Well, I’m back from another Uncharted event, and I can now confirm that my speculation for co-op was right on the money, and it’s just the tip of the iceberg. Last Monday we learned that Uncharted 2: Among Thieves will feature a three-player co-op mode as well as five-on-five team multiplayer. Not only that, but Naughty Dog gave us more than two hours to play both modes. Once again, there was no filming or direct feed allowed, but we have all the details right here and in our interview with the lead multiplayer designer.
Co-Op
I know many Uncharted fans are nervous about co-op ruining their single player game, but the co-op experience is a completely separate mode with specific maps designed for teamwork between two or three players. As Nathan, Sully, and Chloe, we set out through the streets of Nepal City, the same environment we saw in the single player demo a few months back.
As we worked our way forward, we fought off waves of gray-clad soldiers who appeared to be private military units. They come at you from every direction, so you have to watch each others’ backs, and if a soldier is focused on one player, another can sneak up from behind and perform a stealth kill. Every once in a while, we’d also have to deal with more powerful foes in heavy armor and helmets. If one player gets taken down, the other players have a set amount of time to revive him by holding triangle. If nobody helps or if you all go down, you just respawn after a few seconds, but that may just be for demo purposes.
Since the streets are clogged with debris, there were a couple of points where teamwork was needed to advance, marked by red circles so you don’t get lost. I was playing as Nathan, and Sully boosted me up to a sign post to climb into an upper story room while Chloe covered our backs. Once inside, I found a bookshelf, which I was able to push out to the street. Then, we lifted it up against the rubble and used it as a ladder to climb over to the next area. There was another spot where you had to blast a hole through a brick wall to bust into a building. Since they were cycling through groups of people, I didn’t get to play the whole demo, but in general, the game feels a little faster paced and more responsive than the first Uncharted.
Team Multiplayer
For the 5 on 5 matches they had a commentator watching all the screens and announcing each team’s progress over the PA, which was pretty fun. There were two modes available, Team Deathmatch and Plunder. Pretty standard fare for the reveal, but everything you’d expect from Uncharted carries over to multiplayer. You can take cover, dive and roll, climb buildings to reach sniper points, stealth kill from behind, and take out opponents from close range with melee attacks. Weapons consist of the familiar pistols, assault rifles, grenade launchers, and snipers, and there’s also a huge minigun stashed away that slows you down, but really lets you rack up kills. Additionally, you can grab propane tanks, toss them at enemies, and shoot them in mid-air, making for a new twist on exploding barrels.
Plunder is basically a variant of Capture the Flag. A treasure will spawn somewhere in the middle of the map, and both teams race to grab it and take it back to a chest at their base. The first to secure three treasures wins, but the treasures are pretty big and weighty, slowing your character down. So either you’ll need your team to cover you or you may need to throw the treasure forward if you start taking fire. Sometimes the treasure would spawn in a pit, forcing the player retrieving it to toss it and then climb out, but more often than not, someone from the other team would be there, ready to snatch it or lob in a grenade. I was one of the few who managed to get two treasures in a single round. 
Teams are split up into heroes and villains. The villains were all generic mercenary types, but I’m sure more recognizable figures will be added as they’re revealed. The heroes consisted of Drake, Sully, Chloe, Elena, and a new cowboy-looking character. Don’t get your hopes up for Elena making a return in the story though, because Naughty Dog did mention that a number of characters and costumes from the first game would be available in multiplayer. There aren’t any character specific advantages or disadvantages, so don’t worry about getting stuck with old man Sully.
I saw two maps. The Plaza is a squarish night map with buildings and alleys on the outskirts and a central building surrounded by open ground. The Village was a bit more complex, and it’s an all-new environment. It looks like it’s higher up in the mountains and it features some gorgeous rain effects. – It doesn’t look like the graphics are being held back much in multiplayer, if at all.
That’s about as much as there is to say. It’s definitely a lot of fun, but hopefully they have some more original gameplay modes still to reveal. There will be some sort of metagame involved too, similar to Killzone’s ranking system, but they weren’t willing to go into details just yet. Be sure to check out our interview with Naugthy Dog’s Justin Richmond if you haven’t already.
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