Uncharted 2 Details from Official PlayStation Blog Q&A

[cakefoo]

Thanks to Loudninja for filtering the good questions!

Story
Longer than Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. Over 90 minutes of cinematics alone
Even more dramatic than the last game. Drama, emotions and conflicts between the characters are critical to the story.

Puzzles
Similar number of puzzles as DF
This time it's Nate's journal- not Francis Drake's diary- to assist in puzzle-solving
The player will have to thumb through the pages themselves to suss out the solutions to the problems

Environments
Wider variety of environments: urban areas, ancient temples, jungle swamps to snowy and icy locales, Turkey to Borneo, up to Nepal and into Tibet and the Himalayas.
More problem-solving, figuring out how to navigate environments, and the best approach to different combat set-ups
Snow has gameplay implications when the weather really whips up and visibility becomes an issue
Snow and ice look awesome, footprints will be left, realtime 3D Snow Clump BuildupTM around feet

Combat
Refined grenade-throwing mechanics. Sixaxis optional, but they really enhance it now that there's a dedicated button

Revamped combat, melee and enemy system, with different classes of enemies:

-Lightest classes of enemy will allow you to perform hand to hand combat much the same way it was in Drake's Fortune
-Medium classes will counter your attacks requiring you to dodge before you can finish them off
-Heaviest class won't let you melee them at all!

Details
Players will be matched based on skill rating
No splitscreen, didn't want to compromise visuals
New game modes, maps, and boosters will be shown soon
Already implemented a ton of the features that were requested in the MP beta
Another MP demo before launch, with wider availability than the recent Beta

Coop
At least 2 more cooperative modes coming (that are actually some of Evan Wells' favorite)

Competitive
Several more modes incoming, plus variations of all the competitive modes that focus on specific kinds of weapons

Cinema Mode
Play back any match from any angle
Upload matches to share with other PS3 users
Screenshot sharing

Other Details

Release date is"Fall" but an official date will be announced very soon
Various graphics techniques including screen Space Ambient Occlusion, deferred rendering, cloud computing, paralax mapping, high dynamic range tonemapping, per object motion blur, cascade shadows, sub surface scattering simulation...
Still finalizing Trophy list. Might include a couple of MP trophies, but don't want any that require grinding for kills or wins.

We're very fortunate to have a great group of first party developers within Sony that we're able to collaborate with. We're frequently exchanging technical ideas and even share some code from time to time. We've even posted the entire source code of Uncharted: Drake's Fortune to Sony's internal severers so that any first party developer can look through it, or borrow from it... and we plan on doing the same thing when Uncharted 2 ships. We also have a group of programmers here at Naughty Dog called the ICE team. They've been busy writing highly optimized code for the PS3 for the last 5+ years, and that code has been shared externally with the PS3 dev community in the form of the EDGE libraries.

[FFObsessed]

Nicely done!

Some great info there.

[Kagari]

Being longer than Drake's Fortune makes me happy. Can't wait! My most anticipated game of this year (at least from the west) for sure.

[Guled]

so longer story, but same number puzzles, that worries me. And come on with the no split screen excuse, this gen has really disappointed me with the lack of local MP support. Maybe Nintendo wasn't so dumb when putting aside online MP for the Wii. Other then that the game looks awesome, PS3 GOTY for sure

[Tom Penny]

I like me some snow and footprints

[Valkyr Junkie]

Drake snow angels, or bust!

[2 Minutes Turkish]

I don't know which game will be my game of the generation.

This or Crackdown 2. The idea of either one makes me jizz in my pants.

[Costanza]

Over 90 minutes of cinematics alone

nice

[Dante]

Good Stuff!

[womfalcs3]

Hopefully there is more platforming.

[DevelopmentArrested]

yuck to same number of puzzles. the more platforming and puzzles the better.

[mujun]

Glad it's longer, first was way too short.

[CrushDance]

Glad that somehow finally organized the new info into one place :P

I'm really excited for this game though, especially for the single player and co-op. That's what I loved about UnchartedF and although the multiplayer is great for among thieves, the single/co-op is going to be where I spend most of my time!

And @ Naughty Dog uploading the entire game for other first party studios.

[Sean]

Stupid that they kept the same puzzle system. Reaching a puzzle and then having Nathan take out the diary with a picture of the solution kind of defeats the point.

Environment stuff sounds really nice.

[EXGN]

Any word on any sort of advanced stat tracking? I know the single player capmaign is the focus, but Killzone.com's online stat tracking has spoiled me.

[Prezhulio]

90 minutes of cinematics is soo awesome, i loved the cinematics from uncharted.

[WTFing]

mmmmh.

[DMPrince]

more complex puzzles would be great.

[sillymonkey321]

Snow has gameplay implications when the weather really whips up and visibility becomes an issue

If visibility becomes an issue during combat, pleasssse make it so the enemy has to deal with this too instead of the typical " enemy knows where you are at all times and has perfect aim" like so many games fall back on.

[Shadow780]

Hell yeah!

[rexor0717]

I am excited for the cut scenes! I love cut scenes.

[JayDub]

I am excited for the cut scenes! I love cut scenes.

You're one of the scum that liked MGS4, arent you?

[DemonSwordsman]

You're one of the scum that liked MGS4, arent you?

Yeah one of the millions that love the GOTF

[JayDub]

Yeah one of the millions that love the GOTF

Pooey, scum. Thou shalt not speak unless spoken to!

[Shins]

Difference is Naughty Dog has people who understand how to create good cutscenes, rather than the weeaboo bullshit jerkoff factory that was MGS4.

This or Crackdown 2

[Shadow780]

I am excited for the cut scenes! I love cut scenes.

HIGH FIVE!

[borsdy]

I like the simple multiplayer trophies part.

piss off

[Lightning]

I am excited for the cut scenes! I love cut scenes.

Agreed!

[MrTroubleMaker]

nice!

[WTFing]

more complex puzzles would be great.

yes please

[DevilWillcry]

I honestly wouldn't mind visual compromises in split-screen.

[rexor0717]

You're one of the scum that liked MGS4, arent you?

Yes, I must admit, I loved the MGS4 cutscenes. Although, I didn't watch any of them the second time through the game.

[Grayman]

Game should be really long if it has 90 minutes of cinematics.


^that is an empty threat, not optimism.

[Awntawn]

You're one of the scum that liked MGS4, arent you?

And you're one of the extremely vocal minority that hated it, aren't you?

[G-Bus]

no zombies?

[WTFing]

no zombies?

Never again!

[Adam Prime]

GOTY! Can't wait for this!

[MvmntInGrn]

no zombies?

I sure hope not.

[BruceLeeRoy]

Awesome job Cakefoo. Great details.

[AranhaHunter]

so longer story, but same number puzzles, that worries me. And come on with the no split screen excuse, this gen has really disappointed me with the lack of local MP support. Maybe Nintendo wasn't so dumb when putting aside online MP for the Wii. Other then that the game looks awesome, PS3 GOTY for sure

That was my major complaint with Killzone 2, seems like it'll be my major complaint with Uncharted 2 as well.....

[Replicant]

I hope there's some supernatural element in this one too. Haters will hate that aspect anyway.

[liquidspeed]

more complex puzzles would be great.

better puzzles + 90 minutes of cut scenes YAY AWESOME YAY

[Kaako]

This was helpful cause I didn't have to read the other crap on the blog. Thanks for the thread/info.

[slider]

Oooh... puzzles that you're not spoonfed the answers to (hopefully!).

[Loudninja]

Thanks cakefoo

[rexor0717]

I sure hope not.

I hope they do something else, but have some supernatural element. I may be in the minority, but I like the zombies at the end. Just made it a bit more exciting to play.

[dragonflys545]

Damn, that's some jaw dropping info right there. GOTY for me for sure.

[hukasmokincaterpillar]

More problem-solving, figuring out how to navigate environments, and the best approach to different combat set-ups

Was hoping they'd expand on this tract. We'll see how the puzzles turn out, but they can take full advantage of the first game's fluidity and improve the pacing.

like having to flip through the journal now.

-Medium classes will counter your attacks requiring you to dodge before you can finish them off

That's cool. Think it'll get too predictable if its always one class though.

Various graphics techniques including screen Space Ambient Occlusion, deferred rendering, cloud computing, paralax mapping, high dynamic range tonemapping, per object motion blur, cascade shadows, sub surface scattering simulation...

People forget, this is the first gen ND's worked on a 'traditional' GPU. Caught on quick eh?

[mgviperman]

Sounds good to me!

[Lightning]

Never again!

Maybe not how they were implemented in DF but an enemy that poses the kind of threat that they posed late in the game was welcome. Just killing the same old pirates gets boring, the game needed the change of pace and I welcomed the plot twist as well.