Variety Presents: Gaming on TikTok Leadership Summit featuring conversations with executives and creatives on the leading edge of video games, entertainment and content.
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00:00You are running one of the most active, it's a, it's a boutique, but it's a busy boutique.
00:05It's one of the most active purveyors of gaming content, and particularly gaming content
00:10that is making that transmedia leap into films and TV.
00:14You had a couple of big ones in the last couple of years with a little show called The Last of Us on HBO,
00:20a big movie franchise that was launched with Uncharted a couple of years ago, did very well at the box office.
00:26And so we wanted to, we are very happy to have you here to talk a little bit about,
00:30obviously a theme here has been the, both the convergence of gaming and Hollywood IP,
00:37but also I think something that we're seeing is that a greater understanding of what gaming is as a medium,
00:44and that it is gaining respect in the traditional Hollywood content community by leaps and bounds every day.
00:51So again, we are grateful that we are here, and let's, that you're here with us, and that we're all here together.
00:58I'd like to just start by, at the sort of top of the funnel question here for you in terms of,
01:04you knew that Last of Us was a very powerful game with an incredible fandom.
01:09When the ideas started to really come together about could this be a television series,
01:15could this be adapted into other media, what were the, what were the cautions that you had?
01:20What were the red flags that you looked for to say, wait, these aren't the right partners?
01:25And what were the things that, with HBO and with showing a Craig Mazin that made you feel like,
01:30maybe these are the right people to team with?
01:33Yeah, you know, when we were making the game, no one on that team expected it to be as big as it turned out to be.
01:40You know, we were coming on...
01:41Even at the game stage.
01:42At the game stage, you know, we're coming on the heels of Uncharted that became very, very big,
01:46and I remember when I was working on it, I'm like, oh, we're never going to match Uncharted.
01:50I just hope this sells all okay so I get to do this one more time.
01:54And then it did come out, and it did really resonate with a lot of fans in this very kind of intimate way
02:00that I've never seen before in anything I've worked on,
02:02that they really connected with these characters and this storyline to such a degree that it meant so much to them.
02:07And likewise, back at Naughty Dog and our team, it meant so much to us.
02:12We wanted to make sure wherever we team up with does it justice.
02:15And the cautionary tales out there that there were, I think I could say to this group,
02:19there were a lot of bad game adaptations that, you know, when...
02:22We've heard something about that.
02:23When things were moving from gaming to other medium, there was always, I think, this mentality of,
02:28and usually by people that don't play video games, to say, how do we fix this?
02:32How do we take this thing that's really popular and use it as kind of like a marketing launch pad
02:37and then tell our own story and do our own thing, and often those things would fall apart.
02:42And when it falls apart, it hurts your franchise.
02:45It hurts how people feel about this thing that's very dear to them.
02:48So for me, you know, I wasn't head of Naughty Dog at the time,
02:52but as the kind of like the creative director of it,
02:55it was just important to honor it and honor the things that we felt were special about it.
03:01And while there are certain like different deals throughout the years
03:05that some were public and some were not, were just in talks,
03:08I think ultimately those didn't work out because we just didn't have alignment on what makes The Last of Us special.
03:14And or the people that were in charge just didn't understand it or didn't love it in the way that we loved it.
03:21That changed for me drastically one day when I had lunch with Craig Mazin,
03:25on the heels of, you know, he wrote and created the show Chernobyl,
03:30which for my money is one of the best shows ever made.
03:34And I just wanted to meet the guy and just gush about how much I love that show
03:38and like just pick his brain about how he put it together and how he wrote it and how long was he working on it.
03:43And as I'm there in this lunch with this guy and he wanted to meet me as well,
03:47he started talking about The Last of Us and talking about it in such an intimate,
03:52fundamental way of understanding what it was that I'm like,
03:55oh my God, this guy is in love with this game that we've made.
03:59And it's, you know, I'm sure he was a very smart guy.
04:02So maybe he was already thinking ahead of where we were at this lunch.
04:05But I asked him, you know, you work with HBO.
04:08I adore everything HBO, like many of the things HBO have done.
04:11So you are a big consumer of that.
04:13I'm a huge fan.
04:14I'm going all the way back to Sopranos, Game of Thrones, True Detective, Take Your Pick.
04:18I probably love it.
04:20And I asked him, what would it look like to adapt this to a show?
04:25Because up until that point, we're only thinking of it as a movie,
04:28because traditionally games have not been turned into shows.
04:30This is actually a relatively new thing in gaming.
04:33And he said, oh, it's very easy.
04:35We just go across the street.
04:36I tell HBO I want that to be my next project, and it becomes the next project.
04:39And that's exactly what happened.
04:42We went.
04:43I had a meeting with Casey and Franny over at HBO.
04:47The two top leaders, Casey Bloys and Francesco Orsi,
04:50big wigs at HBO and really good people too.
04:54And we walked them through the story and what makes The Last of Us special.
04:59And they stood up and shook our hands and said, let's do this.
05:02And now we are.
05:04And I think this show has become a success because it's made, one, by really talented people.
05:12That's an important ingredient that you can never pass on.
05:15But it's really talented people that love the source material in the way that we,
05:19who've created that source material, love it as well.
05:22And that combination turned out to be the right kind of magic.
05:26There's timing and luck and a bunch of other things.
05:28But for my money, that combination is what has allowed the show to kind of break into the zeitgeist
05:33in the way that it has.
05:37So we have Season 2 coming up, and I know you all are working on that right now.
05:41So no spoilers, but asking a question that the announcement,
05:45the PlayStation PS5 Pro has The Last of Us 2 Remastered coming out in it.
05:52So I know there will be a lot of conversations surrounding the plot in The Last of Us Part 2
05:57and then how that might connect to Season 2 of HBO's The Last of Us.
06:01So I want to know how you all work through what the game has
06:04and what the on-screen adaptation will have in order to surprise people
06:08who are still players of the game and coming to it,
06:10not just to see cut screens that they love in live action.
06:15Yeah, another mistake I think one could make in the opposite direction
06:19is staying so close to the source material that is built and designed and written
06:24for this other medium that has strengths and weaknesses
06:27and trying to translate it as is with no changes to this other medium
06:31that has different strengths and weaknesses.
06:34So Craig and I, the way we approach it,
06:37we start at the beginning of the season, we break the season,
06:39we look at the game, and we start by, first of all,
06:43our goal is to tell the best story possible.
06:46So surprising people, while that's maybe a priority,
06:50it's not near the top priority.
06:53Again, what's important to us is we have interesting arcs,
06:55authentic characters, and then we're building on what we have,
06:58and we have a certain ending in mind that we're working towards.
07:01Those are all kind of important ingredients for us.
07:04And then our process is to just look at the content we have in the game
07:08and say, okay, what are things that we both just overwhelmingly love
07:11and feel could be adapted as is?
07:14And we just kind of put little check marks by those index cards
07:16or whatever we're using at the time, mirror board,
07:20to say, okay, those things could just stay as is,
07:22and that becomes kind of building blocks.
07:24And then there are things that were made for the game that, again,
07:28let's use the Bill and Frank episode,
07:30because I think a lot of people really resonated with that on season one,
07:34and that one deviates quite a bit from the game.
07:37And there are a couple of reasons why we did that.
07:39There's one, in the game you get to know Bill through action,
07:43because the game really relies on interactivity and action.
07:47If we were to translate that sequence of Bill, it might be okay,
07:51it might even be good, it wouldn't be great,
07:53because that amount of action on screen when you're not interacting with it,
07:57you don't get the kind of tension or immersion you would get in the game,
08:00so instead you just get spectacle.
08:02And that spectacle eventually would wear thin.
08:06So we knew that needed a big change.
08:08And then Craig, to his credit, had this idea about these two characters
08:11that are in the game, Bill and Frank,
08:13and to tell a different kind of story with those characters.
08:15When you come into the game, Frank is not alive anymore.
08:19So we hinted this relationship between these two men,
08:22and here instead we said, well, let's focus on that relationship.
08:25Here we get to really focus on drama,
08:27which is the thing that, speaking to the earlier question about partners,
08:31HBO always encouraged us, and to me this was such a relief when they said this,
08:36only have as much violence, only have as much action as you need to.
08:40We care about drama and characters.
08:42And I'm like, those are the things that are important to me
08:44and were important to us when we made the game.
08:47And that change has allowed us to, I think,
08:50create a really beautiful episode that exists in this medium
08:53and very much inspired by the source material but is very different.
08:56And that's the approach we're taking in this season
08:59and potentially next season if we do well,
09:02is to, again, look at the source material,
09:04flag where things can be adapted as is,
09:06recognize areas that just don't work
09:08because they were designed for this interactive medium,
09:11and then start brainstorming, how do we change,
09:13how do we expand this world, how do we build this world?
09:15And I think those are sometimes the best surprises for players
09:18when they get to see a backstory or like,
09:20oh, this was mentioned in the game,
09:22and now I get to see a full episode about this thing,
09:24again, like Bill and Frank, and it makes the game richer.
09:27To me, this is the best kind of adaptation
09:29is it makes both things richer at the same time
09:31without diminishing one or the other.
09:33That's very good to know because if Last of Us 2 Remastered
09:36looks as good as PlayStation tells me it will on Pro 5,
09:40then I don't need a remake of that.
09:44I can appreciate that as a creative person,
09:48it's heartening for somebody to tell you
09:50at an outlet where they have all kinds of freedom,
09:53it's not like, oh, no, you must ladle up
09:5530% of violence in this sequence.
09:57It's nice to know.
09:59The HBO people from your account,
10:01they really do always emphasize the character,
10:04and that's the character in that episode that you referenced
10:08that even though people like me
10:10hadn't spent all that much time with them,
10:12that episode, I'll never hear that Linda Ronstadt song
10:15the same way again,
10:17and I have loved that song for a long time.
10:20That episode was just so powerful,
10:23and it is interesting.
10:25I really appreciate what you're saying
10:27about putting characters into so much action.
10:30As you were saying, that spectacle,
10:32it's the last 20 minutes of every superhero movie
10:34where you're like, when will this thing end?
10:37I think that's a really good point,
10:39that if you're in a game playing,
10:41it's a lot different than you're just watching
10:43and like, okay, how many more blow-ups?
10:46And you not only wrote and broke stories
10:49and wrote with Craig and his team,
10:51but also directed an episode of the first season,
10:54and you directed an episode of this upcoming season.
10:58In season one, you directed episode two,
11:01which is, for any show, especially a new show,
11:04episode two is really where, obviously,
11:07you set things up in the pilot or episode one,
11:09but episode two is where people decide,
11:11okay, am I going to stick with this?
11:13So that was a brave choice on your end.
11:16How is it for you as a creative,
11:18as a writer and director,
11:20working in a medium where
11:22you have a little flexibility at HBO,
11:24but it's got to be within
11:27probably a 50, 60,
11:30maybe 60, 70-minute format.
11:34It's not as rigid as a traditional
11:36ad-supported broadcast network,
11:38but a television episode, even on HBO,
11:40is about 60, 70 minutes.
11:42Was working in that kind of linear storytelling
11:45versus a game where you have
11:47so many different options to go,
11:49was that an adjustment for you?
11:51Did you like it?
11:52Did you find it to be sort of a discipline?
11:54I'm just curious how that process went for you.
11:56Yeah.
11:58Maybe I approached it naively, and you're right.
12:00There should have been more stress, maybe,
12:02when I directed it than I probably took on.
12:04Sometimes that's the best way to go into things.
12:06Ignorance is bliss.
12:09Yeah, no, I remember I was there more as a producer.
12:12Again, so much about this relationship
12:16and this collaboration is about trust.
12:18And initially, I had very little.
12:20So I wanted to be more on set
12:22and be much more involved in every step of the way,
12:24approve every creative decision.
12:26And then I was able to kind of ease up on that
12:29because I saw, again, how much love and good taste
12:32this team had with the source material.
12:36So I was there on episode one as a producer
12:38just to kind of observe and see.
12:40And the first thing that struck me is,
12:42you know, I've never shot live action before,
12:44but I had 10 years of experience on video games,
12:47shooting in like a mo-cap stage with real actors
12:50and thinking about shots and score on the game.
12:53And the show I worked with Gustavo Santaolalla,
12:55two-time Academy Award winner, composer, brilliant guy.
12:58So what struck me was how similar it was.
13:01Like the van diagrams,
13:03they're not a perfect circle on top of each other,
13:05but there's more overlap than I would have thought.
13:08And I realized, you know, going up and giving art direction
13:11is going up and giving art direction.
13:13Except in the studio, I hold a controller in my hand
13:15and I fly around and I give art direction to the team.
13:18On set, I use my feet and I walk over
13:20and there's a team behind me and I give art direction.
13:22When I work with actors,
13:24yeah, they're not wearing mo-cap suits,
13:26they have costumes on,
13:28but, you know, I'm talking to them about motivation and arcs
13:31and, you know, there's blocking.
13:33There's a lot of very, very similar things.
13:35The biggest difference is you're right
13:37in that we don't have that same constraint for time on the game.
13:40The game has a lot of flexibility of how long it takes
13:43because so much of it is also dependent
13:45on how the player plays it.
13:47But even as much for the non-interactive part,
13:49the kind of more cut scene filming sections,
13:51we have a lot of flexibility of how long those will be.
13:54In the show, there was pretty strict guidelines
13:57of how long it needed to be,
13:59but that was more, I think, dictated by the script
14:01that we turned in, that Craig and I worked on.
14:04So the biggest difference, actually,
14:06is an order of operation.
14:08On the game, when we shoot a scene
14:10and I shoot it with the actors,
14:12I have some idea of shots in mind,
14:15but it could change pretty drastically after the fact.
14:18So I could shoot a scene with actors
14:20and we can shoot it beginning to end.
14:22We don't have to worry about coverage
14:24because we're getting all the angles all the time.
14:26It's motion capture.
14:28We're getting 3D data of their body, of their face,
14:30and we have their voice.
14:32Then after I'm done shooting that scene,
14:34I could be on that same stage without the actors
14:36with a virtual camera and figure out,
14:38you know what, that actually, what I thought was a wide shot,
14:40that actually, that performance was so nuanced,
14:42that could become a close-up.
14:44I can't do that on the show.
14:46On the show, what we shoot is what we have.
14:48So you have to do a lot more planning
14:50of all these departments, of props, of costumes,
14:52even props, costume, the weather,
14:54all these things I could change after the fact in the game.
14:56On the show, again, what I get on camera,
14:58except for some exception with the effects,
15:00is pretty much it.
15:02So you're doing all this prep,
15:04and then there's a little bit of a high-wire act,
15:06as you say, action,
15:08and you're hoping all these elements will come together,
15:10and sometimes they do and sometimes they don't,
15:12and it's about, as a director, I think,
15:14figuring out in the moment how do I course-correct
15:16with a very limited amount of time.
15:18And there's a certain high you get from that,
15:20because, again, there's this rush that when you nailed that,
15:22you nailed that shot, you nailed that performance,
15:24you know you got it,
15:26and you don't have to go after the fact and try to fix it.
15:28Anyway, I think I rambled on for a while
15:30about the differences there.
15:32There's some really great practical examples.
15:36How did you approach looking at
15:38what the fan engagement for a show would be versus games?
15:40The gaming community is very, very vocal,
15:42so is the television fan community,
15:44but it's interesting to see
15:46the amount of official marketing
15:48that goes behind a show,
15:50and then the amount of just,
15:52on Mondays after the episode aired,
15:54people doing video breakdowns on TikTok,
15:56people doing explainers of this scene
15:58versus what it was in the game
16:00versus not in the game and the themes they see in this.
16:02So how do you see that as the creator of something,
16:04and do you see the difference in between
16:06how you get reviewed
16:08and comments on games
16:10versus how you do on the show
16:12and kind of how you look at those two things differently
16:14or are they kind of the same?
16:16Yeah, gamers,
16:18and maybe to a larger degree
16:20just genre fans,
16:22I'm not sure what the term for it is,
16:24can be quite particular.
16:26And if you don't give them what they want,
16:28they'll let you know
16:30on every avenue they can find.
16:32So, you know,
16:34I know why there was a lot of
16:36trepidation by Last of Us fans
16:38when the show was announced,
16:40when casting was announced,
16:42when people were feeling it
16:44because they've been abused
16:46by bad adaptations.
16:48History has told them,
16:50this is more likely than not will be bad.
16:52And I'd like to believe
16:54that we have proven to them
16:56that we can treat this with care
16:58and we can make something great with this
17:00that you don't have to worry.
17:02But now I'm seeing that same trepidation
17:04and worry as we get into season two
17:06and worry about what we're going to change
17:08or keep and all that conversation.
17:10All we have to do is just make something great.
17:12Nothing will dissuade them more
17:14than just if we make something
17:16that will emotionally move them,
17:18that they'll talk about.
17:20And I personally like the format quite a bit
17:22of releasing episode week by week
17:24because then it gets people talking about it.
17:26And then I think Craig started this at HBO,
17:28I'm not entirely sure,
17:30but the idea of a podcast
17:32that goes along with each show.
17:34I think that started with Chernobyl,
17:36but don't quote me on that.
17:38The podcast as well was a way
17:40for us to talk to those fans
17:42and explain to them,
17:44here's why we made certain changes on this episode.
17:46Here was our thought process.
17:48Or even if something wasn't necessarily
17:50clear in the episode or there was a callback
17:52to something in the game,
17:54we could point that out and kind of help guide
17:56the conversation around those episodes.
17:58And I think that's a stroke of brilliance
18:00from Craig to do that,
18:02and HBO to do that.
18:04Because it's a way for us to
18:06maybe more broadly speak to our fans
18:08than a tweet or something really, really short.
18:10And really get into depth
18:12about our creative decisions.
18:14And then marketing,
18:16again,
18:18this is the love I have
18:20for HBO,
18:22is they're not just trying to say,
18:24okay, how do we reach the most people?
18:26They say, how do we reach the most people
18:28in a way that's really authentic to the show and the game?
18:30That they're aware that we're bringing in
18:32all these fans, millions of fans from the game,
18:34and we have to honor what they love about this thing.
18:36And not say, okay, you guys did this thing on the game,
18:38now we'll show you how we do things on TV.
18:40It was very much a
18:42conversation, a collaboration with Naughty Dog,
18:44with PlayStation,
18:46about how we advertise this thing.
18:48As anybody
18:50will tell you, things can be
18:52made or broken
18:54in the marketing campaigns, that's for sure.
18:56Was it,
18:58for you as a creator and
19:00as a person
19:02creating content out there,
19:04was it meaningful to you
19:06when you saw even
19:08the first dailies or rushes of
19:10Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey
19:12inhabiting these characters?
19:14To see
19:16an actor, not a motion capture, but an
19:18actor in a costume
19:20inhabiting these characters,
19:22was that, I don't want to say more meaningful,
19:24but did it reach you in a different
19:26way than when you're in the early
19:28stages and you're reviewing
19:30a game? Was there something meaningful
19:32about seeing them for the first time
19:34inhabiting those characters?
19:36It was one of the most
19:38surreal experiences of my life.
19:40I remember being on set for the first
19:42time, and I'm
19:44in Joel's house,
19:46and it looks like Joel's house
19:48from the game. I'm used to reviewing the game
19:50on a TV screen of
19:52various sizes, but I'm seeing a 2D image.
19:54Now all of a sudden, I'm in it.
19:56I'm sitting on Joel's couch, and Pedro comes walking
19:58by, and he's dressed like
20:00Joel.
20:02I just try not to
20:04freak out, because in my mind, I'm freaking
20:06out.
20:08I try to describe it to people, and I'm kind of
20:10at a loss for words. It's as if someone built
20:12Disneyland just for me,
20:14and I get to be in it.
20:16Then I remember I had to take a meeting
20:18while I'm there in Canada for
20:20the next game we're working on,
20:22it's Nolly Dog, so I have to jump on a Zoom meeting,
20:24so I'm looking for a quiet place.
20:26I go into Joel's daughter's room, Sarah's room,
20:28and I close the door,
20:30and then I finally, I could
20:32bring my mask down, and I'm with
20:34all my coworkers, and I'm like,
20:36guys, look at this. Look at the sheets.
20:38Look at the posters. They got all these
20:40details right. Look how much they love the thing
20:42that we all made, and then I kind of
20:44straighten up, and I go back on set.
20:46But there was a moment
20:48this season, I wish I could
20:50talk more about it, but I had...
20:52Please do.
20:54I had a couple of coworkers come
20:56visit me on set on the episode I was directing,
20:58and I'm like,
21:00you guys have to see this, and I walked them over to the set,
21:02and we all had tears in our eyes,
21:04and we got really
21:06emotional. I can feel the love
21:08and the care that you have for this property.
21:10It just exudes from you, and
21:12all of that, and the fact that
21:14Craig was an enthusiastic,
21:16all of this now explains
21:18why this worked.
21:20Is this the sheer love for you,
21:22just the way you're describing it?
21:24Look, I don't want to downplay the luck.
21:26Right place and right time plays a
21:28lot to do with it, but I just know that we
21:30made something that we were all incredibly
21:32proud of, and whether it succeeded
21:34or failed, we won.
21:36Again, we didn't compromise
21:38anything. It's all our vision.
21:40It's all the things we love so much about this thing
21:42is what we made. Can I press you a little bit
21:44on Jenny's earlier question in terms
21:46of, although we'd love some
21:48spoilers, we're not going to ask you for spoilers, but just
21:50in the coordination
21:52of season two and iterations
21:54of the game, is that
21:56something that people that are working
21:58on the game and people that are working on the show are talking
22:00to each other? Is that an important
22:02focus now that you do have this
22:04amazing property in a different medium?
22:06There's a constant
22:08communication between Naughty Dog,
22:10the developers of the game, and
22:12all the production team
22:14on the show.
22:16I was just on an email thread this
22:18week where the VFX supervisor
22:20were now entering post on these
22:22episodes.
22:24There's a location that's exactly like the one
22:26in the game, and he was asking, give us all the
22:28concept art, give us all the 3D models
22:30we have of this area, and our team goes
22:32and collects these things to send them over.
22:34We had sometimes
22:36a design
22:38for one of the infected, the
22:40monsters on the show, that
22:42for whatever reason the show wasn't getting
22:44quite right, we brought over one of our
22:46in-house concept artists from the game
22:48to work on it.
22:52When I'm on set and I'm working with the props
22:54department, and they're showing me this props
22:56or I'm looking at the production design of all these sets,
22:58the first pass they do is they get
23:00all the concept art,
23:02they pour over all the art
23:04books from the game, and I see them plastered all
23:06over the walls. That's their initial pass.
23:08Then they deviate from there, but first
23:10they want to make sure they get the broad strokes right.
23:12As Craig
23:14always says, we have the most expensive
23:16Privas ever made, which is the game.
23:20That's pretty good. Jenny, we'll
23:22have your last question, then we will open it up
23:24to a few questions from the audience.
23:26One more for you, just being
23:28we kind of opened talking about the difficulty
23:30of adapting a video game and doing
23:32it well, but there have been some really
23:34good adaptations since Last of Us
23:36kicked that off. There's Fallout.
23:38I want to know what you think
23:40kind of the secret element
23:42is there, because one of the things I think Hollywood
23:44has a hard time cracking is the player
23:46element that exists in a game
23:48that doesn't in these other mediums that you're
23:50accounting for in a game. Someone is playing
23:52this. Someone is making these choices
23:54and doing this and giving that interactive
23:56quality and that feeling to a film
23:58or TV show is much more difficult.
24:00If there are ways that you all look
24:02to do that or make little nods about it or
24:04what you've seen in other projects that kind of lend
24:06itself to that element that you
24:08can't get crossover directly
24:10from the medium.
24:12I think Fallout
24:14is another great example where
24:16the people making the game
24:18are intimately involved with the show
24:20and the people making the show are fans of the
24:22game and are just really good at what they do.
24:24To me, that's a good place to
24:26start to hit success.
24:30I think sometimes, again, it's usually from people
24:32that don't understand the games.
24:34I remember reading a script for
24:36a game adaptation and it says,
24:38oh, and in this moment, this character jumped
24:40in this particular way and
24:42players will recognize it from this moment in the game
24:44and I'm reading that and I'm thinking, no player
24:46cares about this. They care about
24:48relationships and characters when
24:50they see an adaptation that is
24:52a TV show is
24:54a purely story-driven medium
24:56versus game.
24:58You have almost two genres. You have the story
25:00genre and you have the interactive
25:02genre and those are often
25:04not the same genre. The kind of interactive
25:06genre I think maybe just
25:08should guide you in the kind of actions
25:10that you have, but you can't be a slave
25:12to it because often you're breaking reality
25:14in the game to create
25:16a certain feeling through the interactivity
25:18that when you translate it to here
25:20and you don't have that interactivity, if you just translate it
25:22as is, it will feel off. It will feel
25:24strange. It will feel, and when you're trying to tell
25:26a realistic story, it will feel unrealistic.
25:28So that's
25:30just, I think,
25:32trusting that,
25:34again, there is a difference between these mediums
25:36and just certain things just cannot translate.
25:38I can't go rummage
25:40over there as much as I want to in that scene.
25:42Awesome.
25:44Thank you so much. Let's
25:46see anybody in the audience
25:48have any questions for Neil?
25:52Okay, we have somebody, microphones are coming around.
26:08Thank you. Big fan of the show and
26:10the game.
26:12It wasn't maybe the first, but it was
26:14certainly an early part of the storytelling
26:16genre within gaming.
26:18I was just curious to see where you
26:20got to in that style and whether you took your
26:22leads from TV or other gaming
26:24that led to this kind of storytelling approach
26:26for the game.
26:29We have 50 seconds.
26:31I grew up
26:33playing video games as far back
26:35as I could form memories, and
26:37my favorite games were
26:39old point-and-click
26:41action adventure games, not even action,
26:43just adventure games, and those were very
26:45story-driven. Those are games like
26:47King's Quest, Space Quest, The
26:49Secret of Monkey Island,
26:51anything LucasArts released. Those, again,
26:53those games were just funny, and they're so well-written.
26:55I just fell in love
26:57with those. Then the next big milestone
26:59for me I can think of in gaming was
27:01Half-Life, where they
27:03told these really compelling stories
27:05with characters.
27:07It's a first-person shooter, so you're experiencing
27:09the story as you're moving around, but you have
27:11a character in front of you that turns to you and talks
27:13to you and sometimes says something
27:15to you and winks at you.
27:17If I had the camera turn around 180 degrees,
27:19I would have missed that wink. That wink
27:21felt more special because I saw it.
27:23That really stuck
27:25with me. When we started
27:27working on The Last of Us, one of our goals
27:29was you play as Joel for
27:31part of the game, and then you play as Ellie for another part
27:33of the game.
27:35Specifically with Ellie, how
27:37do we make this AI-driven character
27:39feel like a real
27:41person, like you're on this adventure
27:43with another character that reacts
27:45like a human being?
27:47One of the decisions we made, you can't order
27:49Ellie around because she won't listen to you.
27:51She'll do her own thing and often will
27:53surprise you in a way that a
27:55teenage will surprise you.
27:57We put so much care and effort and
27:59so much as Ashley Johnson's
28:01performance as that character in the game
28:03just brought that character
28:05to life. I'm drawing on
28:07decades of history of
28:09people, pioneers
28:11in this medium that we're still figuring it out.
28:13There's still stuff we're doing in our game
28:15that we're not quite sure is going to work.
28:17We have a lot of theories, and that's another big
28:19difference between TV and games.
28:21With TV, it's like in a
28:23lot of ways this art form has been perfected.
28:25Now it's about how do you
28:27get creative with these tools
28:29that I've had so long to get perfected.
28:31With games, it still
28:33feels like the Wild West in some ways
28:35that have theories about
28:37how we tell stories in this or how we
28:39do certain things with this combination
28:41of interactivity.
28:43The other thing that's unique about games
28:45is it encompasses almost all other
28:47art. You like a certain painting,
28:49you can put it in the game. There's a novel that you like,
28:51you can put the whole novel in the game.
28:53You could put whole movies or TV shows
28:55inside the game. Now you wouldn't do that because it would get
28:57very boring, but you could.
28:59That's why there's this palette of
29:01storytelling that is very exciting to me
29:03as we go forward with our next games at
29:05Naughty Dog and
29:07theories that I'm very excited to see whether they work or not.
29:09It's a real testament to
29:11all that you have going on that we didn't
29:13even get into. We barely talked about
29:15Uncharted. We haven't talked about your theme park
29:17work, your graphic novels. Folks,
29:19there's a lot going on here. Does anybody
29:21have a last killer
29:23question to wrap it up?
29:27Killer. High pressure.
29:29Hello. Hi.
29:31As a huge
29:33fan of the series and an even bigger
29:35fan of the game, I'm so excited to ask this.
29:37At TikTok, but also
29:39personally, we saw such a huge
29:41revisit to the game after
29:43the series launched. Even with
29:45the change in Bill and Frank's storyline
29:47and also a revisit
29:49to the second game.
29:51If you are able to share
29:53for season two and if not
29:55for future adaptations, how are you
29:57thinking about that community revisiting
29:59your games after
30:01coming from the show?
30:05I think there's something
30:07I've really enjoyed.
30:09Thank you for that, by the way.
30:11Which is
30:13one of my goals when making this show.
30:15Because again, we have enough success
30:17at Naughty Dog, we don't need to make this adaptation.
30:19The only reason to do it would be to make
30:21something really great.
30:23As someone that loves video games so
30:25much, I really wanted
30:27this experience of having someone
30:29watch the show and really enjoy
30:31it and then hear, wait, that's based on a video
30:33game? You mean like Pong and
30:35Pac-Man and stuff? That was me.
30:37And then go into
30:39games and check them out and see this rich
30:41history of storytelling in this other medium.
30:43And what I've really enjoyed now
30:45is sometimes there are these people that
30:47have watched the show and then went and played the game
30:49and talked about what a cool experience.
30:51And in fact, the game,
30:53the show sometimes hints at stuff
30:55that we just don't have time to get into the show.
30:57That the game can. And vice versa.
30:59That I think if you experience both,
31:01they're both richer for it.
31:03And I love hearing that experience
31:05from people. They tell me, I watched the show and then I played the game
31:07and I really liked how different the build
31:09sequence is. And that gave me this other insight
31:11into him. And there's stuff
31:13in this season that I'm really
31:15excited by. Again, there's stuff that we hinted at.
31:17One scene in particular
31:19comes to mind. That I
31:21think fans of the game will eat up
31:23because it really kind of tells you a lot of backstory
31:25of this important character that
31:27there wasn't really a way for us to even do that
31:29in the game.
31:31I don't know if I answered your question, but I just went on that
31:33road and maybe I got somewhere
31:35interesting.
31:37Well, we thank you for that answer.
31:39And Neil, thank you for your time here.
31:41Obviously, this is a very fertile topic
31:43that we will be coming back to in terms
31:45of the transmedia of it all.
31:47And really, I think for us,
31:49really, really focused on understanding
31:51how gaming is
31:53its own medium.
31:55Because as you say, the understanding
31:57of the game led to the successful adaptation.
31:59That much is pretty clear.
32:01So, once again, congratulations on your success.
32:03We can't wait for season two.
32:05Thank you for being here.