Wow, chapter 6 now (PCM 5.1 surround = aural heaven?), and damn this game is impressive. I am loving the presentation of the story so far. And, the best thing of all? I just took a tour of the different bonuses, the collectibles, etc etc.. and... wow, best implementation of 'bonuses' I have ever seen. I really hate the xbox live system for the gamerscore, and the assorted points that are awarded are typically dull and merely a way to boost your gamerscore. Now granted, it's also a good way to get players to approach the game a little differently and inspire them to replay different levels to try and earn all the rewards, giving a lot more play time to a game where a straight through campaign would only offer 5-10 hours of play. That's a great plus.
However, Uncharted beats that. Yes, hopefully Sony's Home and the trophy collection help make sure that every game offers some rewards, however developers being forced to include so many points (1000) in every single game released, really drags down the concept. Not all games need them. Now, onto Uncharted. First, the treasure, is similar to but better than Halo 3's skulls. Secondly, the earning of medals earns an assorted number of points (another live-inspired thing: 1000 points): however, these points are actually meaningful: they let you unlock assorted bonuses, ranging from art and videos, to actual things that affect gameplay or the presentation: change post-process art styles, speed up character movement, allow you to equip any unlocked weapon whenever you want. But these are only accessible once enough points have been awarded. That's awesome, and really will help me get quite a few extra hours out of this game, even though there is no multiplayer. And they will be fun. Now, hunting for each treasure piece won't be my reason to replay levels, but getting to play around with assorted weapons and post-processing filters will be fun.
and I just found this out: one of the filters is 'next gen filter', which desaturates the colors, colors tend to be brownish, and a lot of extra light blooms (ala Gears of War, UT3, Resistance, Skate, etc etc).. a way of poking fun at modern game development (for some reason, a lot of games are very brown). I'm also excited about beating the game and then playing on 'Crushing' difficulty.