We've just finished a level review, in which senior members of the team play every section of the game, ad infinitum. Each review takes over an hour as the group meticulously analyse and give notes for improvements. High notes are essential fixes. Lows – like an unconvincing-looking cheese sandwich (yes, really) – are minor. If a problem is something deemed small enough that only the team will notice? They have to let it go. The term is "ship it".
The attention to detail is staggering. Druckmann shows me a new gore system that realistically renders dripping and pooling blood, which a developer created proactively in their spare time. Another "Naughty Dog detail" mimics gravity on Ellie's bracelet, so it slips down her wrist whenever she raises her hands. The developers can also now authentically re-create veins, colour changes in skin and pupil dilation.
In one review, co-game directors Anthony Newman and Kurt Margenau have a 15-minute discussion about the chairs in an aquarium. In another, Margenau identifies a discrepancy. We're currently playing in Jackson, but the petrol station pumps have been copied from a level in Seattle. Apparently, the octane levels in Wyoming are actually supposed to be 85, 88, 91, versus 87, 89, 92 in Washington. Everyone in the room goes silent. "That's… a very Kurt note," Druckmann says, laughing. One person later asks if they can "afford" to change something. They're not talking about money ("If we could throw money at all the problems, we would at this point," Druckmann tells me later). They're talking about time.
