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Uncharted 4 spoiler free early copy impressions

Facism

Member
This game is killing my system fans! Anybody else experiencing this?

It's actually taxing my cooling far less than something like Smite or Ratchet and Clank. I was expecting 24/7 hairdryer, but that only happens on the main menu, loading screens or if i pause the game :/
 
It's actually taxing my cooling far less than something like Smite or Ratchet and Clank. I was expecting 24/7 hairdryer, but that only happens on the main menu, loading screens or if i pause the game :/
Menus have uncapped framerate (200-300 fps). ND fix diz, plz.
 

Auctopus

Member
One of the most impressive things I saw during my playthrough was the reflections. The mirrors in the games, puddles and collected waters reflecting whole environments.
 

Zemm

Member
So here is my thought process on why I like uncharted 2 more. Yes gameplay is better in 4, gameplay enhancements alone don't make for a better game. MGSV has the best gameplay, most won't say that's the best MGS game. Gameplay to me is not just mechanics, it is how you use them. And when U4 uses them it's pretty damn great but there is so much down time where you the player is basically doing nothing much other than moving forward and just looking around places.

This is an action game, therefore action should be the focus. An action game where half of the game is not action hurts the product. Is it good for story, sure but I'm not going to play this game over and over for story, I play it for the encounters, for the thrill of combat. I am not against downtime and story focused moments. The village scene in U2 was perfect in its timing. The giraffe in TLOU, again perfect. But in this game downtime happend after nearly every gun fight. The whole game was action, stop, action, stop, action, stop. If the stuff outside the gunplay was compelling from a gameplay perspective then fine but the platforming is still mostly automatic, puzzles mostly easy, and exploration just a way to get you to collect random treasures and notes. I like all that stuff when balanced well, I just don't think it was balanced that well in uncharted 4.

Everything else is a HUGE positive. Story, graphics, gunplay, encounter maps, when they had a big setpiece it was great.

Yep I agree with this. In UC2 you had that whole huge section from the start of Nepal to when Tenzin finds you that was just balls to the wall, there's nothing even 20% as long as this, the combat stuff is ended just as you're really getting into it, then it's back to an hour of pretty boring platforming. I'd replay UC2 all the time, but I can't with this. I wonder if that's why they put in the encounter select option.
 
A quick thank you to y'all for your awesome impressions, and double thank you for keeping spoilers to a minimum! It's great to see everyone having a great time UC4, and doing such wonderful passionate write-ups about it.

Soon. gimme-gimme-gimme
 
Yep I agree with this. In UC2 you had that whole huge section from the start of Nepal to when Tenzin finds you that was just balls to the wall, there's nothing even 20% as long as this, the combat stuff is ended just as you're really getting into it, then it's back to an hour of pretty boring platforming. I'd replay UC2 all the time, but I can't with this. I wonder if that's why they put in the encounter select option.

I can't fully agree with what he says. This is an action adventure game, not just an action game. It seems U4 leans more towards adventure than previous games. I think this is to the good...games need to be able to sell themselves on more than just action/violence. Indiana Jones movies, for instance, always had far less action than say the Uncharted games. Different mediums to be sure, but I personally feel that an adventure game should go for more of the exploration and interaction parts than action. I am happy they have gone in this direction. I can understand how others aren't, however, this is definitely where I wanted the series to go.
 
Anyone knows if the day one Patch is already included in the digital Version download size? Im going to break some stuff in my Garden tonight if i have to download it once the game is unlocked!!
 
The thing I'm most impressed about is the eyes, like TLOU but it's even more nuanced here. As a whole though, the game looks mind blowing. Here's just 3 pictures from what was already shown in trailers.

1, 2, 3.
 

SomTervo

Member
Those of you who are savvy about hardware specs, it seems unlikely that this game would run at 60fps on the Neo, right?

I'd say the majority of the game (like 60+%) is a very smooth 30FPS. I don't see why that wouldn't be attainable.

The thing I'm most impressed about is the eyes, like TLOU but it's even more nuanced here. As a whole though, the game looks mind blowing. Here's just 3 pictures from what was already shown in trailers.

1, 2, 3.

In-game I find the eyes a bit disappointing, though. Drake looks pretty dead-eyes whenever you swing the camera around and look at him straight on.

TBH I think that's to do with the lighting, though. Whenever you're in really dramatic/intense lighting, he looks fine and his eyes look good. It's whenever you're in blanket sunlight that the faces look a bit odd and the lighting doesn't look its best on them.
 
I

In-game I find the eyes a bit disappointing, though. Drake looks pretty dead-eyes whenever you swing the camera around and look at him straight on.

TBH I think that's to do with the lighting, though. Whenever you're in really dramatic/intense lighting, he looks fine and his eyes look good. It's whenever you're in blanket sunlight that the faces look a bit odd and the lighting doesn't look its best on them.

Which is what I rarely do because I'm focused on playing haha. It is to be commended though with how much they got out of it with the expressions and subtle movements, superb work.
 

nbnt

is responsible for the well-being of this island.
Just finished the game and man.. what a ride.

I think it's the best Uncharted by far, but not my favorite one. 2's impact is still untouched for me personally. But 4 really is a big leap, gameplay and story wise. The encounters are intense and the more intricate level design is just brilliant. The writing is so good it's not fair to other devs tbh.

My only complaint is that some of the combat-free parts really overstay their welcome.
Stats: 14:30 hours, played more than half of it on Hard then switched to Moderate (Normal). Collected 48 treasures out of 109.
 

Necro900

Member
Damn, YES! Thanks Amazon!
Too bad I won't be able to delve into it until later this afternoon.. Oh well, I've waited months, I can stand a few hours.. with this.. sitting on my desk..

0AzD3W.jpg
 
Lol just accidentally got a gold trophy called Ludonarrative Dissonance. Wish the trophy list loaded up so I could see exactly what it was.
I ran over three soldiers in the jeep so that's probably it

V Yeah its pretty awesome. I did a double take when I first saw the portrait
 

SomTervo

Member
What and when is it? Obviously spoiler tag it.

Sorry for slow reply.

Fairly substantial backstory/context spoiler (up to about 2/3 through the game) and a spoiler for a really good, if subtle non-Uncharted-or-Naughty-Dog-related easter-egg which most people probably will have no clue about:

You know the Founders of Libertalia? The 10 pirates or whatever? Remember the one who Sam can't remember the name of, whose sigil is a monkey?

That's Guybrush Threepwood from the Monkey Island series.

You see his portrait and it's like a strawberry blond guy with a biggish chin and pirate regalia. His name is scraped out. Nate texts Sam and Sam texts back like "I don't recognise the monkey sigil". AKA Monkey Island, Guybrush's original destination and haunt.

Then when you get to the treasury on Libertalia, and there are all the portraits with 'Thief' written all over them? The one with Guybrush has the name mainly scraped out, but you can see it begins with "Gu-".

It's fucking awesome. Naughty Dog legit built
the protagonist of one of the greatest adventure games
of all time right into their key lore/plot.
 

Venom Fox

Banned
I'd say the majority of the game (like 60+%) is a very smooth 30FPS. I don't see why that wouldn't be attainable.



In-game I find the eyes a bit disappointing, though. Drake looks pretty dead-eyes whenever you swing the camera around and look at him straight on.

TBH I think that's to do with the lighting, though. Whenever you're in really dramatic/intense lighting, he looks fine and his eyes look good. It's whenever you're in blanket sunlight that the faces look a bit odd and the lighting doesn't look its best on them.
Solid frame rate 95% of the time for me. Only slowdowns were the set peice later on (you know which one) and during photomode. Has anyone else noticed the lighting changes sometimes during photomode?

Sometimes it even adds foliage to a scene as well lol.
 

SomTervo

Member
People since informed me that the press did get to access multiplayer on may 4th and some earlier dates, but I still have a problem with the way the majority of reviews were written. It's clear that many outlets didn't participate in the mutiplayer review opportunity, and many that did dismiss the mutiplayer as non-important and post a generic paragraph about how it adds to the packages lifespan. Gamesradar explicitly say that 'no one buys Uncharted for multiplayer'.

There's a lot of really crappy journalism surrounding the review coverage of this game.

I agree. "Multiplayer events" are such a bad idea. "Review events" of any sort are such a bad idea.

One thing I love about this game I forgot to post about earlier.

I was talking to a character about something, and I triggered some story dialogue by physically moving forward, obviously interrupting the exchange. After the story dialogue was finished Nate said like "so you were saying?" and the other character was like "oh yeah, so..." and continued.

I thought that was really neat. Most games would just completely skip this because you triggered story dialogues.

I also kinda like the soundtrack, it definitely seems Uncharted but not as grand or epic as the previous games. It's kinda just there in the background the whole time.



Is it the
GAF forum page print out?
I thought that was really funny and cool.

Haha, that is brilliant - no it wasn't that.

I also noticed the 'naturally interrupted dialogue' thing BTW. Druckmann and Straley spoke about it on one of their recent videos, too. There are natural dialogue break points in conversations, so if you get interrupted, they'll be like "Anyway, as I was saying..." and resume from a natural point. If something critical happens, they'll drop the topic so the plot presses ahead.

Phenomenal work.

Solid frame rate 95% of the time for me. Only slowdowns were the set peice later on (you know which one) and during photomode. Has anyone else noticed the lighting changes sometimes during photomode?

Sometimes it even adds foliage to a scene as well lol.

60% was a very conservative estimate, haha.

I think during photo mode it goes into 'cutscene lighting', which has a lot more shader detail.

Watch closely when the game fades from cutscene into gameplay, especially if Drake is on-screen. You'll see his face go from super-high detail to moderate detail very smoothly and seamlessly. It's incredibly well done. I imagine Photomode does the reverse - moderate detail to super-high detail.

So here is my thought process on why I like uncharted 2 more. Yes gameplay is better in 4, gameplay enhancements alone don't make for a better game. MGSV has the best gameplay, most won't say that's the best MGS game. Gameplay to me is not just mechanics, it is how you use them. And when U4 uses them it's pretty damn great but there is so much down time where you the player is basically doing nothing much other than moving forward and just looking around places.

This is an action game, therefore action should be the focus. An action game where half of the game is not action hurts the product. Is it good for story, sure but I'm not going to play this game over and over for story, I play it for the encounters, for the thrill of combat. I am not against downtime and story focused moments. The village scene in U2 was perfect in its timing. The giraffe in TLOU, again perfect. But in this game downtime happend after nearly every gun fight. The whole game was action, stop, action, stop, action, stop. If the stuff outside the gunplay was compelling from a gameplay perspective then fine but the platforming is still mostly automatic, puzzles mostly easy, and exploration just a way to get you to collect random treasures and notes. I like all that stuff when balanced well, I just don't think it was balanced that well in uncharted 4.

Everything else is a HUGE positive. Story, graphics, gunplay, encounter maps, when they had a big setpiece it was great.

Yep I agree with this. In UC2 you had that whole huge section from the start of Nepal to when Tenzin finds you that was just balls to the wall, there's nothing even 20% as long as this, the combat stuff is ended just as you're really getting into it, then it's back to an hour of pretty boring platforming. I'd replay UC2 all the time, but I can't with this. I wonder if that's why they put in the encounter select option.

What Chronospherics said.

You're both going in like it's a third-person shooter. It's not. It's an action adventure game. Onus on both adventure and action.

Also action doesn't mean shooting. IMO plenty of the rope-swinging, platforming, near-misses, falls, slides, collapsing things, driving - that's all action, but blended with adventure.

"Gameplay" isn't a synonym for "combat". There's more actual gameplay in UC4 than there is in any of the other games. It's just a bigger ratio of platforming, puzzling and traversal, which is equally valid as combat. There are even lots and lots of multiple routes and hidden areas with their own little puzzles and stuff. I swear I missed 30% of the game's exploration/platforming content first time through. There's a lot in the game.

It is a great pity there isn't more combat, though. Can't wait for multiplayer...
 

Zemm

Member
I can't fully agree with what he says. This is an action adventure game, not just an action game. It seems U4 leans more towards adventure than previous games. I think this is to the good...games need to be able to sell themselves on more than just action/violence. Indiana Jones movies, for instance, always had far less action than say the Uncharted games. Different mediums to be sure, but I personally feel that an adventure game should go for more of the exploration and interaction parts than action. I am happy they have gone in this direction. I can understand how others aren't, however, this is definitely where I wanted the series to go.

I guess it depends what you want out of the games. I felt UC2 had the perfect combat to exploration/platforming ratio but they've really pushed it heavily in favour of the latter for UC4. For me that's not a good thing as I consider the platforming and exploration as pretty meh throughout the series and the encounters the more fun parts of the games. The encounters in 4 are some of the best (if not the best) in the series but there's so few and they're broken up by very long stretches of platforming/exploring that I'm taking more and more breaks throughout the game, whereas playing UC2 I could just keep going all day.
 

SomTervo

Member
I have a real fucking problem on how UC4's story is told (and the story itself). If it wasn't for the gameplay I would have sold that shit the day I beat it. It just doesn't feel like an Uncharted story. I've said it once and I'll say it again. Hennig should've been in charge because Druckmann drunk the TLOU kool aid until he got cordyceps poisoning.

That's it. I ain't gonna say no mo.

Cuz I have to really study. Got finals this week.

You are so crazy, breh.

The opening 1-2 hours are not very Unchartedey, and the last 1-1.5 hours are not very Unchartedy.

But the middle 10-12 hours of Uncharted 4 are pure fucking unadulterated Uncharted with perhaps the odd 10-15 minutes of more somber drama – which was in Uncharted 2 and 3 as well! The beginning of Uncharted 2's last act is somber as fuck and Drake's all like "I'm done with this". You're kidding yourself if Uncharted 4's tone sometimes is new to the series. It's been bubbling under the surface since 2.

I think you need to replay the thing. Which is ironic considering you state you will never do that.

Is David really a villain though or just a survivor with disgusting interests that became an antagonist through chance?

Oooh snap

Why the fuck is this puzzle I'm at so hard?? The fuck is this shit?? This isn't Uncharted. The guy with me is just being a wise ass trying to lighten the mood up. FFS shut up.

image.php
 

nib95

Banned
The thing I'm most impressed about is the eyes, like TLOU but it's even more nuanced here. As a whole though, the game looks mind blowing. Here's just 3 pictures from what was already shown in trailers.

1, 2, 3.

Yea, the eyes are really well done. Here's a gameplay screen example.

Unchartedtrade%204_%20A%20Thiefrsquos%20End_20160508073553.png~original
 

H4r4kiri

Member
Minor Spoilers on Easter EGG :

Has anyone seen the Savage Starlight 2 and the Last of Us Poster with a woman ( maybe Ellie ) beeing pregnant ? Last of Us: American Daughters ?
 

Auctopus

Member
Unbelieably to me, I completed the game in almost one session. 4 hours and 9-10 hours. I don't think a game has ever made me want to genuinely play through the night, even my favourite games of all time.

However, now that I'm collecting my thoughts about the game, I feel like I missed out on a lot and that I might have rushed by some things, the environments really are fantastic and I don't think I spent enough time in them. Either way, I'm really looking forward to my second playthrough.
 

eso76

Member
Amazon copy still not doing anything other than "preordered"

Time to cancel and go digital if that doesn't change by the afternoon :p

I found that with Amazon preorders they usually don't update the status.
It just says "you'll get it by may 10th and don't ask", and you'll get it that day or the day before.
 

ViciousDS

Banned
Amazon copy still not doing anything other than "preordered"

Time to cancel and go digital if that doesn't change by the afternoon :p

they don't ship till later today lol


its the same everytime, monday afternoon/night they ship and it arrives the next day.

Best Buy does the same thing for release date delivery, its so you don't have a chance to get it early.

But it 99% of the time arrives on Tuesday
 
they don't ship till later today lol


its the same everytime, monday afternoon/night they ship and it arrives the next day.

Best Buy does the same thing for release date delivery, its so you don't have a chance to get it early.

But it 99% of the time arrives on Tuesday

Yep, they send every game out to me on Monday and I always get them Tuesday.

Nothing to worry about.
 
Sorry for slow reply.

Fairly substantial backstory/context spoiler (up to about 2/3 through the game) and a spoiler for a really good, if subtle non-Uncharted-or-Naughty-Dog-related easter-egg which most people probably will have no clue about:

You know the Founders of Libertalia? The 10 pirates or whatever? Remember the one who Sam can't remember the name of, whose sigil is a monkey?

That's Guybrush Threepwood from the Monkey Island series.

You see his portrait and it's like a strawberry blond guy with a biggish chin and pirate regalia. His name is scraped out. Nate texts Sam and Sam texts back like "I don't recognise the monkey sigil". AKA Monkey Island, Guybrush's original destination and haunt.

Then when you get to the treasury on Libertalia, and there are all the portraits with 'Thief' written all over them? The one with Guybrush has the name mainly scraped out, but you can see it begins with "Gu-".

It's fucking awesome. Naughty Dog legit built
the protagonist of one of the greatest adventure games
of all time right into their key lore/plot.

That is awesome!!!
 

thenexus6

Member
New update.. 1.02 143mb

Not sure what yet just about to download. Please be MP!!

Edit: General fixes and improvements.

EDIT: MP is UP!!!! Just playing the introduction now.

And the trophies are up now too.

My MP DLC code in the box still isn't working though on the store..
 

SomTervo

Member
That is awesome!!!

You're damn right it is!

Can't wait for my GF to play UC4 and work it out herself. That series is one of her favourites of all time. Actually, it probably is her all-time favourite.

Unbelieably to me, I completed the game in almost one session. 4 hours and 9-10 hours. I don't think a game has ever made me want to genuinely play through the night, even my favourite games of all time.

However, now that I'm collecting my thoughts about the game, I feel like I missed out on a lot and that I might have rushed by some things, the environments really are fantastic and I don't think I spent enough time in them. Either way, I'm really looking forward to my second playthrough.

This is exactly how I feel. Exactly.

Fucking loved it, but feel like I squandered it a bit by rushing.

Minor Spoilers on Easter EGG :

Has anyone seen the snip

Yes, that was great. High potential, too.

FYI I cut down your spoiler a lot because I think it's unfair for people in this thread who don't have the game yet. There's potentially big spoilerage in there.
 
Yep I agree with this. In UC2 you had that whole huge section from the start of Nepal to when Tenzin finds you that was just balls to the wall, there's nothing even 20% as long as this, the combat stuff is ended just as you're really getting into it, then it's back to an hour of pretty boring platforming. I'd replay UC2 all the time, but I can't with this. I wonder if that's why they put in the encounter select option.

I'm on the opposite side of the fence. The constant combat in previous Uncharted games got fatiguing for me. I think U4 is much better paced, and Naughty Dog deserves kudos for giving its game room to breathe.
 

The Lamp

Member
Let's break down the convoy and the train. What exactly can you do during convoy, you drive which is great to have control so that part is cool, it's heavily scripted so you have the illusion of freedom. SPOILERS AHEAD if you didn't see the e3 segment
Then comes the drag by the rope which is super awesome but all you are doing is shooting things while you slowly move up. Once on the cars you are in a limited box just shooting things around you. You can then start jumping from vehicle to vehicle which is awesome and shoot other vehicles. Still your movement is limited there isn't much going on outside hopping around and shooting guys.
Convoy in U2 did practically the same thing just no where near as visually stunning.

You compare that to the train which starts with a potential stealth segment which allows you to move freely around the train and engage enemies as you wish. That transitions into fire fights with big brutes again with freedom of movement. Then a helicopter shows up and you need to fire rockets at it and eventually hop onto a turret to take it down. Then you are on the roof and sides of the train avoiding obstacles. Then you meet a whole different set of enemies and end with a boss battle. The level of variety in that one segment is incredible. It has gunplay, stealth, platforming, turret action, bosses. I don't think it's comparable.

Yes, I definitely missed this from Uncharted 2. They started to get kind of clever in U4s later chapters but mostly none of the encounters matched the creative, changing nature of U2's encounters. In U4 it's mostly that you just reach an outpost and clear it out and that's it.
 

Sn4ke_911

If I ever post something in Japanese which I don't understand, please BAN me.
Yea, the eyes are really well done. Here's a gameplay screen example.

Unchartedtrade%204_%20A%20Thiefrsquos%20End_20160508073553.png~original

Man are you fucking kidding me? how the fuck does this game look so damn good.

Can't wait to see this on my tv.

Oh and "Early Delivery" my ass. I bought the early delivery edition and the game still hasn't shown up so i guess i will get it tomorrow like everyone else. Oh well whatever, one day to go...
 

xRaizen

Member
New update.. 1.02 143mb

Not sure what yet just about to download. Please be MP!!

Edit: General fixes and improvements.

EDIT: MP is UP!!!! Just playing the introduction now.

And the trophies are up now too.

My MP DLC code in the box still isn't working though on the store..
Fuck yeah!
 

The Lamp

Member
Yep I agree with this. In UC2 you had that whole huge section from the start of Nepal to when Tenzin finds you that was just balls to the wall, there's nothing even 20% as long as this, the combat stuff is ended just as you're really getting into it, then it's back to an hour of pretty boring platforming. I'd replay UC2 all the time, but I can't with this. I wonder if that's why they put in the encounter select option.

Both this and your quoted post are exactly how I feel right now. I was worried I was going to end up alone after all the posts about how this blows every other Uncharted out of the water. It does in some aspects, but not in pacing, not in action balance, and not in most of the enemy encounters.
 

nib95

Banned
Let's break down the convoy and the train. What exactly can you do during convoy, you drive which is great to have control so that part is cool, it's heavily scripted so you have the illusion of freedom. SPOILERS AHEAD if you didn't see the e3 segment
Then comes the drag by the rope which is super awesome but all you are doing is shooting things while you slowly move up. Once on the cars you are in a limited box just shooting things around you. You can then start jumping from vehicle to vehicle which is awesome and shoot other vehicles. Still your movement is limited there isn't much going on outside hopping around and shooting guys.
Convoy in U2 did practically the same thing just no where near as visually stunning.

You compare that to the train which starts with a potential stealth segment which allows you to move freely around the train and engage enemies as you wish. That transitions into fire fights with big brutes again with freedom of movement. Then a helicopter shows up and you need to fire rockets at it and eventually hop onto a turret to take it down. Then you are on the roof and sides of the train avoiding obstacles. Then you meet a whole different set of enemies and end with a boss battle. The level of variety in that one segment is incredible. It has gunplay, stealth, platforming, turret action, bosses. I don't think it's comparable.

Part of your post isn't entirely true. Comparing it to the train segment, often you have limited movement whilst on top of the train or inside it as well. Likewise with the UC4 E3 demo, you don't actually have to stay in the Jeep, or leave only when it's burning. You can actually hop out in to any of the other jeeps at any moment, and back again, so there is actually a degree of non instructed freedom. Then there's the straight vehicle elements which give you a lot more freedom, multiple paths etc.

I'd say that E3 segment topped any of the individual set pieces in UC2, though I do agree that thus far (I haven't finished the game yet) there's never a combination of chapters one after the other that keeps up that sort of consistent momentum as found in those segments of Uncharted 2. I think that's intentional though, to give people a breather and allow them to soak in the atmosphere before being propelled in to carnage again. Some people will prefer it, some won't.

But whilst it might not be as consistently balls to the wall or as excitingly paced as Uncharted 2, it does make up for it with much more atmosphere and diversity in exploration, as well as better exposition, character time and narrative delivery.
 
Grrr...didn't arrive today.

Both this and your quoted post are exactly how I feel right now. I was worried I was going to end up alone after all the posts about how this blows every other Uncharted out of the water. It does in some aspects, but not in pacing, not in action balance, and not in most of the enemy encounters.

I find this quite strange, but I suppose it is only natural to want to have ones own experiences validated by others.
 

BeeDog

Member
I only have one question since (1) I'm receiving my copy tomorrow, and (2) I still can't believe it if it's correct;

Are all cut-scenes actually running in real time? I've seen the odd screenshot here and there, and the cut-scene screencaps look mindblowingly good. Please let ND's word earlier still hold true...
 
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