Neil Druckmann is well known for working on the Uncharted series and as creative director of The Last of Us games. Having won numerous DICEs, British Academy, Game Developers Choice Writers Guild of America, and Game Awards, his career was clearly successful. However, he says that he might not have many AAA games left in him.
The Last of Us director Neil Druckmann says he doesn’t have many AAA games left in him
The Last of Us director recently gave an interview with the rapper Logic on the latter’s Logically Speaking podcast. The interview was over an hour and 20 minutes long, and they talked extensively about Druckmann’s career, including his future.
“I guess that I don’t see myself doing this forever at this scale,” he says, just after the 48:50 mark. “It’s just a lot, and it takes a lot out of you. It’s very stressful to manage that many people and multiple studios worldwide.”
He also talked about wanting to spend more time with his kids, especially now that his daughter is a teenager.
“Yeah, so,” the Naughty Dog executive continued,” I’m just at a point in my life where it’s like, you start looking at, ‘what’s the end game here? When is it time to call it?’… So, I could see myself transitioning to something that’s more low-key and lower stressed that still allows me to have this creative outlet. But you know, I’ve started thinking about how many more of these games do I have in me, and it’s not that many.”
Neil Druckmann joined Naughty Dog in 2004, working as a programmer on Jak 3 and Jak X. He then became a designer on the first Uncharted game before rising to co-lead game designer on Uncharted 2. He then co-directed the Last of Us and Uncharted 4 before his promotion to vice-president and later co-president in 2020. Excluding remasters and a cameo in Return to Monkey Island, his last new game was The Last of Us Part 2 from 2020.
