Hey, don't point at me! I didn't kill the guardian!
After reports that Santa Monica Studios has been contributing to The Last Guardian's development, Director of Technology Tim Moss has gone on record with Eurogamer to say otherwise. He said:
I'm never really sure how that got in the press, because as far as I'm aware we're not helping out with The Last Guardian. The only way you can say that is the knowledge that we contribute back to the central tech groups benefits The Last Guardian. So I'm guessing someone was slightly misquoted.
The news that Santa Monica Studios was assisting with the project lended credence to The Last Guardian's on-track, albeit lengthy, development cycle. However, the game is still in development hell and nobody has been able to explain why.
Team Ico is clearly struggling with getting the game out, that much is for certain, but it's the explanation as to why that makes it baffling. Maybe another studio assisting is exactly what the game needs, and Sony Santa Monica would have been a wise choice—it's just making a million God of War games anyway. Then again, ICO and Shadow of the Colossus together haven't broken two-million sales, so it's likely that Sony doesn't want to devote any more resources to it than is necessary. It isn't a mainstream game, and no matter how emotionally captivating it is chances are it won't sell like the other games coming from Sony's first-party studios. But that doesn't matter in gamer's minds. All that matters is being able to play what appears to be one of the most unique next-gen last-gen titles, and if that requires another year of patience then so be it.
