The sun gleams off of the snow covered mountain tops. Birds fly by me with the freedom that no man will ever know. In the distance a train whistle blows, echoing through the valley below. I am truly stunned by the shear beauty of what I am seeing. I can hear bells ringing… ringing… ringing. OH CRAP! I have just been swept to my death by a rail road warning light, because again I wasn’t paying enough attention to what was going on. Distracted yet again by the beauty of the game. That is a testament to how good Uncharted 2 looks, but it’s not the only thing that game does well.
Having been a huge fan of the first game in the series “Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune” I was naturally excited to get my hands on the second. From what I had been hearing from the legitimate gaming press, this would be one of those games that, as a PS3 owner, I needed to get. The last time I heard such hoopla over a game, it was about Metal Gear Solid 4, and I ended up buying a PS3 for just that reason.
The game starts with you again take on the role of Nathaniel Drake, fortune hunter, fighter, proponent of the “half-tucked” shirt, and generally all around smooth operator. The very second that the game starts you are thrust into danger. You are awakened to find yourself bleeding from an apparent gun shot, and seated in a railway car that is dangling off the side of some snow covered mountain. What better way for a game to start then right in the middle of the action (and the games plot as well). The first couple chapters flash you back and forth from the past to the present in an attempt to show you how you got in such a predicament. It was a little jarring at first, going from the mountain to being pool side talking to a couple friends about your next task, and back again. Once that smooths out and sets you on your course it really starts to get going well.
This time you are following Marco Polo’s trek back from Mongolia, where he started off with fourteen ships and around 600 passengers, but reached his destination with only eighteen passengers and one ship. The quest is to discover what happened to the other thirteen ships and five hundred some passengers. Eventually they discover that Marco Polo had found the location of the Cintamani Stone and the mythical kingdom of Shambhala. Drake and his “partners” Harry Flynn and Chloe Frazer make their way through Istanbul, Borneo, Nepal, and other exotic locales in search of clues to help them find their goal. However they aren’t alone. Also trying to find the realm of Shambhala is a Serbian war criminal Zoran Lazarević. He too wants to find the Cintamani stone but for more nefarious reasons. I will say this: This game had one of the more satisfying endings (story wise) to a video game I have played in a long time. Not that it was something that wasn’t expected or out of the ordinary story wise, but I just felt that it summed up the game nicely by the closing credits.
As I said before this game looks gorgeous. Drake goes through many different settings and each feels distinctly different, and thoroughly detailed. From lush rain forests, to frozen mountain tops, and blown out city streets and alleys. There were more than a few occasions that I was killed, or nearly so, just because I was distracted by the scenery. The sound as well is very detailed. Guns sound realistic, the voice work is superb, and several times I caught myself looking over my shoulder [in real life] because I thought I heard something behind me.
As far as game play goes, it has been refined from the first to feel much more tight and precise. The one glaring problem that I had with the first was the sixaxis controls for the game, period. Thankfully, they have taken them out completely. You no longer have to tilt back and forth when Drake walks across a log. Trying to stay hidden and alive in a firefight in the first game was made all together more hard by attempting to tilt the controller for a good trajectory to throw a grenade at an enemy behind a wall. Not anymore though, that has all been mercifully taken out. The grenade controls are simply done by pushing the left analog stick up or down. The cover mechanic seems a little easier to use as well, though I still had issues with Drake trying to jump off walls or over cover points when I didn’t want him to. Though in all honesty that could have been because of human error. Some of the gun fights tend to get a little tense.
Oddly enough for a game that I really figured didn’t need a multiplayer aspect, this one is actually pretty fun, AND well put together. There are several modes for you to cut your teeth on. There is the obligatory Death Match, but this version is more like the “Team” death match that you would find in other games. Play as either part of the “heroes” or the “villains” each with a team of five players trying to take out the opposing force. Plunder is played much like Capture the Flag, but instead of a flag you have to take a treasure from neutral spot and taking it back to their respective base. Also there is Elimination. This plays like a game of “Hard Core” team death match where once you are dead, you stay dead. The game ends when either of the opposing teams has no living players left. Finally there is “Chain Reaction.” This, again, is played much like capture the flag except flags have to be “captured” in order. One team has to take them from first to last, while the opposing team must take them from last to first.
There are also several cooperative multiplayer games to be played as well. One being “Gold Rush.” This is much like Plunder only the opposing team is made up of AI characters trying to stop you from taking the treasure back to the base. This is the game that I have played the most of. It’s a lot of fun to plan routes with your partner(s) and then execute them seeing how well of a defender or attacker you can be while your buddy tries to get away with the gold statue.
All in all, this game isn’t perfect. There are still a few graphical glitches, a couple of control issues I had, and the story was pretty predictable. That said though, it was very enjoyable to play through. I would gladly plunk down my $60 for a copy of this game. There are so many things that OTHER game developers can take away from this game and learn from. Naughty Dog through Uncharted 2, has some of the best facial expressions, and body language animation that I have seen in a video game, ever. It may not be THE reason to buy a PS3, but it sure makes me happy that I did.
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