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[Oni Jazar]

I made a short UC4 video that shows the variety and choice that the player has when executing a combat encounter. No real spoiler aside from the simple location. This is on hard difficulty.

(oh and auto-aim off obviously lol)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmhuAOgFI1A

 

[nib95]

I made a short UC4 video that shows the variety and choice that the player has when executing a combat encounter. No real spoiler aside from the simple location. This is on hard difficulty.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmhuAOgFI1A

Nice vid. The diversity of approach and mobility options, along with the sheer fluidity of it all really is unparallelled imo.

 

[SomTervo]

I made a short UC4 video that shows the variety and choice that the player has when executing a combat encounter. No real spoiler aside from the simple location. This is on hard difficulty.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmhuAOgFI1A

Yeah, good.

 

[SwolBro]

in terms of mechanics i never thought so, and after some time with Uncharted 4 i still don't think so. It's greatly improved though, greatly improved from the first game.

 

[Kyleripman]

Well said, OP. Agree on all points.
Even on the remastered difficulty of Brutal, which was generally quite terrible, there is a surprising amount of options when it comes to each encounter.

 

[Comfort Jones]

All I see are more options that make it easier to regenerate your health when I see maps/gameplay design that gives you that much freedom with no real new tools for the enemies to counter what you can do.

 

[dgamer]

the shooting is the least fun part of uncharted 4's amazing single player. which is hilarious because in the multiplayer it feels good.

 

[Creaking]

the shooting is the least fun part of uncharted 4's amazing single player. which is hilarious because in the multiplayer it feels good.

Well multiplayer is 60fps, and players aren't typically as dead-on accurate as AI, nor to they work so frequently in widespread groups.

 

[JB1981]

I made a short UC4 video that shows the variety and choice that the player has when executing a combat encounter. No real spoiler aside from the simple location. This is on hard difficulty.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmhuAOgFI1A

Damn good vid

 

[WrenchNinja]

It doesn't matter if they're pushed or not... they don't have to equally good at both. It certainly wasn't pushed more than the campaign was, just like Uncharted 4's multiplayer isn't. And dropping the multiplayer off three games for a 10 day beta of the next game hardly paints a picture of multiplayer being a pushed mode for the series anyway. Yes, they made NDC for people to catch up on the Uncharted story in preparation for UC4... because that's what the game sells on, just like MGS sells on the strength of its campaigns rather than the strength of the multiplayer... neither series even had multiplayer initially. This isn't intended as a "knock" on Uncharted... it's intended as a defense of MGSV, because the idea that a game doesn't have great gameplay mechanics unless it's popular amongst both SP and MP is fucking ridiculous.

It kind of does though, it shows how invested the teams are with the mode. They dropped the multiplayer off of four and six year old ports. It's kind of ludicrous to expect them to rebuild and have support for the online for port collection. No one said mgsv doesn't have great gameplay, just not good enough tps mechanics enough to attract people to engage with each other. If they were as top tier as you want to believe, people would be all over the mp

 

[213372bu]

Playing through the first Uncharted right now and the game is total bullshit on multiple levels.

Jet ski levels are jank and going against currents is plain unfun.

Enemy encounters can mean instant death, with shotty/turret/etc. literally materializing around pillars with no regard to where you are.

Same goes for the horrible cover system and inability to play this game with "movement"

Guns have no reliable aim even in ads.

Jumping is janky and can mean deaths.

Stealth combo system is a joke.

Apparently 2 and 3 get way better, but all the game is a really poor shooter with questionable platforming, and a run-of-the-mill story held up by godly dialouge and great characters.

 

[Shpeshal Nick]

Having now played all 4, I can say now that 4 has finally corrected everything from the first 3.

SIGNIFICANTLY improved gunplay. I can now consider an Uncharted game a legit third person shooter, which is also why multiplayer is finally good.

Level design is now more reminiscent of the original. Far less funnel-ly.

Much less jank, which means far less jank deaths.

I'm glad I bought 4 digitally. It's a game I'm happy to be permanently tied to.

 

[Fancy Clown]

Playing through the first Uncharted right now and the game is total bullshit on multiple levels.

Jet ski levels are jank and going against currents is plain unfun.

Enemy encounters can mean instant death, with shotty/turret/etc. literally materializing around pillars with no regard to where you are.

Same goes for the horrible cover system and inability to play this game with "movement"

Guns have no reliable aim even in ads.

Jumping is janky and can mean deaths.

Stealth combo system is a joke.

Apparently 2 and 3 get way better, but all the game is a really poor shooter with questionable platforming, and a run-of-the-mill story held up by godly dialouge and great characters.

Don't worry the first game is not great. This thread is definitely not about Drake's Fortune's combat lol

 

[Lys Skygge]

I made a short UC4 video that shows the variety and choice that the player has when executing a combat encounter. No real spoiler aside from the simple location. This is on hard difficulty.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmhuAOgFI1A

That's pretty much how most of my encounters on hard mode played out. Constantly moving and thinking on your feet. Gameplay is fantastic!

 

[Creaking]

That's because Uncharted 4 single player maps are designed for multiplayer.

Which results in a better multiplayer combat experience than singleplayer. Just like The last of us.

???

There's no crossover between the singleplayer and multiplayer maps beyond general setting. Map design is completely different in both.

 

[NullPointer]

Nice vid. The diversity of approach and mobility options, along with the sheer fluidity of it all really is unparallelled imo.

That's pretty much how most of my encounters on hard mode played out. Constantly moving and thinking on your feet. Gameplay is fantastic!

I'd like to see more of these kinds of encounters that don't involve the player going black and white every time they do something cool.

In that video there were two times the screen went black and white, both times based upon using mobility options and the rope, as usual with most of the videos and GIFs that show off the combat. The game negatively reinforces using the coolest elements of the sandbox. Stealth kills and quick hit and run tactics from stealth or outside of anybody's line of sight are the order of the day.

 

[slade]

I agree with the opening but having recently played the collection myself, Uncharted 1's combat just felt better in my opinion. I was getting headshots left and right in that game. In Uncharted 2, 3 and 4, they were a lot more difficult to pull off for some reason.

 

[MaybeBurger]

uncharted is my favourite TPS; i'd agree. I liked Gears 1 too

the latest uncharted with the rope and stealth adds mechanics to the genre currently MIA; there's nothing quite like it

as for the encounter design; nothing beats UC3's cruise ship theatre and the uncharted 2 bit train fight. They're the most memorable to me. People dropping in left right. That helicopter.

 

[213372bu]

Don't worry the first game is not great. This thread is definitely not about Drake's Fortune's combat lol

Thanks for the reassurance, lol.

I love the characters and dialogue that I'm going to tread on through.

 

[JB1981]

I'd like to see more of these kinds of encounters that don't involve the player going black and white every time they do something cool.

In that video there were two times the screen went black and white, both times based upon using mobility options and the rope, as usual with most of the videos and GIFs that show off the combat. The game negatively reinforces using the coolest elements of the sandbox. Stealth kills and quick hit and run tactics from stealth or outside of anybody's line of sight are the order of the day.

What difficulty level do you play

 

[NullPointer]

What difficulty level do you play

Normal. I think - whatever difficulty is just under Hard. (Edit: Moderate)

Even on normal you'll get pinged when swinging around and running between cover points when things have gone loud. As somebody who looks at getting shot and the screen going black and white as a sure sign of the things the game is training you *not* to do I shifted gears.

To avoid getting hit and going black and white you want to whittle down enemies from full stealth. When going loud you want to hide and attack from outside the enemy's line of sight, especially if running across the open or when using the rope. Then you want to break line of sight quickly and reposition for another hit and run from their blind side. That's what the game's feedback trains me to do.

What it isn't tuned for is swinging right into the action and tackling encounters like a Jedi Arnold Schwarzenegger. You'll have a black and white screen in moments unless you've done legwork to set up those specific attacks - and if you're going to go through the trouble its easier just to take the rest of the enemies down in stealth as that's easier the more solider's you've whittled down.

Late game encounters throw you right into the blender though.

 

[Creaking]

Normal. I think - whatever difficulty is just under Hard. (Edit: Moderate)

Even on normal you'll get pinged when swinging around and running between cover points when things have gone loud. As somebody who looks at getting shot and the screen going black and white as a sure sign of the things the game is training you *not* to do I shifted gears.

To avoid getting hit and going black and white you want to whittle down enemies from full stealth. When going loud you want to hide and attack from outside the enemy's line of sight, especially if running across the open or when using the rope. Then you want to break line of sight quickly and reposition for another hit and run from their blind side. That's what the game's feedback trains me to do.

What it isn't tuned for is swinging right into the action and tackling encounters like a Jedi Arnold Schwarzenegger. You'll have a black and white screen in moments unless you've done legwork to set up those specific attacks - and if you're going to go through the trouble its easier just to take the rest of the enemies down in stealth as that's easier the more solider's you've whittled down.

Late game encounters throw you right into the blender though.

I do think it would have been better if the game's enemies became significantly less accurate when you were on the move, especially while swinging from a rope.

 

[SomTervo]

What are they then?

There are guns you can use agains enemies that yuo shot to kill, in U4 and specially TLOU the feel of killing is liek God Tier and instead of giving us more things to kill they give less, how is that making any sense?

Now if they want to stick to their guns and make a walking, character interaction heavy platformer sure they can Im not saying they shouldnt but for fucks sakes put a mode where I can forget all that shit and go and kill things without worry about cutscenes and stuff.

Hence me asking for Horde mode or survival mode where I can play with a coop partner or 4 and just kill things for fun, I know MP is in there but not everyone likes to play with some magic misticals stuff all over, if you tell me there is a classic mode pure ol team deathmatch now I will be pleased.

They're action adventure games. Third-person shooting is one of the five or six ingredients which are mixed and matched, unlike, say Gears of War where the sole ingredient is third-person shooting. Uncharted 4 is one part climbing, one part puzzling, one part platforming, one part third person shooting (with stealth mixed in). To call it just "a third person shooter" is reductive. It has never been 'just a third person shooter', ever since the first game. You're ignoring/passing over the other 3/4 of the experience. (Reductive.)

Also, FYI, there is a mode where you can "forget all that shit and go and kill things without worry about cutscenes and stuff".

It's called multiplayer. (And it's bloody great, FYI. Includes Trials which are like mini horde challenges. And co-op down the road will probably add an actual horde mode like in the previous games (was in UC2 and 3.)

It's likely because you're just more adept at controlling the character, as a result of the time you've spent playing. Much like I don't have any problems choosing with enemy to attack, or running in between hordes in Phantasy Star Online as a result of learned habits. It doesn't mean that there aren't legitimate control issues that the average person will encounter (and you yourself encountered with the original game).

That's a fair enough comment. The game doesn't really explicitly say "1. make sure you point the stick at what you want to take cover behind, and 2. when you roll you're locked into rolling so time it carefully".

I'm aware of both of these facts and it has literally never been an issue for me in Uncharted 4. But where exactly could Naughty Dog convey this message?

Or don't, and just continue to pick them off. Which is what's been working for many of the people that are dying when attempting to be mobile. It's not that you can't be mobile (people tend to be able to speedrun anything for example), the game's just not designed in such a way for it to be conductive to most players' success.

1. You definitely can survive on Hard/Crushing while being mobile, but it's about choosing your opportunities and timing them perfectly. Indeed, however, the game doesn't really tell you that. On Crushing you need to know the mechanics inside and fucking out and pick your moment perfectly, or you'll die.

In other words, you have to be good at the game. Maybe that's why it's the hardest difficulty? Who'd have thought it! You have to be good at the game to get the most out of it on Hard/Crushing! Eureka!

2. The root of this discussion might actually be the classic chicken-egg argument of 'make your own fun'.

If I play on any difficulty, yes, I can stay in cover the entire time and play it like Gears of War. If I want. But that will be missing the point. I would be limiting my own experience and not using the tools at my disposal for my own fun. I have to choose to play with mobility, and by doing so, it becomes one of my favourite action games of all time. If I chose not to play that way and used a reductive Gears-style tactic (which is completely valid re Gears) then I probably wouldn't love UC4's combat.

For instance, I gave Alxjn tips about how to make the game more fun and make crushing a bit easier, and look what happened:

Tried the Water Feature encounter on crushing. Took your advice and used more opprtunities to break line of sight and incorperate stealth into the mix and everything turned out a lot better.

He notes that other fights were still too hard, though. I suppose the point here is that the game could bash you over the head with how to do this stuff, and it could balance the encounters differently so it's easier to play acrobatic/mobile, but it already spends 5-6 hours teaching you all its mechanics. At some point, the player has to take agency for how they will play.

Really now. Could have sworn they controlled in third-person and you shot people with guns in it.

Yeah, like 1/5th of the time.

That's like saying that because there's a 1-hour segment of Shenmue in which you drive a forklift truck, Shenmue is a 'through-and-through forklift truck simulator'.

Morrigan you're clearly either imagining this or need to git gud.

Again, it clearly hasn't been a big enough issue to stop the game getting 90+ reviews in the harshest critical climate we've seen in over a decade.

I'm not saying it's not an issue at all, even though I never experienced it, but I'm saying it's obviously minor. Morrigan seems to have had an exceptionally bad time of it. Pop over to the many-thousand-post-strong OT and see how many people have been complaining about this.

Normal. I think - whatever difficulty is just under Hard. (Edit: Moderate)

Even on normal you'll get pinged when swinging around and running between cover points when things have gone loud. As somebody who looks at getting shot and the screen going black and white as a sure sign of the things the game is training you *not* to do I shifted gears..

It's not training you not to do this. It's just saying "you better break for cover".

It's fine to swing on a rope, pop a few shots/a grenade off, then when the screen starts going grey, drop into cover and regenerate. If you need to rope again, go ahead and do it.

'Death grey' is a temporary thing. It just means 'get some cover and sweat it out, then get back into the fray'.

In my recent battles on Crushing I've been doing a stunt-like-move, getting wounded, rolling into cover and flanking away to recover health, doing another stunt-like-move, getting wounded, rolling away again, repeat, etc.

Basically you get OHK bursts of action where you pull off good moves, and otherwise you keep moving and breaking into stealth so that you can regain health.

It's fun as fuck playing this way. The only encounter I can imagine not abiding by this rule would be the last ones, which are a bit overboard. Haven't reached them on Crushing yet.

 

[Mr.Fletcher]

The one fault you can level against Uncharted's combat is it doesn't build on itself in any meaningful way (until Uncharted 4 at least but more on that later).


In the original Gears of War the golden rule that, cover is king, is established. Enemies take a battering and dish out the pain quickly so you soon learn that cover is your safety zone.

In Gears of War 2, Epic introduced the meat-shield - which not only kills an enemy, but gives the player access to portable cover.

It also introduces a locust shield which allows you to erecte cover where you want. But the catch is, enemies such as the ticker are introduced to get in your face and drive you out of cover.

In Gears of War 3, the mantle kick was created to allow you to be more aggressive in cover. It also introduced the digger, a gun that fires a small locust creature that burrows into the ground and pops up behind cover, to flush enemies (and the player) out.

It also brought in the lambent enemies, which can not only shoot over cover but evolve if you don't kill them quick enough and hunt you down behind cover.

Gears of War 4 introduces the ability to pull people out of cover and seamlessly mantle cover into a kick - BUT both of these can be countered. It's risk/reward mechanic.

That's the beauty of Gears of War, it builds on itself and adds more and more options as each game progresses. Every new mechanic and every new weapon centres around cover and how you interact with it.


Uncharted doesn't build on itself in a similar way. Being able to shoot and hang was a big addition in UC2, it allowed you to remain aggressive while on the move.

But UC3 regressed by giving you the ability to throw back a grenade completely negating your need to keep moving.

What saves UC4 is it's extremely open combat zones with multiple points of attack, a simple but satisfying stealth system and the rope. The rope is a great addition because it changes traversal and adds more options in combat. It moves the core combat forward in a good way.

However, I do think your lack of health works directly against using it and moving around in general.


Now before I get mobbed, I'm well aware one is a sci-if shooter and then other is an action adventure game with a more grounded world.

I'm not comparing the mechanics because they are totally different games, merely the rate of progression and how they have evolved. UC has more strings to its bow too, so the combat doesn't have to be super deep.

I'm not sure how you'd mix up and add to UC's combat and I'll be clear, I really enjoy it in UC4 specifically, but it would have been cool to see it evolve more.

 

[Synth]

It kind of does though, it shows how invested the teams are with the mode. They dropped the multiplayer off of four and six year old ports. It's kind of ludicrous to expect them to rebuild and have support for the online for port collection. No one said mgsv doesn't have great gameplay, just not good enough tps mechanics enough to attract people to engage with each other. If they were as top tier as you want to believe, people would be all over the mp

How invested the team were with the mode is irrelevant. You're saying that if the mechanics are good then people will play it in multi. The developers intentions have nothing to do with that. So, if Streets of Rage 2 has good mechanics then people should want to "engage with each other" in its versus mode. Nothing to do with marketing, or the intentions of the developer, etc. You're appending additional qualifiers, because your base argument is flawed. What you're saying, actually implies that you can make the core gameplay of game worse simply buy adding an additional mode. So you take something where the core mechanics are considered basically flawless (let's say Resi 4 or Mario 64) and if you add a multiplayer mode that doesn't take off, then those exact same core mechanics suddenly become less great in their original context... because that's basically what's happening with MGSV, the series didn't use to have a multiplayer at all, and when it was added they didn't change the game's core mechanics in order for it to better suit PvP (which would typically come at the expense of it's PvE gameplay)... so now MGSV has worse core gameplay than it would have been considered having, simply buy not having a multiplayer mode at all? It's ridiculous.

BTW, I don't "want to believe" anything about MGSV's gameplay. I've owned the game since near launch, but have only played slightly over an hour of it. I'm not even really a fan of the series. I'd make this same argument about ANY game, because it's a generic argument, where you're claiming two things I strongly disagree with. 1) That great mechanics must be great for both SP and MP simultaneously, and 2) That the quality of gameplay mechanics can be measured by popularity. The second implication is actually more annoying than the first, and can pretty much be used to argue that every FPS is inferior to CoD for core mechanics, and every TPS is inferior to GTA. Games can have absolutely fucking amazing gameplay mechanics and not gain popularity for a multitude of other reasons (e.g. Virtua Fighter).

I'm done with this argument though. Believe whatever you want. It's not worth my time anymore, and is off-topic at this point.

That's a fair enough comment. The game doesn't really explicitly say "1. make sure you point the stick at what you want to take cover behind, and 2. when you roll you're locked into rolling so time it carefully".

I'm aware of both of these facts and it has literally never been an issue for me in Uncharted 4. But where exactly could Naughty Dog convey this message?

1. You definitely can survive on Hard/Crushing while being mobile, but it's about choosing your opportunities and timing them perfectly. Indeed, however, the game doesn't really tell you that. On Crushing you need to know the mechanics inside and fucking out and pick your moment perfectly, or you'll die.

In other words, you have to be good at the game. Maybe that's why it's the hardest difficulty? Who'd have thought it! You have to be good at the game to get the most out of it on Hard/Crushing! Eureka!

2. The root of this discussion might actually be the classic chicken-egg argument of 'make your own fun'.

If I play on any difficulty, yes, I can stay in cover the entire time and play it like Gears of War. If I want. But that will be missing the point. I would be limiting my own experience and not using the tools at my disposal for my own fun. I have to choose to play with mobility, and by doing so, it becomes one of my favourite action games of all time. If I chose not to play that way and used a reductive Gears-style tactic (which is completely valid re Gears) then I probably wouldn't love UC4's combat.

It's not a case of telling the user "be more mobile". This isn't a "git gud" scenario. As I said before, if you're good enough basically any game allows the player to be mobile (including Gears btw, seeing as you're making the somewhat hypocritical implication that you're forced to remain in cover in that game... maybe you're just not good enough at it?). Quite a few pages back Fancy Clown posted a video of his mobility during the Borneo level of UC2, where he almost died numerous times (on Normal) attempting to make the fight as dynamic as possible to demonstrate why the mechanics encourage mobility. I responded to him:

In the Borneo example (as I actually have played that one).. the top of the house where you got that RL is the best spot. nobody's flanking you, you'll never be surprised by a new enemy on the turret (and the turret shooter will fire left if you sit in cover for a few seconds, letting you kill the guy with a single pistol shot), you can kill everyone from this one spot whilst being basically untouchable. You chose to jump down after firing the rocket launcher in order to combat enemies that you could have comfortably shot with a pistol from where you already were. This is what then leads to all the other surprises during the encounter. You're the random variable.

I've also done similar comparisons in other situations on higher difficulties, and come out with similar results. This isn't me needing to get better at playing the game. I am playing it well at this point. How do I know? Because I'm playing by its rules and winning. I could certainly run out there and sabotage myself, leading to numerous deaths until I master a riskier alternative way of progressing, but to claim that it should be required of me, basically amount to saying "throws are cheap" in a fighter. It's the responsibility of the encounter design, and gameplay mechanics to necessitate that I move around the arena more. I should be dying for my conservative movement, not rewarded for it. I've always found "make your own fun" to be a rubbish defense of a game's mechanics, because it can again be applied to pretty much any game, and is basically asking the player to fill the role that the designers should have done for them, by imposing fictional rules upon themselves like "don't stay behind cover too long" just to try and extract enjoyment out of the game.

I look at Oni Jazar's vid at the top of the page, and I'm just like "why wouldn't you have just shot all those other enemies that you clearly had line of sight on at the start?" Instead of killing like 7 of them there and then, he shoots one, and then starts running around the area, seemingly aimlessly, and losing track of where the remaining enemies are whilst soaking up a load of bullets... all to end the minute plus video with a kill count of about 7. Sure, make your own fun and all... but I'm certainly not seeing anything in that vid that tells me that approach is a good idea, and I wouldn't consider myself to be playing better by approximating it.

You should required to be good at the game to "succeed" on hard/crushing, and that success should require you to make extensive use of the game's moveset. It shouldn't only require that level of skill and dedicating for it not to be boring. I've had similar discussions regarding vanilla Destiny... if the game's rewarding you with success for playing it in a more boring manner, then it's on the designers, not the player.

 

[SomTervo]

The one fault you can level against Uncharted's combat is it doesn't build on itself in any meaningful way (until Uncharted 4 at least but more on that later).


In the original Gears of War the golden rule that, cover is king, is established. Enemies take a battering and dish out the pain quickly so you soon learn that cover is your safety zone.

In Gears of War 2, Epic introduced the meat-shield - which not only kills an enemy, but gives the player access to portable cover.

Again, comparing a series which is not a through-and-through third-person shooter (Uncharted) to a series that is a through-and-through third-person shooter (Gears).

Apples and oranges, mate.

Well. Apples and a fruit salad which consists in part of apples.

 

[Curufinwe]

The one fault you can level against Uncharted's combat is it doesn't build on itself in any meaningful way (until Uncharted 4 at least but more on that later).


In the original Gears of War the golden rule that, cover is king, is established. Enemies take a battering and dish out the pain quickly so you soon learn that cover is your safety zone.

Enemies in Gears can one hit kill while you're in cover with explosive arrows.

And the checkpoints were the least well placed of any game I played in 360/PS3 generation.

 

[SomTervo]

It's not a case of telling the user "be more mobile". This isn't a "git gud" scenario. o demonstrate why the mechanics encourage mobility. I responded to him:

You know I said "git gud" once, and as a joke, right? I even posted right after in response saying it was tongue in cheek. I only argued 'you're playing it wrong' in response to the 'the cover button doesn't work' argument, which has never been a problem for me and I've sunk probably around a hundred hours into these games in total, and clearly wasn't a problem for any reviewers (perhaps one who was cited in here, but I think I'm imagining that).

Also do you not realise that I was agreeing with you there? I was saying that they need to tell their users how to get the most enjoyment out of the game, esp on Hard/Crushing (the answer being to be more mobile). Not a case of skill or 'winning', but enjoying the game, which is an argument you brought up. The "it's for less capable players to enjoy the game" line.

As I said before, if you're good enough basically any game allows the player to be mobile (including Gears btw, seeing as you're making the somewhat hypocritical implication that you're forced to remain in cover in that game... maybe you're just not good enough at it?).

Wait... Wait, what?

First off, you're still harping on my 'git gud' joke which - big hint - wasn't serious.

And secondly, I can't think of any encounters on Gears which would be easy (and many which are impossible) without using cover. That's literally the game's entire schtick. You get in cover, you move from cover to cover, you occasionally make rushes for CQC. It's great, but cover is the basis of the entire thing. Unlike Uncharted where it's possible to use cover for 4 or 5 seconds total in an entire 5-minute gunfight. (On Hard/Crushing you're need more cover, but still not as much as comparable in Gears.)

Quite a few pages back Fancy Clown posted a video of his mobility during the Borneo level of UC2, where he almost died numerous times (on Normal) attempting to make the fight as dynamic as possible t

I've also done similar comparisons in other situations on higher difficulties, and come out with similar results. This isn't me needing to get better at playing the game. I am playing it well at this point. How do I know? Because I'm playing by its rules and winning. I could certainly run out there and sabotage myself, leading to numerous deaths until I master a riskier alternative way of progressing, but to claim that it should be required of me, basically amount to saying "throws are cheap" in a fighter. It's the responsibility of the encounter design, and gameplay mechanics to necessitate that I move around the arena more. I should be dying for my conservative movement, not rewarded for it. I've always found "make your own fun" to be a rubbish defense of a game's mechanics, because it can again be applied to pretty much any game, and is basically asking the player to fill the role that the designers should have done for them, by imposing fictional rules upon themselves like "don't stay behind cover too long" just to try and extract enjoyment out of the game.

You seem to have taken 'git gud' as my entire schtick. It's not.

The point isn't that you should play better. Obviously you can find that Borneo safe spot and turtle all you want. The point is that you should play differently to enjoy the combat more. And at the peak of that is the fact that on Hard/Crushing you can still pull off acrobatics - and they're more enjoyable than ever because there's so much pressure/intensity.

But how about the post-train-crash arena in Uncharted 2? Not a single turtling spot in there. On Crushing the guys will patrol until they find you. They can climb, so they can climb up to where you are and flank you. Later, the shotgun guys will flank you, and are heavily armoured, so put you under even more pressure. There is no safe spot. I definitely feel like Uncharted 4's AI does a good job of this. In the Scotland cliff fight I decided to play it from cover for a while and I had to rush out of cover three times when light enemies came out of the brush to flank me. I still dispatched them, but I couldn't just stand still. There was no safe spot.

You should required to be good at the game to "succeed" on hard/crushing, and that success should require you to make extensive use of the game's moveset. It shouldn't only require that level of skill and dedicating for it not to be boring. I've had similar discussions regarding vanilla Destiny... if the game's rewarding you with success for playing it in a more boring manner, then it's on the designers, not the player.

I haven't finished UC4 on Hard/Crushing yet (only Moderate), but in Uncharted 2 (which is the closest in terms of gameplay) you absolutely did have to be good at the game to succeed. I imagine the same will be true of the last fights in UC4.

But that's basically a different argument altogether, coming out of nowhere.

I fail to see how this is in any fucking way, in any universe or on any dimension, similar to Destiny. Even sitting behind cover and pop-n-shooting bad guys is more fun in Uncharted 4 than doing the same thing in Destiny was.

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

Absolutely fucking not. Bullet sponge enemies and weak-feeling guns do not make for a good TPS. And the first 3 Uncharted games are basically a prime example of why people are kinda sick of cover shooters... there's not much to it beyond hiding behind conveniently-placed objects, rinsing, and repeating. They actively discourage you from running out to go fuck dudes up.

Terrible, terrible shooters.

*Disclaimer: I haven't played 4.

 

[staticneuron]

Uncharted doesn't build on itself in a similar way. Being able to shoot and hang was a big addition in UC2, it allowed you to remain aggressive while on the move.

But UC3 regressed by giving you the ability to throw back a grenade completely negating your need to keep moving.

What saves UC4 is it's extremely open combat zones with multiple points of attack, a simple but satisfying stealth system and the rope. The rope is a great addition because it changes traversal and adds more options in combat. It moves the core combat forward in a good way.

However, I do think your lack of health works directly against using it and moving around in general.

Iirc the enemies flank you in UC3 staying in one spot wouldn't help you. You just would eventually have to deal with more than you should be able to handle.

Imo, I agree with OP because UC2 borke me out of thinking this game was sit behind cover (which you could do in most TPS's) into being more aggressive and moving around.

Absolutely fucking not. Bullet sponge enemies and weak-feeling guns do not make for a good TPS. And the first 3 Uncharted games are basically a prime example of why people are kinda sick of cover shooters... there's not much to it beyond hiding behind conveniently-placed objects, rinsing, and repeating. They actively discourage you from running out to go fuck dudes up.

Terrible, terrible shooters.

*Disclaimer: I haven't played 4.

The op even put videos up. I wonder how people even survive the encounter in UC3 without moving. The game encourages you to move and gives you many reasons to move. I have no idea what you mean by actively discouraging because everything I played has been the opposite.

EDIT: I am excluding the first uncharted, there was some area's in which being to active was the death of you. Thankfully I do not see that repeated in the sequels.

2nd Edit: Now that I am reading more of this thread, the question I should aim towards people framing Uncharted as cover play and then taking offense to people describing "how they played", how would you react to someone who called Dark Souls game boring because most enemies they kill to level up they killed with arrows? Just because you "can" play a game a certain way, doesn't mean that it was intended.

 

[Nozem]

the shooting is the least fun part of uncharted 4's amazing single player. which is hilarious because in the multiplayer it feels good.

Eh, I like the shooting the best. Climbing stuff gets really boring gameplay wise, shooting is always fun.

 

[Danny Dudekisser]

2nd Edit: Now that I am reading more of this thread, the question I should aim towards people framing Uncharted as cover play and then taking offense to people describing "how they played", how would you react to someone who called Dark Souls game boring because most enemies they kill to level up they killed with arrows? Just because you "can" play a game a certain way, doesn't mean that it was intended.

The point is that the games feel designed to discourage you from moving out of cover for any length of time. Like, if you watch the video of Uncharted 2 the OP posted, the two times he gets close enough to a guy to do a melee attack, he nearly died because the movement is so damn sluggish.

And either way, I hardly think people aren't playing a cover based shooter the way it's intended if they're using cover. Why else would they put so much of it in the game?

 

[Mr.Fletcher]

Again, comparing a series which is not a through-and-through third-person shooter (Uncharted) to a series that is a through-and-through third-person shooter (Gears).

Apples and oranges, mate.

Well. Apples and a fruit salad which consists in part of apples.

Completely agree matey.

I hope that come across in my post too, because mechanically they are totally different and exists at opposite ends of the spectrum.

 

[ghibli99]

2nd Edit: Now that I am reading more of this thread, the question I should aim towards people framing Uncharted as cover play and then taking offense to people describing "how they played", how would you react to someone who called Dark Souls game boring because most enemies they kill to level up they killed with arrows? Just because you "can" play a game a certain way, doesn't mean that it was intended.

What I don't understand is why folks get so bent out of shape if others play a game differently. If someone wants to go through Demon's Souls with just magic and then at the end say that it was boring/easy, so what? This desire to assert something as the be-all, end-all definitive way to play/enjoy a game is annoying. I loved UC4, but I didn't love the combat. The game is still one of the best I've played this year, but it gets old when a certain subsection of the community has to go out of their way to somehow disprove and invalidate those feelings/opinions, usually in patronizing ways. Guess that's the internet, though.

 

[SomTervo]

Absolutely fucking not. Bullet sponge enemies and weak-feeling guns do not make for a good TPS. And the first 3 Uncharted games are basically a prime example of why people are kinda sick of cover shooters... there's not much to it beyond hiding behind conveniently-placed objects, rinsing, and repeating. They actively discourage you from running out to go fuck dudes up.

Terrible, terrible shooters.

*Disclaimer: I haven't played 4.

Enjoy reading the OP yeah?

This reads like a response to the thread title and nothing else

Completely agree matey.

I hope that come across in my post too, because mechanically they are totally different and exists at opposite ends of the spectrum.

Ah, I didn't pick up on it. There was someone a while back comparing them directly and unfavourably towards Uncharted

Fair play brohammed the prophet!

The point is that the games feel designed to discourage you from moving out of cover for any length of time. Like, if you watch the video of Uncharted 2 the OP posted, the two times he gets close enough to a guy to do a melee attack, he nearly died because the movement is so damn sluggish.

And either way, I hardly think people aren't playing a cover based shooter the way it's intended if they're using cover. Why else would they put so much of it in the game?

I don't see it as much as 'you're discouraged to move out of cover' but that 'your time is limited when out of cover/stealth, so make it count'.

Because if you pull of acrobatic/stuntman moves on the harder difficulties it feels about a billion more times more thrilling than it does on Moderate because you're actually hanging on by the skin of your teeth. It's so thrilling. Sure, you spend a lot of time with a grey screen, but it's worth it, because you capture that pure Uncharted essence of "fuck that was close, but I pulled it off".

 

[Mr.Fletcher]

Ah, I didn't pick up on it. There was someone a while back comparing them directly and unfavourably towards Uncharted

Fair play brohammed the prophet!

No worries.

I'll quote myself from the other page.

Gears of War, Uncharted, Metal Gear Solid, Vanquish, Max Payne - they are all doing different things. Some are pure shooters, some are action-adventure games with shooting elements, some are something else entirely.

None of them feel the same and none of them play the same, but that's by design.

Uncharted 4 feels great but it's going after something totally different to the rest.

People who want more heft in Uncharted and people who want more verticality in Gears don't understand what makes those games work in the first place.

*Tips hat*

I'll see you in the UC4 OT.

 

[Sayad]

If you approach Ucharted 4 as a shooter, shooting isn't the problem, I think it was great, the problem is the dead time between encounters. I enjoyed the game, but I can see why anyone who didn't like the story/characters or just want the play the game as a shooter would end up hating it.

 

[Synth]

.

I probably shouldn't have used quotes on the "git gud"... I wasn't actually implying that to be a direct quote from you (and in fact, I had to run a search for where you said that phrase exactly, as I was confused by what you were even referring to). I focused my post on that aspect, because it was essentially the entire point of your previous reply. To be more exact, you stated (and even bolded and italic'ed):

In other words, you have to be good at the game. Maybe that's why it's the hardest difficulty? Who'd have thought it! You have to be good at the game to get the most out of it on Hard/Crushing! Eureka!

You know what this essentially translates as? Yup... "git gud". It's just been stated in a more descriptive manner. You claim for it not to be serious, but it is actually forming the basis of your argument against people's complaints about the game.

I think you're misunderstanding me somewhat here, as you believe you're agreeing with me in regards to the controls and playstyle, but we don't actually agree at all. Whereas you believe the developers should have done more to educate the player on the nuances of the cover controls, or how to be more mobile without getting killed... I'm saying that the game should have instead been designed so these controls issues simply wouldn't be encountered by anyone in the first place, and that being mobile shouldn't require a level of mastery significantly higher than remaining primarily in cover. If mobility is the way the game is designed to be played, then it should offer the path of least resistance... but it doesn't, and so many players are naturally inclined to play the game in a manner more similar to how they'd play Gears, because like Gears it results in them seeing more success.

Now, I agree that this is Gears' entire schtick. I wasn't suggesting that running around in the open will end well for pretty much anyone playing Gears, ever... however, at a certain level of mastery for the controls, and knowledge of the encounters and enemy behaviours, you can implement quite a large degree of movement into your combat in Gears, so long as you:

1) Wait for the correct opportunity
2) Pick some guys off
3) Leap at your chance for some acrobatics (which in Gears case admittedly only really consists of some roadie running and dodge rolling).

Basically the same steps you advise someone to employ for Uncharted. You'd have even more trouble implementing this in Gears, yes... but you still can. However, much like Uncharted, doing so successfully without getting yourself murdered is significantly more difficult than the more conservative approach of remaining in the safest spot you can find until you're either forced from it by the enemy, have no clear line of sight on the enemy, or need a resource located somewhere else on the field. Outside of these cases, employing unnecessary movement only increases the variables that can lead to your death.

I didn't cherry pick the Borneo fight myself. It was a scenario Fancy Clown had selected, and claimed punished attempts at turtling. I was simply describing how it really didn't (like much of the game doesn't). I do actually remember the post-train crash area standing out as being different in this regards... but it stood out because it was probably the only area of the game that I noticed that the encounter design had been set up to effectively discourage remaining in one area, unlike say something like Resident Evil 4 or Halo where my mind doesn't go to any particular encounter for this reason, because it's something the encounter design throughout the game in general does a good job of promoting. These are situations where the gameplay is dynamic because the encounter design is forcing it... not because the player is simply choosing to find a way to make it work, because they'd be bored otherwise. If the entirety of Uncharted fit this example (and hey, maybe UC4 does...), then we wouldn't even be having this discussion.

And feel free to disregard the aside I made about Destiny. I wasn't trying to claim they're similar (there are very few games with encounter design that I'd rate a low as Destiny). It was just that this discussion reminded me of ones I was having regarding Destiny where some people were claiming that we where making the encounters boring for ourselves, because we weren't going out there and risking death in the middle of the battlefield, in order to make it more thrilling... whilst we were arguing that the game should have then been designed to make that the more successful tactic instead, then we'd be doing it and rating the game more highly.

 

[BouncyFrag]

If you approach Ucharted 4 as a shooter, shooting isn't the problem, I think it was great, the problem is the dead time between encounters. I enjoyed the game, but I can see why anyone who didn't like the story/characters or just want the play the game as a shooter would end up hating it.

I was having a great time with the combat later in the game because I was running around mixing things up but the over long traversal areas really killed the momentum such as getting through the flooded ruins.

 

[Deleted member 17706]

I absolutely loathed the combat in 3. It was just pure frustration. I felt like I could never tell from where I was being shot. The shooting controls didn't feel good, either.

I loved Uncharted 2, though. For whatever reason, that game just really clicked with me and I ended up Platinuming it. The combat in Uncharted 4 seems quite good so far (up to chapter 10), but I'm feeling a bit of "wonkiness" with the controls already. One specific thing that stands out to me is that the reticle never quite appears where I expect it to when I press L2 to aim. This means that I have to press L2, then adjust my aim (while getting shot), then take the shot before going back into cover. I never had this problem in UC2, but it was massive in UC3 and seems to still be present in UC4.

 

[Curufinwe]

Absolutely fucking not. Bullet sponge enemies and weak-feeling guns do not make for a good TPS. And the first 3 Uncharted games are basically a prime example of why people are kinda sick of cover shooters...

Don't say "people" to try and disguise your personal opinion as a broad trend.

 

[Exploratory]

if the base mechanics make it such an amazing tps then surely people would be all over the multiplayer wouldn't they

Um...no? Balance is almost bad as Uncharted MP, it has horrible lag issues, map design is questionable, and even getting into a game is difficult. It also has a lack of modes a poor upgrade system etc etc I mean the list doesn't end. Good base mechanics can't save that game.

 

[ForsakenLotus]

I feel like the best TPS usually do a better job with the bullet sponginess of enemies without sacrificing the satisfaction of a headshot. I get that Uncharted has other things going for it like the vertical play spaces and platforming integrated into combat (a particular favorite); but at the end of the day most people aren't confident enough, creative enough or skilled enough to really explore Uncharted's combat system the way you say it's meant to be played.

So most people are going to be playing it like a cover based shooter, and to some degree platforming and darting around. Is it the wrong way to be played? Possibly. But it's the base gameplay and the game allows for that with its design. And with this understanding, the bullet sponge enemies and waves of enemies is definitely a valid criticism, although personally I think it's overstated and to those who say Uncharted's gameplay is poor overvalued.

I think Uncharted, especially 2-4, are very good TPS from a combat mechanic. They certainly aren't any worse than average even for the most well versed shooter fan.

 

[Morrigan Stark]

How invested the team were with the mode is irrelevant. You're saying that if the mechanics are good then people will play it in multi. The developers intentions have nothing to do with that. So, if Streets of Rage 2 has good mechanics then people should want to "engage with each other" in its versus mode. Nothing to do with marketing, or the intentions of the developer, etc. You're appending additional qualifiers, because your base argument is flawed. What you're saying, actually implies that you can make the core gameplay of game worse simply buy adding an additional mode. So you take something where the core mechanics are considered basically flawless (let's say Resi 4 or Mario 64) and if you add a multiplayer mode that doesn't take off, then those exact same core mechanics suddenly become less great in their original context... because that's basically what's happening with MGSV, the series didn't use to have a multiplayer at all, and when it was added they didn't change the game's core mechanics in order for it to better suit PvP (which would typically come at the expense of it's PvE gameplay)... so now MGSV has worse core gameplay than it would have been considered having, simply buy not having a multiplayer mode at all? It's ridiculous.

BTW, I don't "want to believe" anything about MGSV's gameplay. I've owned the game since near launch, but have only played slightly over an hour of it. I'm not even really a fan of the series. I'd make this same argument about ANY game, because it's a generic argument, where you're claiming two things I strongly disagree with. 1) That great mechanics must be great for both SP and MP simultaneously, and 2) That the quality of gameplay mechanics can be measured by popularity. The second implication is actually more annoying than the first, and can pretty much be used to argue that every FPS is inferior to CoD for core mechanics, and every TPS is inferior to GTA. Games can have absolutely fucking amazing gameplay mechanics and not gain popularity for a multitude of other reasons (e.g. Virtua Fighter).

I'm done with this argument though. Believe whatever you want. It's not worth my time anymore, and is off-topic at this point.

It's not a case of telling the user "be more mobile". This isn't a "git gud" scenario. As I said before, if you're good enough basically any game allows the player to be mobile (including Gears btw, seeing as you're making the somewhat hypocritical implication that you're forced to remain in cover in that game... maybe you're just not good enough at it?). Quite a few pages back Fancy Clown posted a video of his mobility during the Borneo level of UC2, where he almost died numerous times (on Normal) attempting to make the fight as dynamic as possible to demonstrate why the mechanics encourage mobility. I responded to him:

I've also done similar comparisons in other situations on higher difficulties, and come out with similar results. This isn't me needing to get better at playing the game. I am playing it well at this point. How do I know? Because I'm playing by its rules and winning. I could certainly run out there and sabotage myself, leading to numerous deaths until I master a riskier alternative way of progressing, but to claim that it should be required of me, basically amount to saying "throws are cheap" in a fighter. It's the responsibility of the encounter design, and gameplay mechanics to necessitate that I move around the arena more. I should be dying for my conservative movement, not rewarded for it. I've always found "make your own fun" to be a rubbish defense of a game's mechanics, because it can again be applied to pretty much any game, and is basically asking the player to fill the role that the designers should have done for them, by imposing fictional rules upon themselves like "don't stay behind cover too long" just to try and extract enjoyment out of the game.

I look at Oni Jazar's vid at the top of the page, and I'm just like "why wouldn't you have just shot all those other enemies that you clearly had line of sight on at the start?" Instead of killing like 7 of them there and then, he shoots one, and then starts running around the area, seemingly aimlessly, and losing track of where the remaining enemies are whilst soaking up a load of bullets... all to end the minute plus video with a kill count of about 7. Sure, make your own fun and all... but I'm certainly not seeing anything in that vid that tells me that approach is a good idea, and I wouldn't consider myself to be playing better by approximating it.

You should required to be good at the game to "succeed" on hard/crushing, and that success should require you to make extensive use of the game's moveset. It shouldn't only require that level of skill and dedicating for it not to be boring. I've had similar discussions regarding vanilla Destiny... if the game's rewarding you with success for playing it in a more boring manner, then it's on the designers, not the player.

Fantastic post. Pretty much agreed with everything.

I will say, it's OK to suggest to someone who isn't having fun, "try playing it <this way> instead", assuming <this way> is a viable alternative of course. But you are right that if the game doesn't encourage <this way> so well, it's a problem in the game's fault.

 

[NullPointer]

My wish list for changes to UC4's combat: (AI changes really.)

* Give the players a defensive buff / (or AI accuracy debuff if you prefer) when running, jumping, swinging, and engaging in melee. Front load this buff for when the player begins their run, jump, swing, etc, and have its defensive bonus degrade quickly over time. Cool down the buff when the player enters cover or when the enemies lose track of them.

* Firing from cover should also offer up more protection than it does now. Popping out to fire a single burst or a few pistol shots still gets you dinged from enemies far too quickly and too often.

* Don't have enemy AI fire on the player when that player is already engaged in melee with one that AI's allies. This happens way too much, and doesn't make any sense ta boot. If enemies aren't supposed to give a shit about their nominal allies, limit that kind of fucked up friendly fire stuff for heavies or other mini-boss types.

With these changes the tilt of the combat's risk/reward would shift from only incentivizing stealth and hit and run tactics, to incentivizing stealth and mobility and outlandish Hollywood moves. It'd feel more Uncharted imho.

 

[Daffy Duck]

I just started 3 last night, and I cannot say I love the floaty controls when using a gun, I swear 2 felt tighter than this.

The movement also seems a little off too for me, whether that's an adjustment period that is needed from me after playing CoD before I don't know.

 

[Wink]

I think UC4's combat doesn't hold a candle against TLOU.

I guess the combat AI is good enough, there's flanking and grenades to flush you out of cover, the usual, while the stealth AI is just atrocious and really takes me out of the game.
And something just feels off, I get that it's all about agility and supposed to play faster, which has its moments, but after clearing out an area I don't feel the satisfaction like in their previous game.

Maybe it's me since TLOU played like puzzle solving while this is far more chaotic, but normally I'm down for that as well.
Simply spoken from a mechanical perspective, I don't agree that one could hail UC as the shining example of TPS gameplay.

 

[Gbraga]

I wish the developers stuck to validating that more mobile playstyle when designing the harder difficulties because Crushing will often penalise you for moving around (or maybe devs didn't test the highest difficulties to still be fun). Sure they might try to flush you with grenades but often you can just move to the next piece of cover and get back to stop-and-pop. They tried to make it harder for Uncharted 4 Crushing by taking away the ability to throw back grenades. This is a contrast to a recent TPS, Quantum Break, where on the hardest difficulty, you are forced to be more mobile or you're dead and are made less vulnerable when moving around. While in Uncharted 4, you're more vulnerable to shots such as when rope-swinging (i.e. negating the cinematic action hero feel with bullets whizzing past him).

I agree that Naughty Dog is kind of terrible at difficulty balancing. Survivor in The Last of Us is also less fun than Hard, in my opinion, because the lack of resources means you can't craft nearly as many stuff to use in combat, but the NPCs giving you bullets when you need them will guarantee you almost always can shoot at enemies. It becomes more boring, imo. It's doable, it's not cheap or anything, but Hard felt much better. And I feel the same about any Uncharted game.

But at least on Hard, being very mobile is definitely rewarded, in my opinion. And in Uncharted 4, it's pretty much required. They made it not only a fun way to play the game but not encouraged, they made it necessary to stay alive.

Uncharted 4 on Hard is fantastic.

 

[1.21Gigawatts]

I think UC4's combat doesn't hold a candle against TLOU.

Its very different in some regards and very similar in others. But I wouldn't say combat in TLoU is better, its just more intense.

Stealth is actually pretty similar, minus the throwing stuff to lure enemy to certain spots. Here is a short clip I recorded of stealth gameplay.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5l7Qof4ugU

Not in the clip: Blowing enemies up with grenades from cover. Insanely fun, especially since you seem them panic a little when they see their buddies flying through the air and they don't know where it came from

Non stealth gameplay in Uncharted benefits from great level design. Jumping, rolling, climbing and swinging around in a very vertical level makes for highly dynamic gameplay and allows for epic kills when you are good at it.
TLoU on the other hand has simpler level design, but benefits from different enemy types(infected and humans), each encounters have very different gameplay, mainly because infected don't shoot and just rush you once they spotted you.

 

[Magic Mushroom]

Its very different in some regards and very similar in others. But I wouldn't say combat in TLoU is better, its just more intense.

Stealth is actually pretty similar, minus the throwing stuff to lure enemy to certain spots. Here is a short clip I recorded of stealth gameplay.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5l7Qof4ugU

Not in the clip: Blowing enemies up with grenades from cover. Insanely fun, especially since you seem them panic a little when they see their buddies flying through the air and they don't know where it came from

Non stealth gameplay in Uncharted benefits from great level design. Jumping, rolling, climbing and swinging around in a very vertical level makes for highly dynamic gameplay and allows for epic kills when you are good at it.
TLoU on the other hand has simpler level design, but benefits from different enemy types(infected and humans), each encounters have very different gameplay, mainly because infected don't shoot and just rush you once they spotted you.

Yeah, if anything UC4's combat is a lot moe dynamic, simply because Nate is a way moreversatile character. Joel can't jump, climb, slide and swing and the level design in TLoU is less vertical.

In terms of actual systems, they're very different and I wouldn't even call TLoU a TPS, especially on higher difficulties where ammo is really sparse. Stealth and melee are way more effective.