Paul Plays Playstation: Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Welcome to the inaugural installment of a new segment I’m calling “Paul Plays Playstation.” It’s exactly what it sounds like, and I thought I could make it its own feature because most of the games I’ll be discussing here actually came out some time ago. I’ve only recently picked up a Playstation 3 after all these years, and now I’m able to finally play them and share my thoughts, albeit a few years behind schedule.

I have a whole host of PS3 exclusives lined up to review, and I’ll work my way through them over the coming weeks and months. But when I picked up the console, I knew immediately what title I wanted to play through first, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves.

Site veterans may recall that I actually had the chance to play through the original Uncharted some time ago on a friend’s PS3, and I found the experience incredibly enjoyable as the game was a fresh take on both the adventure platformer and the cover shooter. Add in a lead with an actual personality, and you had a great recipe for a franchise from the team that once upon a time brought us Crash Bandicoot.

Uncharted 2 however, was said to outshine the first game, and was in most circles 2009’s game of the year. With that sort of praise, and my enjoyment of the first title, I knew that this was a must play, and so it was my first purchase the day I got my PS3.

I’ve beaten the game over the past few days, and can now share my findings on the widely beloved title. It’s hard for something to live up to so much hype, but more often than not, Uncharted 2 does just that.

“A vague promise of treasure? I’m in!”

Nathan Drake is relaxing after being hunted by Nazi zombies on a lost island in his last adventure, but can’t say no when a new mythical legend comes his way. The sultry Chloe and the scheming Harry say they know where Marco Polo’s lost fleet is, one that claims to have sunk full of treasure pillaged from the legendary city of Shambala, including one legendary gemstone. Further investigation concludes that the prized object in question never left Shambala, and the Cintamani stone still sits in the hidden city, and is worth a ton of cash as it’s reported to be a sapphire so big, a man can’t fit his arms around it.

Nathan breaks into a museum with Harry to find some clues, and he’s promptly betrayed by him which is a turn that can be seen form a mile away. From there, the adventure takes Nathan from the murkiest jungles to the most frigid mountains, and everywhere in between. He’s racing a war criminal, Lazarevic, to the stone, which in addition to being valuable is said to allow those who possess it to command unspeakable power. Along the way he runs into his old friend and quasi-flame Elena, who is attempting to track down Lazarevic for journalistic reasons, but soon she’s holding a pistol once more and has joined the hunt for the stone.

Uncharted 2 improves dramatically from the original game in terms of size and scope. While that game took place almost entirely in one locale, an island jungle, much work has been put into crafting a ton of different environments in which Drake can cause mayhem. The traditional jungle setting is still present, but there are also ornate museums, war torn cities, mountaintop villages, vast ice caves and of course, mythical lost cities. The attention to detail in these environments is simply stunning, and if you weren’t so busy being shot at, it you could wander around for hours admiring the digital sculpting of everything from piles of debris to astonishing vistas. I still don’t think that the PS3 has a solid graphical leg up on the 360 overall, but if there was ever such a case to be made, Uncharted 2 would be the opening argument.

Most of the environments are as breathtaking as this.

Similar diversity has been inserted into the game’s set pieces as well. Yes, there are your typical “big room filled with chest high walls” encounters, but there are some sequences that go above and beyond that of the typical action game. There’s one battle atop and inside a moving train that is etched in my mind, along with a frantic truck-hopping gunfight that got my blood pumping.

Uncharted does action, and in particular, cinematic action better than almost any series out there. There have been complaints that it’s almost TOO much like a movie, but I would say that’s more of a compliment than an insult. Sure, there are a ton of cinematic set pieces littered throughout the game, buildings falling, ruins crumbling, vehicles exploding, but Uncharted also manages to make actual gameplay cinematic and creative as well.

I’m reminded of a particular segment where Drake is being chased by a tank through a rural mountain village. Drake runs around the outskirts of town, avoiding the tank’s fire, picking off straggling enemies as he does so. At the end of all this, some games would have you run up to the tank, press R2 and plant a grenade inside it. Not so with Uncharted, Drake must kill pockets of rooftop enemies, take their RPGs, shoot the tank, then move to the next building and repeat the process, dodging soldier and tank fire as he does so. It’s refreshing to see boss battles outside their traditional “shoot the giant glowing spot” comfort zone, and the game is full of these type of moments that feel authentic and still maintain the flow of the game without breaking immersion.

“My ass does NOT look fat in these jeans!”

Though the world has expanded and the set pieces have grown more epic in scale, core combat and gameplay remains relatively unchanged. Climbing is once again a key part of the game, but feels a bit less involved than it used to, as the path to the next foothold is usually pretty clear cut, and you’ll rarely have to pause for a moment to figure out what to do next. Similarly, I would like to see the games few actual puzzle sections to be a bit more in depth. Right now they usually rely on looking in Drake’s journal and flipping a few switches accordingly. It’s a good start, but there’s more to be explored here, and they’d be well advised to look to a game like Zelda for a blueprint on how to make these sections really feel like  challenge.

Combat is still mainly cover based, although I did notice it was generally a touch easier than the last game. Cover seems a lot more stable than it used to, and rarely will you find the object you’re hiding behind blown to bits, and subsequently have to scramble to find a new spot. That was part of the charm of the last game, but here it feels like you’re much safer hanging out in one location than you used to, and the game doesn’t require you to be quite as creative when dismantling an approaching army. What IS a big improvement however is hand to hand combat, which was almost unusable in the first game thanks to a complicated timing system I never got down. Here in the sequel it’s just mashing square until they’re unconscious, and rarely you press triangle to counter. Simplistic maybe, but far more useful, and there’s even some pretty cool choreography in Drake’s beat downs.

There are very few new weapon types, only the three round burst zoom scope FAL and the hand held shotgun, the Pistole, come to mind. The same goes for enemy types, as in terms of soldiers, the only new addition is a gatling gun toting behemoth that requires massive amounts of explosive damage to kill.

Steath? Oh Drake, you so silly.

The game is fortunately lacking Nazi zombie monsters, a mood killing moment from the first game that tried to pull a supernatural Indiana Jones turn, but ended up feeling tacked on. But the supernatural is still firmly in place here, as when Shambala is finally discovered, some purple skinned, musclebound…things show up prepared to pummel you to death and riddle you with crossbow bolts so you don’t reach the all powerful Cintamani stone. It’s less of a shock as at least you know the supernatural is probably coming once more, but still it seems a little odd to have the first nine tenths of your game based in reality, and then have the last section swarming with creatures that would appear to have wandered in from an entirely different game.

As cinematic as the game is in action sequences and visual splendor, there’s still a ways to go to put it in league with actual classic action films. The plots of legendary lost treasures are good starts, and Drake is fortunate to have been blessed with SOME sort of personality which is more than can be said with most video game protagonists, but still, the characters in these games, Drake included, feel pretty one dimensional and I don’t think it would hurt for there to be a few more quiet moments where some depth is explored. Sarcasm and witty banter alone does not a gripping script make.

Uncharted 2 is a great game, and one that expands on the originality of the first in ways that make the series bigger and better. New environments and crazier action sequences create more than a few jaw dropping moments, but the luster of something incredibly new and different is lessened by the fact that with the same enemies, guns, cover and climbing centric gameplay, it’s not exactly innovating too much from its predecessor. The plot and characters are good for a video game, but the series is going to need to keep pushing itself to really reach that next level of greatness.

Without a doubt, Uncharted 2 is pure fun, and minor gripes aside, is a worthwhile playing experience for anyone who is able to pick up a controller. It’s accessible without being easy, challenging without being maddening, and a visual feast for the eyes in a way few games have ever achieved before. I can’t wait to see how things evolve further in the third installment.

Next up: Heavy Rain or Demon’s Soul