Uncharted : Drake's Fortune*

It downloaded pretty quickly for me, for a big demo release anyways (about 45 minutes which is crazy long for 1.2gb, but not too bad). The graphics are unbelievable in every way. It does have some minor tearing (and I noticed very minor clipping in the first cutscene), but that doesn't detract from it at all. The tearing is about the same as in Jak 3, so nothing to worry about. You don't feel the framerate drop like in heavenly sword, just a little tear with a still smooth feeling framerate. The DoF effects are the best (coolest looking to me anyways) I have ever seen in a game and a definite improvement from the E3 gameplay videos and trailers (I only really play console games since the only PC game I play is the UT3 demo).

The gameplay is very very smooth and tight feeling. I was actually a little surprised at how fast and good it felt. Aiming is extremely easy, the cover system didn't give me any trouble (I never got accidentally stuck to anything), and walking over logs was A LOT easier than I thought it would be after seeing so many videos of people falling on them constantly. Maybe they made walking on logs easier than it was at E3, but like I said it's a piece of cake. It took me a couple tries (and an unfortunate death) to get the timing down for the hand to hand combat. But once I did it was very fun.

All in all, I was very pissed off when the demo ended. And that's a good thing. I always know when a game is good when I don't notice the time passing and just keep playing.

I couldn't have said it better.
 
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:oops::oops: wow ...
 
I played on normal and hard as always.

presentation:

Jaggies didn't bug me at all maybe due to cartoony look.
Low poly, low density dark green grass looks last gen, rest of the vegetation is pretty good.
Indeed poly edges on the environment don't look unnatural. Drake's shoulder while aiming looks a little bad, but overall geometry looks very nice.

Water is as good as it gets for 2d water (is there any 3d water implementation with real reflections?). It actually looks almost perfect as it's not deep in the demo (minus splash effects).

Also I now understand why people make big deal out of Drake's cloths getting wet. :)

Some of the best textures and bump mapping I have seen (the sense of depth on some of the stones :oops:) I guess having lots of flat textured vegetation helps in terms of texture memory.
I have to say though, it feels like high resolution textures don't really belong with cartoony look but I won't complain.

And of course possibly best lighting ever. :)

So none of the videos I have seen does any justice to the game. Especially ingame graphics are way more impressive.

Gameplay:

Many previews said melee attack won't be any use against multiple enemies.
That's totally false. AI is aggressive when you are cornered and camping, they either throw a grenade or come very close at which point you can do the melee combo especially in absence of a shotgun.

Sometimes AI jumps out of cover to fire and looks stupid, but I'd say shooting and cover system works perfectly. It's so fun I don't think I would mind having to shoot an enemy ten times to kill as long as I had ammo. Also there are little details like enemy sliding to a cover or climbing down from a wall, looks pretty cool. Overall animations are what everybody knows. But environment interactions such as taking cover, climbing or hanging to a corner are very smooth too.

Since I'm tired, I'll keep it short.
Here is the bottom line: I wasn't sure about the gameplay especially with all the negativity, and had doubts about the reception of the game due to it's style.

Now if the demo doesn't sell the game even with negative media, I think Sony should quit gaming business start selling flowers or something.

Best demo on PSN.
 
You forgot: most robust shadow map implementation I have ever seen (though I suspect some kind of very clever fake is going on with vegetation shadows). Well done ND!
 
AI and control impressed me the most. The shadows is insane and animations are very good, running down the creek just look amazing and felt so cool.
 
holy crap, the attention to detail is amazing. i love when Drake moves, his shirt ripples so realistically. and yeah, i love how his shirt looks when its wet. textures are amazing (his hair looks really good), nice bump mapping, enemies look great and the AI is definitely above average. and the animations :oops:. took a little while to get used to the controls (i've been playing R&C for probably 10+ hours over the last few days) but once i got the hang of it, they felt very good.

i've watched so many videos of Drake so i wasn't surprised at how good it looks, but its nice to see it in motion on my own setup. the controls are a lot better than i thought too. overall, i loved the demo.

definitely a day 1 purchase for me.
 
You forgot: most robust shadow map implementation I have ever seen (though I suspect some kind of very clever fake is going on with vegetation shadows). Well done ND!

I must be the only person who has played the game and noticed several areas where Drake projects precisely zero shadows. Mostly when I got out of the creek and was jumping up on rocks...was pretty weird looking to me. (I recognize this isn't about vegetation shadows/shadow maps, but it got me thinking)

The graphics are pretty good, in general. I definitely don't agree with all of the "oh my GOD" type impressions, it didn't blow me away (though running Crysis last week with dual 8800 Ultras s can do that to a guy). I was particularly unimpressed with the low-poly grass and rock formations. The water shaders are great -- not as great as Crysis' but still very solid.

Gameplay wise...don't think it's for me. I just turned it off after I picked up the AK-47. It's getting kind of late and I just didn't feel compelled to continue. To be honest, I downloaded it mostly as a tech demo based on the "OMFG" type impressions I've seen here since this game has been under my radar for quite some time.

The character models look great. The facial animation is something I think could use a lot of work, but then again I just played through HL2 EP2 so perhaps I'm spoiled. The sound could use some work, I think -- the guns especially sound so muffled and bland.

Can't say much about the AI yet due to my limited exposure. Was not over or underwhelmed.

May be a rental for me sometime next year.
 
Am I the only one who notices the jaggies? Taken by me:
http://img458.imageshack.us/img458/9734/dsc00169ok2.jpg

It is really bad, or is it me? The water looks decent, water physics are non-existant, and drake getting wet, and then drying off is pretty sweet. But I can't appreciate the graphics with the lack of AA... specially when all I've been looking at, Pictures, Video, everything has ALOT OF AA. Someone tell me im not crazy :/

:oops:
 
Just completed the demo.

One question: I noticed in the second area (right hand side), there are 2 triangular flags with writings hidden behind trees. Am I supposed to retrieve them ? If so, how ? If not, is there something else I need to get ?

I killed all the enemies, and left empty handed. Did I leave any secrets undiscovered ?

Asher said:
I must be the only person who has played the game and noticed several areas where Drake projects precisely zero shadows. Mostly when I got out of the creek and was jumping up on rocks...was pretty weird looking to me. (I recognize this isn't about vegetation shadows/shadow maps, but it got me thinking)

The graphics are pretty good, in general. I definitely don't agree with all of the "oh my GOD" type impressions, it didn't blow me away (though running Crysis last week with dual 8800 Ultras s can do that to a guy). I was particularly unimpressed with the low-poly grass and rock formations. The water shaders are great -- not as great as Crysis' but still very solid.

Well, not everyone wants to spend so much on a dual 8800 Ultras PC setup (considering the noise level). To be fair, I think Uncharted is one of the best looking console games so far. CoD4 is pretty too, and neither of them need to be compared with PC games to win gamers' hearts.

I noticed the sparse grass too but the graphics are very solid overall. I thought the vegetation and rock formation looks good. I like how the trees sway in the wind. Water is of course great looking. Nathan's wet look is also very neat. I like the look of the enemies also.

Gameplay wise...don't think it's for me. I just turned it off after I picked up the AK-47. It's getting kind of late and I just didn't feel compelled to continue. To be honest, I downloaded it mostly as a tech demo based on the "OMFG" type impressions I've seen here since this game has been under my radar for quite some time.

This demo is somewhat limited like R&C's demo but with tougher gun fight. The real game will be largely story driven with treasure hunting. Both important elements are missing from the short game, which is unfortunate (and may be inevitable ?).

The character models look great. The facial animation is something I think could use a lot of work, but then again I just played through HL2 EP2 so perhaps I'm spoiled. The sound could use some work, I think -- the guns especially sound so muffled and bland.

I only pay attention to facial expression during cutscene. They look fine. What's wrong with them ?

Can't say much about the AI yet due to my limited exposure. Was not over or underwhelmed.

I like how the enemy AI behave. They are quite wicked :)
Besides taking cover and flanking, they also vary their moves. e.g., They may emerge from cover differently while firing at you, or dive from cover to cover. They also know when I run out of ammo ("He's out of ammo !"). If I hide too long, they will charge.

I also like how grenading works (especially grenade warning -- much better than CoD4).

The main thing I don't like is the walk movement. I feel that Nathan moves too slowly sometimes. But once I got him to run, it's ok. I noticed he stepped on the corpses too (The dead bodies will shift posture/move a little when Nathan "tripped" over them).

The other thing is the demo should have included more things to do or see :)
 
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