The combat featured in the trailer - especially hand-to-hand stuff - looks incredible. How are you managing to give the player satisfying control in these moments, but with enough precision for effective, tactical combat choices?
Hennig: The hand-to-hand combat, like all of Drake’s moves, is contextually driven. So the player can make tactical choices based on terrain, enemy position and facing, etc. In other words, Drake will perform different attacks if the enemy is facing forward or away, if he’s standing near an edge, if he’s near a high or low wall, etc. This not only provides a huge variety of combat outcomes, but enables the player to make predictive choices.
Uncharted has made few appearances since it was revealed this time last year - how far into development is the game, and have you a predicted release date?
Hennig: We’ve been working on Uncharted for a couple of years now, starting with a small concept team after we shipped Jak 3. It’s hard to put a “percent complete” on the game at this point, but we’re targeting a holiday release.
