Josh Scherr, a bit of a Naughty Dog legend, has left the developer after a 21 year run which saw him ship games like Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End and The Last of Us 2. In total, the veteran contributed to a total of ten games, including Jak & Daxter: The Precursor Legacy and Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception. Scherr started out as a cinematics animator, before moving into a writing and narrative designer role.
“When I was a kid, making video games was my hobby,” he said on Twitter. “[I] never dreamed I’d get to make them for a living, let alone at a studio like Naughty Dog. “I'll miss the Dogs a ton, but at some point, I'll get to play a Naughty Dog game knowing very little in advance. And they are cooking up some incredible stuff.”
Scherr is keeping his next destination secret for the time being, but did hint that “you’re not ready” for what Naughty Dog has in store next, a play on an old PS1 marketing slogan. It’ll be interesting to see where Josh ends up, but even if he never made another game, what a resume he already has. An incredible 21 years!
Comments 12
Wonder if he's going to that ashfall game.
@Americansamurai1 That NFT Blockchain Game which will probably never come out lol?
@Americansamurai1 My exact thought lol.
I can understand him leaving. They don’t need writers when they rerelease titles.
😏 Oh yeah, I went there.
Honestly though, he may be experiencing the feeling of been there done that and just wants to do something new. ND’s next projects may feel samey in comparison to their last decade of work and he is burned out on it.
I always worry about things when long-time employees leave a studio. It seems like a very amicable departure though. Is ND not paying enough or not giving him the creative freedom he wants? Is he just ready for a change in scenery? Maybe he’s not a fan of the live-service angle? Maybe he’s just burned out on game development altogether.
@OmegaStriver better getting remakes from them than whatever direction TLOU2 had and i'm not talking about Aby or Eli, I'm talking about the focus in the ultra violence, it never made sense to me 😂
@Th3solution You shouldn't worry for long-time employees leaving because after 21 years everyone needs a change so is either that or retirement. It's just how life works.
Is this the guy who claims Naughty Dog games aren't baseless cash grabs, or was that someone else?
@Milktastrophe If you mean the person who defended The Last of Us Part 1 last weekend, that would be a cinematic animator who moved on to Sony Bend after he was done working on it (Robert Morrison).
@OmegaStriver maybe he just thought he wasn't appreciated druckman does seem to get most of the credit for naughty dogs success
@GymratAmarillo Yeah, that’s life. But the day Sammy leaves Push Square I’ll still shed a tear. Especially if he shows up after that as an editor on Kotaku.
@Grimwood Sounds like a massive over generalization but I’ll take your word for it. I’m conceding you have more experience in the area than I do. I’ll start my 20 year timer.
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