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Uncharted 4: A Thief's End |OT| You're gonna miss this ass

Finished the game just now and looked at the Metacritic score.

93 for critics makes sense, but why is it only 7.8 for Users?
The game was pretty great.

Is it a console war thing?
 

ironcreed

Banned
Beat it last night. I am not crazy about some of the action sequences and thought that the final encounter was awful. But on the whole it was one hell of a ride and the game is absolutely breathtaking in terms of visuals. I give it a solid 9. Great way to close out the series.
 

EatChildren

Currently polling second in Australia's federal election (first in the Gold Coast), this feral may one day be your Bogan King.
I think there are plenty of games with similarly impressive tech to Uncharted 4. Naughty Dog have the time/money/talent in art to go that extra mile and, alongside the tech team, enrich each scene with a frequently unfathomable density of custom assets and textures, and context specific effects and animations.

We're talking about a game where the devs took the time to program and model 3D mud between tyre tread that accumulates when driving through specific terrain, and then deteriorates when driving on others. Do burnouts on rocks and the mud will fly off.

Few devs have that attention to detail.
 
quite curious this thread.

every time I've read an uncharted thread, people have
complained about the supernatural elements in uncharted
, take it away and people go "we miss this".

lol
 
Are the golden guns you find in the game important in any way?
It just means the gun is super powerful and can usually kill anything in one shot

quite curious this thread.

every time I've read an uncharted thread, people have
complained about the supernatural elements in uncharted
, take it away and people go "we miss this".

lol
Because it's different people who are complaining
 

Gray Matter

Member
So in UC4 Nate forgot his first big traversal skill, the rope, and a very important combat skill, throwing back grenades.

Sometimes I don't understand.
 

nib95

Banned
Death of the artform is the only kind of hyperbole that can give me any catharsis, but still, if this type of design thought and this tier of writing is so positively reiforced it logically means we'll get more like this and less of anything else in our top tier AAA space -- which is a relatively limited space.

I really do dislike selfish sentiment like this. Just shows bad character. Hundreds of thousands if not millions of people love this franchise and by virtue this style of game design, and you want it and it's style of design to die just because you yourself don't like it, and others might borrow from it. How sad. How many games like Uncharted are there again? That's right, barely any. There are enough games out there to satisfy all tastes and all diversities, if you don't like a certain style of game, simply don't play it, and instead play one of the countless others that do exist.
 
So in UC4 Nate forgot his first big traversal skill, the rope, and a very important combat skill, throwing back grenades.

Sometimes I don't understand.
I really don't get why the removed throwback. Would it confuse the priority of the triangle command for reload and pick up? Did they think it made the game too easy in uncharted 3? Instead they add an explosive damage animation that pushes you out of cover with no way to counter except moving assuming there's any cover left cause it's all made of cardboard
 

Acorn

Member
So in UC4 Nate forgot his first big traversal skill, the rope, and a very important combat skill, throwing back grenades.

Sometimes I don't understand.
Fucking hate that you can't throw it back. Especially at higher difficulties, fucks up your cover too.
 

m4st4

Member
I really don't get why the removed throwback. Would it confuse the priority of the triangle command for reload and pick up? Did they think it made the game too easy in uncharted 3? Instead they add an explosive damage animation that pushes you out of cover with no way to counter except moving assuming there's any cover left cause it's all made of cardboard

I think they wanted you to constantly move your ass around the map (although they did that nicely with constant flanking). Sucks on higher difficulties though.
 
I really don't get why the removed throwback. Would it confuse the priority of the triangle command for reload and pick up? Did they think it made the game too easy in uncharted 3? Instead they add an explosive damage animation that pushes you out of cover with no way to counter except moving assuming there's any cover left cause it's all made of cardboard

The existence of the rope and the placement of the rope-swing pillars around the combat arenas largely implies the game's preferred design choice is for you to be constantly moving around in combat, and probably to that extent, they decided that empowering your position in cover is anti-thesis to that design choice.

Thus they did things like making covers weaker, enemy flanking more prevalent, and remove grenade throwbacks.
 

Gecoma

Member
Posted this is another thread, quoting it here. Thoughts/Spoliers ahead, only highlight if you've finished the game.

Just beat it, very rambley mixed thoughts incoming. Spoilers obviously.

I saw some people say it had a good final boss & a good treasure story. But that boss fight was just as bad as the others & the Avery plot went fucking nowhere. Seriously, just one throwaway line about how he died trying to escape & then never mentioned again. The founders stuff was interesting but predictable.

Giant Bomb's Dan Rykert was talking about how the 2nd half was much better than the first & I couldn't disagree more. Everything up until the boat crash on Libertalia was great. Highlights include the opening prison break, the actual opening credits, exploring their house, Madagascar, the car chase scene & the "At Sea" chapter. The Scotland caves chapter was the only poor one in the first half of the game.

Once we got to Libertalia I feel like the quality just dropped. Enemy encounters especially became much more of a chore. Bar some good character stuff the 2nd half of the game was much less enjoyable than the 1st.

The shooting felt so much worse, I finished the game with about 25% accuracy & granted while I'm not great at shooters I did just Plat all 3 previous Uncharted games this year. So I feel like I shouldn't have been missing as much as I did. Maybe I'm just to used to the old ones idk.

I liked the happy ending with no cliche deaths but now the marketing & some ominous dialogue feels kinda deceitful. Even though the ending was anticlimactic & kinda drawn out I did like it.

Overall I do think it's a great game, looks fantastic, amazing set pieces, great dialogue, fun stealth mechanics. But ignoring the fact that I'm probably gonna play it again at some point to try & platinum it (assuming that "finish with over 70% accuracy" trophy doesn't fuck me that is) I'd honestly rather replay Uncharted 1 purely for fun. Granted I'm a wierdo who likes U1 the best.

So yeah personally very mixed feelings right after finishing it but undiniably a great game. I think that terrible exploding mummies chapter near the end is a large part of my anooyance right now haha. Almost forgot about that beach/ship graveyard fight. That shit was infuriating, hands down my least favourite Uncharted level. Right along side the exploding mummies.
 
The existence of the rope and the placement of the rope-swing pillars around the combat arenas largely implies the game's preferred design choice is for you to be constantly moving around in combat, and probably to that extent, they decided that empowering your position in cover is anti-thesis to that design choice.

Thus they did things like making covers weaker, enemy flanking more prevalent, and remove grenade throwbacks.
You largely move around in every uncharted, u4 is not special in this way. They didnt think about the ramifications of having no real safety when they were balancing crushing cause rope swinging is a death sentence and destructible cover turns a lot of encounters into trial and error
 

nib95

Banned
You largely move around in every uncharted, u4 is not special in this way. They didnt think about the ramifications of having no real safety when they were balancing crushing cause rope swinging is a death sentence and destructible cover turns a lot of encounters into trial and error

They thought about it with the level design, which is by far the most complex and optioned in the franchise. There are multiple pathways, climbing ridges and points, windows, walls, ledges, areas of long grass, pillars, platforms of different elevations etc literally everywhere in most major encounters. Then there's encounter specific stuff like mudslides, underwater swimming etc.
 
They thought about it with the level design, which is by far the most complex and optioned in the franchise. There are multiple pathways, climbing ridges, points, Windows, walls, areas of long grass, pillars, platforms of different elevations etc literally everywhere in most major encounters. Then there's encounter specific stuff like mudslides, underwater swimming etc.
That's great when stealth is actually available to the player.

Sorry I'm still fuming over those last couple of chapters.
 

Finalow

Member
The existence of the rope and the placement of the rope-swing pillars around the combat arenas largely implies the game's preferred design choice is for you to be constantly moving around in combat, and probably to that extent, they decided that empowering your position in cover is anti-thesis to that design choice.

Thus they did things like making covers weaker, enemy flanking more prevalent, and remove grenade throwbacks.
pretty much, making all those changes was actually a good decision.
if you're annoyed at not being able to kill everyone while staying behind the same cover for 30 minutes and possibly without dying a single time then I guess just play on super easy babby mode with auto-aim on.

and honestly I don't know how much different crushing is but I'm almost done with my run on hard and I've yet to find enemies spamming grenades non-stop.
 

BadAss2961

Member
One quick question before I start. Does this game still use the beat hard, unlock crushing format?

Trophy reasons... 2 playthroughs instead of 3.
 
pretty much, making all those changes was actually a good decision.
if you're annoyed at not being able to kill everyone while staying behind the same cover for 30 minutes and possibly without dying a single time then I guess just play on super easy babby mode with auto-aim on.

and honestly I don't know how much different crushing is but I'm almost done with my run on hard and I've yet to find enemies spamming grenades non-stop.
Dude knock it off with this bullshit. That kind of playstyle wouldn't get you anywhere in any of the game's on crushing.
 

nib95

Banned
That's great when stealth is actually available to the player.

Sorry I'm still fuming over those last couple of chapters.

Yea, some of them are tough on Crushing. Ship graveyard is straight ludicrous in terms of difficulty spike, but it is basically the last proper gunfight and true final boss lol. That bit you just have to be fairly mobile, and play very strategically in terms of cover choices, as well as saving the right weapons and all your grenades only for the last wave of the two heavy chain gunners. Once the nades knock away their armor, you can headshot them for an easy kill, and just remember they can't climb, so get up high and they can't get you. Grab the revolver bottom left of the map, down in front and of the left sniper before you do though.
 

WanderingWind

Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
Finished the game. It was okay. Probably won't make my personal top 10 of the year, but if you've been an Uncharted fan for a while, I can see how you couldn't have asked for a better send off than this.
 

KorrZ

Member
Been enjoying this game so far (on chapter 16) but I continually am getting reminded that I never actually liked the combat in Uncharted period.

The bullet sponge enemies and the huge amount of damage you take so quickly is constantly infuriating. I definitely appreciate the additional stealth options to make it less tedious.
 

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
I think the millennial generation will be known for basically destroying the meaning of words. How can you use atrocious to describe anything in this game?

How old do you think
Nate is at the end of the game? 50? I hope I look that good at 50.
 
I think the millennial generation will be known for basically destroying the meaning of words. How can you use atrocious to describe anything in this game?

How old do you think
Nate is at the end of the game? 50? I hope I look that good at 50.

I imagined he was around mid 30's for the game. His kid is early teens, so Drake being around 50 isn't too off, considering how in shape he is it's not shocking to see he still looks good. Really, the design for them being older, especially Elena was spot on, just enough wrinkle.
 

nib95

Banned
I think the millennial generation will be known for basically destroying the meaning of words. How can you use atrocious to describe anything in this game?

How old do you think
Nate is at the end of the game? 50? I hope I look that good at 50.

Secretly Nate has been taking
little nibbles of the blue tree resin he keeps in that test tube at the beginning of the game.
 

Kule

Member
I imagined he was around mid 30's for the game. His kid is early teens, so Drake being around 50 isn't too off, considering how in shape he is it's not shocking to see he still looks good. Really, the design for them being older, especially Elena was spot on, just enough wrinkle.

It's all the tropical humidity keeping his skin looking young.
 

Tankard

Member
Finished the game after 17 hours. What a masterpiece!!
Maybe i'm overreacting because I just finished but U4 might be my favourite Uncharted game. Going for the platinum now.
 
I imagined he was around mid 30's for the game. His kid is early teens, so Drake being around 50 isn't too off, considering how in shape he is it's not shocking to see he still looks good. Really, the design for them being older, especially Elena was spot on, just enough wrinkle.

It's all the tropical humidity keeping his skin looking young.

Secretly Nate has been taking
little nibbles of the blue tree resin he keeps in that test tube at the beginning of the game.

Yes to everyone one of you
 

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
Seriously I was like gaddam at those calf muscles

And if
Elena is the same age then she is an all time beauty.
 
Yea, some of them are tough on Crushing. Ship graveyard is straight ludicrous in terms of difficulty spike, but it is basically the last proper gunfight and true final boss lol. That bit you just have to be fairly mobile, and play very strategically in terms of cover choices, as well as saving the right weapons and all your grenades only for the last wave of the two heavy chain gunners. Once the nades knock away their armor, you can headshot them for an easy kill, and just remember they can't climb, so get up high and they can't get you. Grab the revolver bottom left of the map, down in front and of the left sniper before you do though.
See I came in with the condor, killed the six dudes at the bottom, used the para to kill the two guys below the perch, ran up to to the crate with the sniper rifle, then ran up to the crate with the revolver, the ran all the way back to the area where you sstarted the encounter and sniped the the snipers, then went back down to get the power assault rifle thats below deck and try to bait the the reinforcements to follow me otherwise the minigunners will just camp at the other side of the map where the next encounter is supposed to happen, then I climb up all the way back up top, wait for the two minigunners to group up and lob the grenades to take them down, then make sure to kill the two gas mask grabber guys and then I move down and pick up the minigun and just start firing away at all of the other reinforcements. I just hate that I had to cheese that area so hard by running up top to hide.

As far as I hate a lot of encounters in the games, I was enjoying myself a lot in the encounters when you get to Libertalia. That's where all the expert level design was in the game, and I think it stopped right when you get to big water area with you know who. I love that sequence cause it reminded me a lot of uncharted 3 and sneaking in and out of water
 

Deku Tree

Member
Took me 18 hours to be the game on Hard. First play through. Was taking it slow and looking around the environments a lot. Still missed most of the collectable junk, lol. A lot of it is hidden well.
 

cyba89

Member
Just finished it. I really liked the combat encounters encounters in the game but the
ship graveyard battle
was just shitty. Everything what makes U4 battles good (traversal, freedom, verticatility, stealth) didn't work out for me and it became just a bad cover shooter.
I was playing on normal. Can't imagine how annoying this is on higher difficultlies.

Otherwise the game was great. I liked the pirate story and the pacing was good too. I like it better than U3 and it's equal to U2.
Too bad they already showed the best action sequence at E3. Would have been infinitely more mindblowing seeing that in the game the first time.

I wonder what they'll do for the singleplayer DLC.
 

Croash

Member
Just finished it after starting it on Friday evening. What a ride! Everything about the story and characters was top notch. Very satisfied with how this franchise has evolved, although I think I prefer the more straightforward/linear nature of previous entries to a certain extent.

I felt how different it was compared to the trilogy, having just played through it all last week.

And that's just the thing... I don't feel like jumping back again like I did for the others. Uncharted always was to me an "amusement park" kind of game where I could replay my favorite rollercoaster rides (train, ship + plane, chateau, etc...).

To me, 4 is a bit closer to what ND did with The Last of Us, and it feels like the adventure is just too big to be enjoyed again here and there (I did not actually feel this for TLoU since I don't play it for the same reasons). Chapters are long. Puzzles, exploration, combat and set piece moments work together as a whole but after that's done, I'm not encouraged to isolate only a few specific moments. It would take too long to reach them.

I thought the Encounter Select menu would be perfect for that, instead of playing a chapter right from the beginning, but unfortunately each Encounter checkpoint you load that way abruptly ends with no possibility to keep on playing. Even one huge sequence (E3 2015 demo) is divided in 3 encounters so either you play through a long chapter with puzzles and climbing to reach that part again or you'd have to play it with 3 separate loading screens. :/

That's a bit disappointing. But it doesn't tarnish the first playthrough so my enjoyment of the adventure isn't suddenly erased. It is a lot closer to being a movie than anything ND has done before and that is why, along with its excellence, it's too bad I'd need to go through exposition/exploration moments that won't matter again to me.

Anyway that's a minor personal complaint I had to mention.

Uncharted 4 is a masterfully executed, polished experience. Surprised me at every turn. From seamless cutscene transitions, to huge vibrant and breathing environments, little things like dialogue interruption being taken into account, a plethora of animations for pretty much everything, etc... Even the Bonus Render Modes had my jaw dropping at how fun they are!

Congratulations to Naughty Dog and thanks for the memories. Especially that Sony nostalgia moment... <3

Can't wait for information about the Single Player DLC.
 

Rodin

Member
Played through the first six chapters. Loved the intro, i think they hit all the right notes with tone and narrative, and the "tutorials" felt all very natural. Graphics are stunning, both from a technical and artistic standpoint, and the gameplay seems like a huge step ahead compared to the previous entries in the series in every possible way. The things borrowed from TLOU are improved here, and they actually work better in Uncharted. Acting is also fantastic (i don't think there is a game that can compare to this one in this particular aspect), and the dialogues are pretty good too (especially the funny ones).

About the negatives, i don't like Sam that much for now, and i expected more from music (although i didn't find it as bad as some people think).
Seriously I was like gaddam at those calf muscles

And if
Elena is the same age then she is an all time beauty.
She is!
 
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