Uncharted: Drake's Fortune

Developer: Naughty Dog
Year of release: 2007
Platform: Playstation 3
Official website: http://www.unchartedthegame.com/
Date finished: 19 September 2009

It was two years ago at a Dutch games convention where I played a demo of Uncharted for the first time. The game already played quite ok back then. I played for around 10 min and what I can remember it was not bad.

That was still a year before I would buy my PS3. Up till last week those were the only 10 min of Uncharted game play experience. A few weeks ago, I visited the game convention in Cologne, where I played a demo of Uncharted 2. Yet again it was nice; it looks great and plays very smooth.
Since Uncharted 2 is one of the most anticipated games for this year, the demo reminded me that I still hadn't played Uncharted 1. I have the game at home for a few months now, but Street Fighter 4 and Red Faction Guerrilla kept me busy.

So after finishing Red Faction, I was thinking to play Batman: Arkham Asylum, but when I saw the release date of Uncharted 2, 13th October, I decided to play Uncharted 1. I'm probably going to pre-order Uncharted 2 and if I do, I have to play the first one before I can start playing part 2.

So last week I made a start and the first thing that directly got my intention was the cinematic. They are all done with the game engine and they look so lively; the character movements and facial expressions are very realistic. Having motion capture in your game can really bring some high quality result.
Next to the lively appearance of the characters the cinematic are clever used to tell the story and the relations between the characters, with great voice work and nice dialogs which really make the characters come alive. Also the positioning of the camera feels professional. All together I had the feeling that I was looking at a Hollywood production.

As for the gameplay, in short, it is a 3rd person action shooter with platforming and puzzle elements.
The shooting works really well, with an excellent cover system. By a simple press of a button you take cover behind the closest wall or object around. Aiming while you are in cover makes you shift out a little, giving your enemies more chance to hit you. The cover feels natural and the animations while in cover are really good looking. In hard mode, which I played on, taking cover is a must.
Also the aiming works well and is very easy; with a stable crosshair you can easily aim and perform headshots with any weapon. As for the weapons, you can only carry 2 guns and grenades. You can take guns and ammo from the enemies that you defeat.
Next to the shooting there is also a melee combat system. You can perform a melee move depending from which side you are approaching the enemy and there is a light combo and heavy combo that you can pull off. As with the cover system and shooting, the melee combat is easy to perform.
All together the cover system, shooting and melee work well and feel really satisfying.

There are also some platforming and puzzle elements in the game. Platforming is often jumping from one ledge to another and climbing up walls. Jumping and climbing works really well, it is only facing the right direction and a little timing that does the trick.
There are a few puzzles in the game. Most of them are interesting and quite easy to solve.

Next to standard shooting, platform and puzzles gameplay there is also a rail shooting car chase, water scooter shooting, run away shooting and some quick time events.

The AI is also done nicely. Enemies will take cover behind objects and react on bullets that are being fired at them, even when they miss. They will throw grenades and charge at you when you stay put at one spot and do not fire.

The gameplay is really well done, the actions are easy to perform and satisfying. Because of this the game plays smooth and you have the feeling that you are always progressing. You never really get stuck anywhere and if you do, the game will give hints so you won't be stuck for a long time.

The pacing in the game is really good, the variation and timing between shooting, platforming, puzzling and cinematic are done so well. During the whole game I never had the feeling that I was bored or that things got repetitive. Another thing that helps is that you never notice any loading times. I guess the levels get loaded when a cinematic is played and a cinematic gets loaded when you are almost nearing the end of a level. It is always that you come to an area, cinematic starts and when the cinematic is over you can directly play. There is never a moment where the menu or a screen comes up where you have to wait until things are loaded in. Even when you die, there is no loading screen. Within a few seconds you are back at the last auto save point. And there seem to be a lot of auto save points. I didn't die much but when I did, I only had to replay less than a minute. This all really keeps the player into the game. Like looking at a very interesting movie, where you can really be sucked in with your full attention.

The game hud is clever made. When you are walking around, platforming or puzzling the hud is not visible at all. Only when you switch to a weapon, you will see the weapon swapping hud pop up for short a moment and when you have a weapon in your hand the weapon and ammo hud will be visible. As for health, when you get hit, the colours turn a little grey the more grey the more health you have lost, but there is no health bar visible at all. You automatically regain healthy when you do not get hit for a short period. I can remember that I and others were impressed by the clever hud in Dead Space, but at that time I did not know that Uncharted also had such a clever hud.

The story of Uncharted is also nice, treasure hunters exploring dungeons and travelling to exotic locations. Looking for clues that lead to the treasure of El Dorado. Taking notes from history, the Spaniards and Germans who where also looking for the treasure. Nice plot twists and building up to a nice climax. The story feels like it is a script from a Hollywood movie.

The good

• Cinematic, good looking, good use of motion capture and facial expression. Interesting dialogs and events. It feels like a Hollywood movie.
• Excellent pacing, good timing and variation between shooting, platforming, puzzling and cinematic. No visible loading times. Lots of auto saves, when you have died, you respawn within a few seconds, replaying only a few minutes.
• Easy to play, simple controls, most actions can be done by a single press of a button. Platforming is interesting and very forgiving. Puzzles are quite easy and hints are given when the player is stuck.
  
• Polished in every way, the game looks awesome even for todays standard 2 years after its release. The animations of the characters are fluent when walking, climbing, jumping etc. Shooting and cover system feels well. Hud is simple and clean. The camera follows you well, the story is good, cinematic are awesome, excellent voice acting and great characters with their own distinctive look and feel and even the music and sound effects are nicely done. Also the 60 treasures that you can find and the things you have to do to get the trophies are well done.

The bad and improvements

• Throw grenades using six-axis, using the six-axis to determine the distance of the throw does not work to well. It requires the player to hold the controller in a certain angle and it takes time, which makes you vulnerable when you are trying to get the distance right. Having the right analog stick to set the distance would have been a better choice.
• Sound effect not being heard when you are not facing the sound source. I heard from a colleague that it is a PS3 issue and not only for Uncharted. Of course when you are standing near a sound source you should always here the sound even when you are not facing towards it.
• Human zombies/monsters near the end, the entire game is quite realistic; your enemies are always human until a certain point. From that point the game goes from a realistic adventure shooter to a horror zombie monster shooter. This breaks the experience a little, because it doesn't really fit in what the game has been till that point. But its only for a short moment after that it turns back to reality.

Uncharted is one of the best games that I have played the last few years. It looks awesome, it plays well, the controls are good and user friendly, the cinematic are high quality and interesting, the pacing is excellent, the story is good...what do you need more?
It is rare to see a game that is so polished. Nothing but praise for Uncharted and I'm really looking forward to part two.

9.6/10.0

Red Faction: Guerrilla

Developer: Volition inc
Year of release: 2009
Platform: Playstation 3, xbox 360, PC
Official website: http://www.redfaction.com/index.php

The Red Faction series has always been praised for the destruction that was possible in the games. I have the very first Red Faction (a fps) game from 2001. I can remember the game was nice, even though I never finished it. But back then the game was famous for its destroyable environment.

Between the first and Guerrilla a second game was released but I never played that one. So how did I get my hands on Guerrilla? Well I had seen some impressive developer's walkthrough videos explaining how they use havok physics to create buildings and the infrastructure on Mars and how they all can be destroyed real time in the game.
Also the first demo that was playable on the PS3, really got my attention. It was a nice demo, showing off all the good parts of the full game. You have your hammer to smash walls and enemies and your explosives to blow up buildings, which all are useful in a level fully pact with enemies, buildings and vehicles. Your goal was to steal a huge mech, called 'walkers' that was stalled in a hangar, guarded by Earth Defence Force soldiers. After reaching the walker, you have to pilot it and make your way through the EDF camp destroying everything in your path. Outside the camp a red faction member with a truck awaits to bring you to a save place. When the walker is loaded on the truck you take place behind the canon that is mounted on the truck. While the truck is moving to a save place you have to keep the EDF away from it. This 'shooting on a moving vehicle scenario' is comparable with the scenes at the end of the MGS games, Resident Evil 5 and Uncharted, but then with more explosions and more destroyable objects. Making it a very enjoyable demo.

Ok, so a good demo wins me over to buy the game. But I didn't play the game until 3 weeks after I bought it. The only thing I had played was the first level which I showed off in the Playlogic studio. Most of my colleagues were really impressed about the level of destruction that was possible. At that time I was still playing Street Fighter 4 a lot. Having said good bye to SF4 I finally started playing Red Faction Guerrilla.

So what is the story? Mars is under control by the EDF and the people who are living on Mars are treated like slaves that have to dig up the valuable resources that can be found on Mars. The Red faction is against the way how the EDF treats the civilians and they make it their goal to clean Mars from EDF's control.
You are Alec Mason, a miner who comes to Mars to visit his brother and to look for work. While helping your brother you find out that he is a member of the Red Faction and when your brother gets killed by the EDF, you are going for revenge and join the Red Faction.

Guerrilla is a 3rd person open world action game. After the first level, when you start your game you will always be spawned at a safehouse. In the safehouse you can buy weapons and fill up your weapons with ammo. You have a map where the missions, guerrilla actions and important targets are marked on. You can place a navigation beacon on the map and in the game arrows will be marked on the roads to lead you. The missions have to be done to progress in the game while the guerrilla actions and important targets are optional side quests that you can do.
An area will be freed from EDF's control when you have completed all the mission of that area. Also a new area on the map will be revealed where new missions, guerrilla actions and important targets are found. In total there are 6 maps, 5 big once and 1 small.

Guerrilla actions are optional side quests that are spread all over the maps, there are 8 different types of guerrilla raids, from destroying EDF properties to racing cars to rescue detained civilians from the EDF. In the game there are more than a 100 of these side quests that you can do, I did almost all of them.
Doing mission and guerrilla actions will reward you with ore ( the money unit in the game), unlock new weapons and boost the moral of the Red Faction and the civilians. When the moral is high enough civilians will join you when they see you fighting the EDF.

The important targets are valuable buildings to the EDF. By destroying them you lessen the control of the EDF in that area.

In the game there are lots of vehicles to transport you to the desired area on the map. You can ride any vehicle that you see by stealing/borrowing it, a la GTA. Next to vehicles for transport there are also assault vehicles like tanks and walkers.

The goal of the game is to fight off the EDF, by completing all the missions.

A pretty long description what the game is all about but how was the gameplay?
The game was very nice. As a 3rd person shooter you have all the standard actions; walk, run, jump, crouch, fire weapons, use melee and taking cover behind objects. The cool thing is that almost every object can be destroyed in the game, except for the ground. You can take cover behind objects but the question is often, how long will the object stand before it gets blown to pieces?
The destroyable environment really brings some unique experience with it. I have never played a game before which had so much things to destroy and because it uses havok physics, the destruction looks realistic. Take a vehicle and drive it right through a building, destroy a big part of the building and after a while it will collapse because of the lack of weight support.
Because of all the destruction, there are different play styles to complete a mission or guerrilla action. In the first part of the game I often took a sturdy vehicle and rammed most of the buildings that had to be destroyed and I tried to kill as many EDF soldiers by driving them over. In the later part of the game, where the mission and guerrilla actions get tougher, I did a more subtle approach; find a good location to shoot down the EDF soldiers and try to sneak in and place remote charges and hammer down EDF soldiers or fire rockets from a save position which the EDF soldiers could barely reach. The choice of play style is all up to you.

The AI of the EDF soldiers is nicely done too. They are often very aggressive, attacking you in large numbers and taking cover a lot. Which makes some mission and guerrilla actions quite difficult.

The difficulty level is quite high in the game. I usually play all games on hard mode but after playing red faction on hard I died quite often, so after a while I switched the game on normal mode. In normal mode I still had the feeling that some mission were in hard mode, but it was really on normal. I often like games that are the on difficult side but I can imagine that some people don't like that and will die a lot even when the game is set on easy.

Next to the story mode, there is also the online multi player and the wrecking crew mode. I won't tell much about these two modes, because I haven't really played them much. But one thing that I found quite strange is that in the online multi player there are certain equipments that you can not get in the story mode, why is that?

The good

• Destruction, almost everything can be destroyed. I have never seen a game before that has implemented a destruction system so well. Technically speaking it is incredible what they have pulled off with Havok physics. It is just amazing that you can walk into any building and go to each floor of it, while you can also destroy it completely. I have also worked with Havok physics and it's not easy to work with lots of physics objects, constraints, vehicles etc and make it all run and stand stable.
  
• Missions and guerrilla actions, there are a great amount of missions and guerrilla actions that you can do, which keeps the game interesting.
• Vehicles, tanks and walkers, each vehicle has its distinct look and feel. The tanks and walkers are just amazing when you are controlling them and causing sweet destruction.
• Different play styles, because of all the destruction you can adapt different play styles and chose the style you like or is suitable for a mission or guerrilla action.
• Weapons and equipment, the giant hammer is the coolest melee weapon I have ever seen in a game. It feels good to sneak up on an EDF soldier and hammer him down. Later on you even get a jet pack to fly around with!
  

The bad and improvements

• Invisible walls, I guess most game have them. Often they are there to prevent the player from falling or dying, but in red faction I have noticed some invisible walls and ceilings at places where you would think that you can easily go to.
• Pacing of new guerrilla actions, on the second map you can already play all the different types of guerrilla actions. On the four maps that are still to come you will not get any new type of guerrilla action. I think it would have been better if they did the pacing a little slower so you have at least one new guerrilla action type on each map.
• Pacing of getting new weapons, on the first two maps you can unlock almost all the weapons. On the four maps that are still to come you will only unlock one weapon and the jet pack. I rather see more weapons that could be unlocked in the last 4 maps. I did all guerrilla actions hoping that I would unlock more equipment and weapons, but in the last 4 maps there wasn't much to unlock. Also weapons that are in the online multiplayer mode should be unlockable in the story mode.
• Difficulty level differs a lot, the difficulty is quite hard even when it is set on normal, I'm fine with that. But some missions and guerrilla actions can be really hard. With most of them you die 0 to 3 times but with some you really die 10+ times as if the difficulty level is set on a much higher level for that mission or action.
• Tanks and walkers appearance, tanks and walkers appear rarely in the game. I've only driven a tank +- 3 times and a walker +- 6 times in the entire game. They are the coolest vehicles to drive in and it would have been nice if I could have driven them more often.
• Safehouse is always safe, when you have the EDF on your heels and you are driving to a safehouse you are instantly safe. Which feels strange because the EDF soldier defenitly saw me going into the safehouse. In GTA you can not go into a safehouse untill you have shaken off your pursuiers.
• Lack of bosses, there are no real bosses in the game. Only at the end of the game there is a boss, which is a normal sized tank. Some nice giant robots, walker tank bosses to end a mission would perfectly fit into the game, too bad there is none.
• Missions and guerrilla actions can end when you are surrounded by the EDF, in some missions and guerrilla actions you have to destroy a certain building or kill a person. When you have done that, the mission directly ends, even though you are surrounded by the EDF. This looks quite strange, at a certain moment you are surrounded, but after the mission or guerrilla action has ended they are all gone. It would have been better if you would also have to reach a safehouse or make sure you have shaken off the EDF as a part of the mission. As a player you will often directly go for the target instead of thinking of how to safely get out of this situation.
• Lack of compelling story, the story of red faction can be told in a few lines. It's very straight forward. Having a little more story e.g. more history about the EDF and the Red faction and how Mars got colonised would have been nice.

Red Faction Guerrilla is a nice game with lots of action and solid gameplay. I really had a great time playing the game. The explosions and the rampage that they cause are unique and never seen before in any other game. I have witnessed new gameplay possibilities e.g. driving a vehicle into a building, pick up people and drive out again through another wall or blowing up a building that is 1000 times the size of you.
With the destroyable environment and realistic physics it will defenitly set the new standard for other games.
But there are quite some improvements that can be done to make it even more fun and more appealing to others.

As for the gameplay time, it took me around +- 30 hours to finish the game with all the guerrilla actions and important targets.

8.4/10