'The Last of Us' art director Nate Wells leaves Naughty Dog

Naughty Dog artist Nate Wells, who was one of the leaders during the production of The Last of Us, has left the studio and moved on to a different project.


Late on Sunday, Wells confirmed the news via Twitter that he has joined Giant Sparrow way back on April 3rd.

Hmmm....seem to be some threads here. Yes, I joined the wild, wacky, and ultimately brilliant folks at #GiantSparrow on April 3rd.
— Nate Wells (@PrettyLarceny) April 21, 2014

Giant Sparrow is still under the Sony developer umbrella, meaning that Wells is still designing games exclusively for PlayStation.

Computer and Video Games reports that the developer "signed a three-game contract" with Sony, meaning that Wells' work will still be exclusively on PlayStation projects. IGN reports that the second game on Giant Sparrow's list is "reportedly called Edith Finch." It may or may not be a sequel to their first game, The Unfinished Swan.

While turnover in the game industry is very common, it's unknown why three talented, high-profile people at Naughty Dog have jumped the ship. The other two Amy Hennig and Justin Richmond, worked at Naughty Dog for at least six years -- Hennig since Jak & Daxter on the PS2.

But Wells' departure could just be a contract ending. Wells joined Naughty Dog in 2012 after spending 13 years at Irrational Games, the former developer famously known for the BioShock series. He was likely just at ND to work on TLOU before finding another project to work on.