In a recent interview between Eurogamer and Uncharted 3 Game Director Justin Richmond, he was stated that although the game will not move into an open world setting, you will have more room to explore and move around. If your wondering how they will be able to accomplish this I took out a few key quotes from the interview that explain how they tackled a few of the design challenges.
“We’re not an open-world game…We’re never going to be an open-world game – just because that’s not what we’re interested in making…It’s still up in the air how much gameplay we’re going to let you wander around…It will probably feel more open than the other games have. For sure.”
So for any of those fans that had night terrors of their favorite franchise going rouge, put those fears aside. Nathan Drake won’t be going GTA on the franchise anytime soon. But you may find yourself wondering, what do they plan on doing in the desert sequence shown in the trailer? There doesn’t seem to be any boundaries in the scenery show. How can they accomplish the feeling of being lost while still keeping you on the guided path and not resort to invisible walls?
“When we said ‘desert’ the first thing all the game designers said was, ‘Well, crap. How are we going to rein you in?’
“We sent guys to the desert and looked at desert reference and realized that the desert actually does have some natural barriers. There are dunes that are impossible to climb. We sent a couple of our art guys out there and they were trying to climb these dunes and the sand was just sliding. We get away with some of that kind of stuff.
“But at some point we have to do something. And I don’t want to say what we did because I think we came up with a really cool solution. But we try not to kill you.”
It’s good to see that the dev’s have found a way around the invisible wall trick that a great deal of developers use these days. It helps keep the player immersed in the experience and add to the realism. I know I definitely look forward to playing this amazing game when it releases later this year.
