Learning how to bring characters to life with all the nuances of personality, habits, quirks and mannerisms was really Sony Bend’s first and most important job when we started to work on UNCHARTED: Golden Abyss. We have an awesome example in the UNCHARTED series, and we wanted to give the characters a level of depth that transcends the screen. These videos shows just a glimpse of our process and how we worked with our eclectic cast of characters.

I’m no stranger to writing, having written all the Syphon Filter games, but this title taught me some new tricks. By the time we started shooting in February 2011, I had gone through over 40 revisions, changing everything from setting, characters, names, dialogue and action. If we count all the in-game VO dialogue, we ended up with over 400 pages of script for UNCHARTED: Golden Abyss.

Of course, writing and performance capture was just beginning. What followed was an intense year of motion capture clean-up, animation, camera work, set building, lip-synching, prop building, editing, sound and music, by a team of over 50 artists working across five different studios.

Yes, UNCHARTED’s stunning visuals require next-gen hardware, but in the end, Uncharted’s charm comes from its characters, their friendships and chemistry. The great thing about story is that it’s hardware independent. Players can tell a good story from a bad one, great production values from not-so-great. We knew that the end result – all of that effort by all those people – would pay off in an UNCHARTED experience that would lose nothing simply because it was on a portable console. It’s the main reason I was so excited to learn the UNCHARTED approach to cinematic storytelling. On February 22nd, you’ll be able to see for yourself.

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Happy 2012! We’re starting the year off with a fresh batch of UNCHARTED 3 DLC content and more in the pipeline that prophecies forbid us from fully portending quite yet. Hope you’ve all gotten 2012 off to a rocking start even with all the 2012 phenomenon chatter. If not, we’re about to make your end of days talk and your UNCHARTED gaming life much more awesome.

First off, today we’ll be releasing four maps we teased a couple of weeks after the UNCHARTED 3 launch.

You’ll be getting the Cave, Fort, Lost City, and Sanctuary maps in this download pack. Dynamic lighting effects, new particle effects and a slew of technical changes have been made to these maps. The lighting was reworked from scratch. New textures and weather effects are apparent and freshly decorate all maps. We poured hours of development time into these maps to make them be really fun in the UNCHARTED 3 multiplayer ecosystem. This map pack is a taste of how far we can go to remix some of your favourite maps into a completely new UNCHARTED 3 gameplay experience.

If you’re a member of the Fortune Hunters’ Club these maps will be available free to you. If not, you can gain access today by purchasing the FHC from the PS Store. It’s a fantastic deal at €24.99 / £19.99

Initially, the Fortune Hunters’ Club offered savings off the seven multiplayer packs (three character skin packs, four map packs) that will be released for Uncharted 3. We’ve kicked this deal up a few notches and are now offering 14 total packs, 7 new packs that we will be revealing as the year progresses! As a FHC member the savings for these 14 packs will be over 60%! Current membership and any new membership purchased will include all currently available and any upcoming DLC packs for Uncharted 3 as well as an exclusive Fortune Hunters’ Club theme that will let you know when new Uncharted 3 DLC hits right from the XMB of your PS3.

Besides the fun new maps you’ll be playing on today, we wanted to tell you about some future hits of DLC. We have three new character skins packs coming at you next. The Rogues Pack 1 and Rogues Pack 2 will let you play as some of the major thugs and minor characters from Uncharted 3. Donut Pack 1 will giant-size some of your favorite Uncharted 3 heroes and villains.

Details on how and when the three new skin packs will be available, and what DLC is coming after that, will follow in our next blog update. We have a lot more DLC coming at you. To whet your appetite, here’s a hint to as what it may be:

Any guesses to why Lazarević is holding half a Janus head?

As you see we are currently hard at work on completely new DLC for your UNCHARTED 3 online adventure. As soon as all the content is fully baked, tested through QA and we have locked release dates you’ll be the first to know. For now, let’s explore some new maps together. See you online!

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Hey everyone, this is John Garvin, writer and director of Uncharted: Golden Abyss. Today I’m here to run you through some of the highlights of the two levels we’re showcasing this week at the Tokyo Game Show.

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My name’s Natalya Netselya and I’m an artist specialising in the medium of sand. I’ve been creating imagery in sand for almost five years now, but this is the first time I’ve created a piece inspired by a videogame. As Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception takes place in the Arabian desert, it provided the perfect backdrop for my sand art. It was fun for me to recreate an iconic character like Nathan Drake in some of the amazing settings from the latest game. I’m sure you’ll recognise some familiar sights from Uncharted 3, and I hope you enjoy watching me bring them to life in sand.

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Hi everyone, this is John Garvin, from Sony’s Bend Studio, the writer and director of Uncharted: Golden Abyss.  We’ve just released a trailer that introduces a new and important character from our story. You met Jason Dante  in our E3 demo and learned a little bit about him: that he and Drake have known each other a long time, that they each know Sully, that Drake taught Dante a lot about treasure hunting, that Dante can be a little, well, greedy.

This time we’re introducing Marisa Chase — but as she tells Drake at one point, call her “Chase,” only her grandfather calls her “Marisa.” I don’t want to give too much away at this point, but I can say this: once again Nathan Drake finds himself on a quest to solve a historical mystery which he hopes will lead to a fantastic treasure. The trick is staying alive long enough to get there. No easy task. And when Drake gets between Dante and Chase, events spiral out of control quickly.

We were lucky to get some really great talent to play our key characters. Nolan North, of course, reprises his role of Nathan Drake. Nolan brings more than just acting to the story, he helps make the dialogue his own, creates funny ad libs on the spot, and helps rework scenes that might be having problems. Chase is played by the talented Christine Laken, who you might remember as Al from the television show “Step by Step.” Dante is played by the amazing Jason Spisak, who’s played almost as many characters as Mr. North. Working with these guys and watching them bring our Uncharted world to life was amazing. I think Amy Hennig, the writer over at Naughty Dog, once told me that good actors can make even my bad dialogue sound good.

Not that I have any…

Anyway, I hope everyone enjoys the trailer. There’s more information on Uncharted: Golden Abyss coming soon.

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