As you may or may not recall, I dramatically concluded 2016's Sunday Summaries feature on Xmas Day (as in, the last Sunday of last year) but the intent was really to shorten it considerably and publish it on Saturdays instead. I lost the plot with that feature, stuffing it to beyond bursting point every week with pithy rundowns of new releases - most of which I've still yet to purchase and play - and some elaboration on what I've been working on wiki-wise. From now on, it's just going to be these intros, a list of links to the week's blogs, and a paragraph or six on whatever I happen to be playing.

First, some housekeeping:

• I began two features this week that I intend to continue throughout most of 2017. The first of these is The Top Shelf: a feature wherein I try to determine which of my PS2 games deserves to be proudly displayed upon a solitary row on my bookshelf, with the rest going into storage and disc wallets (or the trash, in some cases. Don't grieve for them; they almost certainly don't deserve your sympathy). This week featured the first batch of five case files (a number that might vary in the weeks to come): FromSoftware's Eternal Ring, SCEJ's Fantavision, Team Ninja's Dead or Alive 2, Namco's Tekken Tag Tournament and FromSoftware's Evergrace. Essentially, a half-OK first-person FromSoftware RPG, a tech demo that's fun for an hour, two fighter games I never much cared for and another early FromSoftware RPG that I never completed because it was bad and dumb and strange. Not necessarily the most auspicious of starts, but we will have some bangers on the way eventually. Not next week, though. That's going to be another rough one.
• The second feature is my Indie Game of the Week review, an attempt to force myself to get through this ridiculous Steam backlog I've accrued. I'll also be highlighting the occasional PS3/PS4 Indie game also, since the performance is a lot better over there. The first week covers the mostly excellent Flywrench (Messhof, 2015), a distinctive action game that sits somewhere between a shoot 'em up and a platformer that comes from the stylishly minimalist minds behind Nidhogg. It's hard as hell too, but I did go back and complete it eventually. (I have proof, even!)
• I also covered the Awesome Games Done Quick event with my selection of must-watch picks pulled from the event's schedule. Even in spite of all these extra blogging goals I've given myself, I'll probably veg out and watch an unhealthy number of those speedruns. There's certainly a few I don't want to miss.

Next week will include some more PS2 games to scrutinize, another Indie game to review (an easier one, this time) and hopefully the finishing tweaks to this "GOTY 2014 (Adjusted)" list I've been working on. Maybe I'll even have time to play some games.

Uncharted 4: A Thief's End

I feel like I'm not too far from the end in Uncharted 4, but I keep getting distracted this week from catching up with the site's GOTY content and conceiving all these new features. Once I settle back into a rhythm, I'll hopefully find a few hours to knock out the last few chapters of this excellent game and move onto some other pressing recently-added backlog items.

Uncharted 4 hasn't offered a whole lot new so far. I denigrated Uncharted 3 for a similar inability to deliver anything like the change of pace that Uncharted 2 was. That's not to say it couldn't keep up, simply that the difference between 2 and 3 was negligible compared to the difference between 1 and 2. Same old cinematic deathtraps, lengthy shoot-outs and quips with nearby companions. Yet, there's something about Uncharted 4 that feels very different, and it's more than just the incredible visual upgrade - surpassing what was already a very photogenic series. The backdrops look amazing, the characters are rendered in a very believable way both in terms of face rigging tech and the way they emote with each other, and there are times when I'll just wander around looking at the world Naughty Dog created instead of getting on with the plot and finding the nearest overtly-shaded set of handholds to climb.

I also appreciate that the combat's been de-emphasized, but only in the sense that you can avoid fighting enemies with equally difficult stealth sections as the alternative. What you then have is one of three choices: immediately open fire, possibly after stealthing your way to a vantage point or a convenient means to remove deadly snipers or multiple enemies with one explosive before triggering the battle. You could also ghost the entire encounter, reaching a specific point where enemies are no longer able to reach you and you can move on to the next part of the game. You can also half-and-half it, using stealth and cover to quietly assassinate as many guards as possible before you eventually get spotted and a firefight breaks out. There's a handful of trophies for staying stealthy during specific sections of the game, but there's also a lot of trophies for various combat feats like headshots and killing multiple enemies with one explosion: the game's not particularly bothered what you to choose to do, as it anticipates that you'll want to go through it all again with a different approach anyway. (Also cute? There's a trophy for killing 1000 people called "Ludonarrative Dissonance". Way to give it to those eggheads, Naughty Dog.)

I've enjoyed the story too. Without spoiling too much, Nathan's heretofore unmentioned older brother Sam suddenly comes back into his life, and leads him on another adventure when Sam reveals that a scary South American druglord has given him an ultimatum to find a legendary pirate's treasure haul or face a fate worse than death. Nathan pretends that he's doing all this climbing and puzzle-solving for Sam - even neglecting to tell his now-wife Elena about his latest treasure hunt - but it's clear he's every bit as invested as Sam is. There's a lot of interplay between the two brothers, and the game largely focuses on the pair with Sully and Elena in supporting roles as well as a couple new villains I don't particularly care for (the main one, Rafe, is a little too close to the smarmy rival Harry Flynn from Uncharted 2, up to and including an early flashback level where he and Nate are working together. The actor does some good work displaying the guy's barely contained psychopathy beneath his crocodile smiles, though). What's curious about this interplay is how Sam's exactly as dexterous and knowledgeable as his brother, leading to this sense of rivalry that never turns bitter or adversarial: the two enjoy each other's company for the most part, especially after so long apart, and the game does a great job of depicting them and their relationship at various stages of their life, including their childhoods. I feel that there is a little bit of retconning going on, but it's also possible that they've been cleverly and carefully filling in gaps in Nathan's backstory that just so happen to include this brother we've never heard about previously.

I left a half-complete observation dangling earlier, about how the game feels different. I think it's a greater degree of dramatic tension, presumably brought over from Naughty Dog's work with the dour The Last of Us. it's not quite Oscar material, but between the more personal story and the more realistic faces, it's been less the usual genre-fare treasure-hunting action movie with quips and explosions (plenty of both though) and more about the quiet contemplation and examination of its characters. I dunno. The pace feels a little weird, but not in a bad way. More in a "hey, there's nothing shooting us and we aren't sliding down a mud bank to our deaths right now, let's talk about our feelings a little" sense, though not nearly as melodramatically trite as I'm making it sound. There's a point where you reach a certain location and you can just sit and chew the fat with Sam Drake for a while, discussing the future and how things might've shaken out differently had the duo not become treasure hunters. Scenes like that add a lot, certainly more than spending ten minutes running around trying to find cover while dealing with waves of armored, shotgun-wielding goons.

I'm dying to found out how it ends - literally, since the gunfights haven't been a walk in the park even on the medium difficulty setting - and I'll be carving out some time this weekend to see it through. After that, I've got some prep work for my recurring features and then it's onto either Deus Ex: Mankind Divided or Dishonored 2. Of course, I might be so utterly sick of sneaking my way past potential gunfights that I'll play something else entirely, like any of the dozen JRPGs I've been meaning to get around to. Have a good weekend, folks.