Uncharted and amplifying those, the team created The Last of Us, a post-apocalyptic game that featured zombies.

The Last of Us launched for PlayStation 3 on Jun 14, 2013 as one of the final big titles for the console. The impact that The Last of Us had on people cannot be overstated, as this is regarded by so many as one of not only the best stories in video games, but one of the best video games full stop. Winning Game of the Year awards left and right, 10/10's essentially across the board, this game solidified itself as an instant classic, and proved to many skeptics that video games can tell effective, cinema-quality stories.

Following up on The Last of Us, the team released The Last of Us: Left Behind on Feb 14, 2014, Naughty Dog's first expansion downloadable content story. The game was way smaller in scope, but no less devoid of the same magic that made The Last of Us shine. The game was initially controversial for its depiction of LGBT characters, but nevertheless, Left Behind received its own batch of perfect scores, and proved that this was not the last we would see of this series.

Taking a detour from The Last of Us, Naught Dog wanted to revisit and conclude the Uncharted series. As a result, the team released Uncharted 4: A Thief's End on May 10, 2016 as their first game for the PlayStation 4. The team used what worked for The Last of Us in a storytelling sense and applied it to the mainline Uncharted series (at least by Naughty Dog). This strategy clearly worked, as Uncharted 4 just as well as their previous games, and fans viewed this as a fitting conclusion for the story of Nathan Drake, while still polishing the Uncharted formula as much as they possibly can.

During the development of Uncharted 4, Naughty Dog promised a Left Behind style story expansion for Uncharted 4. During development however, the team realized that the scope of this expansion would be better served as its own separate game, so Naughty Dog made the choice to release Uncharted: The Lost Legacy on Aug 22, 2017. The game received positive reviews, with many pointing out the noticeably shorter length as a criticism, while still maintaining the Uncharted flair. Lost Legacy would be the last Uncharted game Naughty Dog would develop.

After the development of Uncharted The Lost Legacy, Naughty Dog would proceed all hand on deck with the development of wildly anticipated The Last of Us Part II. This anticipation would be put to rest when The Last of Us Part II released as one of the final big titles for the PS4 on Jun 19, 2020 with a budget of $200 mil. This game was a showcase for how far Naughty Dog had come in terms of storytelling, gameplay, and art/level design. The graphics even today are incredibly realistic, and people took notice of it. However, even though this game was lauded by critics, and it was nominated for hundreds of awards, fans are very divided on this game. Some people just didn't sit right with some of the story choices Naughty Dog took with Part II.

The Last of Us featured a multiplayer mode, which many people noticed was lacking in Part II. To satisfy the wants of fans, Naughty Dog set forth to create a standalone Last of Us multiplayer game. This game, however, would be cancelled, as the developers didn't want to divert the attention required to maintain this game from their single player story-driven games.

Naughty Dog started off as just two teenagers wanting to express their passion about video games, regardless of how they came off to their peers. Across the decades, Naughty Dog moved to California, it's massively grown in size at around 400+ people strong, and they have proved that they can not only provide a fun game to play, but an experience that will last you a lifetime, with their unparalleled storytelling skills. Naughty Dog is a massive reason why stories in games are respected as much as they are today, and I feel its hard to know where the industry would be without them.