With combat forming the bulk of the game it is thankfully very intuitive and fluid to effectively trade fire with the various goons you will meet. Standing out in the open is a great way to get killed, so taking cover behind objects is a must. Shooting from cover is a simple matter of either aiming and slightly exposing yourself to fire accurately or simply firing blindly over or around your hopefully solid object. Nate can throw grenades to take out particularly lodged enemies, but of course they can do the same which results in you scrambling for alternate cover as you leap away from the blast. Nate can carry two weapons, one small such as various pistols and a Micro Uzi and one large such as a variety of rifles and shotguns as well as a sniper rifle or RPG. Every weapon has a distinct role, so you will often elect to pick and choose which two weapons you have based on your play style and the task at hand.

The game also features a surprisingly solid stealth element, letting you sneak around and take out some enemies before they even know you were there. Enemies can be stealthily killed in a variety of fashions, such as grabbing them from cover and breaking their necks, or grabbing their foot and pulling them over a ledge that you are hanging from. Even when enemies are fully aware of your presence you can still use stealth to your advantage. If you make a lot of noise and start shooting from one position, it is possible to then stick to cover and sneak around to the sides or rear of the enemy positions. They will still be using suppressive fire on where they think you are, letting you take out a couple of them that lag behind and leave the rest of them none the wiser that you moved at all. Transitioning from cover to cover is easy but using cover to move around a corner is practically impossible to reliably get right. It’s rarely a big issue, but it’s one of the few flaws in a cover system that otherwise painlessly does its job.

Multiplayer rounds out the experience nicely, allowing you to play in both competitive and cooperative modes. Competitive play runs the gamut of traditional game modes such as the objective-based capture the flag or king of the hill as well as simple deathmatch or team deathmatch. Cooperative play pits three players against AI enemies in one of two modes; either progressing through a level and numerous gunfights to reach the treasure at the end or fighting wave after wave of opponents in an arena. Playing in any multiplayer mode lets you accumulate money, which not only lets you level up based on how much you have gained in total but can also be spent on perks and upgrades. Perks work similar to the recent Call of Duty games and let you have bonuses such as enhanced aim, more ammo, or stronger melee hits.

The only problem is that the game doesn’t really feature any apparent balancing mechanics. It is entirely possible to have a team of relatively lowly ranked players get put up against a slew of people ranked significantly higher, which means they will have many perks that are simply not available to anyone on your team. Thankfully the playing field is still even when it comes to weapons, and while everyone starts off with a pistol and an assault rifle you must find any other weapons scattered throughout the level itself. Thus it is the perks themselves that is the only difference between low and high level players but they do have a quite noticeable impact on gameplay, if not on how much fun the matches are then at the very least on how much harder one team might have to fight for victory over the other.

Wrapping it all up in a nice little package is the game’s presentation, with graphics that are among the best this console generation has to offer. Character models are consistently well animated down to minute details in facial expressions, and the environments are lushly filled with details from important ones such as hand grabs on the side of a building to a staggering assortment of other details that bring the game world to life. The epic scale is helped along by its orchestral soundtrack, matching nearly every section of the game with musical accompaniment that matches or sets the mood perfectly. The voice acting makes the characters believable and gives them distinct personalities, which is used heavily in cutscenes as well as interspersed regularly (and usually with comic effect) during gameplay.

Uncharted 2 is easily one of the best games released on the PlayStation 3, but also finds itself as one of the best releases across any platform in recent memory. The game manages to incorporate its various mechanics into one big epic ball of fun, stringing set piece moments one after another with nary a dull moment. With its blockbuster presentation and solid gameplay it has few flaws to speak of, and none of which diminish its quality as a game that manages to keep you gripping your controller tightly right up until the credits roll.