Uncharted 4: A Thief's End [PS4]

[Billy Idol]

I did like her influence on the appearance and role of the female characters in Uncharted...at least I guess it was her influence driving this...

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I'm actually not surprised things are changing at ND, it's hard to do what they've done year after year. The pressure and expectations must be immense. They should have let the IP rest IMO and the creative team should get sabbaticals to refresh, recharge and come back inspired. They could cycle 2 or 3 IPs and creative teams if need be.

I think that's a good idea. Take a year for the for the team to break up into smaller teams putting out little download arcade titles and the like. Big projects are exhausting. That's why quite a lot of old-guard devs have broken away to produce smaller indie games.

TLOU was definitely done by Neil Druckmann. She was credited for UC1 to 3.

I can imagine that Druckmann got involved in UC4. Not a bad thing though, TLOU was far more impressive on the emotional level. The UC series are more like a rollercoaster action movie, from one sequence to the next.

But UC was a rollercoaster action movie! That was its design intention. It was a light-hearted, action romp dealing with trivial stories about treasure and lunatics. LoU was an intense story set in a post-apocalyptic world with people struggling ot survive. Of course it was going to have a more emotional story!

 

[Sigfried1977]

^You can still tell a coherent tale in an actiony, rollercoaster-type game, though, and in that regard U3 dropped the ball pretty hard.

 

[jlippo]

The writing isn't done before they start production?

At least UC3 was written during full production.

 

[BoardBonobo]

As is says in that article (and I really hope this isn't the case):

Sources claim Hennig was “forced out” by The Last of Us’ Neil Druckmann and Bruce Straley, and explained that Uncharted may now come under their control.

It's not that they aren't stellar content creators, TLoU per astra!, but if they put the screws on because they think they could do a better job... Why not just work with her?

 

[Inuhanyou]

It doesn't have to be literally. As i said on the last page, its most likely that she was sick of people comparing her work constantly to Neil's, and figured it wasn't worth the time. The pressure on her was probably unreal. And after she left, they put Neil on UC4. Everyone knows UC2 was the best received, and he did that one just fine, so i'm guessing ND isn't sweating that much.

 

[wco81]

Seems like they could get some screenwriter who's done action movies to script these games.

Or maybe the people who write the games scripts are looking to screenwriter for movies.

 

[messyman]

UC3's story was not entirely Amy's fault as ND made all the set pieces first and she had to write the story around them.

 

[Wynix]

UC3's story was not entirely Amy's fault as ND made all the set pieces first and she had to write the story around them.

No wonder it was disappointing, 2 was significantly better.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

UC3's story was not entirely Amy's fault as ND made all the set pieces first and she had to write the story around them.

Is there a source for that?

 

[messyman]

Is there a source for that?

It's in the making of UC3 in the game.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

It's in the making of UC3 in the game.

Thanks! Haven't looked at any of those vids yet.

 

[Brad Grenz]

There's a good Irrational Interviews podcast episode with Ken Levine talking to Amy Hennig and they spend a lot of time discussing how fluid the writing process is for a big budget game and how much you inevitably are forced to throw out or adapt based on the needs of the gameplay.

 

[Sigfried1977]

Is there a source for that?

Pretty sure that was the case with UC2 as well actually. (and with just about any other action game for that matter)

 

[BoardBonobo]

So has anybody found any of these secrets hiddens around the internet yet?

 

[Gitaroo]

Pretty sure that was the case with UC2 as well actually. (and with just about any other action game for that matter)

With U2, they had everything map out first, so the spacing wasn't all over the place. With U3, they got the U2 MP guys doing the SP, they design it kind of like a MP game I think, create levels and assets then try to come with the story later. Its the same for sucker punch if anyone interested, all their games were 80% done then they come up with a story for them.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Pretty sure that was the case with UC2 as well actually. (and with just about any other action game for that matter)

It just seems a backward way of doing things but I suppose the engine programmers and game/level programmers, when working on the previous game, have great ideas for things they do next game and these become some kind of technical and gameplay goal that the story has to fold around.

Uncharted 2 for me was the highlight of the PS3. I loved The Last of Us as much, if not more, but Uncharted 2 had that polish with an upbeat vibe and felt so well put together, with few contrived moments, I had such a rush playing it - I just didn't want to stop. That doesn't happen a lot to me these days, having started gaming on the Atari 2600.

 

[DieH@rd]

News just broke. Neil Druckman and Bruce Straley have also forced out Jack Tretton from the position of SCEA CEO.

Spoiler

 

[Deleted member 11852]

News just broke. Neil Druckman and Bruce Straley have also forced out Jack Tretton from the position of SCEA CEO.

Spoiler

I'm pretty sure they also forced me out of Starbucks' Westminster branch this morning, and bought all the blueberry muffins.

Bastards.

 

[BoardBonobo]

Sony can't afford Jack...