TheMay30thMan
Member
After taking a year-long break between the trilogy on PS4 and the fourth game in the mainline Uncharted series, I've finally finished it. Here are my thoughts that no one asked for:
Uncharted 4 is somehow the best, and worst, game in the entire series.
Gameplay:
I've always maintained a controversial take on the series' gameplay when compared to other fans. I think that the climbing and exploration are the best part of these game. Absolutely phenomenal. By the fourth iteration, the climbing mechanics are better than ever before. The rope and pick are great additions to gameplay loop! Everywhere else, falls completely flat for me. The combat is awful to me. It was awful and the first three games, and it hasn't changed. There was an amazing effort to add verticality to the combat encounters, but it didn't really matter for me since I hated the combat to begin with. The long-grass/stealth option was almost entirely unused to me. I didn't feel like making the encounters last any longer than they needed to.
Story:
Meh. I think the addition of an unmentioned Drake brother is fine, but there really wasn't anything worth writing home about in the writing department. Sadly, I had known about the twist of Sam's betrayal and lies before playing, so every interaction between Sam and Nathan was irritating for me. That being said, this was one of the first games that I've played where a spoiler had a massive impact on the experience, and that is impressive to me. The plot was fine, better than most games, but....
A bit of both:
Unfortunately, the worst part of the entire experience for me ties both into the story and the gameplay. Both categories are at complete odds with each other for the entire experience. The amount of times control was ripped from me for a story beat felt more numerous than all of the previous games. Interacting with object takes up to 10+ seconds for Nathan to complete animations. It's daunting. Puzzles that require an AI partner were the worst, since there was a lot of time just waiting to be able to do something. I almost quit when the flashlight went out in Avery's cave. You have to wait for over 2 minutes to be able to do anything. That was not fun. Who thought that would be a good idea? Also, it's really frustrating to see how many times Nathan conveniently forgets that he has a rope. Both Sully and Elena would have been able to join Nathan for the finally of the game if he had just remembered that a rope was strapped to his belt. A LOT of conflicts in the story would be resolved if Nathan didn't forget about his rope...It's weird.
Summary (also written above): Uncharted 4 is somehow the best, and worst, game in the entire series. 5/10.
Uncharted 4 is somehow the best, and worst, game in the entire series.
Gameplay:
I've always maintained a controversial take on the series' gameplay when compared to other fans. I think that the climbing and exploration are the best part of these game. Absolutely phenomenal. By the fourth iteration, the climbing mechanics are better than ever before. The rope and pick are great additions to gameplay loop! Everywhere else, falls completely flat for me. The combat is awful to me. It was awful and the first three games, and it hasn't changed. There was an amazing effort to add verticality to the combat encounters, but it didn't really matter for me since I hated the combat to begin with. The long-grass/stealth option was almost entirely unused to me. I didn't feel like making the encounters last any longer than they needed to.
Story:
Meh. I think the addition of an unmentioned Drake brother is fine, but there really wasn't anything worth writing home about in the writing department. Sadly, I had known about the twist of Sam's betrayal and lies before playing, so every interaction between Sam and Nathan was irritating for me. That being said, this was one of the first games that I've played where a spoiler had a massive impact on the experience, and that is impressive to me. The plot was fine, better than most games, but....
A bit of both:
Unfortunately, the worst part of the entire experience for me ties both into the story and the gameplay. Both categories are at complete odds with each other for the entire experience. The amount of times control was ripped from me for a story beat felt more numerous than all of the previous games. Interacting with object takes up to 10+ seconds for Nathan to complete animations. It's daunting. Puzzles that require an AI partner were the worst, since there was a lot of time just waiting to be able to do something. I almost quit when the flashlight went out in Avery's cave. You have to wait for over 2 minutes to be able to do anything. That was not fun. Who thought that would be a good idea? Also, it's really frustrating to see how many times Nathan conveniently forgets that he has a rope. Both Sully and Elena would have been able to join Nathan for the finally of the game if he had just remembered that a rope was strapped to his belt. A LOT of conflicts in the story would be resolved if Nathan didn't forget about his rope...It's weird.
Summary (also written above): Uncharted 4 is somehow the best, and worst, game in the entire series. 5/10.