Uncharted 4...anyone else come late to this?

[Bob_McMillan]

I started playing the older games yesterday because of this thread, and I have to ask, am I the only one who thinks Uncharted 3 is worse than Uncharted 2 in almost every way?

The gun play is annoying, the graphics I feel are somehow worse (this is the remastered version), and of course the plot is all over the place. I think the only improvement I like is the ability to throw back grenades.

It's not bad, but I am surprised how it's almost a total regression from Among Thieves.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I thought it was a nice closure to the series, and it was a good continuation of the gameplay that the series has down to perfection.

My only complaint is that it was missing something that the other three games had. I won't spoil it, since you have just started the game, but when the end came around and what I was looking for still hadn't shown up, I can't help but feel that the story dropped the ball a little bit.

I was actually pleasantly surprised by the absence of the thing, it was a nice subversion of expectations. The whole game is really a subversion of expectations, or at least attempts to be.

Uncharted 1 started with Nathan Drake scuba diving to find the coffin of Sir Francis Drake. This game starts you off scuba diving, you think you're in the middle of the ocean looking for some fabled treasure, a sunken cargo ship of some kind, and then when you breach the surface of the water you're in a shitty river doing your shitty salvage job, bringing up spools of copper wire.

It creates a brilliant contrast with the other games in that regard and I really appreciate it.

I started playing the older games yesterday because of this thread, and I have to ask, am I the only one who thinks Uncharted 3 is worse than Uncharted 2 in almost every way?

The gun play is annoying, the graphics I feel are somehow worse (this is the remastered version), and of course the plot is all over the place. I think the only improvement I like is the ability to throw back grenades.

It's not bad, but I am surprised how it's almost a total regression from Among Thieves.

No, you're not the only one.

Uncharted 3 is a step back in pretty much every way. The whole game seems like they had a bunch of ideas for set pieces, and just threw them together loosely rather than attempting to have an engaging narrative.

It's still fun, but more in that "trashy popcorn flick" kind of fun rather than "gripping and engaging action movie" fun. Kind of like the difference between Raiders of the Lost Ark and Temple of Doom.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

I started playing the older games yesterday because of this thread, and I have to ask, am I the only one who thinks Uncharted 3 is worse than Uncharted 2 in almost every way?

The gun play is annoying, the graphics I feel are somehow worse (this is the remastered version), and of course the plot is all over the place. I think the only improvement I like is the ability to throw back grenades.

It's not bad, but I am surprised how it's almost a total regression from Among Thieves.

Uncharted 3 is an average game at best. I detailed a couple posts above yours why I wouldn't even consider it canon because the narrative is horrible on every level and the characters contradict themselves as well. The whole game is everyone telling Drake to stop and saying how it's not good to bring along Sully, yet they do nothing with that and cop out at the end with Drake learning nothing and the game basically ending merely to return to status quo. And, of course, Sully backing out of the adventure in Uncharted 2 because he can't do it anymore but is perfectly fine to follow Drake on a pointless adventure in the 3rd game.

Naughty Dog screwed up the shooting in Uncharted 3 and didn't want to admit it. There's an "alternate" shooting option from a patch that fixes the default shooting with regards to aiming issues (sorta like Witcher 3's alternate movement option). Also, the game was very rushed, Naughty Dog mistakenly left out motion blur and didn't have time to add in the normal Uncharted extras and cheats. Weeks before going gold, the game was unplayable on fat PS3s and they had to rush to fix it.

 

[Casual Shinji]

I started playing the older games yesterday because of this thread, and I have to ask, am I the only one who thinks Uncharted 3 is worse than Uncharted 2 in almost every way?

The gun play is annoying, the graphics I feel are somehow worse (this is the remastered version), and of course the plot is all over the place. I think the only improvement I like is the ability to throw back grenades.

It's not bad, but I am surprised how it's almost a total regression from Among Thieves.

You're not, it's shit. The main reason being that after Uncharted 2 Naughty Dog split its team up into two; Their A-team went off to make The Last of Us and the B-team made Uncharted 3.

Though it may even be just because of one guy; Bruce Straley. He's been the game director on all of Naughty Dog's good games from the 7th generation onwards. Uncharted 2, The Last of Us, and Uncharted 4 were all helmed by him. Which is why it sucks that he's not doing The Last of Us 2.

 

[BrawlMan]

I could never get in to the Uncharted series, but if you like it, more power to you. I'm busy with GRavity Rush 2, Yakuza 0, and Nier: Automata next week when it comes out.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

I thought it was a nice closure to the series, and it was a good continuation of the gameplay that the series has down to perfection.

My only complaint is that it was missing something that the other three games had. I won't spoil it, since you have just started the game, but when the end came around and what I was looking for still hadn't shown up, I can't help but feel that the story dropped the ball a little bit.

I'm honestly curious as to what you're referring to, I've played all of the Uncharted series and I only have a guess.

Spoiler

Was it the supernatural twist? All of the Uncharted games pull some sort of Raiders Of The Lost Ark at the end, were you expecting Henry Avery to still be alive or something?
Not saying you're dumb if you did, I wouldn't blame you at all but I am curious.

Nailed it.

Spoiler

While I wasn't expecting to find Henry, or anyone, alive after so long, I was expecting...something. The gold being cursed, or the island they built their city on having some weird plant that drove them mad. Anything other than what the game was making it seem like: they had all this wealth, but they got greedy. I mean yes, from a story stand point that makes the most sense seeing as they're all pirate lords, but without that supernatural element, the game kind of felt incomplete to me.
These pirates went through all this trouble, created this huge civilization that was far beyond most at the time, had enough wealth to retire everyone and THEN some, and they gave it all up simply because they wanted more. It just felt like a letdown to me in a way.
It's like a Castlevania game without vampires, or if Tomb Raider really was just Lara searching through old tombs without stumbling across some ancient magic thing and not fighting cults and animals.

 

[Bobbety_F]

I'm glad they didn't pull a supernatural twist this time. They were never really done right in Uncharted anyways; mostly spoiling the atmosphere like someone throwing a moldy gym sock onto a dinner table in a "Oh by the way, surprise!!" kind of way. The enemies always felt cheaply tacked on and just thrown at you while you're trapped somewhere.

I enjoyed the campiness of the first three games, especially UC2, but UC4 is the first time I actually felt connected to and intrigued by the story.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I'm glad they didn't pull a supernatural twist this time. They were never really done right in Uncharted anyways; mostly spoiling the atmosphere like someone throwing a moldy gym sock onto a dinner table in a "Oh by the way, surprise!!" kind of way. The enemies always felt cheaply tacked on and just thrown at you while you're trapped somewhere.

I enjoyed the campiness of the first three games, especially UC2, but UC4 is the first time I actually felt connected to and intrigued by the story.

I think Uncharted 1 pulled off the supernatural twist pretty well, but that game had a host of other problems that held it back quite a bit. Still, it's the only game where fighting the supernatural enemies didn't feel like a total drag because it's the only game where they aren't ridiculous bullet sponges.

Uncharted 2's burly purple cavemen are boring to fight and aren't even visually interesting. That part of the game was a huge letdown. Shambhala could have been ANYTHING but it's just some ruins in a jungle, it's like they had some leftover assets from Uncharted 1 that they wanted to use.

The supernatural enemies in Uncharted 3 aren't even supernatural, they're just hallucinations caused by Nathan Drake being drugged, so why the hell can their fireballs one shot kill you?

As much as I say that, I do kind of wish that there was some more enemy variety in Uncharted 4.

 

[Bobbety_F]

I will say this: if the games had to have a supernatural twist I'd prefer the first as well, because they got progressively worse as the series went on. Plus, I personally think the last 2-3 levels of UC1 up until finding El Dorado were some of the best in the first 3 games.

Overall I still find the first game the most charming. 2 had the best polish and set pieces, but I still have the fondest memories of the original.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I will say this: if the games had to have a supernatural twist I'd prefer the first as well, because they got progressively worse as the series went on. Plus, I'd personally sat the last 2-3 levels of UC1 up until finding El Dorado were some of the best in the first 3 games.

Overall I still find the first game the most charming. 2 had the best polish and set pieces, but I still have the fondest memories of the original.

I played the Uncharted games in kind of a weird order. I played Uncharted 2 when a game of the year edition came out, 3 the day it released, 4 two months after release, and 1 immediately after finishing 4 (borrowed The Uncharted collection from a friend of mine).

As such I got to see all the gameplay improvements made in Uncharted 4, and then went back to Uncharted 1 and played it fresh. You know what? Those last few levels of Uncharted 1 hold up. The first part isn't great, the characterization isn't the best, the writing is contrived, the gun play is boring, and the jumping mechanics and fixed camera angles are kind of janky. The moment you finish the section jet-ski section though, the game suddenly gets REALLY good. The last 1/3 of the game when you're running through the Church and the catacombs, and the nazi submarine base, it's all really fun and compelling, and it does a much better job of making the supernatural elements feel cohesive than Uncharted 2 or 3 did.

Then the final boss happens and everything fun that the game was doing comes crashing down around it so the whole things ends with a wet fart.

Still, for how dated it is, how mediocre the combat is, and how absolutely abysmal the jet-ski sections are, the final 1/3 of the game really makes it worthwhile and fun. I ended up having a lot more fun with it than I expected to.

 

[Bob_McMillan]

If UC4 had done a better job of revealing what had happened on the island, without having to rely on random collectibles, I think the non-twist would have been pretty good. I was tired of the supernatural twists, because c'mon, these are just fucking pirates. I guess it is a symptom of the series' turn towards realism, which I am not a fan of, but the idea that sometimes ordinary people are the worst monsters of all was neat.

 

[Bobbety_F]

Then the final boss happens and everything fun that the game was doing comes crashing down around it so the whole things ends with a wet fart.

Still, for how dated it is, how mediocre the combat is, and how absolutely abysmal the jet-ski sections are, the final 1/3 of the game really makes it worthwhile and fun. I ended up having a lot more fun with it than I expected to.

I agree on the final "boss" sequence playing like a wet paper bag full of farts, but I actually didn't mind the jetski levels. They did a good job of how they'd be to handle going up a rapid river. Plus it was visually stunning at the time for consoles. Now that I think of it, UC4 is pretty reminiscent of the original in a few ways, and I'm not complaining.

 

[peabuddie]

I feel it has some pacing issues. I got an itchy gun finger. Just let me shoot something will ya? Seriously, I have mixed feelings. It looks beautiful, it's a fitting ending for the franchise with a lot of fan service, but Among Thieves is still my favorite. There just wasn't enough action for me.

 

[Irwin126]

I am extremely late to Uncharted...

I keep picking up [and putting down] The Nathan drake collection. As I got kinda far in Uncharted 4 and I did kinda like it. But I doesn't hit my " I must keep playing " Trigger that other games hit. That and I still have 2 and 3 to Finnish and that doesn't make it easier.

 

[Bob_McMillan]

I feel it has some pacing issues. I got an itchy gun finger. Just let me shoot something will ya? Seriously, I have mixed feelings. It looks beautiful, it's a fitting ending for the franchise with a lot of fan service, but Among Thieves is still my favorite. There just wasn't enough action for me.

Same. And the little action that there was is toned down by all the stealthing you can do.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

The moment you finish the section jet-ski section though, the game suddenly gets REALLY good. The last 1/3 of the game when you're running through the Church and the catacombs, and the nazi submarine base, it's all really fun and compelling, and it does a much better job of making the supernatural elements feel cohesive than Uncharted 2 or 3 did.

And here I'm thinking I hate it when the zombies. I like the supernatural "twist" (more than Among Thieves' almost-yetis), I just think they're a ***** to fight. I agree that the final section of the game involving human enemies is a lot of fun though.