Just days after the reveal of the game’s first trailer at the Spike Video Game Awards, Naughty Dog’s hugely anticipated Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception made a cross country trip to New York City where it was played live onstage on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.
Naughty Dog’s Evan Wells and Christophe Balestra accompanied the game, and helped coach Fallon (“Up and X. Up and X!”) through a brief stage that featured series protagonist Nathan Drake and his mentor Victor Sullivan figting bad guys and trying to escape from a building engulfed in flames.
The live playthrough showcased a bit of the new technology and gameplay mechanics described on the Uncharted 3 website, including Drake’s ability to go hand-to-hand with more than one opponent at a time. The clip also showcases a great looking diving take-down maneuver in which Drake jumps from a floor above his target and lands with maximum impact. The trademark Uncharted cinematic moments pop up, with sudden camera shifts and unexpected complications for the characters to overcome, and the fire effects are flat out fantastic.
Take a look at Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception live in action on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.
Before he began his tenure as host of Late Night, Fallon pledged to cover video games to the same degree that other shows cover movies, and to a large extent he has held to that promise. Kinect and Need for Speed Hot Pursuit both received live demos on the program significantly in advance of their release dates, and such industry luminaries as Time Schafer and Cliff Bleszinski have appeared as guests.
Though brief, the Uncharted 3 demo once again demonstrates Naughty Dog’s nearly peerless mastery of their art. Of the dozen games revealed at the VGAs, how many developers were content to showcase exclusively rendered CG? Most. But not Naughty Dog (or Insomniac, for that matter). That two short days later, the developers at Naughty Dog were ready to show a slice of their game being played live on national television speaks to both their confidence and competence, and reinforces the idea that 11/1/11 can’t arrive soon enough.
Ranters, did you watch Uncharted 3 on Late Night? What are your first impressions of the game in action?
Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception releases November 1, 2011, exclusively for the PlayStation 3
Source: Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
