Uncharted 3

[Billy Idol]

It's not 'logic', but believability within the game world. If in Rambo 3, Stallone suddenly took to flying in the air shooting death-rays from his eyes, everyone would have been up in arms, because there's nothing within the story universe foreshadowing that and describing it as normal. Whereas in the Marvel universe with a funny coloured rock nearby, it'd be perfectly logical. If in a Superman film, Superman is suddenly shot by an ordinary bullet, everyone would be up in arms because everything up to that point has told us he's impervious to everything except Kryptonite. The story establishes the rules of the alternate reality, and then must conform to them or break the believability of the universe.

U3 is telling us Nate is weakened, suffering to the point of near death, very explicitly presenting us with a realistic desert scenario referencing our real-life knowledge of deserts - and they suddenly flip that randomly with no explanation and have him running around. The story has set us up with a situation but not followed it through. The desert rescue by the nomads should have come before the fight. Of course, this is just a computer game and the story bits are just padding for the actual game people play... except ND are trying to be more than that, and doing a pretty good job, so they should tighten up their story and game integration in future efforts to keep the plot relevant and the characters believability within the game universe.

Well, that is the point where we disagree: for me, John Rambo and Nathan Drake are Super Heros...Super Heros in disguise! Thus, it is like a Marvel movie, it is Indiana Jones type popcorn movies. One second the hero is nearly dead without hope, the other second he brutal kills the evil villain with a cool quote!
I guess that is also the reason why Naughty Dog choose the art style of their games: it is more colorful Far Cry type, compared to super realistic Crysis art style and color.

Look, I understand that it was weird to play this. But for me, it is not a game breaker! Still one of the best games around there...although it has some major flaws (similar to the stuff Npl said in his posts..but fortunately ND gave us the chance to select the chapters we want to replay so that I can choose the action sequences...which I certainly do)

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Look, I understand that it was weird to play this. But for me, it is not a game breaker!

I don't consider it a game breaker either. But I do consider it an area for improvement.

 

[Prophecy2k]

Well, thats kinda what I am saying... they shouldnt be interactive?
I still wish they werent there, I still think the game wouldve been better without it. Not that this is the biggest issue, but the pacing in U3 is very slow already with minor faster peaks, and this pushed it even farther.
And the part with the spiders was rather tedious aswell, while the chase scenes where rather fun.
Fair enough, but U2 is - atleast to me - head and shoulders above U3, and did interactivity right - without feeling forced. U3 went way to far with adding "interactivity" (if you can call it such) in sections that dont need it. I know that you could be blunt and call most climbing sections "interactive cutscenes" too - but that would be brutally trying to misinterpret me. not all "interactive cutscenes" are equal. There is enough between pure gameplay, scripted events and pure cutscenes that you cant just say they are good/bad in general and games should be judged on how they do them - which was the original point I was making (or trying to before this got out of hand and I have defend every word and interpretation thereof).
There were some other ways of interaction besides running a very narrow path - other things to do simply. And it came after a long rush of action instead of a short sprint.
Well, I finished the game so it wasnt horrible enough... its bad enough however, together with the rather slow pacing, that it really stops me from replaying the whole game (instead of the few interesting scenes). But thats also just half the truth, its just that if I want to (re)play Uncharted theres really no need for me to look at anything besides U2.

Fair enough, but it sounds very much like your issues with U3 (over U2) derive from much more than the desert scene alone. I can understand complaints about stuff like pacing in U3 and a lack of coherancy in the narrative at times. I can also understand complaints about stuff like level design, characters and story etc. I my point was merely that complaints about stuff like scripted sequences and cutscenes in U3 seemed off to me, because they were faaaar from the game's biggest issues (if even issues at all).

All in all I think the game came in a little under U2 overall, but it was still a great game for me. I would still consider U3 as one of my stand out games of the generation. In many ways, it is my opinion that U2 was such a great game that it would have been difficult for ND to surpass it on every level, and that even small things in U3 that weren't done as well would have been amplified in the minds of gamers, because U2 was such an allround exceptional package.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Fair enough, but it sounds very much like your issues with U3 (over U2) derive from much more than the desert scene alone. I can understand complaints about stuff like pacing in U3 and a lack of coherancy in the narrative at times. I can also understand complaints about stuff like level design, characters and story etc. I my point was merely that complaints about stuff like scripted sequences and cutscenes in U3 seemed off to me, because they were faaaar from the game's biggest issues (if even issues at all).

Npl didn't say U3 was a lousy game. Only that the unskippable, player confined events, of which there are quite a few, are a turn-off. The desert scene is great narrative though confused gameplay, but a boring event in the second play-through because you can't skip it - hence Npl not playing through U3 more than once. If the desert scene were a simple cutscene, it'd still have the same narrative, but also could be skipped to the bit where you run around shotting people. I appreciate that ND were going for interactive story; I just don't think they've pulled it off perfectly yet. Everyone's still learning the tools and techniques to achieve that.

Edit: I'll give another example of confusing narrative gameplay to show it's not just U3, but lots of games. In U2 on the train, there's the fight with the grunt. In the very first encounter, the player follows all the existing rules and shoots this guy repeatedly, but does no damage and gets killed. It then takes several trial-and-error attempts to learn that this is actually a predefined event with a script the player has to follow, going through the pattern of melee and grenades or whatever it was. This is no longer the player in control of the game, but the game in control of the player, and it's sprung on the player with no warning or explanation. Other games have gone with QTEs in such interactive narratives, and in doing so have made it obvious that this is aside from the normal gameplay. ND tried to be more subtle with it, but the result was just a confusion and frustration.

 

[goonergaz]

It's interesting that people are complaining of a slow segment in the game but then also there's complaints that (in reality) the slow segment should have been longer due to dehydration.

I must admit - and I love Uncharted, I think it's the best IP this gen hands-down - that that particular part did feel a bit odd. It would def have been better if the desert there were just a few grunts and that Drakes aiming was all off but by some fluke he managed to hit something explosive that killed them all before being rescued.

As for the triangle pressing bits - I guess a skippable cut-scene would not hide the loading?

Personally I thought U3 was great but not as good as U2 - it's like they took the U2 blue-print and made each set peice "bigger and better" - but as like with many films (The Mummy is a great example) - bigger is not always better!

I will play this through again - just waiting on a 3DTV

 

[Sigfried1977]

Edit: I'll give another example of confusing narrative gameplay to show it's not just U3, but lots of games. In U2 on the train, there's the fight with the grunt. In the very first encounter, the player follows all the existing rules and shoots this guy repeatedly, but does no damage and gets killed. It then takes several trial-and-error attempts to learn that this is actually a predefined event with a script the player has to follow, going through the pattern of melee and grenades or whatever it was. This is no longer the player in control of the game, but the game in control of the player, and it's sprung on the player with no warning or explanation. Other games have gone with QTEs in such interactive narratives, and in doing so have made it obvious that this is aside from the normal gameplay. ND tried to be more subtle with it, but the result was just a confusion and frustration.

That's why I was actually glad that the final encounter in U3 was just an elaborate quick time event. There's really nothing worse than enemies who soak up ridiculous amounts of bullets for no other reason besides them being bosses. (Deus Ex: HR failed miserably in that regard as well) The tank level in U2, now that's how boss battles should be handled in a game like U2.

I thought U3 was easily at its best during the ship graveyard and cruise liner sections. Really felt like the designers were told to just go nuts with the Uncharted gameplay template instead of worrying whether it all makes sense or not

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I hated the end of U2 as a gameplay experience as I was set up to lose, just like the train boss. Whereas I hated the ending of U3 because it was just stupid. The story didn't make a great deal of sense and everyone's left wondering why Drake didn't just blow Marlowe and Talbot away across the water. Plenty of us players arrived at that scene with a grenade launcher.

You know, I can't remember many game endings I was happy with...

 

[nightshade]

There's another issue that I have with games in general, and its a big one. Player character kills hundreds of no name people but when it comes to the main story characters they'll have trouble pulling a trigger due to moral issues. Military shooters get away with this cause the characters are soldiers killing other soldiers in a war.

 

[Sigfried1977]

Heavenly Sword was just about the only game where I was completely satisfied with the conclusion. Having one of the best villains and one of the most impressive boss battles certainly helped.

 

[Billy Idol]

Heavenly Sword was just about the only game where I was compeltely satisfied with the conclusion. Having one of the best villains and one of the most impressive boss battles certainly helped.

Agree.

 

[nightshade]

I'll agree as well.

 

[Sigfried1977]

Folklore had an amazing ending as well, now that I think about it (including yet another fantastic boss battle)

 

[Arwin]

Heavenly Sword was just about the only game where I was completely satisfied with the conclusion. Having one of the best villains and one of the most impressive boss battles certainly helped.

Heh, that boss battle for me was the typical fare that took too long, and I never finished the game as a result.

Returning to the topic, Patch 1.13 is up, and this is quite a big one, among others introducing tournaments:

http://www.naughtydog.com/site/post/patch_113_notes_the_full_rundown/

 

[deathindustrial]

Got this via PS+ (which was a hassle due to Sony's packaging system wanting at least 80GB to do the install) but am experiencing pretty horrible performance during cut scenes. Anyone using the DD version encountering slowdowns / stuttering or is it likely an issue with the hard drive on my machine?

Could easily be me but I am also finding the controls super janky on this Uncharted. I don't remember Nate flailing around or hugging objects at the worst possible angle anywhere near as much on the last 2 games. Also can't say that I am a fan of "long corridor; press triangle; long corridor" being considered gameplay.

Cheers

 

[patsu]

Did you replace your HDD ?

 

[deathindustrial]

Nope, it's the one that came with the 120GB slim.

Tried rebuilding the file system but didn't make much any difference.

Cheers

 

[betan]

Missing Blu-ray BW issue? Uncharted games stream level data during FMVs and limited read buffers may cripple sequential reads from HDD.

 

[Arwin]

Uncharted 3 may be a game that performs better with BluRay disc, considering they have an efficient 3 step texture streaming system where they stream from BD to HDD to RAM.

I loved the harbor section and the cruise ship afterwards, for how alive the whole game world in those.

 

[Nesh]

Nope, it's the one that came with the 120GB slim.

Tried rebuilding the file system but didn't make much any difference.

Cheers

I suspect that your HDD is on its last legs. I was getting some weird bugs and cut scene hiccups with my games too for a while when my HDD started to have problems. No file system rebuild or any other solution would fix it as the problem was not related just with the file system. The problems were fixed when I replaced it. Just in case not all saves can be copied on a USB stick or external drive due to copy protection, buy a plus subscription to back up all your saves on the cloud
If your HDD has issues you might even have trouble backing up all your HDD data on an external through the settings menu.
When I begun realizing that there was a problem I tried to back up through the settings. But I was getting errors every time. So I uploaded all my saves on the cloud and redownloaded all my purchases

Check if you have issues with other games too such as loading screens becoming longer

 

[RenegadeRocks]

BTW< I think UC3 DLC is free for everyone now !!

and here's some news on their next game :

Quizzed by a user about its thoughts on Sony’s next generation console, Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception’s lead multiplayer designer Robert Cogburn hinted that there’s an amazing game around the corner.
“If I said anything about what we’re doing right now it wouldn’t be exciting,” he teased. “The PS4 is awesome. It gives us the chance to do a lot of things that we’ve been talking about for some time. You’ll be in awe when you play it.” And now our hype levels are actually through the roof.

http://www.pushsquare.com/news/2013/11/naughty_dog_youll_be_in_awe_when_you_play_our_ps4_game
If the X1 can do RYSE, and BF4 and COD showing that PS4 can do more than X1, then with Naughty Dog on board :::--- ...... . can...not......wait....!