Uncharted 4 - A Thief's |Reviews Thread| Nateness Awaits

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No, she said in so many words, 'been there done that' to some new mechanics... which is basically the same as 'adding nothing new'. Semantics, I know.

It did not help when the Beyond guys ran away with that down the cliff edge.

I think somebody quoted that line as if she said it, when she hadn't. Based on what JC et al are saying.

I'm not reading reviews just to avoid any possible spoilers, so i based my criticism of Lucy's review on a quote somebody else provided - which may not be an actual quote.
 
Yea, my apologies. I based my criticism of the IGN review based on the summary someone else provided.

Probably should've gone and read it myself.
 
-5 minute train opening
-2 hours of museum and UC1 jungle adventures with Sully and Chloe
-30 seconds of running from a convoy opening in Nepal, then a lot of extended action sequences with Chloe until the big climax with the Helicopter(so that's 1)
-Outside one pre-requiste gunfight with six dudes, you then meat up with Elena and that's about 40 minutes of traversal and cutscenes and exploring that big temple place and then you fight your way out. You then go off with Elena and there's a lot of action mixed in with the required traversal bits.
-You get on the train...that counts as setpiece 2, about halfway through the game. Its a long hallway of combat that goes across multiple chapters. Then you crash, then there's even another fight out in the snow.
-Finally you get the village, and you actually get to mess around with Tenzin in the snow caves for a hour. Not a lot of combat, mostly traversal, environmental interactions, couple NPCs, that kind of thing.
-The village attack! Giant tank is there...I suppose this is #3 set piece about 8-9 hours into the game. Big action chapter, which leads right into Convoy, which I guess can be a separate #4.
-Monastery chapters with Elena. There's some traversal here, and even one pitiful attempt at a puzzle with the boxes and all that, but its mostly a parade of action sequences. Like you cant go five minutes without running into more bad guys.
-Finally get to the entrance and of course the bad guys are waiting for you there. There's some more traversal bits with Flynn, there's the spinning colunms puzzle, and that annoying fight with the gorilla/orge/monster people.
-Finally get to the end game place, and you get a cutscene or two and maybe you have to push a cart to reach a ledge, but most of the time is taken up fighting more of the same bad guys you've been fighting for half the game now, with the addition of newly annoying enemies who like to rush you and soak up damage.
-Then there's a mediocre final boss fight, so...set piece #5?

So yeah...not THAT many set pieces spread over 12 hours of gameplay. I mean there's the train which goes for a long time, but its really more like a new stage then any big scripted sequence like the ship sinking or the whole airplane thing in UC3.

People remember there being more set pieces because they are the big memorable moments in a sea of action. Seriously, there is sooo much combat in UC2. Its kinda funny when people praise its pacing when large sections feel like the equivalent of Horde mode, for all the puzzles or characterization or unique traversal or narrative elements you just don't get for large sections of time.

Right there are four major setpieces in U2, which is a lot, U3 had about the same. U4 has less.

I prefer the non stop action of U2 over the constant stop and go of U4. Plus so far (almost at the end) 2 has a better variety of enemies too. It's a shame cause the combat is soooooo much better in this game, why cutback on the thing you improved so much on.
 
Hmm, I haven't played 4 yet, but I have completed the first three. I think the sequence shown in the E3 2015 footage definitely tops anything in the first three in terms of spectacle.

I personally am excited that they are trying to do more stuff without shooting. If videogames want to elevate as an art form, they need to get include more interesting stuff to do other than just killing...This is an action adventure...of course adventure should be a bit element.

It's great if the other stuff is actually interesting to do or mechanically engaging, but it has been pretty hit or miss for me with Naughty Dog. I liked some of Left Behind's more unconventional moments like the brick throwing competition, but then you have things like ladders/planks which don't really require any actual problem solving by the player.

An example from Uncharted 4 would be the area under the waterfall in the madagascar gameplay. You need to find a box to stand on in order to reach the collectable, but because there is an icon that pops up whenever you're near a grapple point the solution is immediately obvious. Sure, it was a very simple 'puzzle' to begin with, but it would feel like a more natural action without the prompt there.
 
I think somebody quoted that line as if she said it, when she hadn't. Based on what JC et al are saying.

I'm not reading reviews just to avoid any possible spoilers, so i based my criticism of Lucy's review on a quote somebody else provided - which may not be an actual quote.

Just went to the review... it is in the review.

I appreciated the option, even if this is fairly pedestrian and routine stealth gameplay in 2016:

Fairly Pedestrian = ordinary or dull, also can mean something that is done routinely throughout different mediums

Semantics, but they all lead to the same round about, 'nothing new' since it is 'pedestrian'.

I mean, were Tomb Raider's 'RPG' mechanics 'rather pedestrian' then?

More of a backhanded compliment then I suppose.

"Hey you have pretty eyes, are those contacts?"

;P
 
Just went to the review... it is in the review.



Fairly Pedestrian = ordinary or dull, also can mean something that is done routinely throughout different mediums

Semantics, but they all lead to the same round about, 'nothing new' since it is 'pedestrian'.

I mean, were Tomb Raider's 'RPG' mechanics 'rather pedestrian' then?

More of a backhanded compliment then I suppose.

"Hey you have pretty eyes, are those contacts?"

Sorry - we were talking about something else - the "no new mechanics in UC4" statement.
 
Just went to the review... it is in the review.



Fairly Pedestrian = ordinary or dull, also can mean something that is done routinely throughout different mediums

Semantics, but they all lead to the same round about, 'nothing new' since it is 'pedestrian'.

I mean, were Tomb Raider's 'RPG' mechanics 'rather pedestrian' then?

More of a backhanded compliment then I suppose.

"Hey you have pretty eyes, are those contacts?"

Dude. Please. Stop.

She says the stealth gameplay is good, just nothing groundbreaking. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this statement.

This also has nothing to do with new mechanics. You know, the thing she didn't say that everyone is claiming she did. And no, she didn't say "no new mechanics" in a roundabout way. She never implies in her review that the game is doing nothing new.
 
Plus so far (almost at the end) 2 has a better variety of enemies too. It's a shame cause the combat is soooooo much better in this game, why cutback on the thing you improved so much on.

We'll have to compare killcounts for a Normal playthrough without deaths to see how much of that is really cutback. My hunch is the enemy killcounts are similar, its just the game is longer AND larger with more things they have the player do so it seems like there's less combat then there really is.

Interesting comment about enemy types. I mean, how many could there possibly be? Assault rifle guy, armored shotgun guy, sniper dude, rocket launcher pricks...dont know if there's any "annoying bullet resistant end game mythical people", but hey there might be a good thing if they're gone.
 
God bless The Game Collection

Oh dear, people are still hung up on that IGN review? It's an 8.8 which is a great score and it was her opinion, get the fuck over it.
 
All reviewers should be noting the difficulties and settings of their playthrough(s). This actually matters a lot.

Good point, especially games that add enemy variety, pathing, etc..

I do not recall reading many that do mention it, over the years.
 
The only enemies that really are missing are the shield guys.

Personally I didnt really miss them until they were pointed out. Same with the grenade throwback mechanic but I never used that in the prior games.

The armored enemies are still there.

Edit: I never liked the grenade throw back mechanic either, but I could see it being useful on higher difficulties. I'll have to play on hard and crushing to see.
 
The reviews are everything I dreamed of and it's crazy this is almost as well reviewed as The Last of Us. My copy was already shipped and hoping to get it already on Monday.
 
The only enemies that really are missing are the shield guys.

Personally I didnt really miss them until they were pointed out. Same with the grenade throwback mechanic but I never used that in the prior games.

The armored enemies are still there.

I am just glad barrels are still there. Barrels are bae!
 
Yea, my apologies. I based my criticism of the IGN review based on the summary someone else provided.

Probably should've gone and read it myself.

Actually those criticisms were not part of the review but echoed by other IGN editors during Podcast Beyond. I was thinking only Lucy had problems with it but it seems IGN is united on the score. I feel that maybe the reason they felt the way they did is because they tried to muscle through it instead of taking their time. It's very easy to be reductive when reviewing a game like Uncharted because a lot of the motivation of why you are doing certain things is so connected to the story. If you are drawn up in the story, it doesn't matter that you have to repeat things a lot.

Some of the pacing issues have been echoed by other reviewers, but most reviewers feel that the whole package makes up for it. I mean even Last Of Us kept making you push crates around but that was one of the best games ever because it does so many other things right and better than most other games. I think Uncharted 4 is the same.
 
We'll have to compare killcounts for a Normal playthrough without deaths to see how much of that is really cutback. My hunch is the enemy killcounts are similar, its just the game is longer AND larger with more things they have the player do so it seems like there's less combat then there really is.

Interesting comment about enemy types. I mean, how many could there possibly be? Assault rifle guy, armored shotgun guy, sniper dude, rocket launcher pricks...dont know if there's any "annoying bullet resistant end game mythical people", but hey there might be a good thing if they're gone.

Well I don't want to spoil anything so I'll hide it...
a helicopter would be nice. A tank? U2 had mini bosses on the train and the ice cave. I remember a whole lot more heavy chain gun guys in U2

And we did kill counts on the spoiler free thread, it's on par with the first game which is half the length of this game.
 
Right there are four major setpieces in U2, which is a lot, U3 had about the same. U4 has less.

I prefer the non stop action of U2 over the constant stop and go of U4. Plus so far (almost at the end) 2 has a better variety of enemies too. It's a shame cause the combat is soooooo much better in this game, why cutback on the thing you improved so much on.
Uh... I found the same enemy types that U2 had.

Pistol grunt, assault rifle grunt, higher damage assault rifle grunt, sniper grunt, launcher grunt, high damage pistol grunt, and armored LMG grunts. I guess the only missing is the shield guys?

Edit: Oh U4 also has the semi auto rifle grunts with the Mettler and the M21's
 
The reviews are everything I dreamed of and it's crazy this is almost as well reviewed as The Last of Us. My copy was already shipped and hoping to get it already on Monday.
True. I honestly didn't expect this one to even review within the same ballpark as TLOU cause that was something truly special. It's making the wait to play this much harder for me atm lol.
 
What is this weight stuff in Metacritic? I thought it was a simple aggregator.

Certain reviewers have proven to be way too inconsistent to the point that I don't even think their is any benefit to the reader of to applying significant weights any more. They should just apply a 1.25 weight to the more experienced gaming review sites (based on volume of review and age of website) and 1.00 to the rest of the web sites.

Or apply an even weight to all sites.
 
IGN has been disappointing me for a long time in terms of the general editors' hyper-reluctance to not support a reviewer's score, opinion, and reasoning on big games. I have a hard time thinking back to a time when I listened to a podcast Beyond and the people on the podcast were comfortable coming out and directly disagreeing with a recent review. I'm sure there are many counter-examples across all time but that's just the general vibe I've gotten from that staff's way of handling the review process.

I'm perfectly fine with Lucy's review, but IGN's groupthink when it comes to reviews sours the entire thing. Maybe there was some confusion on who said what, the review vs the podcast, but they come off to me as so obsessed with trying to back each other up that it might as well be mashed together on some level.
 
Calling Uncharted 2 'non stop action' isn't really accurate.

It just kinda feels like non-stop action cuz there really isnt much else they do besides that. They're arent any extended young drake sections without guns, no large areas where you explore with a jeep or a boat, no swimming underwater, maybe 3 rudimentary puzzles over the course of 12 hours. There's a few of extended traversal sections(the museum is pretty quiet stealth chapter, there's the clambering around in the Nepal temple with Chloe, then there's the ice caves with Tenzin). But usually...when you're not watching a cutscene or doing some traversal, you're shooting somebody.

But even if you were inclined to see "larger variety in game design and ideas" as a negative for UC4, the combat that is there is leaps and bounds over any previous title. The sound design, the size of the areas, the use of verticality and the rope swing, the controls of Drake himself, the switch between stealth and action, the varied and satisfying melee animations where the screen shakes on hit, all the little details like muzzle flash and the lighting on the gun as it fires, or the pacing of the camera when you aim, or the way the gun animates like a real gun instead of rattling around like a child's toy....like Im sorry but its not even really comparable, UC4 and UC2. Its in a completely different league in just about every aspect you could possibly define "combat".

So even if you weren't playing this game for the adventure but really just the parts where you shoot people...its far and away better now than it was in UC2. Like if you can look and experience all of the above, go back and play UC2 and still think its combat is better...more power to ya man, but I dont see it.
 
Mom & Pop stores here in Chile are selling the game al ready ( $75 thou) xD

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Mom & Pop stores here in Chile are selling the game al ready ( $75 thou) xD

dc5y67S.jpg

Portland is terrible at stocking games early haha. Not many independent stores around that i know of either. Shame... i would pay 70 bucks for it. I guess i'll just wait for Tuesday.
 
Did you review the game? if so what you give it?

No got my code and played some but not really allowed a real review until Monday I think which is when that part of the embargo goes away.
Otherwise its just sort of show the same footage already shown and blather.
I have the blathering down pat but no reason to do one or do impressions without new video for me.

Working on a Walking the Walk video too but that may come later depending on the timeframe.
 
IGN has been disappointing me for a long time in terms of the general editors' hyper-reluctance to not support a reviewer's score, opinion, and reasoning on big games. I have a hard time thinking back to a time when I listened to a podcast Beyond and the people on the podcast were comfortable coming out and directly disagreeing with a recent review. I'm sure there are many counter-examples across all time but that's just the general vibe I've gotten from that staff's way of handling the review process.

I'm perfectly fine with Lucy's review, but IGN's groupthink when it comes to reviews sours the entire thing. Maybe there was some confusion on who said what, the review vs the podcast, but they come off to me as so obsessed with trying to back each other up that it might as well be mashed together on some level.

I believe you make a very good point. I also think that is where a lot of the confusion is coming from, admittedly even myself early on, hoping in mid discussion. It felt disingenuous, where they got carried away with trying to justify... something, anything.

I still disagree with the 9.3 territory for RotTR, and felt it was more in line with the Meta, and we will all find out Tuesday if this is more in line with the Meta as well.

No got my code and played some but not really allowed a real review until Monday I think which is when that part of the embargo goes away.
Otherwise its just sort of show the same footage already shown and blather.
I have the blathering down pat but no reason to do one or do impressions without new video for me.

Definitely looking forward to your review. Will it have anything that could be considered 'spoiler'? Your reviews do a good job not having any, but this is a heavily narrative driven game, so I am sure it was quite tough.
 
Uh... I found the same enemy types that U2 had.

Pistol grunt, assault rifle grunt, higher damage assault rifle grunt, sniper grunt, launcher grunt, high damage pistol grunt, and armored LMG grunts. I guess the only missing is the shield guys?

Edit: Oh U4 also has the semi auto rifle grunts with the Mettler and the M21's

I specified above, it's missing some cool stuff U2 had.
 
Definitely looking forward to your review. Will it have anything that could be considered 'spoiler'? Your reviews do a good job not having any, but this is a heavily narrative driven game, so I am sure it was quite tough.

Well I think I have messed up maybe 4 times in 200 or so odd reviews so odds are good I can keep it spoiler free. The real issue is that some people have insane ideas of what a spoilers is hahaha.
But for the general meaning of the word and how it is reflected in Uncharted 4. Ya I think its going to be fairly simple
 
Well I think I have messed up maybe 4 times in 200 or so odd reviews so odds are good I can keep it spoiler free. The real issue is that some people have insane ideas of what a spoilers is hahaha.
But for the general meaning of the word and how it is reflected in Uncharted 3. Ya I think its going to be fairly simple

Fantastic! Looking forward to watching it Monday.
 
IGN has been disappointing me for a long time in terms of the general editors' hyper-reluctance to not support a reviewer's score, opinion, and reasoning on big games. I have a hard time thinking back to a time when I listened to a podcast Beyond and the people on the podcast were comfortable coming out and directly disagreeing with a recent review. I'm sure there are many counter-examples across all time but that's just the general vibe I've gotten from that staff's way of handling the review process.

I'm perfectly fine with Lucy's review, but IGN's groupthink when it comes to reviews sours the entire thing. Maybe there was some confusion on who said what, the review vs the podcast, but they come off to me as so obsessed with trying to back each other up that it might as well be mashed together on some level.

I'm not trying to call you out directly, but this type of "hivemind" criticism of IGN and similar sites seems to only come up when it's in reference to a game that isn't scored in a way that certain people were expecting.

When the general consensus of the editorial staff at IGN over Uncharted 3 and Skyward Sword receiving perfect 10's was that of agreement, I didn't see folks complaining. In hindsight....maybe they should have?
 
Well I think I have messed up maybe 4 times in 200 or so odd reviews so odds are good I can keep it spoiler free. The real issue is that some people have insane ideas of what a spoilers is hahaha.
But for the general meaning of the word and how it is reflected in Uncharted 4. Ya I think its going to be fairly simple

Looking forward to your review too! I'll just wait until I finish my run too see it if you upload it before, should take me until the weekend.
 
How about you tell me what you give it? You can tell me, im sure no one is reading this thread :)

LOL. I remember a couple weeks ago there was a thread about a certain game and the PR company contacted me and basically said "I know you use neogaf and probably saw the other reviewer yacking in detail about the game while saying they WEREN'T giving anything away. Ya don't do that."

In the last say 9 months stuff has got far more tight and watched. It can suck. Like here for example where one day you are told you have code coming and the next told you wont cause your a dirty 'tuber' but such is life.

Looking forward to your review too! I'll just wait until I finish my run too see it if you upload it before, should take me until the weekend.
Mine wont go live until the video embargo for new stuff is up.
 
No got my code and played some but not really allowed a real review until Monday I think which is when that part of the embargo goes away.
Otherwise its just sort of show the same footage already shown and blather.
I have the blathering down pat but no reason to do one or do impressions without new video for me.

Working on a Walking the Walk video too but that may come later depending on the timeframe.

Looking forward to your Walking the Walk video, I think it is a great series. I hope you throw in a few photo mode beauty shots in as well. Hopefully it will be ready soon after I complete the game, but as you say life gets in the way of fun.
 
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