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NaughtyDog: Uncharted was once fantasy, Sony wanted a more gritty/realistic direction

N

Nirolak

Mrgrgr
I felt this was a fairly interesting revelation about Sony's direction shift this generation.

We knew that their studios as a whole were going for a more realistic direction, but I think this is the first time someone has directly attributed it to Sony.

NowGamer said:
Uncharted has become the series it is today thanks to Sony feeling pressure from the success of Xbox with its 'gritty shooters', an ex-Naughty Dog developer has revealed.

Talking exclusively to Play, Don Poole, former Environment Modeller at Naughty Dog, explains how Uncharted: Drake's Fortune was originally a 'fantasy' game until orders came from Sony to make it more 'realistic'.

"We were talking about a more 'realistic' game in terms of how it was modelled and rendered but the concepts were much more far out. One was a forest world where the antagonists lived underground," explained Poole.

"It had elements of Tolkien in for sure. Sony kept pushing for a more realistic game in all respects. The market had changed a lot by then. The demographic was older and gritty shooters were really dominating. Sony wanted very much to get into that market share, it pushed all of its developers in this direction."

"So the big push from Sony, not just at Naughty Dog but at all of Sony's development companies at the time, was to craft games for PlayStation 3 that were much more realistic. The pressure from Xbox's success with gritty shooters was a very real force on our direction at that time."

We had a lot of internal grumbling about the realist bent. More of the old dogs were from the Crash and Jak era and preferred that more whimsical style. But alas, that was a losing battle."

For more on the secret story of Uncharted: Drake's Fortune's development, including the content that was cut, the worries over Nathan Drake's character and how the team celebrated, check out issue 209 of Play, available here.
Click to expand...
Source: http://www.nowgamer.com/news/1063301/naughty_dog_gritty_xbox_shooters_shaped_uncharted.html

Does anyone have issue 209 of Play Magazine by the way? It sounds like they have more interesting information about Uncharted's development.
 
Angry Fork

Angry Fork

Member
We had a lot of internal grumbling about the realist bent. More of the old dogs were from the Crash and Jak era and preferred that more whimsical style. But alas, that was a losing battle."
Click to expand...

=( I wish these guys would buy back Crash and make a new one for PS4.
 
N

nelsonroyale

Member
I really enjoy uncharted...but hopefully after this one they can make a more fantasy-based game...ND are darn good at those as well... a more complex, evolution of the Jak games would be great
 
R

RoboPlato

I'd be in the dick
Wow, considering how perfectly executed the pulp era stuff is in the series I never would have guessed that it wasn't the original intent.
 
J

JWong

Banned
It's funny how he's talking about "we" when he's no longer at Naughty Dog.

I doubt the situation is as cut and dry as saying "Sony made us do it" as he's putting it.
 
D

Dr.Palutena

Member
Luckily Naughty Dog was able to accomodate the executive meddling in a way that still produced a good game. I'd also say this is funny since the only slights I've ever had with the series were the times it took a sudden turn to "fantasy" plot-wise. Also it's not like we didn't get a good deal of fantasy games this gen to make up for it.
 
B

Brobzoid

how do I slip unnoticed out of a gloryhole booth?
considering I stumbled onto the set of Avatar during uncharted2 I say they could have pushed harder.
 
S

Sullichin

Member
Brobzoid said:
considering I stumbled onto the set of Avatar during uncharted2 I say they could have pushed harder.
Click to expand...

Was thinking this. I'm all for fantasy, but that was probably the worst thing about Uncharted 2, so I guess I'm ok with this :p
 
A

AAK

Member
I though Sony was known for allowing complete creative freedom? Damnit sony, we could have gotten something truly special. Why you gotta restrict such talent????
 
U

ultron87

Member
So you mean I could have had all the crazy set pieces of Uncharted but with dragons and shit?

DAMN YOU SONY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
M

MuddyDonut

Member
THBJj.jpg
 
G

Gravijah

Member
ultron87 said:
So you mean I could have had all the crazy set pieces of Uncharted but with dragons and shit?

DAMN YOU SONY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Click to expand...

imagine instead of climbing on top of a cargo plane in U3 we could be scaling a dragon the same size.
 
S

ShinobiFist

Banned
I actually agree on Sony's push for a more "realistic" look towards the franchise. Given that the console was very expensive at the time, it would've been very difficult to market or convince the masses to buy a "Kiddy" looking game on a very expensive console. But regardless on what I said, Sony is horrible on marketing their games, period. Kratos got no love from Sony.
 
A

AAK

Member
Seriously, i loved the Jak series because of how ambitious it was where you had insane weapons, larger than life boss fights, and how it seamlessly merged the gameplay of the greatly successful Tony Hawk games at the time and masterfully merged it into platforming.

I honestly didn't get ambition from a gameplay perspective with Uncharted. This fantasy scope they had planned would have definitely been an improvement.
 
E

erpg

GAF parliamentarian
Nothing more realistic than nazi vampires and immortal blueman tribes. I'm cool with this.
 
D

DMeisterJ

Banned
Looks like Sony didn't win the whole battle with ND as both Uncharted's have a bit of fantasy in them.

Good for Sony though, they made the right call, critically and commercially.
 
H

hsukardi

Member
darkpaladinmfc said:
Regardless of how good the game is, Sony shouldn't be forcing such big decisions on developers...
Click to expand...

Considering they own Naughty Dog, I wouldn't think Sony should just let them make Shadows of the Damned or No More Heroes.

Creativity and freedom is all good, but when the project fails and you have to pick up the cheque by laying off some of your best friends dat feelin aint guud mang
 
P

pvpness

Member
:( I understand making it appeal to the kids through the mature filter but now I'm always gonna feel like we could have gotten something amazing without Sony's meddling. So it goes. Not like we ended up with crap in a box I guess.
 
Proelite

Proelite

Member
That sucks.

Having mostly human hostiles is the only weak point of Uncharted. You can see the devs trying to spice things up by adding mutants, but a semi-realistic universe doesn't offer them as much freedom when it comes to enemy variety.

The perfect TPS would be Uncharted Mechanics set in the Gears of War Universe.
 
P

ProfessorMoran

Member
AAK said:
I though Sony was known for allowing complete creative freedom? Damnit sony, we could have gotten something truly special. Why you gotta restrict such talent????
Click to expand...

Phil was in charge of SCEWW at the time. See what I just did.
 
D

Dr.Palutena

Member
scitek said:
Because a fantasy setting would have resulted in a bad game?
Click to expand...

nobody is saying that, but it's hard to say "boo sony , how could you" when this resulted in a game that most of us liked. Personally it's easier for me to be content about a good game I actually got than unhappy over a hypothetical good game that I didn't.
 
B

Boken

Banned
I don't know how you guys can judge that the current Uncharted is better than a game that doesn't exist.

Wow. You guys.
 
U

ultron87

Member
I wonder if Sony's directive was literally just "make it Indiana Jones" or if it was a little more loose than that.
 
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