The Last of Us multiplayer project, which Naughty Dog says it had been calling The Last of Us Online internally, has been canceled. The studio revealed the news in a blog post, citing the game's ambitions as being so big that it would require the full attention of the studio, thereby taking any part of the team off of narrative-driven single-player games, the likes of which have been Naughty Dog's M.O. to this point.

"In ramping up to full production, the massive scope of our ambition became clear," the statement reads in part. "To release and support The Last of Us Online we’d have to put all our studio resources behind supporting post launch content for years to come, severely impacting development on future single-player games. So, we had two paths in front of us: become a solely live service games studio or continue to focus on single-player narrative games that have defined Naughty Dog’s heritage."

The fate of The Last of Us Online has seemed in doubt for some time now. Earlier this year, it was reported by Bloomberg that development on the project had slowed down, with many of its developers moving to other projects within the studio. Naughty Dog responded to that report in a statement online, saying it was "proud" of the work that had been done so far and confirmed the development of a new single-player game, too.