![\"Uncharted-nate-drake\"](\"http:\/\/danielprimed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/12\/Uncharted-nate-drake.jpg\" "\\"Uncharted-nate-drake\\"")
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There’s an awkward contradiction in the original Uncharted<\/em> where the gorgeously detailed jungle landscape and its lack of interactivity juxtapose to create a hollow feeling within the player. In fact, it’s just one of ways in which Uncharted, through Naughty Dog’s virginity to the genre and the Playstation 3 and their determination to neatly place the player in one of either two modes of gameplay, severely de-equips the player, or rather instill the feeling of being de-equiped.<\/p>\n \n \n (We’re still razzing on the inactive landscape here)<\/em><\/p>\n \n Intended as a benchmark for the Playstation 3’s technical capabilities, Uncharted<\/em>‘s jungle landscape, even now after the release of its sequel, still inspires great awe. Yet I’ll be damned if it isn’t anything more than digital window dressing. Sure, wind will blow in and stir up foliage or a scripted event will send a rock crashing onto car, but during standard play the landscape does little to respond to the player. The jungle is simply a conduit to the next gun fight, climbing sequence or story event where Uncharted can operate in its comfort zone as a derivative mix of Prince of Persia<\/a><\/em> and Gears of War<\/em>.<\/strong> External to these sequences, the player is covered in bubble wrap and can only look but not touch. In this sense, the landscape hardly contributes to the game in a meaningful way on a mechanical level, unless of course it’s within the aforementioned capsules of gameplay. Examples of the latter include shooting exploding oil cans and the tear-away platforms.<\/p>\n \n (One could quite correctly argue that this is the case for most games, and indeed it is. My response to that would therefore be the very fact that Uncharted<\/em>‘s environment is so darn pretty, that is has such an important presence in the game world unlike most games before it, that it almost suggests to be more important than it really is.<\/strong> This, I’d wager, is the implication.)<\/p>\n The lack of seamless interaction cuts at the environment’s personality and to some extent the believability too (although it’s pretty hard not to believe it when it looks so good!). Personally speaking, I found that the implications affecting my attitude towards the game were numerous. There’s feelings of betrayal as the environment is something of an illusion. There’s the feeling of selfishness in that you’ve been spoilt with such lovely visuals but don’t have the means to appreciate it beyond turning the camera angle to get a more picturesque view. To put it in another way, it feels as though you’re \u201cwasting\u201d Uncharted’<\/em>s graphical splendor.<\/strong> The feeling which lasted the longest for me though was a feeling of helplessness. That is, you want to interact with the environment but you can’t, the game does not permit it.<\/p>\n \n \n Put those words together and consider what this means for gameplay. That is, have you ever tried to shoot an ant from 30 metres away? Everything that you shoot at in Uncharted<\/em> feels so distant. There are several reasons for this as touched upon in the title:<\/p>\n \n –High definition<\/em><\/p>\n Means more stuff can fit on screen, more so than it takes for an analog stick to cleanly sweep and target. Naughty Dog haven’t quite hit the right spot when matching this with a suitable reticle movement speed.<\/p>\n \n –Small reticle<\/em><\/p>\n This is the area where you shoot; a tiny white circle in the middle of a high resolution image<\/p>\n \n –Highly-detailed Jungle<\/em><\/p>\n That high resolution image is full of heavily textured landscape, swatches of rich colour, dispersed lighting, detailed scenery and animation. Point being that there’s many distractions to throw your attention off target.<\/p>\n \n –Fast-moving, Ultra Responsive Enemy Types<\/em><\/p>\n Maybe they’re not that<\/em> fast, but they’ll certainly flinch once you’ve hit them. Hitting a pirate (bad guy) anywhere on the body apart from the head will cause them to sporadically throw themselves in the opposite direction. This can totally off-balance your shooting as the nimble reticle speed makes it difficult to re-align your shots.<\/p>\n \n –Layout of the Arenas<\/em><\/p>\n Although not mentioned in the title, the layout of the gun fights (arena layout, cover spots, enemy spawn points, movement patterns, etc) is the primary reason why aiming in Uncharted<\/em> feels so terribly myopic. Gun fights are very spread out, layered almost like a shooting range where the player clears a hoard of goons, jumps the fence and closes in the enemies by taking refuge at the next point of cover. The closest row of goons in the shooting range are often distanced at a point which is a little uncomfortable. However, the core problem lies in that enemies which occupy the back rows are given startlingly good accuracy\u2014and with three or so of them in the back and reinforcements moving to the front, it’s tactically safer to camp at a distance than risk moving forward. Furthermore, when the rows of pirates at the front are few, there are side rows which contribute to the tactical security of staying put.<\/p>\n \nEats Your Greens<\/h3>\n
![\"uncharted-shotgun-ruins\"](\"http:\/\/danielprimed.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/12\/uncharted-shotgun-ruins.jpg\" "\\"uncharted-shotgun-ruins\\"")
<\/p>\nA Tiny High Definition Reticle in a Highly-detailed Jungle Landscape with Fast-moving, Ultra Responsive Enemy Types<\/h3>\n