1. The
Last
Of
Us
-­
Production
Pipeline
Ideation
The
co-­‐founders
of
Naughty
Dog
had
to
decide
whether
or
not
to
reboot
the
IP
“Jak
&
Daxter”,
the
ideas
they
were
coming
out
with
though
didn’t
suit
that
particular
IP
so
they
made
the
decision
to
start
a
new
one.
Neil
Druckmann
-­
Creative
Director,
and
Bruce
Straley
-­
Game
Director
came
forward
with
the
idea
of
a
post-­‐apocalyptic
game.
Their
two
initial
ideas
which
they
built
the
game
from
were;
a
post-­‐apocalyptic
world
and
a
developing
relationship
between
the
two
main
characters.
These
were
the
two
starting
points,
and
the
two
un-­‐changing
elements
through-­‐out
production,
right
up
to
the
finished
game.
Inspiration
came
from
many
non-­‐fiction
documentaries
and
books,
such
as
a
book
called
“The
World
Without
Us”
which
describes
what
would
become
of
the
world
if
uninhabited
by
people.
The
documentary
“Planet
Earth”
described
how
a
fungus
could
take
over
an
ants
mind
and
control
them,
this
was
the
basis
of
the
infected,
the
directors
thinking
“what
would
happen
if
this
fungus
could
move
to
humans?”
Pre-­production
Writing:
The
script
for
the
game
was
written
by
Creative
Director
Neil
Druckmann,
as
it
was
something
that
dealt
with
developing
the
story
and
characters,
which
was
his
area
of
direction.
The
reason
they
didn’t
hire
in
a
writer
was
because
the
story
was
seen
as
such
an
important
element
of
the
game
that
it
had
to
be
handled
by
a
Director.
Concept
art:
What
concept
art
does
is
give
the
designers
an
idea
of
the
overall
look
and
feel
of
the
game
and
gives
them
something
to
work
from,
the
concept
art
helped
the
evolution
of
the
infected
from
a
traditional
zombie
to
something
a
little
bit
more
different.
Michael
Knowland
-­
Lead
Character
Artist
came
up
with
the
idea
of
there
being
fungus
on
the
infected
and
created
concept
art
from
gathered
images
of
fungal
growth.
Production
Motion
capture:
The
motion
capture
was
directed
by
Neil
Druckmann
to
preserve
the
continuity
and
to
stick
to
the
script,
it
was
also
filmed
with
a
handheld
film
camera
to
get
a
natural
camera
positioning
reference
to
make
the
game
more
realistic.
Shaun
Escayg
-­
Animation
Lead
was
also
present
during
the
motion
capture
sessions
to
supervise
it
and
collect
a
reference
for
the
animation.
Music:
Gustavo
Santaolalla
-­
Composer
insisted
that
he
be
a
part
of
the
project
from
early
on,
most
composers
join
the
project
during
the
post-­‐production
but
he
wanted
to
get
a
feel
for
the
game
early
on.
In
order
to
create
a
unique
soundtrack
Gustavo
used
very
odd
and
strange
instruments
that
he

2. had
never
used
before,
which
created
a
very
emotional
and
very
real
feel
to
the
soundtrack.
Post-­production
User
interface:
The
interface
was
originally
designed
in
a
very
complex
way,
meaning
you
had
to
go
into
a
menu
in
order
to
change
weapons
and
it
took
too
long,
so
Alexandria
Neonakis
-­
User
interface
Designer
made
an
overlay
menu
which
can
be
accessed
with
the
D-­‐Pad
in
order
to
change
weapons
easily.
QA
Testing:
Damon
Buteau-­anderson
-­
Quality
Assurance
Manager
had
the
job
of
running
QA
groups
to
find
bugs
and
glitches
in
the
game
and
report
them
so
that
they
can
be
fixed.
This
is
important
as
if
this
is
not
done
a
game
could
be
shipped
with
an
unknown
game
breaking
glitch.
Sound
Design:
Derrick
Espino
-­
Senior
Sound
Designer
did
the
sound
design
for
the
game,
his
job
is
to
think
in
creative
ways
on
how
to
create
the
audio
for
the
game,
in
order
to
create
the
sounds
for
the
zombies
he
got
a
sample
of
someone
doing
a
classic
zombie
screech
and
edited
it
with
sounds
of
himself
making
a
clicking
sound
with
his
tongue
to
create
a
unique
sound
for
the
zombies.
Promotion:
In
order
to
hit
the
right
target
audience
they
ran
the
first
advert
after
the
season
finale
of
“The
Walking
Dead”.
To
further
promote
the
game
it
was
bundled
with
the
PS3
in
selected
special
edition
boxes,
only
the
best
of
games
are
bundled
with
consoles
most
the
time
so
this
was
a
big
promotion
for
them.
A
very
simple
trailer
was
put
onto
YouTube
featuring
rioting
and
no
actual
Gameplay,
this
got
people
thinking
what
it
could
mean;
this
was
2
years
before
the
game
was
released.
Post-­mortem
The
documentary
“Grounded”,
produced
by
PlayStation
and
Area
5
productions,
serves
as
a
Post-­‐mortem,
going
through
the
Pipeline
process
with
interviews
from
different
people
involved,
and
charting
the
games
production.
Most
aspects
of
the
development
are
shown
in
the
documentary,
making
it
easy
for
them
to
look
back
and
see
what
they
could
have
potentially
done
better
and
what
was
done
good
and
what
was
done
bad.