Since the debut trailer unveiling Naughty Dog’s next game – Intergalactic – first came out, there has been some level of negativity levelled at the game, especially with regards to its protagonist bounty hunter Jordan A. Munn, played by Tati Gabrielle. In a recent interview with Last Stand Media, director Neil Druckmann spoke about the controversy, and how the studio wasn’t phased by it. Check out the interview below.
In the interview, Druckmann spoke about how, despite the controversy, Naughty Dog is more focused on keeping its head down and working on making a good game. “I don’t know if there’s much I could add to that conversation, to be honest,” he said. “It’s just that there’s stuff happening right now with media that you just have to ignore for the most part, stick to your guns, and do what you believe in, and I feel like that’s how I would want artists to carry themselves.”
The statement comes shortly after Gabrielle had spoken about being “boot-camped” by Druckmann for her role as Jordan in light of the backlash and controversy that arose around Naughty Dog with the original release of The Last of Us Part 2. “There was a lot of hate over me being a woman, me being a woman of colour, me having my head shaved, all these things that I didn’t even actually initially see,” said Gabrielle.
“I’m out of the social media zeitgeist for that reason – but once I did, Neil [Druckmann] was like, ‘Ignore it. No matter what, me and you, we’re going to make something beautiful. We’re going to make something that we’re proud of.’”
Intergalactic was originally unveiled with a trailer during The Game Awards 2024 back in December. The trailer didn’t really give us much in the way of gameplay, but it did give us a glimpse at the personality of Jordan and the game’s the sci-fi setting.
Since then, Druckmann has spoken about wanting to explore a variety of themes with Intergalactic, including those surrounding religion, faith, and the idea of loneliness. To help with that, he has also said that players will not have many allies throughout their time with the game, which would be in contrast to other Naughty Dog titles that tend to have at least one friendly face around to help out.
“I really wanted to make a game about faith and religion, but also about just being lonely,” said Druckmann. “So many of the previous games we’ve done – there’s always, like, an ally, with you. I really want you to be lost in a place where you’re really confused about what happened here.”
Druckmann also said that he wants players to think about the same things Jordan would be feeling, especially when it comes to figuring out the mysteries in the game, like those involving the mysterious people that can be found on Sempiria.
“Who are the people here? What was their history?” Druckmann said, describing questions he wants players to wonder about. “And, in order to get off this planet – no one has been heard from [on] this planet for 600 years – so if you ever hoped to have a chance to get off, you have to figure out what happened here.”
Intergalactic is in development for PS5. The game doesn’t yet have a release date, however, and rumours indicate that it might not even come out next year.
