Naughty Dog and Nonlinearity

A look at the history of Naughty Dog's Action Adventure games and their different approaches to non-linear gameplay. Support: https://www.patreon.com/thegami...

Charlie Cade takes a look at how Naughty Dog’s approach to linearity has changed over the years, examining the tradeoffs made in each of its major franchises. To me, the most interesting point is that nonlinearity enables riskier design, as a frustrating moment is much more likely to cost you a player if the player can’t try doing something else for a while.