Painfully Obvious.

You don’t need me to tell you how good this game is; the rest of the gaming world got there first. I don’t know if any one game can be a “system‐seller” — but if you already own a PS3, it’s inexcusable not to own Uncharted 2.

It’s not just good; it’s unusually, surprisingly good. It’s unusual for a game to be this much better than its prequel. It’s unusual for a game to make such large graphical leaps over its prequel on same‐generation hardware.

But most of all, it’s unusual for a game to have this much polish. Video games are developed according to rigorous schedules, lest the technology become outdated before the game’s done. Nearly all games, regardless of quality, have to scale back their ambitions in order to ship on time.

Maybe there’s stuff that didn’t make it into Uncharted 2. But it doesn’t look that way from the outside. If Naughty Dog have figured out how to streamline the game development process, then they possess a competitive edge far more important than tech specs.