The Last of Us Part I is one of this year’s most anticipated PC releases, but its launch could be a bit of a rocky one. As spotted by users on Steam last week, Naughty Dog has confirmed that the PC port of the game was actually developed in collaboration with Iron Galaxy, a studio that critics say doesn’t have the greatest track record when it comes to bringing games to PC. Batman: Arkham Knight, which Iron Galaxy released for the PC in 2015, was slammed by gamers for having performance so bad that it prompted Warner Bros. to delist the game and then agree to full refunds, while Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection’s release this year was met with complaints that included poor mouse controls, stuttering, and other supposed problems. That said, Naughty Dog seems to have nothing but good things to say about Iron Galaxy, having noted in a post from October 2022 that it had deliberately partnered with them to learn more about PC development.
From a Naughty Dog post:
As you may already know, The Last of Us Part I is in development for PC following its successful launch on PlayStation 5, and with this being, ahem, uncharted territory for us, we knew we have a lot to learn about bringing our games to PC. But we were also determined to bring our careful consideration for every aspect of our games to this new version. So for the UNCHARTED: Legacy of Thieves Collection, we deliberately partnered with Iron Galaxy because we saw in the studio not only a tremendous understanding of PC development we could learn from, but also a team that shared a love for our series as if it were their own. Iron Galaxy offered a partner we could trust would deliver a high-quality version of these two UNCHARTED games, and with whom we could work closely to better understand PC development while internally staying focused on current and future projects and bringing them to PC as well.
The UNCHARTED series’ PC debut is both thrilling and reflective, a chance for us to take the lessons learned about offering our games on a new platform, and the expectations and opportunities that go along with it. In learning so much through our partners at Iron Galaxy, we’re able to look ahead to the future of Naughty Dog games on PC more excitedly than ever.
