After engaging in many hours between the June beta and the just released beta, I think its safe to say that Naughty Dog has created one solid multiplayer experience within the Uncharted universe. With several maps, game types, characters, and modes, PS3 gamers are about to get an equivalent to Microsofts Gears of War. Featuring the same additive play style as Gears of War, Uncharted 2 goes beyond what that title offers. Sony has finally received their defining online experience to show that PlayStation gamers are serious about online gaming. If you didnt preorder the game from a local GameStop or EBGames, dont worry, youll be able to participate in the same demo on September 29th.
Naughty Dog packed the demo with tons of content. Weighing in just over a Gigabyte, this is just a skeletal outline of what we can expect from the full retail game. Offering four maps to play through, youll have your choice of Plaza, Village both of which were in the previous beta. Two new maps are also introduced, Ice Caves and Temple. These two levels are smaller than the previous two maps, but they still pack a lot unique opportunities and positions for you to take dominance over. Ice Caves isnt only a marvel of graphical presentation; the level design is also mind-blowing and gives the players a chance to use a variety of weapons and positions. Temple is jaw dropping in many characteristics. Whether its the graphics, design, weapons, or the type of intense battles youll find yourself in, the Temple is always a blast to play on. The Temple is designed for flanking or taking control of the high balcony in the middle of the level and shooting down on your swarming opponents. There may only be four maps available in the demo, but there isnt one you wont want to play on.
Like the beta before it, Deathmatch and Plunder modes are back but with slight differences. Plunder mode now has different difficulty levels and Deathmatch has a couple new play types and styles. While playing in Deathmatch, youll often find yourself voting on whether you want a standard DM game or if itll be purely shotgun/snipers, pistols/grenades, or the new Elimination and Chain Reaction modes. Elimination plays like the name would suggest. There are two teams and your goal is to kill everyone on the opposite team. Annihilate the other team three out of five times, and youll be declared the winner. Once a player is killed during a round, though, they wont respawn and then youll need to reassess your strategy if you find yourself alone and battling four other people. Chain Reaction will have you capturing flags in a specific order. One team will need to capture flags 1-5, while the opposing team will need capture flags 5-1. So, things may become a little more intense around flag three. Another new mode is Co-op Arena. Co-op Arena is almost like Horde mode from Gears of War 2, but slightly different and more meaningful. You can partner up to three players in this mode, and youll need to fight off numerous of swarms of enemies as you try to locate a golden idol and return it to a safe box on the other end of the level. Things get hard fairly quickly in this mode, but its a blast to play with a couple friends.
The addition of Twitter is a nice feature and itll definitely be a nice thing for those who love using the application to showoff their Uncharted 2 accomplishments. You can customize what information will be sent to Twitter. If you want everyone to know when you are playing the game, earn gold, reach certain peaks, or what have you, the game has the option for it.
The biggest addition is the new cinema mode. You can save matches, replay them, take screenshots, and take total control over the camera to watch the action of the match from any viewpoint. The only feature missing from this mode is a rewind option. You can slowdown the footage, fast-forward it, but you cant rewind it. The only option available is to start the match from the beginning. Its a small thing, but I hope they do add a rewind option in the future.
The true heart of the Uncharted 2 online experience comes from earning money by killing your enemies, collecting treasures, and winning as a team. Acting like experience, the money will allow you to level up your ranking, unlock new weapon upgrades, skins, perks, and more. Much like Call of Duty, everything is dependant on your game performance. The better you do, the better your rewards. The demo is capped at level 50, whether or not the full game will have a higher level or a prestige type of option hasnt been revealed, yet. Unfortunately, all these perks, levels, and cinemas we create will not carry over to the full release. So, youll have to ask yourself if you want to try to unlock all those medals and perks before you get the full game in hand.
With the recent demo and new features revealed, Uncharted 2 is going to be the ultimate PS3 online experience. Everything is looking to come together nicely and Naughty Dog even has a website dedicated to your personal stats. Naughty Dog put in a lot of time to craft this multiplayer mode and its showing. This will be the online title to get PS3 gamers ready to form an online community like that of Xbox Live. With this demo ending on September 28th and the public demo going live on the 29th, many of us will be playing until the full retail launch.