Ever since Crash Bandicoot, ND has been on an unbelievable streak. Not a single one of their games since then has been considered bad. It all peaked with Uncharted 2, which took numerous GOTY awards (and U3 did the same later)...

...or that's what we thought until the release of The Last of Us, the most awarded game EVER. The praises for that game were unbelievable (and deserved, imo, but that's another story).

Now here's my question: with such an amazing streak of fantastic games, the hype over anything ND does will be ridiculously huge... so have they reached a point where it's impossible to live up to the colossal expectations? Will people be disappointed at U4 (and then the next game, and then next...) because it's "not as good as their previous works"? It's even worse that reviewers seem to be really picky lately. Granted, I haven't played any of these games, but stuff like Second Son, Driveclub or The Wonderful 101 seem to deserve more than 70-80 metas.

Sounds pessimistic, but the thought just crossed my mind today. What do you think?

Journalists have no integrity. They will score Uncharted 4 what they think fans expect, regardless if it's deserving of that score or not. It'll more than likely deserve it, but that doesn't change my opinion on gaming journalists.

Let's wait till they make a game that can be considered bad, or a game that is not up to their usual standards.

At this point they can either blow our minds again or severely disappoint us.... Sorta like square enix has last gen

All of Naughty Dog's series have been pretty equal in quality, just different experiences. As long as the quality doesn't dip they'll be fine.

I agree with the OP, i think ND is in a serious situation in which they cant just make a simply good game but rather they are forced to make a better game than before, and after TLOU thats gonna be hard, i wish for them the best and i hope that when the situation comes people understand (that they cant just expect every game to be GOD-LIKE).

Actually I fully agree with the Second Son meta score. But then again, last gen most of the games I played I thought got too high meta scores, and that includes the ones I like. There were only a handful of games that I rated higher than the meta score.

As to ND. If they don't use the powah of the PS4 to bring something fresh to UC4 other than way better graphics I can see it being heavily criticised. Even though I'm pretty sure I will like it as much as the previous games, even if it pretty much follows the UC2/3 formula. I would like to see more platforming, and more interesting puzzle elements. I would actually like less hoarde type gunplay. Probably a 50% reduction in the number of enemies in the main fighting sequences, but much better enemy AI, more demand for tactical combat than just hiding behind a barrier and pot shooting enemies. Even better might be a rebalancing toward more melee. Having said that I did like some of the UC2 and 3 levels where you get knock off quite a few enemies with stealth before getting caught and having to start a shoot out.

Slightly more demanding platforming where jump timing becomes more important would be good too.

If ND uses elements of TLOU and Tomb Raider 2013 as inspiration for evolving the UC series I think they can take UC4 to new places and give fans new experiences.

I agree that they are setting themselves up. But Il keep trusting them till the end.

Make Savage Starlight...

U3 already improved the melee. It was MUCH better than U2 on that regard, I really enjoyed the melee combat on that game. As for tactical combat and platforming, hum, I wouldn't hold my breath. The series is about dem setpieces (and I'm damn fine with that), and U4 seems to star an older Drake. So maybe they take away a little from the platforming? I really don't know.

And I'm fairly sure they'll use elements from TLOU on U4. Both games do have the same directors after all. And TR 2013 totally felt like Uncharted, I'm not sure what they could take from the game that isn't already on the series =P

As long as I enjoy their games as I have J&D, all Uncharted games and TLoU I don't care. I liked U3 thought it was no U2, but TLoU completely outdid anything that they have done before and they have been working on U4 much longer than any of their other games.It can be better than U3 which will be good enough and maybe as good as U2,but topping TLoU with a sequel to another franchise would be tough.