Posted Oct 2nd 2008 5:30PM by Alan Tsang Filed under: News
Avi Arad, the producer of blockbusters such as the Blade series, X-Men series and an upcoming Everquest movie, has been revealed as the producer of a cinematic adaptation of Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. In an interview with Kotaku, the 60-year old producer (Kotaku has him listed as 33, leading one to suspect they are actually speaking with Ari Arad, Avi's son) talks about how Nathan Drake isn't just an Indiana Jones clone. Drake is a complicated character, according to Arad. "He's not a benevolent guy, but he's certainly not a great guy. Indiana Jones was always a good guy and he relentlessly did the right thing. Drake is a guy who's being hauled over to virtue throughout the game."
The film won't bring you to the island as quickly as the game did, according to the producer. Instead, the film will add some background to the story and "explore some of the modern day piracy that's going on today in South America." How do you feel about this film thus far? Is Arad the right guy for the job? Or would you rather have Brett Ratner?
When we first restarted the Ask PS3 Fanboy column we were bombarded with a hail of Uncharted questions. All of them were regarding the Asian version of the game, and a good portion of those were about Trophies. While North American and European gamers quietly racked up a Trophy collection last month, Asian gamers were left without the enhanced feature. That, however, appears to be changing as reader KhunMo tells us the Asian Trophies patch for Uncharted is now out.
At the end of August, the Japanese version was updated with the Trophies patch and we suspected the Asian version would follow in the following weeks. It looks like it happened. If you're a gamer from Asia, load up your game, see if you can get the patch, and let us know!
The 160GB model announced at Leipzig today will also be coming to America in a new bundle featuring last year's blockbuster PS3 exclusive, Uncharted. For $499, the 160GB system will include the new 160GB system, a DUALSHOCK 3 controller, a voucher for PAIN and a copy of Uncharted. It will be available in November.
"As PLAYSTATION Network continues to evolve with our recently launched video delivery service and more exclusive games, PS3 owners are demanding more storage capacity," said Jack Tretton, president and CEO, SCEA. "Consumers also are utilizing PS3 as an entertainment hub for their digital media, placing content such as their entire music collection on the hard drive. The 160GB PS3 system addresses this growing consumer demand in a compelling bundle that delivers significant value."
Posted Aug 5th 2008 6:30PM by Alan Tsang Filed under: News
Richard Lemarchandm, Co-Lead Game Designer at Naughty Dog, sat down with Three Speech in a lengthy interview to talk about their latest developments. He goes on extensively about how Uncharted: Drake's Fortune's trophies were implemented, Cell architecture, and one tidbit of detail concerning rooms in Home, but it's nothing new if you've beenkeepingup. If you want to read the man's own words, Three Speech has your interview right here.
Unfortunately, Lemarchand is rather reticent about Naughty Dog's next project, offering no information other than they are "quite a way into our next production cycle now. " He does, however, give his two cents about the future of multiplatform games: with a set of tools "developed on the Naughty Dog premises, actually, by a group of very, very senior games programmer, some from Naughty Dog and some from elsewhere" called Edge, he believes third-party developers "are going to be able to use them in their own ways, to get more and more and more out of the PS3 over the years." In fact, Lemarchand believes that even Naughty Dog is currently only using 30 to 40 percent of the PS3's power.
The video game designer concludes the interview with by speaking well of the relationship they have with other PS3 developers: "We have this culture of open communication ... we're always trading war-stories with Insomniac and Evolution and Sucker Punch. We're just one block away from Sony Santa Monica -- the guys who made God Of War -- and we get our designers together ... and I think it makes everybody stronger and smarter." Sounds about right to us.
So by now you probably know that the Uncharted trophy patch has dropped and are itching to get your hands on some more glittering prizes. We've listed out every trophy in the game, including those with the mysterious "???" title. Here's the full trophy list:
Bronze Trophies
First Treasure - Find one treasure
Beginner Fortune Hunter - Find 5 treasures
Novice Fortune Hunter - Find 10 treasures
Enthusiast Fortune Hunter - Find 15 treasures
Intermediate Fortune Hunter - Find 20 treasures
Skilled Fortune Hunter - Find 25 treasures
Proficient Fortune Hunter - Find 30 treasures
Advanced Fortune Hunter - Find 35 treasures
Professional Fortune Hunter - Find 40 treasures
Senior Fortune Hunter - Find 45 treasures
Expert Fortune Hunter - Find 50 treasures
Crack Fortune Hunter - Find 55 treasures
Relic Finder - Find the Strange Relic
Brutal Brawler - Kill 5 enemies with a brutal combo
Steel Fist - Kill 5 enemies with a single punch after softening them up with gunfire
Headshot Expert - Kill 5 enemies in a row with headshots
10 Headshots - Kill 10 enemies with headshots
30 Headshots - Kill 30 enemies with headshots
Dyno-might! - Kill 3 enemies with one explosion
Run-And-Gunner - Kill 20 enemies by shooting from the hip (without aiming with the L1 button)
Hangman - Kill 10 enemies while hanging from a ledge
Grenade Hangman - Kill 10 enemies with grenades by aiming while hanging from a ledge
Expert Dyno-might! - Kill 3 enemies with one explosion, five times
50 Kills: PM - 9mm - Kill 50 enemies with the PM - 9mm
50 Kills: 92FS - 9mm - Kill 50 enemies with the 92FS - 9mm
50 Kills: Micro - 9mm - Kill 50 enemies with the Micro - 9mm
20 Kills: Wes - 44 - Kill 20 enemies with the Wes - 44
20 Kills: Desert - 5 - Kill 20 enemies with the Desert - 5
30 Kills: MP40 - Kill 30 enemies with the MP40
50 Kills: AK-47 - Kill 50 enemies with the AK-47
50 Kills: M4 - Kill 50 enemies with the M4
30 Kills: Dragon Sniper - Kill 30 enemies with the Dragon Sniper
50 Kills: Moss - 12 - Kill 50 enemies with the Moss - 12
50 Kills: SAS - 12 - Kill 50 enemies with the SAS - 12
30 Kills: M79 - Kill 30 enemies with the M79
20 Kills: Mk-NDI - Kill 20 enemies with the Mk-NDI
Well look-y here. Europe got a patch earlier in the day (or should we say at the same time of the day, given the time zones), but now North America can too avail of the sweet goodness of pirates, curses, and gold with added trophy hunting. You can download the 13MB patch for Uncharted trophies as of right now. Go on and get ready to replay the game and grab those trophies.
What? No fanfare? The trophy patch for Uncharted: Drake's Fortune is now available. At the moment this is only true for Europe, but no doubt the patch for other regions will be up soon. We'll be sure to update you when that happens. This patch contains a full set of 48 trophies, 47 of which correspond to the medal system already found in the game. The final, platinum, trophy is only achievable once you've obtained the others.
So go ahead and give Uncharted a dusting off, stick it in the drive and start collecting. Your PSN level depends on it!
An interview with Naughty Dog's Arne Meyer revealed a few details about Uncharted's upcoming Trophy patch which confirms what we've suspected all along. Trophies will be identical to the in-game rewards system ("medals"). The evidence? Arne says the game has 48 Trophies, 47 regular ones and 1 Platinum for completionists. The original game also featured 47 medals. Descriptions of certain Trophies, like killing fifty enemies in a row without dying should be familiar to those that already earned those medals. "The Trophies are tied to the medal rewards which already exist in Uncharted. The requirement to get each Trophy is exactly the same as the one for the associated medal."
Unfortunately, there is no retroactive rewards system for Uncharted. If you want Trophies, you're going to have to start all over from the beginning. "To receive Trophies in Uncharted you will have to start a brand new save game without any medals or rewards unlocked."
Also, don't expect any new content in the upcoming patch. It's all about Trophies. Expect the patch to go live in just a few more weeks.
Hype for Home may be pretty dead right now, but there are still a few aspects of the service that intrigue us, like Game Spaces. A couple of these were shown off in trailer form at Sony's E3 Press Conference, but we had a chance to have an in-depth look at the Uncharted and Warhawk spaces with a Sony representative. Most of the presentation was seen through the lens of a camera, so check out the gallery for plenty of snapshots.
The Uncharted Game Space takes the form of Sully's bar, complete with "photos" of characters from the game on the walls. The space is made up of several rooms and rull of relics and mounted animal heads. There's a chance that something in there might be indicative of where the series is headed (a diver's helmet? Uncharted 2: Quest for Atlantis confirmed?)
The Warhawk space is similar, featuring assets from the game. The best things about these Game Spaces are the interactive elements. Uncharted has a locked door with a keypad input. The number can be found by carefully looking around and this will open another room for you to explore. There's also an Uncharted-inspired platforming mini-game. The Warhawk space has a sandtable for you and your clan to plan out your method for the upcoming match before jumping into a game.
We've known for some time now that Naughty Dog's incredible fan-favorite Uncharted is getting Trophy support via an upcoming patch. However, we haven't heard of a time frame ... until now. An interview with Joystiq reveals that the patch was "incredibly easy" to implement because the game "already contains preliminary support fro Trophies via its Medals rewards system." However, don't expect to get any Trophies retroactively ... you're going to have to earn them all over again. (Considering how good the game is, we won't complain!)
Interestingly, Naughty Dog's Evan Wells included these "hooks" for Trophy support because the team believed Sony would implement the feature before the launch of Uncharted last November. Guess those guys were a bit too foward-thinking. Regardless, we can't wait to boost our PlayStation Level.
Want more trophies? Firmware 2.40 isn't even out yet (though it should be only a matter of hours at this point) and we've already have Criterion reveal that Burnout Paradisewill be patched in at some point "soon." Now, in a post-announcement interview with GameSpy, Eric Lempel has revealed that Uncharted will also get a trophy patch in "the foreseeable future". No other details were mentioned but no doubt we'll hear more about Naughty Dog's plans on the PlayStation Blog. Hopefully, fairly soon.
Amazon's Gold Box deal prepares to steal your money once again today as it chops $20 off the price for one of the best PS3 games available, Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. At $60 the game was a must-buy, but at $40 there's simply no excuse. If you haven't yet partaken in Drake's epic quest for the gold of El Dorado, then now's your chance to do so. If you need yet more persuading, check out our review of the game. This deal will only last until they are out of stock and there's no telling when that will be, so be sure to act swiftly.
Commenting on the "replica Uncharted gun," that we posted about yesterday, Sony has told Gamesindustry.biz that it is not officially endorsed and they certainly don't condone it. The gun is supposed to be a replica of Drake's weapon from the 2007 gem, Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. Without official licensing from Sony, however, selling it as such is just a sneaky attempt at cashing in on the game's success.
Sony has said that they are "investigating the source of this product and will proceed with the most appropriate action." Appropriate action, in this case, probably means letting loose their pack of half-starved, feral lawyers. So don't expect it to be around for too much longer.
It's hard to play through Uncharted: Drake's Fortune without wanting to be Nathan Drake at some point or another. Well you may not be able to look like him without major cosmetic surgery, but you candress like him and, now, fondle his weapon.
An airsoft replica of Drake's gun is available now for $170 at King Of Swords and comes with a free aluminum carrying case. For the full specs check out the site. It's a pretty replica, certainly, but we'd much rather put it in a glass case and stare at it than actually shoot it. Perhaps that's just us.
Okay, so you won't actually be able to recreate Uncharted without thousands of dollars worth of software, a PlayStation 3 dev kit and a considerable amount of talent. However, for anyone who is interested in various aspects of how the game was put together, Naughty Dog has very kindly placed their GDC powerpoint presentations up on their website for anyone to take a peek at.
Topics covered include a post-mortem of the game (which everyone should see), a look at Uncharted's animation pipeline and Naughty Dog's use of the high-detail modeling package, Mudbox, and how it integrates into other modeling software. Some of these will be very technical and might not be particularly interesting to everyone. Animation and 3D modeling students, however, have some new game-specific reading material to sift through. Get stuck in!
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