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Posts with tag naughty-dog

Uncharted 2 details revealed in latest EDGE


Those lucky so-and-sos at EDGE have had some eyes-on time with upcoming half-tuck-em-up Uncharted 2. The preview in the latest issue reveals a lot of backstory as well as quelling our fears about the potential of those stealth sections. Fans of Nathan Drake will be happy to hear that Uncharted 2 will delve further into his character, showing that while he's "affable and charming, he can also be a jerk."

No longer is Nathan on a quest for Francis Drake, instead he's turned his sights to Marco Polo, whose journey back to Europe from the court of Kublai Khan saw his 600-man fleet dwindle to just a dozen survivors. Ultimately Drake's journey will lead him to Tibet and an ancient city, which is said to house a gem that can grant wishes. The story in this game will allow for plenty of variety in the environments you'll be visiting.

Naughty Dog also clarifies what they mean by a "stealth mechanic," which put many people on edge when the game was announced. There is no intention of turning Uncharted into the next Splinter Cell; "stealth just gives you something more in the toolbox - another element, another choice that's available to you. Stealth or shooting - both choices are valid at any time." There's plenty more interesting stuff to read in the full article. It's certainly done a good job getting us even more excited about what's to come from Naughty Dog next year.

Here, have some Uncharted 2 screenshots and concept pics


We know exactly how you're feeling. You saw the Uncharted 2 trailer (probably multiple times) and it just left you wanting more. NeoGaf user "jiggle" has posted a whole bunch of screenshots and concept images from Nathan Drake's second outing. They show a new urban environment, with decidedly non-piratey armed guards (though, in true Uncharted fashion, they do all look the same). There's also some snowy concept art, what appears to be a new female sidekick (we're still rooting for Elena to make a return) and an ancient city in the mountains (shown above) that we can't wait to explore.

We're not sure what the source of these images is, but we'll be sure to update you should we learn of their origin. Regardless, take a peek and get yourself even more hyped up for what is quickly becoming our most anticipated game for 2009.

[Thanks Noshino and Monik]

Spike VGA Trailersplosion: Kratos, Drake, Watchmen, Brutal Legend & Dante's Inferno

So you missed the Spike VGAs. You didn't miss much. Only the first footage of Uncharted 2, God of War III, Brutal Legend, Watchmen and Dante's Inferno (from the team behind Dead Space, don'tcha know). We've got your back, though. After the break you can watch all of the trailers from the show without having to sit through any of that boring "awards" stuff (GTA IV for GOTY? Really?)

We're having trouble deciding which of these trailers is our favorite. Realistically it's probably Uncharted 2, because we love us some Nathan Drake. Then again, we have demon nuns, Kratos wielding massive gloves, Rorschach beating up bad guys and another interesting looking new IP from the Dead Space team. What's there not to like? 2009's looking great.

Continue reading Spike VGA Trailersplosion: Kratos, Drake, Watchmen, Brutal Legend & Dante's Inferno

Uncharted 2 preview in Game Informer reveals juicy details


After watching the breath-taking teaser trailer that was supposedly rendered in real-time, we couldn't wait to find more about Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. Well, our wish is Game Informer's command -- their cover story for January features adventurer Nathan Drake's second outing and various sources on the interwebz have already gathered all the little juicy bits.

MaDogNik96 of GameFAQs reports that Drake will be looking for the "lost" ships of Marco Polo and will joined by one Chloe Frazer, who is voiced by Claudia Black of Stargate SG-1 fame. Speaking of voice actors, Nolan North will reprise his role as the main protagonist (editor's note: yay!). New improvements and mechanics, some of which were already reported, include free climbing, stealth gameplay, "more dynamic" melee combat, elimination of SIXAXIS controls, access to your weaponry during any stance, improved graphics, retooled QTE sequences that give the player more control and more.

The game will also reportedly use "nearly 100%" of the PS3's power (Drake's Fortune has been quoted as using 30%), but that sounds a stat that will remain true only until Uncharted 3 is unveiled. A scan of the article is available here. A summary of all the information can be accessed here.

[Via Joystiq]

Source -- Uncharted 2: Among Thieves [GameFAQs]
Source -- OMG first Uncharted 2 Scan [GameTrailers.com]
Source -- New Uncharted 2 INFO -- GI [NeoGAF]

Avi Arad producing Uncharted: Drake's Fortune film


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?

[Via Variety]

Uncharted Trophy patch finally hits Asia

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!

[Thanks KhunMo and Marcial G.!]

Naughty Dog designer: we are using only 30-40% of PS3's power


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 been keeping up. 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.

Trophies: Uncharted: Drake's Fortune

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.

Continue reading Trophies: Uncharted: Drake's Fortune

Uncharted trophies patch hits North America

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.

[Thanks everyone who sent this in!]

Uncharted trophy patch drops in Europe


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!

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Uncharted's Trophies identical to in-game medals


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.

[Thanks, AlterEgo!]

Uncharted getting Trophy support by mid-August


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.

Uncharted getting a trophy patch in the 'foreseeable future'

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 Paradise will 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.

Learn to make Uncharted at home!

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!

[Via PlayStation.Blog]

GDC08: The Uncharted post-mortem


At Game Developer's Conference, our pal, Richard Lemarchand from Naughty Dog hosted a post-mortem on Uncharted entitled "Amazing Feats of Daring." His talk covered the various challenges the team encountered on their first PS3 project, and the tricks they've learned along the way. The audience was jam-packed, as representatives of gaming's most proclaimed development teams attended the session.

Continue reading GDC08: The Uncharted post-mortem

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