PlayStation’s esteemed Shuhei Yoshida remarks that the beloved PS4 action-adventure title The Last Guardian likely should not have persisted under a typical publisher, emphasizing that despite technical difficulties perplexing the developers, he was adamant about its release.
During a segment of the 2025 Taipei Game Show (via IGN Japan and translated by Genki), Yoshida discussed The Last Guardian’s notoriously prolonged development period, which began in earnest at Team Ico in 2007, nine years prior to its release in 2016. The game was initially targeted for launch on PS3, but the console’s capabilities fell short of the developers’ aspirations for the project.
According to Yoshida, The Last Guardian was operating at an astonishingly low frame rate of 10-15 FPS on PS3, and after exhausting all possible options to improve performance, PlayStation transitioned its development to PS4, necessitating the rebuilding of much of the pre-existing code from the ground up.
Yoshida further mentioned that he does not believe The Last Guardian would have endured scrutiny under a different publisher. Nevertheless, he was committed to delivering the game for fans of Team Ico and its previous titles, Ico and Shadow of the Colossus. Yoshida expressed immense trust in The Last Guardian director Fumito Ueda’s vision, which instilled a mindset of ‘failure is not an option.’ Ultimately, he determined, “‘whatever happens we must release it!’ and consistently encouraged the team with ‘let’s do our best!’ to see it through.”
The Last Guardian faced numerous challenges in addition to the previously mentioned technical issues, notably including the exit of Ueda and several other key members of the team.