The game director for the original The Last of Us and Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End has spoken about how “boring” he finds modern AAA games these days. In an interview with Edge magazine, Bruce Straley spoke about the modern gaming landscape and called out the AAA industry for not taking risks. Interestingly, one of the big examples he used was the upcoming God of War Laufey, which is set to be one of Sony’s tentpole first-party releases in 2027.
While he praises how God of War Laufey has looked so far in various marketing materials, he noted that the title is unlikely to be a big risk for Sony or developer Santa Monica Studio, especially when it comes to gameplay.
“God of War Laufey, I look at that game, and every pixel is mind-blowing. The amount of work and skill that’s gone into every single frame… I’ve made those kinds of games, and I’m still blown away. But when I actually look at what you’re doing in the game? I’m not excited. And that’s nothing against the God of War team. Just, across the board in triple-A, it feels like there’s no opportunity to inject fresh, innovative ideas.”
Straley’s sentiment comes almost a decade after his 2017 departure from Naughty Dog after releasing Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End. The studio has gone on to appreciate his influence, and even went as far as to mention him in the Special Thanks section of the credits for The Last of Us Part 2.
Back in December 2025, Straley said that he left Naughty Dog because he needed “new problems to solve” and “new creative outlets”. He also brought up the idea of wanting to build things of his own that could then be turned into an entire franchise.
“It really comes down to: Do you want to continue working for someone else and put in all the effort to build an IP, to build characters, to build things that a franchise could be built out of? I got paid very well there, I got some appreciation there, but it felt like it was time to break out and try it on my own. It felt like it was time to evolve my concepts and build a new team. It might fail miserably, but I thought that it was at least my failure based on my choice.”
After leaving Naughty Dog, Straley founded his own studio – Wildflower Interactive. The studio was founded in 2022, and in announcing it, Straley said that he couldn’t stop thinking about an idea for a game. He is working as studio director alongside other staff members like Wouter Gort on art, Liz Fiacco on design, and Ole Ciliox on programming, among others.
“And I realized I need to make this game. But if I’m going to make this game, it means I have to build a team. And if I build a team, I have to build a company. And, well, if we’re going to do that, then we have to do it the right way.”
The studio’s debut title, Coven of the Chicken Foot, was unveiled last year during the Game Awards. The title is being developed for PC and doesn’t yet have a release date.
