After the release of Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune in 2007, developer Naughty Dog greenlit a sequel to be released for the holiday season of 2009. With the foundations of the new franchise outlined by the first game, Naughty Dog now had to build on those foundations to deliver a sequel perfecting their vision of a playable summer blockbuster.
This adventure takes Nathan Drake away from the lush green jungles of the Amazon, on a larger adventure over the Frozen Himalayas. With new characters, a much longer story and new bombastic playable action set pieces.
A Vision Realised
Set two years after the Uncharted: Drake Fortune, Among Thieves throws Nathan Drake on a new adventure in search of the Chintamani stone. This game continues a similar tone to the original, a fun swashbuckling adventure with charismatic characters. Only, this time the story is improved, adding new characters and tighter pacing over an extended game length of 10-12 hours.
Nolan North again delivers a charismatic performance as the lead Nathan Drake, acting alongside an expanded cast of returning characters, and new ones, that bring out different aspects of Drake’s personality.
Drake this time finds himself wrestling with his selfish desires of adventure and fortune, versus doing the right thing. This is best represented through the fun love triangle Drake has with Chloe and Elena. New love interest Chloe Frazer, played by Claudia Black, encourages Drake’s more selfish desires. Whereas “Last Year’s Model” Elena Fisher, played again by Emily Rose, challenges Drake to do the right thing.
A notable new addition to cast is the late Rene Aubejonois as Karl Schafer. Meanwhile, Richard McGonagle makes a brief return as Victor “Goddamn” Sullivan, and Robin Atkin Downes appears in a new role of the Tibetan guide, Tenzin.
Stronger Villains
Antagonistic forces are improved upon in this sequel. Drake now faces off against a Serbian war-criminal, Zoran Lavarevic. Played by Graham Mactavish in a menacing performance that pushes Drake to think more about the safety of those around him, instead of simply getting to the treasure.
The other main antagonist is rival Treasure-Hunter, Harry Flynn, played by Steve Valentine as the franchise’s second British baddie (there’s a lot of them in this franchise). Harry Flynn is an interesting foil to Drake, representing who Drake could become if he indulged too far in his selfish desire for gold.
Like Drake’s Fortune, the story is told through pre-rendered cutscenes, with some lasting longer than five minutes. Despite the length, the cutscenes utilise the performance capture of the actors so well, they are as engaging to watch as the gameplay itself. A much-welcomed change from a lot of AAA games today, having static animations for major moments that break away player immersion.
Overall, the story is greatly improved from the first game, delivering an adventure that has you hooked immediately from the game’s iconic opening, hanging off a derailed train in the Himalayas.
Gameplay
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves gameplay is built on the same central pillars of combat, traversal and puzzle solving.
The first major improvement back when this game was released on PS3 was making the sixaxis controls of the original game optional. This particular feature was also used in a more subtle way this time around.
Gunplay
In combat, a better positioned, zoomed-in, over the shoulder camera gives the player a better view of their surroundings. Additionally, there’s additional zoom options for some weapons. For instance, when using a Sniper Rifle, R3 is used to zoom in, and use the rifle’s scope when aiming. Unfortunately, this can be a small frustration versus defaulting to the scope right away when aiming.
Most of the game’s combat takes place in disguised combat arenas. Naughty Dog have improved these arenas, adding traversal options for the player to take the high ground. Arenas also hide special weapons, encouraging the player to explore to get an advantage.
Like Uncharted 1, Drake can only carry two weapons at a time, one side-arm and one long weapon. While most of the weapons from the first game return, new weapons are also added. These include the three round burst rifle, the FAL, and the shotgun pistol, called the ‘Pistole’.
Tactical Equipment
Other new combat features that increase the players tactical options in a fight include a riot shield that acts as moveable cover Drake can use. As a trade-off, movement is slowed and Drake can only wield his side-arm. Uncharted 2 also introduces a large heavy minigun players can pick up to completely clear out the battlefield. Again, slow movement speed is a counter to the increased damage, along with a long warm-up before firing.
Grenades also make a return, dumping the SIXAXIS controls to be thrown with an arc aimed with the Y axis of the right analogue stick. Players can also throw tanks of propane at enemies and explode them. Most combat arenas have a pile of propane tanks lying around. Players can pick them up and throw them at enemies like a grenade, pressing the fire button to shoot and detonate the tanks when it lands close to the enemy.
Improvements Big and Small
Enemies have greatly improved since the last game, with more variety and levels of difficulty. It becomes very clear through colour how difficult enemies are. From playing the game, you easily pick up that enemies in grey are easier. Whereas enemies in black are tougher and heavily armoured opponents are even tougher. As the player you intuitively distinguish this without being directly told.
Hand to hand combat has had a small update. Where Uncharted had you repeatedly mashing the Square button to beat baddies without retaliation, enemies will now attempt to fight back. When the enemy attempts to counter Drake’s fist, the player must quickly press Triangle, instead of continuing to mash Square. If completed successfully, the player can then continue mashing Square. Baby steps, I suppose.
Stealth has the biggest improvement from the first game. Instead of just being able to do a single takedown before being automatically spotted by everyone, Uncharted 2 enables the player to perform stealth takedowns without alerting everyone in a 5-mile radius and their mums. By today’s standards, it’s very simplistic. Sneak up to an unsuspecting enemy when no-one is watching and press the Square button to perform a stealth takedown. Throughout the game there are several sequences where you start a combat arena in stealth, encouraging you to pick off as enemies before you eventually get dragged into full combat.
There’s even an entire level dedicated to being a tutorial stealth, which sees Drake breaking into a museum in Istanbul. Unfortunately, I remember it not being clear what route you are supposed to take through the level. This lead to a very frustrating experience within the first hour of the game.
Same Linear Exploration
As the player, you explore the world of Uncharted 2 through linearly designed levels, used to keep the player’s focus on the story, with no side-quests or exploration diverting player’s attention. Only one level in the game lets the player freely explore the environment; Drake is given free exploration of a small Tibetan village, interacting with the locals and petting yaks, letting the player build a connection to this peaceful location.
Although the game is linear, hidden treasures make a return in Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. Hidden on corners of the map, or in secret routes. There are a total of 101 treasures to collect. Doing so, will reward PSN trophies and unlock special in-game rewards, like playable character skins.
Improved Traversal
The climbing systems have majorly improved from the first game, achieving the franchise goal of a building everyman action hero closer than before.
As Drake you’ll be spending a lot of time climbing around set traversal paths. There are new climbing features this time, such as monkey bars. The climbing system has improved from the first game, looking much less cartoony. With free movement across walls, Drake now climbs more realistically as you climb with the left analogue stick. Making him feel more like an everyman than the first game did. Balance beams return from Uncharted 1, now no longer requiring an annoying input to centre the SIXAXIS controller to stop Drake falling off.
Puzzle Solving on a Larger Scale
Puzzles return in Uncharted 2, appearing a lot less frequently, but being on a much larger scale when they do. Entire chapters of the game are dedicated to solving a particular puzzle. Many of the puzzles in the game incorporate a lot of the traversal mechanics. For instance, one puzzle has Drake climbing to every corner of this large underground temple to project mirrored light beams to the correct spots.
Drake has a new journal in Uncharted 2, used to provide clues, and sometimes the answer, to all the game’s puzzles. However, you’re free to peruse this new journal at any point in the game. With new entries updated throughout the adventure, the player can browse through pages containing puzzle clues, historical information, and several humorous entries, providing an insight into Drake’s mindset and sense of humour. It’s a clever way of Naughty Dog humanising Nathan Drake to the player.
Action Set-Pieces
The franchise staple of bombastic ludicrous action set-pieces truly began with Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. These begin from the first minute of the game, where the player is suspended off a derailed train in the middle of the Himalayas. Across the game, players will find themselves in set pieces such as fighting through an office building, collapsing before them in real-time, hopping from truck to truck in a convoy racing through the frozen mountainside, and most famously, fighting through a moving train chugging along the Nepalese countryside into the Himalayas.
A lot of these action set-pieces keep players engaged with escalation. Each action set piece begins with Drake in a spot of bother before building up, adding more ludicrous and bombastic elements to the set-piece. Eventually, this leads to a final crescendo moment, where Drake concludes with a quippy one liner. Each set-piece is paced brilliantly, with constant escalation to keep the player on the edge of their seat. The reason these set-pieces became so popular is because you can fully control Drake through these grandiose moments, instead of them being shown to the player in passive cutscenes or semi-interactive quick-time-events.
Graphics and Audio
Uncharted 1 wanted to look different from the crowd of action games currently on the market. Naughty Dog wanted to throw players into colourful, lush green rainforests, instead of miserable grey and brown battlefields. Uncharted 2 continues that, this time putting players into orange streets of a Nepalese city, or the blue and white frozen peaks and caves of the Himalayas. However, this game does have a new slightly darker tone to the original. The environment reflects this new turn with murkier weather like rain or blizzards, as well as darker colours being used in the game’s more bleaker moments.
Overall, the graphics have improved in Uncharted 2, character models have more detailed textures allowing them to look less like a Madame Tussauds‘ statue. Environments look and feel more detailed and lived in. Several areas in Uncharted 1 felt like an obvious combat arena, with several conveniently placed chest high walls for cover. These areas wouldn’t make any sense being there realistically. Uncharted 2 disguises it’s combat arenas and traversal sections in war-torn city streets and mountainside monasteries.
On the audio front, composer Greg Edmonson returns yet again to deliver a new soundtrack for the series, mixing in a lot of Asian instruments and inspiration, and even some Mongolian throat singing.
Drake Improvements
Nathan Drake character model in Uncharted 2 also changed from the first game. Nathan Drake came out skinnier than intended in the first game, so the devs bulked him up for this game. The other main difference is Drake now wears a brown shirt over his white shirt. Again, this emphasises the slightly darker tone of this new game. Drake’s animations have been improved, giving him a more realistic ‘everyman’ feel than before. Animation details like holding his arm to shield his face from fire, or staggering to walk after being shot, build this character as a realistic person instead of chiselled, indestructible action-man.
In Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, the big technical marvel shown off by Naughty Dog was the water and how it reacted to Nathan Drake. This time, the developers proudly marketed their snow effects. Tracks in the snow follow the player in whatever direction they go. Clumps of snow even form around where Drake stands. Water effects do return in Uncharted. Water now reacts more realistically to character movement and bullets.
Multiplayer
When released in 2009, Uncharted 2 featured an entire Multiplayer mode where two teams of players would compete in different game modes. This was the fashion at the time. Between 2008-2013 it seemed every single-player game was released with a companion Multiplayer mode.
Uncharted 2’s Multiplayer was very simplistic and straightforward compared to other games of the time, like Call of Duty. Players would compete in matches, ranking up their level to unlock new rewards, such as playable character skins. Players competed in game modes like Team Deathmatch or Capture The Flag, split between two teams. One side played as hero characters, the other side as Villains. On the hero side, you got to play as beloved characters like Drake, Elena, Chloe, and even Sully. However, if you were on the Villains you got to play as Lazarevic or faceless Serbian mercenary. It was more fun to play the heroes.
The servers for Uncharted 2 were shutdown on September 3rd 2019, running for nearly 10 years following the games release in October 2009.
Final Thoughts
For many Uncharted 2: Among Thieves is considered the best in the franchise. This is perhaps demonstrated with it winning 3 Game of the Year awards in 2009. From all the lessons learned and the criticisms received, Naughty Dog built on the foundations of the first Uncharted to deliver on their vision of building a playable Summer Blockbuster.
Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune walked, so Uncharted 2: Among Thieves could run.
If you enjoyed this article why not have a look at my piece on Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune?
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