Naughty Dog Sexual Assault: Former ‘Uncharted’ Dev Claims He Was Sexually Harassed

David Ballard, a former employee of Naughty Dog who has worked on ‘Uncharted’ and ‘The Last of Us,’ is now claiming that he was sexually harassed while he was working at the American first-party video game developer. Ballard says he has now mustered his courage to reveal his story because of the number of people in the Hollywood industry who are voicing their own experiences.

Ballard talked about the harassment in several posts he shared via Twitter last Friday night. In the tweets, Ballard claimed that he was sexually harassed in late 2015 by a lead in his team back then. The experience was so disturbing that he said he subsequently suffered a mental breakdown.

“In late 2015, I was sexually harassed at Naughty Dog by a lead,” he wrote. “My work environment became extremely toxic afterward. In February 2016 I had a mental breakdown at work.”

According to Ballard, Sony was well aware of the incident, for the company’s PlayStation HR even became involved. Ballard further claimed that the response to the incident was not something that one would expect. “When I told them about the harassment they ended the call and fired me the next day.”

The situation turned pretty shady when Ballard was offered money on condition that he won’t be disclosing the sexual assault incident publicly. “They tried to silence me by offering $20k if I signed a letter agreeing to the termination as well as to not discuss it with anyone. I declined to sign. I have been unemployed for 17 months since.”

Ballard worked at Naughty Dog for over six years as an environment artist. His credits include “Uncharted 2,” “Uncharted 3,” “Uncharted 4” and “The Last of Us.” Hence, it was a bit surprising when he left the company. When asked by interviewers about his departure, Ballard said he would tell them he “was burned out by the crunch.” He did this for he was ashamed about the sexual harassment that took place.

As to what made Ballard come out with his sexual assault story, he stated, “I’m speaking out now because of the strength I’ve seen in others coming forward about their experiences in the TV/Film industry. This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I will not let anyone kill my drive or love for the video game industry, my passions or life.”

Following his revelation, Ballard received a lot of messages of support from both fans and fellow developers. However, PlayStation maintained in a statement it forwarded to Eurogamer that it does not have any record of what Ballard is claiming in his social media posts.

The statement has since been posted by the Sony-owned studio on its Naughty Dog website. The statement reads: “We have recently read on social media that an ex-employee of Naught Dog, Dave Ballard, claims he was sexually harassed when he worked at Naughty Dog. We have not found any evidence of having received allegations from Mr. Ballard that he was harassed in any way at Naughty Dog or Sony Interactive Entertainment.”

“Harassment and inappropriate conduct have no place at Naughty Dog and Sony Interactive Entertainment. We have taken and always will take reports of sexual harassment and other workplace grievances very seriously. We value every single person who works at Naughty Dog and Sony interactive Entertainment. It is of utmost importance to us that we maintain a safe, productive workplace environment that allows us all to channel our shared passion for making games.”

Ballard has yet to respond to Naughty Dog’s statement that undermines his sexual assault allegation. Meanwhile, many of Ballard’s supporters are urging him to name the lead whom he claims assaulted him.