Uncharted 3 thoughts
So, I beat Uncharted 3 at some ungodly hour on Friday night. Work and various obligations kept getting in my way all week, but when I finally got the chance to sit down to the game without a time limit hindering me, it was over far too quickly. Been meaning to hash out something more substantial than my brief Twitter reactions, so here we go.
There's a lot in this game that makes me gush and flail like a witless fangirl, so perhaps I should say upfront: Uncharted 3 isn't perfect. There were a few missed opportunities that made it feel somewhat less fleshed-out than Uncharted 2. I'm almost positive this was a result of the tight production schedule Naughty Dog was bound to. Other big games, like Mass Effect 3 and BioShock Infinite, have the luxury of pushing their release date out when it becomes clear they need more time to polish things up. For whatever reason, Sony wasn't willing to be that lenient with Uncharted... and from all the interviews I've read, the Naughty Dog staff nearly killed themselves to get this title wrapped up with a pretty little bow by November 1st.
Knowing this makes me even more impressed with how much they accomplished, because Uncharted 3 is SO AMBITIOUS. For one thing, it is absurdly beautiful to look at. The textures are even more detailed this time around (I didn't think that was possible), the character models have been carefully streamlined, and the lighting makes it all pop to great effect.
If I recall correctly, Nate now has over 2,000 contextual animations that bring him to life. That's ridiculous. If you walk too close to a wall, he'll put his hand out to steady himself. If he's tired and beat up, he'll hunch over and stumble around with looser arms. During the whole sequence where he crosses the Rub' al Khali, it's amazing and affecting to witness his slow physical breakdown.
Secondly, the narrative is the strongest of the three games. Within three chapters, I felt like I knew Nate and Sully better than I did in the two previous games combined. I attribute this to the fact that the "quest" is personal this time - closely tied to Nate's own past and secrets, instead of just those of his proverbial ancestor, Sir Francis Drake. I would like to thank Amy Hennig a hundred times over for bothering to give us two full chapters of 15-year-old Nate running through the streets of Colombia. Not only is he ADORABLE and totally believable as the street-rat version of this personality we've come to know so well, he already has his journal (!), and he's already more well-read than Sully. Ha! ;P I like that it isn't just a flashback for the sake of a flashback, either... it has direct relevance to the current events in the game.
(Oh, I should also mention - Greg Edmonson's score had some awesome new cues this time around, like this one when little Nate is running from Talbot's men. Who is Greg Edmonson? Why, the composer for Firefly, of course - if you listen closely, you can hear some definite similarities in the instrumentation he uses, etc.)
Marlowe and Talbot were great villains. But damn, I wish we knew more about them. What's this 400-year-old society they're a part of, and what's with the weird hints of immortality attached to voodoo-man-in-a-suit Talbot? A few more answers would've been nice. Regardless, Marlowe's reveal about Nate's past halfway through the game was an amazing moment, and the subtle reactions in Nate were animated flawlessly. She's right: he's not afraid of a physical fight, but when it comes to the kind of psychological warfare Marlowe uses, he's at a loss and has no idea how to defend himself.
I like that everyone from Chloe to Sully to Elena tells Nate to drop this particular quest. (All except for poor Charlie Cutter! Who I LOVED.) It contributes to the weird sense of foreboding that the game succeeds in building up early on - and the sense that Nate is totally out of his depth with Marlowe. His pride directly leads to some rather heavy consequences. I like the theme of examining Nate's fears, but I do wish there had been more to that "trip-out" sequence in the final chapters. I mean, instead of just seeing Sully with a gun to his head, why not have him see things like Elena's "death" in UC2 (especially since he voiced that fear to her midway through the game), and/or his mother's suicide? These things both got screen time in dialogue - why not capitalize on them in visual form later for maximum effect? Nitpicks, yeah, but I feel like those threads should've been picked up again.
Speaking of Elena: her scenes were definitely a highlight of the game. I love the way her relationship with Nate has been portrayed in UC2 and UC3. It's not sugar-coated, but it's not wholly pessimistic, either. In the end, for all their independence, they are each other's safe harbor, even after various forms of unexplained heartbreak. One particular moment (after Nate's adventures in the collapsing cruise ship of DOOM) caught me totally off-guard, because it's something I never expected to see in a videogame... it's so nuanced.
Meanwhile, the ending was thematically perfect. My qualms with other aspects of the narrative felt like they got paved over by the gold there. I was proud of Nate when he refused Marlowe's taunt and decided he didn't have anything to prove. And Sully giving Nate back his wedding band... yeah. It just doesn't get much better than that.
Plenty about Uncharted is unrealistic, over-the-top, and scripted for the sake of adrenaline (WHICH IS THE POINT :D ♥), but those strong character arcs and interactions make it stand so far out from the crowd. I would love to see more game developers follow suit in thinking critically about their characters and giving them the level of emotional realism that Nate, Elena, Sully, Chloe, et al have.
Not saying other game writers and developers don't do this. Obviously, there are more examples we can cite (hello, John Marston! hello, Monkey and Trip!). I'd just like to see it become more of a trend, rather than the exception to the rule.
In conclusion: will play again (and again, and again). Meanwhile? SEE YA ON MULTIPLAYER.
There's a lot in this game that makes me gush and flail like a witless fangirl, so perhaps I should say upfront: Uncharted 3 isn't perfect. There were a few missed opportunities that made it feel somewhat less fleshed-out than Uncharted 2. I'm almost positive this was a result of the tight production schedule Naughty Dog was bound to. Other big games, like Mass Effect 3 and BioShock Infinite, have the luxury of pushing their release date out when it becomes clear they need more time to polish things up. For whatever reason, Sony wasn't willing to be that lenient with Uncharted... and from all the interviews I've read, the Naughty Dog staff nearly killed themselves to get this title wrapped up with a pretty little bow by November 1st.
Knowing this makes me even more impressed with how much they accomplished, because Uncharted 3 is SO AMBITIOUS. For one thing, it is absurdly beautiful to look at. The textures are even more detailed this time around (I didn't think that was possible), the character models have been carefully streamlined, and the lighting makes it all pop to great effect.
If I recall correctly, Nate now has over 2,000 contextual animations that bring him to life. That's ridiculous. If you walk too close to a wall, he'll put his hand out to steady himself. If he's tired and beat up, he'll hunch over and stumble around with looser arms. During the whole sequence where he crosses the Rub' al Khali, it's amazing and affecting to witness his slow physical breakdown.
Secondly, the narrative is the strongest of the three games. Within three chapters, I felt like I knew Nate and Sully better than I did in the two previous games combined. I attribute this to the fact that the "quest" is personal this time - closely tied to Nate's own past and secrets, instead of just those of his proverbial ancestor, Sir Francis Drake. I would like to thank Amy Hennig a hundred times over for bothering to give us two full chapters of 15-year-old Nate running through the streets of Colombia. Not only is he ADORABLE and totally believable as the street-rat version of this personality we've come to know so well, he already has his journal (!), and he's already more well-read than Sully. Ha! ;P I like that it isn't just a flashback for the sake of a flashback, either... it has direct relevance to the current events in the game.
(Oh, I should also mention - Greg Edmonson's score had some awesome new cues this time around, like this one when little Nate is running from Talbot's men. Who is Greg Edmonson? Why, the composer for Firefly, of course - if you listen closely, you can hear some definite similarities in the instrumentation he uses, etc.)
Marlowe and Talbot were great villains. But damn, I wish we knew more about them. What's this 400-year-old society they're a part of, and what's with the weird hints of immortality attached to voodoo-man-in-a-suit Talbot? A few more answers would've been nice. Regardless, Marlowe's reveal about Nate's past halfway through the game was an amazing moment, and the subtle reactions in Nate were animated flawlessly. She's right: he's not afraid of a physical fight, but when it comes to the kind of psychological warfare Marlowe uses, he's at a loss and has no idea how to defend himself.
I like that everyone from Chloe to Sully to Elena tells Nate to drop this particular quest. (All except for poor Charlie Cutter! Who I LOVED.) It contributes to the weird sense of foreboding that the game succeeds in building up early on - and the sense that Nate is totally out of his depth with Marlowe. His pride directly leads to some rather heavy consequences. I like the theme of examining Nate's fears, but I do wish there had been more to that "trip-out" sequence in the final chapters. I mean, instead of just seeing Sully with a gun to his head, why not have him see things like Elena's "death" in UC2 (especially since he voiced that fear to her midway through the game), and/or his mother's suicide? These things both got screen time in dialogue - why not capitalize on them in visual form later for maximum effect? Nitpicks, yeah, but I feel like those threads should've been picked up again.
Speaking of Elena: her scenes were definitely a highlight of the game. I love the way her relationship with Nate has been portrayed in UC2 and UC3. It's not sugar-coated, but it's not wholly pessimistic, either. In the end, for all their independence, they are each other's safe harbor, even after various forms of unexplained heartbreak. One particular moment (after Nate's adventures in the collapsing cruise ship of DOOM) caught me totally off-guard, because it's something I never expected to see in a videogame... it's so nuanced.
Meanwhile, the ending was thematically perfect. My qualms with other aspects of the narrative felt like they got paved over by the gold there. I was proud of Nate when he refused Marlowe's taunt and decided he didn't have anything to prove. And Sully giving Nate back his wedding band... yeah. It just doesn't get much better than that.
Plenty about Uncharted is unrealistic, over-the-top, and scripted for the sake of adrenaline (WHICH IS THE POINT :D ♥), but those strong character arcs and interactions make it stand so far out from the crowd. I would love to see more game developers follow suit in thinking critically about their characters and giving them the level of emotional realism that Nate, Elena, Sully, Chloe, et al have.
Not saying other game writers and developers don't do this. Obviously, there are more examples we can cite (hello, John Marston! hello, Monkey and Trip!). I'd just like to see it become more of a trend, rather than the exception to the rule.
In conclusion: will play again (and again, and again). Meanwhile? SEE YA ON MULTIPLAYER.