“This is the best game I have played this generation.” This is one consensus that I have seen a lot in the past weeks. Now, I feel this is a truly marvelous game in so many ways, but I disagree that it’s one of the absolute best games that has been devised this generation. Even so, Naughty Dog has once again hit another home-run with Uncharted 2 by bringing superb single player with great multiplayer to boot. Go pick it up.

Game Details			Loading Reality Scoring
Format	PlayStation 3 (all PS3 reviews)		Score Meaning: Fantastic game! In spite of small flaws, this game brings something different to the table and executes incredibly well. Any game receiving this score is a contender for game of the year.
Publisher	Sony Computer Entertainment
Developer	Naughty Dog
Category	Action/Adventure		Presentation
ESRB	T		Gameplay
Online Players	16		Graphics
Offline Players	1		Sound
Price	59.99		Value Factor
Release Date	October 13, 2009		Final Score

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

When I played the original Uncharted, I fell in love with the presentation, the characters and the overall feel of the game. Two years have passed since the release of the original title, and I’m very pleased to say that Uncharted 2 surpasses all expectations I had for it, and a game where I adore it just a tad more than the original. Let me get one thing straight though, while I find this game marvelous, this is not “the greatest for this generation.” It’s a game that I recommend everyone to play, and it’s a game where I can say it beats the original game in every aspect.

The story is set several years after the first one. Nathan and his fellow comrades, along with a few new people thrown in the fray are in a search for Marco Polo’s lost fleet. Of course, when Nathan Drake is involved with something, nothing is ever as simple like finding a missing fleet. The plot itself is good, but what makes this story completely over the moon are the characters.

Naughty Dog has placed an absurd amount of effort in bringing every character to life, and the result is simply a marvel to witness; it even exceeds the original title. Every character in this game has a distinct voice that suits them perfectly. The character conversations with each other are very smooth, and usually a joy to listen to as Drake makes a humorous remark about their current situation. The character development is another reason why the narrative excels. Each of the characters has their own motives for performing the deeds, which leads the story in an interesting path.

The level design is a lot more expansive in Uncharted 2, unlike the prior game where everything was covered with foliage. The game spans multiple environments like an urban city, a moving train (personally, one of my favorite levels) and a vastness of tundra are some of the examples of the environment, there is to explore in the game. A side note: when mentioning snowy terrain gives me a thought. I feel like someone from Naughty Dog should go over to Guerilla, developer of Killzone 2, to simply laugh in their face at how quickly they beat them in the graphical department and mention to them how Uncharted 2 has color in the game instead of pure grayness surrounding their levels.

Taking it even further than simply the environment, the game is simply a beauty to gaze at. While I was playing through my copy of the game, several of my friends commented on how this game looked like a film. The character model is so well-done that I even had a non-gaming friend commented how she found Drake a “hot guy.” The animation flows seamlessly from Drake walking or running up a pair of stairs from him leaping from a building to another building.

The musical score is another great part of the game. Greg Edmonson, the composer of the first Uncharted and Firefly, returns to give another awe-inspiring musical score for the game. The moment the title screen appears to the orchestral pieces, the game delivers on the score.

Even the gameplay has improved immensely since the first Uncharted, though it still has it shares of flaws. First off, let’s get down to the matter of the basic mechanics. There’s the basic Gears of War cover and shoot combat; while it’s my least favorite part about the game, the problem it had in the last game has been resolved (though, I still had some control issues during hectic moments of the game). Then the other major portion of the game is the platforming and solving puzzles a la Tomb Raider, which still works wonders.

Besides the two I just mentioned, there is also one more core mechanic, and it's new to the Uncharted franchise: sneaking. For the majority of the game, I really enjoyed this new mechanic, aside from the one early part of the game where I was surprised at how the game forced you to sneak around. The mechanic can be used to avoid meaningless battles (and at times, I found this to be the more efficient route). After the part I mentioned, the game never forces you to sneak, but it allows you to choose how you want to proceed when enemies are crawling about.

Several major issues of the first game have been resolved in this lovely sequel, like the “bullet-sponge enemies.” In the first game, the enemies were like “mini-Rambo.” Now that wouldn’t be that huge of a problem, but the majority of the enemies were wearing tight jeans and a loose shirt, and it usually took seven bullets to force these men onto the ground. Naughty Dog resolved this problem by taking away their “mini-Rambo-ness” and the enemies die a lot quicker in this game; it’s worth noting that the enemies’ design makes sense now regarding the number of bullets they should be able to handle.

Do you remember those very clunky melee controls that were in the first game? Yeah, Naughty Dog realized how bad the melee combat was and replaced it with a far superior combat system. In the first game, you had to time your punches to effectively knock a guy now, which was handled very poorly. Now, Drake has the opportunity of dodging and counterattacking an enemy in a far easier matter (now that I think about it, all you could do was enter an offensive stance in the first game) while fluidly going back to attack an enemy soon after counterattacking.

The single player alone makes me think that this game is fully worth retail price, but Naughty Dog decided that wasn’t enough and gave us something that was even needed, a multiplayer component. Naughty Dog took time to make this a superb gift, since this mode is not treated like an afterthought at all, but is instead a fully fleshed out component.

First off, the main thing I noticed is that the multiplayer is very similar to the Call of Duty’s multiplayer in the term of presenting it. There is a matchmaking mode that connects to a game in a timely matter. Each game plays with each player being in a team consisting of five maximum players in a given team. Uncharted 2 has its basic modes like Deathmatch, Elimination and CTF. Then, we have modes like Turf War where each team tries to take over each of the available zone. There are more modes, but I was unable to play through all of them.

There is an inventory store in the multiplayer mode. There are a lot of items in the store that will take players many games to buy every item. Even if you have the cash to buy an item, you may be unable to purchase it because of your level. Uncharted 2 features a leveling up system in the multiplayer, again like Modern Warfare, each time you hit a new level, a new item will be available to be purchase, so there is an incentive to keep playing through the mode.

If you ever feel you played a horrendous game, or just want to gloat to your friend just how amazing you were in a particular game. Naughty Dog has your back on that. There is a mode called “cinema” that allows you to watch your previous match. This is a feature that has been in previous games, but nonetheless, it is a very refreshing thing to see Naughty Dog paying attention to what the consumer base wants.

It is worth noting that there is a co-op mode in the game. At the time of this review, I have decided to not play through that mode without a headset, since I wouldn’t be getting the real experience from it.

4.5 / 5

Written by :

Necrovex

 

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