The Last of Us Part 2 Delay Revealed in Report UPDATED: Delay Confirmed

The Last of Us Part 2 has been delayed, according to a report published Thursday by Kotaku.

Publisher Sony announced The Last of Us Part 2's release date in September, scheduling its arrival for Feb. 21, 2020. Two sources close to the situation at developer Naughty Dog confirmed to Kotaku the game won't arrive until spring. No further specifics about the new release date have been revealed.

Sony has yet to confirm the delay and did not respond to a request for comment. An official announcement is expected later this week.

The Last of Us Part 2 was to be one of several high profile releases in the first half of 2020 alongside the Final Fantasy 7 Remake in March and Cyberpunk 2077 in April. It was also to be one of the last tentpole PlayStation 4 exclusives ahead of the PlayStation 5's release in fall 2020.

Update: The Last of Us Part 2 game director Neil Druckmann confirmed the delay hours after Kotaku's report went live, revealing the new release date of May 29, 2020. Below is his statement in full.

Let me cut to the chase and get the news out of the way. The Last of Us Part II has a new release date of May 29, 2020.

I know. It was just about a month ago when we had our big blowout for the game, letting media play over two hours of it along with debuting our new story trailer and revealing the release date. The positive response we saw from our community was overwhelming. You can feel the energy among the team members. After working on something for so many years, it’s invigorating to get a glimpse of validation for all the hard work.

However, it was during the last few weeks, as we were closing out sections of the game, that we realized we simply didn’t have enough time to bring the entire game up to a level of polish we would call Naughty Dog quality. At this point we were faced with two options: compromise parts of the game or get more time. We went with the latter, and this new release date allows us to finish everything to our level of satisfaction while also reducing stress on the team.

While we’re relieved that we won’t have to compromise our vision, we’re disappointed that we weren’t able to avoid this exact situation. We wish we could’ve foreseen the amount of polish we needed, but the size and scope of this game got the better of us. We hate disappointing our fans and for that we’re sorry.

We hope you understand that this additional time ensures that The Last of Us Part II lives up to our collective ambition as well as our commitment to the highest level of quality. We know the extra few months will add to what may already be an excruciating wait for all of us. We are grateful for your patience and continued support. Come next May, you will finally rejoin Ellie in The Last of Us Part II.

-Neil

Photo courtesy of Naughty Dog/Sony