Tomb Raider Boss Apologizes for Calling The Last of Us Gameplay “Fake”

Last night Sony Interactive Entertainment showed of a healthy slab of new The Last of Us Part II gameplay footage. And, well, it looked phenomenal, boasting an incredible visual fidelity boosted by world class animation and motion capture work. You could say it looked near photo-realistic, almost uncanny.

Many fans were amazed with how good it looked, if not shocked. One person took it a bit further though: claiming the gameplay demonstration was “fake.” That person? David Anfossi, the head of Eidos Montreal, who just happens to be working on Shadow of the Tomb Raider, a series that rivals Naughty Dog’s other well-known IP: Uncharted.

In response, Jonathan Cooper, an animator tweeted the following:

With Cooper bringing to light Anfossi’s deriding comment, the studio head — likely being subjugated to many angry fans — issued an apology not longer after.

Seeing Anfossi’s apology, Cooper put to the bed the mini-altercation.

It’s quite common for gamers and random Internet users to disparage game’s and the creators of them, but it’s not incredibly common that we see developer on developer action, especially with developers and studios of this level of prestige. Whether Anfossi’s comment was lost in translation, who knows. It also may just have been a mistake, a moment of misjudgment. Everyone is guilty of one occasionally.

Whatever the case, it’s not a good look for Anfossi or Eidos Montreal or Square Enix. But at least it’s all squashed now.

In case you missed it, here’s the new Last of Us demonstration in question. It looks really good.