The Last of Us Part II is the follow up to the heavily acclaimed The Last of Us.

Players follow Ellie's journey into Seattle as she attempts to get justice on a wrong done to her. The game features visceral combat that encourages careful usage of rare resources in order to be successful. It is paramount that the players explore the lush environments to find useful crafting components in order to survive this Survival-Horror action title. It goes without saying that The Last of Us Part II will feature an emotional and painful narrative journey.

It will be released exclusively on the Playstation 4 on May 29th, 2020.

Aesthetic: Narrative, Exploration, Combat
My Production Development Time: May 2018 to March 2020

Game Engine: Custom Engine
Scripting Language: In-House scripting language

Website: www.playstation.com/thelastofus2

Roles: Single-Player Level Layout Designer

As a Level Layout Designer at Naughty Dog, it was initially my job to take rough narrative concepts/moments and flesh them out and develope them into fully realized 3D playable spaces. At Naughty Dog, we are given a lot of creative freedom to determine what happens inside of our levels and we work closely with the writing team and animation teams to further create the narrative of the level. Once the level was approved by the Directors, my job switched to a Producer role to ensure the level was being done on time and provided a better experience than the original blockmesh.

I also spent a large amount of time using the in-house scripting language to prototype early combat encounters, progression, character dialogue, and so much more. Additionally, my scripting work can be seen shipped in the final game.

Unfortunately due to an HDD failure, I have lost the videos of the blockout work I had done on TLoU2. But I brought two levels from initial concept to shipped content. Here are some highlights.

Jackson/Joel's House

• Worked closely with art team to layout Jackson walk with a focus on the paths Ellie and Jessie would take.
• Implemented NPC reactions and animations, and small interactions throughout the levels.
• Designed the snowball fight combat arena.

Patrol

• Took the initial concept of "Ellie and Dina go out on Patrol. A Blizzard forces them inside an old library where they smoke weed and hook up", and fleshed it out by designing, prototyping, and implementing the rest of what happens in the level with approval from leads and narrative teams. Personally, I saw this level as Ellie and Dina's first (unknown to them) date, and designed content and events to show their closeness.
• Significant level revisions and iterations working with lead designers, artists, and directors. 
• Level was chosen to be used as 1 of 2 levels demo'd for Press before release. As one of the first levels completed in the game, it established a high bar of quality the rest of the game needed to hit.
• I implemented the majority of Dina's systemic explorations and conversations with Ellie. If the Player hangs out in a location Dina will begin to explore and move on when the Player does.
• Worked closely with the Infected Combat Designer to fine tune the combat arenas. Majority of enemy pathing was done by me, but enhanced together. We needed to create an engaging, but maintain that it was ultimately a hidden tutorial.

Ground Zero

• The inital concept "Abby enters a closed off part of the hospital and encounters a horrific abomination."
• I pitched and implemented the idea of telling the environmental narrative backwards of the doctors attempting to escape the sealed hospital wing. Their narrative creates a suspense as the Players delve deeper and deeper into "hell".
• Initial level design was more standard with additional combat areas. But we found that placing enemies to fight was ruining a lot of the fear and suspense of the area. We wanted Players to ask "where are the infected?"
• While TLoU as a franchise has horror elements, it rarely leans into as a focus. This level we designed it explicitly with tight corridors, sharp turns, and drapping obscuring elements, to create a sense that at any time, something could get the Player. Resident Evil 2 Remake had just released, and it was a big influence on the overall design.
• TLoU level design usually has the Player focusing on how to get from A to B to C. But this level was designed for the Player to search for a Key Item and return to a specific location, so A to B, back to A. This was a challenge, as we had to break the Player of an established unspoken level design philosophy. We accomplished this through narrative, slowing the pace way down, overly clear important details, and lots of locked doors you just knew was going to burst open with horribleness.
• The Clicker hallway fight was implemented soon after the Infected Door mechanics were implemented, near the end of development. 
• With the dialogue team busy on other parts of the game, I took it upon myself to go through Abby's lines for the level, pick and choose her lines, and implemented them for the shipped game. (Dialogue team approved this and my work of course).
   

Ratking Boss Fight/Arena

• The Ratking Encounter space went through a lot of iterations, like having to pull open doors, (unintentionally) hidden deep pools of water to slow the player down, and significantly more paths into and out of a room. TLoU combat design requires there to be at least 2 or 3 exits from any space so the Player can escape. To make the Ratking fight maintain the momentum from the chase and make it unique, we purposefully broke those design rules.
• By having the Player be trapped momentarily until the Ratking bursts through a wall or starts squeezing through a doorway, we were able to create those high intensity moments.
• I implemented many of the VFX work on the breaking walls and doors, and the swinging lights.
• The chase sequence was a pitch from the Infected Combat Designer after playing RE2R. We had to promise not to do a Crash cam, but after a quick prototype, the layout and sequencing came together quickly and great. The gurney flipping while desperately opening a door was the chef's kiss.
• After running from the Ratking, indicating to the Player that they needed to stop and fight was difficult. Initially we tried to imply there was an exit in the combat arena, but it left too many Players confused and some never tried fighting. I went through Abby's dialogue and chose ones that make her feel awesome when she tells the big monster that she is tired of running. Some of her lines trigger when the Ratking is at specific health intervals, and they are designed to denote changes in behavior, but also match Abby's growing confidence in dealing with the monster.
• For the Ratking, we knew we needed to make it feel unique and different from the Bloater fight. We didn't want infinite spawning runners, but at the same time, a single enemy can be easy to avoid. Thats when I pitched the split/Super Stalker.
• The Super Stalker let us throw a new wrinkle into the fight just as the Player had let the Ratking create a lot of pathways. Now those pathways that let the Player escape could be hiding an ambush from the Super Stalker. One time we didn't tune the Super Stalker enough for a playtest, and it was brutal. Without careful tuning, the Super Stalker would grab the Player and hold Abby down until the Ratking arrived to finish the Player off.
• The final Super Stalker arena only had 1 small iteration. The fight in the flooded morgue worked out really well. The combat design itself went through significant changes however. We wanted to make it a cat and mouse fight and make sure it had ways to hide and escape from aggressive Player melee. The Infected Combat designer and I spent a lot of time tuning that encounter.

Gameplay from the September Press Demo

'Patrol' Demo Clips are all the snowy clips, or are inside the pharamacy/supermarket

Release Date Reveal Trailer

'Patrol' Demo clips are from 0:38 til 1:05

Jonathan Gregoire - Game Design
JonathanAGregoire@gmail.com

January 2026

Sanzaru Games was shut down by Meta due to a strategy shift. The cancelled project(s) were incredibly impressive and would have raised the standards for AAA VR games.
 

September 2024

Began working with Sanzaru Games with Meta on two AAA VR titles as a Senior Level Designer.
 

August 2024

Ready At Dawn was closed. During my time I worked on 4 separate projects with multiple responsibilities from protyping, level designing, and bringing scenes to shippable quality.

October 2021

Helped ship Lone Echo 2 as a System Designer.

July 2020

Started at Ready At Dawn as a Senior Level Designer on an unnanounced project.

July 2020

Started at Ready at Dawn as a Senior Level Designer on an unnanounced project.

March 2020

Last days at Naughty Dog working on The Last of Us Part II.

September 2019

Shipped the Last of Us Part II press demo level "Patrol".

May 2018

Started working at Naughty Dog as a Contract Single Player Level Layout Designer on The Last of Us Part II. 

December 2017

I started doing contract work for a start-up company called MyPad3D that focuses on VR experiences for corporate products.

More interestingly, I have begun to prototype my own card game on the side and have been volunteering with Sunbreak Games on an unannounced product.

July 2017

With a heavy heart, E-Line Media has shut down the Seattle studio, laying off everyone including myself. I am currently looking for new opportunities.

November 2016

Began working at E-Line Media again as a Level Designer on an unannounced and untitled game.

October 2016

Updating my website to reflect the work I did on the Forest Song with Colabee Studios. Unfortunately due to funding issues, I am no longer with them, so I am currently looking for new opportunities.

December 2015

Lots of new stuff since I last updated. Added in a short comic I made called Old Debts. Also have put up information about my role(s) on Never Alone and Never Alone: FoxTales.

January 2015

Promoted to Lead Designer on Never Alone: FoxTales at E-Line Media.

Summer 2014

Graduated Digipen as a BAGD and with a Cum Laude. Started working at E-Line Media as a Level Designer.

March 2014

Uploaded a new Beta build of Chained. Also just put up the old builds of the game for anyone interested in our very quick process and progress.

January 2014

I recently wrote a paper that was published for the IGDA about the benefit of Paper Prototyping. You can read it at this following link: http://newsletter.igda.org/2013/11/30/student-beat-faceoff-the-influences-of-board-games-on-video-games/#!