Uncharted 2 : Among Thieves - PS3

I had been waiting anxiously (obsessively??) for this game. I loved the first one and had been devouring any piece of media that trickled out since the fist trailer I saw, about a year ago. I remember it was December because I was staying at my parent's place.

It was well worth the wait. It did NOT dissapoint !






One of the things that impressed me about the first one was the character models. The sequel pushes it even further. Yes, the motion capture is sometimes zombie-ish and the eyes are freaky (especially Cloe) and sometimes the facial animations are a little stiff, but compared to what you see in video games ususally .... WOW.

The storyline is exactly what you'd expect. Over-the-top impossible action. Drake would be dead so many times if it were real life. The story keeps you engaged and doesn't let go. I had to FORCE myself to stop playing when it got to the wee hours of the morning.

It's not re-inventing storytelling. It's just a fun roller-coaster ride that even though it feels familiar it is still thrilling to play through.

The backgrounds are gorgeous and much more varied this time around. A slew of different locales are explored, each with their own feel and atmosphere. The amount of detail in all the levels is staggering.

Some moving levels (train level, truck chase) were just so intense and awesome, it made my socks blow off.

Now, I'm not terribly good at shooting games. So I always play these at the easy settings, because I want to be able to get through the game. This one lasts a good amount of time, longer then the original one. I would say about 12 hours and it is a very satisfying length.

There were only two things that bugged me and it's nitpicks.

First: the snow level. It looks awesome, don't get me wrong. But it bugs me (in movies too) when snow isn't cold. SNOW IS EFFING COLD! Yes, Nathan gets a warm coat, but he grabs icy ledges and goes through everything without any mittens! His fingers would have fallen off in the first 5 minutes if it had been real. He wears gloves in one of the levels where there is no snow. Why couldn't he here?

Second : I wish there had been a "classic" Nathan skin. There are tons of unlockable skins, even some from the first game that weren't even characters! (Skeleton Sir Francis Drake?!!) and they can't even do that? Maybe in DLC. One can hope.

I won't be talking about the online portion of the game. Even though it seems hefty and well done, I have no interest in online play. So, I'll leave it to other reviewers to do that.

So, all in all I think it deserves it's title of video game of the year.

On the one hand, I appreciate that it's a big budget game, with oodles of money shelved in by Sony. And it really raises the bar for future video games. But on the other hand, few studios have the resources that this game got and I'm afraid we're going to see little guys being hit hard by the higher standards.

We'll see what the future holds.
I know I'm waiting for Uncharted 3 with great anticipation.