Uncharted 2
I completed Uncharted 2 last night and really enjoyed it. It's one of those games that's so good, I'm tempted to buy another PS3 controller and invite Bonk over to co-op some missions. I'm rarely impressed with games, and I've always wondered how much longer I can be entertained and surprised by games with linear plots and action sequences you can't really deviate from. Well, I guess if they're very well done, if they're developing some neat characters and telling a good action story, they can easily grab me for that "interactive movie" sensation. For such a thing, a sandbox game isn't really appropriate. So far, Uncharted 2 is the best 2009 release I've played.

First off, the characters are a bit more developed in this game, than in the previous game. They've got hints of history and surprisingly enough, you sort of begin to give a damn about the game's main characters. This is a rare experience for me. The main villain is fairly one-dimensional. He's a cruel, ambitious, callous Russian war criminal commanding a personal army of Russian bad-asses. That's right, the swarthy hordes from the first game are gone. They present some very entertaining challenges. I've always said that Uncharted took the Gears of War cover system and perfected it, adding in melee elements to combat and making the enemy AI better. When you hide, they get annoyed and flush you out with grenades. They move to flank you, lay down covering fire, while soldiers wearing heavy ballistic armor move in for the kill with devastating shotguns. You rarely get the time to camp in one spot and pick off soldiers at your leisure. They've added more diverse ways of handle combat areas. There's a greater emphasis on action-stealth as an option in many areas, and there are battle areas that have pathways up and over obstacles as an option for flanking fortified opponents. And it wouldn't be an Uncharted game if the enemies didn't just keep coming out in huge numbers. Just when you think you've taken care of things and you're collecting ammo from dead bodies, their buddies show up in squad strength, pouring out of doorways and alleys, often with grenade launchers and GAU mini-guns.

The graphics are really outstanding. The combat controls are some of the most natural and easy to master I've ever felt in a video game, especially the grenade controls. Grenades are now a handy, appreciated tool in your firefight tool box in Uncharted 2. They aren't the difficult-to-master, hard-to-aim, maybe-you'll-get-lucky pains in the ass they are in most games. The pacing feels just right, and the character tension feels pretty natural for a video game. There's a palpable fear when you're climbing something that's slowly falling apart, dangling over a cliff. There's a real sense of terror and hopelessness in being chased by a T-72 through a Nepalese village, and the tank isn't acting like a boss in a boss fight in a video game. It's acting like it has a crew that has the full intention of killing you. Other than that, I think I appreciate this game because I can relate to a wise-cracking Nathan Drake, who seems to like the female ass as much as I do. There are several references to this peppered throughout the game, and they only served to draw me closer to the hero as the kind of person I'd like to kill a few beers with.

There are only a few gripes. They are quite minor. I'd like to see Drake with some more appropriate hand-wear, if he's going to be climbing by the tips of his fingernails on some of the least hospitable terrain on Earth. I don't ever want to see another visible laser beam on a gun in any video game or movie, ever again, for as long as I live. They are the stupidest things I can imagine, and only a shoulder-biting retard would ever put a visible laser beam on his gun. I would be content with seeing red dots appear around my character when I'm being targeted, and leave it up to ME to determine where they are coming from, as best as I can. That is, as long as you insist on giving "snipers" laser target systems, which are usually only fixed to weapons for short-range fighting. That sort of thoughtlessness makes me want to roll up a newspaper and bop the game developer on the nose, while saying "No!" repeatedly.

Otherwise, if you have a PS3, and you like third person action games, this game is your thing. Get it.