So Uncharted 2 has been out since mid-October and I’ve been playing it diligently. So diligently in fact that I forgot to write the review! By now you know all sorts of things are ultra-cool in the game. I’m not going to tell you a lot of new things here, but I said I would write it up and write it up I must.

The very first level of Uncharted 2 Among Thieves is quite possibly the coolest opening sequence for a title ever with you on a train hanging off a cliff. It not only throws you into the story like a two-seam fastball but it secretly tells you the controls you’ll need for the rest of the game. Very clever Naughty Dog. The game does a fantastic job of seamlessly sewing together cut-scenes that progress the story and give you an immediate goal and the actual gameplay. It’s quite possibly one of the best I’ve seen and there have been times where I said ’oh! Now I should start playing’ because I was so engrossed in the storytelling.

Speaking of the story, it’s not totally unique, but it’s fresh enough so that you remain interested. There are no amazing plot twists that catch you off guard and it’s a classic roguish but noble hero attempts to thwart evil guys from doing evil things and messes up some stuff along the way. Such is life and it makes the character of Nathan Drake more believable because he’s not perfect.

But he is in amazing physical shape if you think about all the things that he does in the game . Constantly climbing, running, gunning and throwing people into the air to grab onto out of reach items. Plus he can certainly take a lot of bullets, unless it’s to the head. But hey, he’s an action star and they can all manage that stuff right?

The graphics on the game are extremely well done aside from some minor flaws. People in the game have some of the creepiest eyes I’ve ever seen and at times there are some strange graphical glitches. But really they’re all minor when you’re running down a street firing a pistol at ten bad guys chasing you.

Physics in the game are quite well done also. There’s lots of stuff that you can blow up and affect in the environment but it’s not totally destructible like say reality or Red Faction Guerrilla. There are also some minor glitches here. I fell ’through’ some boards just by walking on them and had to restart from the last checkpoint because I had fallen ’into’ the level itself and could not move. But hey, at least you can swim in the game, so water is not acid-based like days of old.