I finished Uncharted 3 and I wanted to get a feel from Giant Bomb of something I realized halfway through the game. It deals with the sneaky-sneaky parts of the game where you roll up on a gang of enemies wandering around an area and have the option of trying to pick them off one-by-one. I feel like Uncharted 2 had some great optional stealth sequences where you could clear an entire area without sounding the alarm and feel like a badass.

Uncharted 3, I feel, gives you the illusion only to force you into a massive gun battle no matter how sneaky you are.

The point I realized this is the airport right before you reach the cargo plane. I took out everyone except two guys who are standing right in front of the thing you're supposed to climb to the next area. They're right next to each other, so no matter what you do they always see you and sound the alarm. Even if you use the silenced pistol, as soon as you kill one guy it's "Oh crap, they must have spotted us." Drop a grenade and it's the same story. Then I realized this pops up a bunch of times throughout the game.

The Ocean Liner is another frustrating example. Once you get inside the ballroom Drake himself quips "Let's try to do this quietly". But there are two guys sitting on crates in the back of the room that will always see you no matter what order you try to eliminate the guys standing in the front. Even worse is the end of the Convoy level where enemies can spot you through a raging sandstorm so you're always getting caught by dudes you can't even see. This also sucks when they're sniping you with laser sights through a cloud of dust. Whatever goggles those guys are wearing, I want a pair.

Has anyone pulled off a stealth sequence successfully? Or is it always going to boil down to Drake vs. the World? I know that Uncharted is not a stealth game by any stretch of the imagination. It's just a let down to play so carefully only for the game to go "Surprise! Gun battle!" at the last second.

No clue honestly, I barely even tried to stealth my way through the stealth sequences. It always seemed faster to just shoot everyone in the face to me!

I managed a few stealth sections without setting off any guards and you're usually rewarded with some extra dialogue and no army of dudes running at you.

However some sections had 2 guys next to each other and I have no idea how you are meant to kill 2 at once, I tried the grenade launcher which killed them both instantly, meaning the whole area was empty, but it still set off the "we've been discovered" trigger which refilled the whole area.

I had the same problem. U2 didn't really have that issue as you could sneak around most areas.

From the sounds of it, they decided to make some of those sections you mention un-stealthable, so that they end in a big shootout, because there is probably a significant portion of their audience that think it would be a waste if each large area didn't end in a Gears of War-style giant cover-based shootout.

I don't know you may can't stealth all the way but there are a good amount that you can go total stealth. But everyone complained about the starting stealth mission so i could see why they cut it back a bit.

I killed seven in the airport sequence, but I was spotted for no reason at all.

I had trouble at this part too. I tried so many ways of stealth killing those last two but eventually gave up. As I left that area, however, I noticed that the door they were guarding was not the exit. Instead, you are supposed to climb the roof behind them.

So, just a theory that I totally didn't test, but maybe you are supposed to sneak by and leave them be. Or not, whatever.

@KittenMitten said:

I had trouble at this part too. I tried so many ways of stealth killing those last two but eventually gave up. As I left that area, however, I noticed that the door they were guarding was not the exit. Instead, you are supposed to climb the roof behind them.

So, just a theory that I totally didn't test, but maybe you are supposed to sneak by and leave them be. Or not, whatever.

I actually did try to just run past them. However, since Elena is part of your group she can't sneak by them, and the game will actually set you back to the checkpoint for leaving her behind. Like she got caught or something. So no dice there.

Yup I had that problem in the citadel area. I cleared the entire area using stealth and couldn't do anything, then I ran to the other side and the whole freaking area re-populated.

Yeah it's quite bullshit.  The thing that annoys me is that when you get spotted, not only do you have to deal with the guys you didn't manage to kill but also 20 other people who just come out of god knows where. If it were just a matter of just finishing off the people you couldn't stealth i'd let it slide.
 
you know, everyone is praising this game saying how although it's very similar to Uncharted 2, that ND still managed to outdo themselves. I completely disagree. I feel like there are substantial flaws and detriments to this game that bring down the SP experience as a whole. If it wasn't for the excellent online and co-op i would have sold it already
 
-The idea of stealthing an entire area, that the game purposely tries to set you up for, is total bullshit 

-Although still enjoyable, with the exception of the last level, all the major setpieces had been revealed before the game even released  

-The game feels disjointed as if split into two pieces both in terms of gameplay and narrative. All the puzzle and slow paced sequences are front loaded into the beginning of the game. All the shooting is in the latter part of the game. The beginning of the game fleshes out Cutter and Chloe only to be thrown by the wayside for Elena in the later half.  

-The game tries to show itself off too much as far as graphics, animation and combat to the point that they go overboard in a lot of respects. The fact that the opening and end sequence of the game is hand to hand combat is very telling. There's a lot of "Focus on drake at the end of a cutscene for a few seconds to emphasize graphical fidelity and how good he looks" The new "reach out and touch every wall" is overdone. Should've only been used when he's walking slowly as opposed to every 5 seconds.   

-Enemies are super aggressive. Flanking is one thing which i don't mind but a lot of the arena type battles don't really present you with any kind of advantageous positioning because you're always faced with a variety of powerful enemies. Enemy on a turret, Sniper on a roof next to a grenade launcher enemy while you get flanked by an armored shotgunner and a guy with a pistole. This sounds like it should be a good thing or atleast nothing to complain about but it's super frustrating feeling like every place i go to for cover doesn't offer me any real advantage over the last piece of cover . It changes the dynamic of gunfights and feels like i'm just running around  like a chicken with it's head cut off rather than developing a suitable way to approach the situation
 
- I've had music cut out in the middle of gunfights.

Yeah it's quite bullshit.  The thing that annoys me is that when you get spotted, not only do you have to deal with the guys you didn't manage to kill but also 20 other people who just come out of god knows where. If it were just a matter of just finishing off the people you couldn't stealth i'd let it slide.  you know, everyone is praising this game saying how although it's very similar to Uncharted 2, that ND still managed to outdo themselves. I completely disagree. I feel like there are substantial flaws and detriments to this game that bring down the SP experience as a whole. If it wasn't for the excellent online and co-op i would have sold it already  -The idea of stealthing an entire area, that the game purposely tries to set you up for, is total bullshit  -Although still enjoyable, with the exception of the last level, all the major setpieces had been revealed before the game even released   -The game feels disjointed as if split into two pieces both in terms of gameplay and narrative. All the puzzle and slow paced sequences are front loaded into the beginning of the game. All the shooting is in the latter part of the game. The beginning of the game fleshes out Cutter and Chloe only to be thrown by the wayside for Elena in the later half.   -The game tries to show itself off too much as far as graphics, animation and combat to the point that they go overboard in a lot of respects. The fact that the opening and end sequence of the game is hand to hand combat is very telling. There's a lot of "Focus on drake at the end of a cutscene for a few seconds to emphasize graphical fidelity and how good he looks" The new "reach out and touch every wall" is overdone. Should've only been used when he's walking slowly as opposed to every 5 seconds.    -Enemies are super aggressive. Flanking is one thing which i don't mind but a lot of the arena type battles don't really present you with any kind of advantageous positioning because you're always faced with a variety of powerful enemies. Enemy on a turret, Sniper on a roof next to a grenade launcher enemy while you get flanked by an armored shotgunner and a guy with a pistole. This sounds like it should be a good thing or atleast nothing to complain about but it's super frustrating feeling like every place i go to for cover doesn't offer me any real advantage over the last piece of cover . It changes the dynamic of gunfights and feels like i'm just running around  like a chicken with it's head cut off rather than developing a suitable way to approach the situation  - I've had music cut out in the middle of gunfights.

@KittenMitten said:

I had trouble at this part too. I tried so many ways of stealth killing those last two but eventually gave up. As I left that area, however, I noticed that the door they were guarding was not the exit. Instead, you are supposed to climb the roof behind them.

So, just a theory that I totally didn't test, but maybe you are supposed to sneak by and leave them be. Or not, whatever.

I actually did try to just run past them. However, since Elena is part of your group she can't sneak by them, and the game will actually set you back to the checkpoint for leaving her behind. Like she got caught or something. So no dice there.

I don't know you may can't stealth all the way but there are a good amount that you can go total stealth. But everyone complained about the starting stealth mission so i could see why they cut it back a bit.

At the one part where you and Cutter are trying to get to the tower, I took out all the enemies in the area stealthily and...nothing.  Cutter was still hiding at the beginning, I wasn't getting any action prompts to do anything.  So I fired my weapon and a bunch more enemies spawned.  Two of them literally right next to me.   It wasn't until after killing all the newly spawned enemies that I was able to progress.

@hbkdx12 said:

Yeah it's quite bullshit.  The thing that annoys me is that when you get spotted, not only do you have to deal with the guys you didn't manage to kill but also 20 other people who just come out of god knows where. If it were just a matter of just finishing off the people you couldn't stealth i'd let it slide.  you know, everyone is praising this game saying how although it's very similar to Uncharted 2, that ND still managed to outdo themselves. I completely disagree. I feel like there are substantial flaws and detriments to this game that bring down the SP experience as a whole. If it wasn't for the excellent online and co-op i would have sold it already  -The idea of stealthing an entire area, that the game purposely tries to set you up for, is total bullshit  -Although still enjoyable, with the exception of the last level, all the major setpieces had been revealed before the game even released   -The game feels disjointed as if split into two pieces both in terms of gameplay and narrative. All the puzzle and slow paced sequences are front loaded into the beginning of the game. All the shooting is in the latter part of the game. The beginning of the game fleshes out Cutter and Chloe only to be thrown by the wayside for Elena in the later half.   -The game tries to show itself off too much as far as graphics, animation and combat to the point that they go overboard in a lot of respects. The fact that the opening and end sequence of the game is hand to hand combat is very telling. There's a lot of "Focus on drake at the end of a cutscene for a few seconds to emphasize graphical fidelity and how good he looks" The new "reach out and touch every wall" is overdone. Should've only been used when he's walking slowly as opposed to every 5 seconds.    -Enemies are super aggressive. Flanking is one thing which i don't mind but a lot of the arena type battles don't really present you with any kind of advantageous positioning because you're always faced with a variety of powerful enemies. Enemy on a turret, Sniper on a roof next to a grenade launcher enemy while you get flanked by an armored shotgunner and a guy with a pistole. This sounds like it should be a good thing or atleast nothing to complain about but it's super frustrating feeling like every place i go to for cover doesn't offer me any real advantage over the last piece of cover . It changes the dynamic of gunfights and feels like i'm just running around  like a chicken with it's head cut off rather than developing a suitable way to approach the situation  - I've had music cut out in the middle of gunfights.

Great stuff you said, to me. It's so brutal on Hard that it's not fair. The boat scenario sucked because I would be trying to stealth kill everyone until after about 8 deaths, I realized it's impossible. I started the killing at the beginning of the level and had worked my way through most of the level then was murdered from behind by an armored shotgunner. Went through again, killed what I thought was everyone and was killed by a Hammer 'Nade launcher guy on top of the huge rusty boat. Re-did it again and then spent about 20 minutes swimming around trying to find where I needed to go when really, I just had to climb on top of a mast and jump to a ladder. 
 
The game makes thing so difficult and complex at times that the simple stuff goes right over my head because I'm used to trying to think like fucking Einstein to move through a level. Same thing happened with the fire-demons at the end, where they surrounded me in that small room-ish area. There are just too many cheap kills throughout the game, along with all that you've mentioned, and that brings it down to a 9.3-9.5 type of game. It was still very good, in my opinion, but it simply was not as good as UC2.   
 
The shooting wasn't as good, it took a couple too many bullets to kill guys, and the movement felt much clunkier in juts the way he walked around. It was god overall, but not great. It's like the shooting was a mixture of second-best. The cover-system shooting wasn't as good as Gears 3, the melee wasn't as good as Arkham City (even though nothing is), the stealth was non-existent but damn well should have pushed Splinter Cell, in my opinion, etc. 
 
 It's still a great series and I thoroughly enjoyed the game on my second playthrough (on Easy, so that I could actually get the damn trophies, since Hard and Crushing is fucking ludicrous), but it seems to be a Bridesmaid in every. Single. Category. It all adds up to great, but still wasn't perfect in any one aspect like others.

Yup, the game sucks.

@SpencerTucksen said:

@hbkdx12 said:

Yeah it's quite bullshit.  The thing that annoys me is that when you get spotted, not only do you have to deal with the guys you didn't manage to kill but also 20 other people who just come out of god knows where. If it were just a matter of just finishing off the people you couldn't stealth i'd let it slide.  you know, everyone is praising this game saying how although it's very similar to Uncharted 2, that ND still managed to outdo themselves. I completely disagree. I feel like there are substantial flaws and detriments to this game that bring down the SP experience as a whole. If it wasn't for the excellent online and co-op i would have sold it already  -The idea of stealthing an entire area, that the game purposely tries to set you up for, is total bullshit  -Although still enjoyable, with the exception of the last level, all the major setpieces had been revealed before the game even released   -The game feels disjointed as if split into two pieces both in terms of gameplay and narrative. All the puzzle and slow paced sequences are front loaded into the beginning of the game. All the shooting is in the latter part of the game. The beginning of the game fleshes out Cutter and Chloe only to be thrown by the wayside for Elena in the later half.   -The game tries to show itself off too much as far as graphics, animation and combat to the point that they go overboard in a lot of respects. The fact that the opening and end sequence of the game is hand to hand combat is very telling. There's a lot of "Focus on drake at the end of a cutscene for a few seconds to emphasize graphical fidelity and how good he looks" The new "reach out and touch every wall" is overdone. Should've only been used when he's walking slowly as opposed to every 5 seconds.    -Enemies are super aggressive. Flanking is one thing which i don't mind but a lot of the arena type battles don't really present you with any kind of advantageous positioning because you're always faced with a variety of powerful enemies. Enemy on a turret, Sniper on a roof next to a grenade launcher enemy while you get flanked by an armored shotgunner and a guy with a pistole. This sounds like it should be a good thing or atleast nothing to complain about but it's super frustrating feeling like every place i go to for cover doesn't offer me any real advantage over the last piece of cover . It changes the dynamic of gunfights and feels like i'm just running around  like a chicken with it's head cut off rather than developing a suitable way to approach the situation  - I've had music cut out in the middle of gunfights.

Great stuff you said, to me. It's so brutal on Hard that it's not fair. The boat scenario sucked because I would be trying to stealth kill everyone until after about 8 deaths, I realized it's impossible. I started the killing at the beginning of the level and had worked my way through most of the level then was murdered from behind by an armored shotgunner. Went through again, killed what I thought was everyone and was killed by a Hammer 'Nade launcher guy on top of the huge rusty boat. Re-did it again and then spent about 20 minutes swimming around trying to find where I needed to go when really, I just had to climb on top of a mast and jump to a ladder. 
 
The game makes thing so difficult and complex at times that the simple stuff goes right over my head because I'm used to trying to think like fucking Einstein to move through a level. Same thing happened with the fire-demons at the end, where they surrounded me in that small room-ish area. There are just too many cheap kills throughout the game, along with all that you've mentioned, and that brings it down to a 9.3-9.5 type of game. It was still very good, in my opinion, but it simply was not as good as UC2.   
 
The shooting wasn't as good, it took a couple too many bullets to kill guys, and the movement felt much clunkier in juts the way he walked around. It was god overall, but not great. It's like the shooting was a mixture of second-best. The cover-system shooting wasn't as good as Gears 3, the melee wasn't as good as Arkham City (even though nothing is), the stealth was non-existent but damn well should have pushed Splinter Cell, in my opinion, etc. 
 
 It's still a great series and I thoroughly enjoyed the game on my second playthrough (on Easy, so that I could actually get the damn trophies, since Hard and Crushing is fucking ludicrous), but it seems to be a Bridesmaid in every. Single. Category. It all adds up to great, but still wasn't perfect in any one aspect like others.

That's another thing i forgot to mention. Sometimes it's not evidently clear where or how you're suppose to proceed. I remember in the "abducted" chapter, after i fought all the pirates and go to the outside of the boat, and it does this massive glance of the scenery and you see the cruise ship way in the distance and everything in front of you and below you is old rusty broken steel boat pieces. So obviously i'm not jumpin in the water. So i didn't see the rope at all so I decide that i have to hang off the ledge and shimmy somewhere. I try to do that, he doesn't even hang on and i die. Restart and i see the rope. Jump to it and then i make my way to the big yellow chain of the other boat and i'm literally stuck on this chain for like 10 minutes because i can't go up and i'm afraid to jump into the water because i think i'm going to die cuz im assuming its either gonna be too deep or there's rusty parts in it that'll kill me. Til finally i just jump down only to realize that this part of the water is fine. Then i proceed to get into the upcoming gunfight which i couldn't help but feel was total BS for all the reasons i mentioned before.  That whole chapter pissed me off and really almost made me put the game down for good. If the whole capsizing ship moment didn't happen when it did. I don't know how much longer i would have made it through SP without feeling like i don't give a shit and don't want to play this anymore. The game is such a slow burn that i felt like the ship, which is chapter 14 IIRC, is the first time the game delivers on why we come to Uncharted. That's halfway through the game which is far too long of a wait to me.   Giving this game 9.3-9.5 is very generous in my opinion. If i didn't play it or didn't have these issues, i wouldn't doubt you at all. But i feel at best, atleast just focusing on the SP, this game is a good 7 or at best an 8. There were just too many things that made my normal playthrough more frustrating than delightful that i can't imagine going through this again on hard much less crushing. Any subsequent playthroughs will definitely be on easy considering there's no cheats or modifiers anymore.

@Wiseblood said:

At the one part where you and Cutter are trying to get to the tower, I took out all the enemies in the area stealthily and...nothing. Cutter was still hiding at the beginning, I wasn't getting any action prompts to do anything. So I fired my weapon and a bunch more enemies spawned. Two of them literally right next to me. It wasn't until after killing all the newly spawned enemies that I was able to progress.

This happened to me. Exactly the same thing. All the dudes were gone, and Cutter was just chillin down behind cover. Ran around for a bit, then shot my gun. Two guns spawned RIGHT beside me. Killed them all, and then moved on.

I got through a lot of the game with Stealth, I was playing it on Crushing so I had no choice but to focus on routes with the least gunfire. It worked out really well.

@Melvargh said:

@Wiseblood said:

At the one part where you and Cutter are trying to get to the tower, I took out all the enemies in the area stealthily and...nothing. Cutter was still hiding at the beginning, I wasn't getting any action prompts to do anything. So I fired my weapon and a bunch more enemies spawned. Two of them literally right next to me. It wasn't until after killing all the newly spawned enemies that I was able to progress.

This happened to me. Exactly the same thing. All the dudes were gone, and Cutter was just chillin down behind cover. Ran around for a bit, then shot my gun. Two guns spawned RIGHT beside me. Killed them all, and then moved on.

i know exactly where you guys are talking about, and I also ran around for a long time, i just restarted the check point, and im pretty sure i mastered how to stealth that section, but i do recall a bunch of guys still apearing at the end, and thus ensued another gunfight.

happens a bunch of times throughout the game, like the one talked about in the OP, also on the boat sections too. they really had to pad the game hours didn't they

I am playing on Crushing, and I did manage to fully stealth one part! It was the part where you're with the whole gang, but you and Cutter get seperated from Sully & Chloe. I finished that with full-stealth, but it took a long time. And you're absolutely right, there is no way around most of the gun battles.

@SpencerTucksen: yeah i thought that mission was pretty awesome too and it was not all that hard so i don't get why it got so much hate.

@SpencerTucksen: yeah i thought that mission was pretty awesome too and it was not all that hard so i don't get why it got so much hate.

@Sarumarine said:

... the airport right before you reach the cargo plane. I took out everyone except two guys who are standing right in front of the thing you're supposed to climb to the next area. They're right next to each other, so no matter what you do they always see you and sound the alarm. Even if you use the silenced pistol, as soon as you kill one guy it's "Oh crap, they must have spotted us." Drop a grenade and it's the same story.

This section is the only one I know how to successfully stealth through. On the last 2 guys, you have to run out in front of them for a moment then immediately hide back into cover, one then comes to check out the area. you melee stealth kill him, then run around to the side of the other guy and pistol headshot him. I only know this from the Uncharted 3 guide book for crushing mode.

For the record, I usually hate guides, but the Uncharted 3 one has amazing attention to detail and looks pretty as all hell. Really recommend it for anyone into that sort of thing.

@MelficeVKM: Wow. I didn't know that Uncharted enemies did the Metal Gear Solid "Who was that?" routine. That might have helped in a lot of areas where it appeared there was no way around them.

The only area I was able to completley stealth was that area leading up to the plane boarding (although it took me a good 20 tries to do it all stealth). The ship graveyard, castle entrance, and other castle scene where they start as stealth always ended in a gun fight. It was still fun either way, but I definately feel like this one had some pretty bad "stealth optional" parts. The airport was pretty fun and all, but nothing beats the jungle one from U2.

I couldn't do most of the bits I wanted to stealth through stealth, It says something that despite this I still enjoyed the game beyond most things I've played since UC2.

@Sarumarine: It seems pretty inconsistent, though. Even in my above example of getting one of the guards to approach you, sometimes he would do the whole "Huh? Who's there?" routine, but not actually walk over. Don't think anyone could figure that out without being explicity told, like I was!

I just beat the game on Hard last night. Could never fully stealth anywhere. I just assumed at some point he wanted to do it stealthy but it was never going to happen (so basically he was just making a joke about it), at least for some of the spots you mentioned like the ballroom and the cargo plane sneak up.

My bigger problem was that once I got to the waves of dude, I wouldn't know what would actually trigger them to go away. I swear there were a couple of times where I found some magical trigger and the fight just ended despite me not killing everyone.

@Sarumarine: I agree

The section where you sneak into the airport and you sneak around, I got it down to 1 guy, he saw me and then a massive swarm of enemies appeared out of nowhere. I hated that.

The stealth levels killed the flow of Uncharted 3 and ruined the level of enjoyment I had with the game. It isn't that they're challenging or that if you screw up basically the entire military is on your back but actually because they suck. Naughty Dog didn't make them worthwhile to experience. Uncharted 3 continually works against you during the stealth sequences, much unlike Uncharted 2 or Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 where it'll guide you through it either by means of an NPC, a particular camera angle/oversight of the area or literally providing you with the right equipment (e.g. hearbeat sensors) to make the thing a whole lot easier to play through.

But to put it plain, Naughty Dog should of realised that Uncharted 3's high octane action and explosions make any sort of espionage suitably inappropriate with the rest of the mix. There is a reason stealth sequences are often left out of games now, more often than not people don't enjoy them - critics included.