After beating Uncharted 2 across all modes (except very easy) in the past month, I gotta say that between it and Resident Evil 5 and Modern Warfare 2, 2009 was one of a decent year for me gaming-wise.
These days it takes a lot for me to want to replay a game and do everything in it, but I did with two games in the past year.
So I guess I can say I'm satisfied. I'd have to say I like RE5 and UC2 equally though. I just can't say I like it more than RE5 considering how fun that game was to me.
After all my playthroughs this is my take on the game:
+ Great combat, controls, gunplay and mostly great cover system.
+ They took every thing I liked about Uncharted (the exploration, the platforming, the adventure) and enhanced it, while making everything I thought was alright (the gunplay, for starters) and made it excellent.
+ While the first game's story and characters felt off to me, its sequel nails the Indiana Jones feel through its campy dialogue, multiple locations, and fun adventure. The amount of killing and shooting lowers the Indy feel a bit, but not enough to the point where it ruin the experience.
+ ND was always great with rewards and replay value, but I don't think they've ever had such a robust system as they do in Uncharted 2, especially when you consider multiplayer and how that ties in with the single player rewards. It's a system that keeps me coming back.
+ The multiplayer. It is fantastic. Unfortunately, MW2 seems to have killed the servers. You're lucky to get more than 9k players on a server on a weekend. That's pretty..uh...bad.
- My main grievance with the game are the boss fights. They're really bad: bullet sponges, very little strategy involved (final boss for instance is essentially a game of cat and mouse...except longer than it should be) and on replays both the train boss and the final boss are beyond tedious. You had awesome boss fights in the Jak trilogy, ND, so why are you having so much trouble with boss fights in the Uncharted series?
- The over reliance on shooting in the last 5-6 chapters was really disappointing. I felt the rest of the game had excellent pacing and balance in terms of exploration, platforming and shooting. But the end is grating and tiring.
Like you'll clear a map where you fight the Na'vi (who are bullet sponge enemies...which suck) just after taking on 2-3 shotgun storm troopers, a mini gun dude, AND an assortment of grunts (who may or may NOT have rocket launchers!!). The end game would have been better to me if they spaced the fights out instead of having the player get tired of killing all of these guys.
- On that note, bullet sponge enemies ARE NOT FUN!!! Especially if they're BOSS FIGHTS.
- While I know ND wanted to go for realism when it comes to physics, it's not fun when an enemy shoots a rocket launcher at you, you're in cover, survive and the blast makes Nathan stumble back, giving the enemy the opportunity to mop you. I'd rather have zero physics than that. This is especially annoying on Crushing when enemies can kill you with 3 or so hits.
Honestly, aside from my note on the boss fights, these are just nitpicks.
I think it can now be said that Naughty Dog is at their best when they make sequels. Crash 2 was one of the best games on the playstation, Jak 2 is arguably one of the best 3d platformers I've played and now Uncharted 2 remains just as impressive.
Looking forward to Uncharted 3 a lot but I'd take Jak 4 first.
Should get the platinum trophy later today!
