Naughty Dog issued a statement following the horrific death threats and harassment targeted towards The Last of Us Part II developers and voice actors. In the past few days, multiple people who worked on the game began to speak up and post images about harassment received from fans.
Read: It Takes Sony 30 Seconds To Build a PS4 Console at This Factory
Laura Bailey, the voice actress who plays Abby in The Last of Us Part II took to Twitter to share some disturbing death threats received over the role.
Man. I try to only post positive stuff on here… but sometimes this just gets a little overwhelming. I blacked out some of the words cuz, ya know, spoilers.
Side note. Thank you to all the people sending me positive messages to balance it out. It means more than I can say.❤️ pic.twitter.com/kGyULWPpNu
— Laura Bailey (@LauraBaileyVO) July 3, 2020
At the same time, game director Niel Druckmann also named and shamed those who harassed him through text messages and Twitter DMs.
You can love or hate the game and share your thoughts about it. Unfortunately too many of the messages I’ve been getting are vile, hateful, & violent. Here are just a handful of them (feel it’s important to expose.) Trigger Warning: transphobic, homophobic, anti-Semitic, etc. pic.twitter.com/uR9vpGgYQa
— Neil Druckmann (@Neil_Druckmann) July 5, 2020
After this went down, Sony Interactive Entertainment studio, Naughty Dog posted a tweet condemning the actions of these ‘haters’;
Although we welcome critical discussion, we condemn any form of harassment or threats directed towards our team and cast. Their safety is our top priority, but we must all work together to root out this type of behavior and maintain a constructive and compassionate discourse. pic.twitter.com/eoq4t1ITnh
— Naughty Dog (@Naughty_Dog) July 5, 2020
The Last of Us Part II received a load of hate at launch. The game was review-bombed withing the first 24 hours on Metacritic and social media was intense. However, we loved the game. Check out our review here as well as an awesome unboxing of the press kit edition here.
