‘The Last Of Us Part 2’ Not Getting Early Digital Release After Delayed Launch

The bad news keeps on piling up for fans of “The Last of Us” series.

After Sony confirmed the delayed release of “The Last of Us Part 2” due to logistical problems brought by the coronavirus pandemic, Naughty Dog boss Neil Druckmann highlighted that the postponement includes the digital release of the game.

The upcoming action-adventure game was scheduled for release on May 29, but the game publisher announced in a statement that they will be postponing the launch indefinitely.

However, while the delivery and shipment of the game shouldn’t affect the digital release, Naughty Dog was against the idea as it is unfair for other regions and players who don’t have the “infrastructure” to download the game.

“There hasn’t been a final decision yet, we’re just reacting to the different retail chains, whether we can get physical copies to people,” Druckmann shared on the release of the game during his interview at the PlayStation Blogcast (via VG 24/7).

“Also the digital infrastructure. This is a worldwide game that people in every country are waiting for and we want to make sure we’re fair.”

Druckmann also highlighted that they are “looking at all sorts of different options” in order to get the game to the fans as soon as possible. However, he noted that it is not an easy task and that it would take time for them to ship and get things figured out.

Aside from the delay and unlikely early digital release, Druckmann also shared that there will not be a playable demo for the game.

As reported earlier, releasing a playable demo is a daunting task for the Naughty Dog team, and they just can’t allocate the time and manpower to deliver such given the current situation. Moreover, Druckmann shared that a public demo poses huge problems for them, which doesn’t make it feasible.

“That’s a massive amount of work that we don’t want to put our team through. We would rather put our focus on finishing the actual game,” Druckmann said about the idea of making and releasing a playable demo.

“The Last of Us Part 2” is still in development, but the dev team said that they are nearing completion – with just the final bugs being fixed. Unfortunately, no specific new date has been announced for the release of the PlayStation 4-exclusive game.