GameInformer's web tease on the PlayStation 3 title notes that the sequel "revolves around the 13th century explorer Marco Polo and his voyages." Uncharted 2 separates itself gameplay-wise with a new "free climbing mechanic and stealth gameplay." Ewww... stealth gameplay? The new stubble rendering I like, but I'm already feeling apprehensive about the S-word and the possibility of lots of ice levels.

The mag also promises a first look at Guitar Hero: Metallica which is almost guaranteed not to have any stealth segments, thank God.

January Issue Revealed [Game Informer - thanks, Max]

The news allegedly comes straight from the mouth of Naughty Dog co-prez Christophe Balestra. We're not calling Mr. Balestra a liar or anything, but we're going to check in with the developer to make sure this is all on the up and up, considering PSM3 cites a "French news channel" interview.

Update: We heard back from Naughty Dog, who point out that the interview PSM3 cites is dated January of this year, something we've already covered on Kotaku, you know, in January. While we have little doubt that the boys and girls in Santa Monica will revisit the Uncharted universe, don't go hanging your hopes on this particular source.

Naughty Dog’s Richard Lemarchand, Co-Lead Game Designer of Uncharted, talks trophies, Edge, cells and studios… [Three Speech]

Fortunately, it sounds like some of them are related to shooting people in the face, something I excel at in Uncharted. However, we've been hearing rumors that if you can get Nathan Drake's shirt fully tucked in, it unlocks, like, twenty nude codes. We're confirming.

Uncharted Trophies Q&A [IGN]

Honestly, I loved the game. I thought Uncharted was very interesting. There was some very, very interesting aspects to it. The big difference between Uncharted and what we're doing here is that Uncharted was still structured like a video game. It gives you a bit of story, then action, then a bit of story, then action — like porn movies, when you think about it.

More adult film musing after the jump.

Porn movies are structured in exactly the same way, except that the action is not the same (laughter), but it's the same structure. Most video games are done like that. It's one thing to do a great cutscene, even if it's real time. It's another thing to try to tell the story as you play, so the story's not told through cutscenes — it's told through gameplay. So you don't need acting performance in cutscenes. You need interactive performance.

Guess that means Uncharted the best game ever made with the same structure as a porn movie about a dude in a T-shirt and jeans.

Dreaming of a New Day: Heavy Rain's David Cage [Gamasutra via Eurogamer]

Sony's Eric Lempel Talks PS3 Version 2.4 [GameSpy]

The Drake's Gun is not licensed or in any way sanctioned by SCE and one we certainly do not condone... We are investigating the source of this product and will proceed with the most appropriate action.

Like telling King of Swords to put the newer blond lady sidekick in its ad?
Sony To Take Action [Games Industry]

Narrative-based videogames have a wish fulfillment aspect to them, and gamers expect their protagonist to match the setting and game play. People don't buy Gears of War so they can hear Marcus Fenix wax philosophical on the nature of the soul, crying softly every time he curb-stomps an enemy.

But it's the Uncharted mini-game that has us far more pumped.

According to our sources, Uncharted: Drake's Fortune comes to Home armed with a side-scrolling 2D arcade game, described to us as reminiscent of both Contra and Out Of This World. Sounds kind of like Capcom's 2D remake of Bionic Commando in its execution, full of enemies and exploding barrels to shoot.

Sony is apparently pitching features like these to developers to extend the lives of their titles, using strong first and second party development showcases to prove that Home can effectively market outside of traditional means. We hope they take them up on their offer, because we're definitely excited about the prospects.

He writes of Drake's shirt "Jet skiing, swimming, and almost kissing—nothing can dislodge or fully tuck Drake's half-casual shirt. It is draped in a purgatory state, half in, half out, never completely free." A bold and fascinating analysis from a visionary mind that anyone who has even a passing interest in video game fashion should read. Compelling stuff.

Half-tuck is the new Mullett [Double Fine]

The PLAYSTATION 3 is a complex yet powerful system. We could not pull off the rich, seamless world of Uncharted on any other console. Because the system is so powerful, it means that tapping into that power requires great engineering efforts. We're lucky that Naughty Dog has some of the best programmers in the industry. I can also tell you that as we're finishing Uncharted, we've found new ways of optimizing our engine to take advantage of the hardware. All of which means that, as beautiful as our game is, there is a lot more in store for the PLAYSTATION 3.

Do I like nerds? I am a nerd. I have shelves full of books at home about vampires and werewolves. And I always have my PSP with me. Right now I'm playing Jeanne D'Arc, which is just awesome. Also, I've got a PS3 and I'm dying for the new Final Fantasy to come out. See? I told you I was a total nerd.

If you are reading this grave, you're a huge nerd. Please get a life and a girlfriend.

In Resistance one could uncensor the game simply by downloading a Us save file. This does not work for Uncharted however as the save files are not compatible. You will be able to copy the Us save file to your system but the game will not even acknowledge it as it is in a different folder. Simply overwriting the files into a Jp save file results in corrupted data. I am unaware of any way to convert the save data and even then I'm not sure it would add the blood back.

It's all about the location.

I completely understand them, just because this is a genre which is not that widely used in videogames for whatever reason — people tend to focus more on science fiction. This more realistic, treasure hunting, pulp action adventure genre really hasn't been tried by that many. So I think just by the very fact that both Nathan Drake and Lara Croft are treasure hunters, there will be comparisons. But beyond that, they diverge pretty rapidly. From a character standpoint, Nathan Drake is an everyman who struggles to get by, who you can see on his face that he's stressed out as he's flinching from bullets ricocheting off the cover he's hiding behind, while Lara is the more stone-faced acrobat, perfect landing every time. And then the game play, obviously we were very focused on third person cover-based play, while theirs is more auto-aiming and a little more heavy on the puzzle-solving.

But it's impossible to see a clip of Uncharted without getting a little excited, even if blowing up barrels slows the action more than we'd like.

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune [gametrailers]

They [Naughty Dog] just preferred her blonde.

We specifically didn't want[Uncharted: Drake's Fortune] to be a launch title... We wanted time to really understand the hardware.

Aside: I played Uncharted at E3. I really liked the title, but Naughty Dog, PLEASE change how enemies are killed. In the demo I played, if you shoot someone a couple of times, they died. If you punched them a couple of times, they died. That makes no sense! Add a finishing moved like a neck snapping or something.
Not for Launch [Games Radar]

Meanwhile, the blog has kicked off a new poll, this one asking readers what feature they'd most like to see added to the site:

Receive email updates for new posts
Additional post tagging and sharing options
Links to the most popular blog posts
Downloadable high-res screen shots
A Flickr photo stream of PlayStation picts
Desktop widget with this blog's headlines

While I love those ideas, what I'd love to see is a mystery livecam. Those things are great in development studios.
A New Poll, We Need Your Help [Playstation.Blog]