Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune (PS3) review

Naughty Dog has been making games exclusive to the PlayStation series of game consoles for a long time…first there was Crash Bandicoot (the first four good PS1 titles, anyway), then Jak & Daxter (again, the first four titles, but on PS2 this time).  With the PS3 came another opportunity to create a new IP, and they came up with Uncharted.  The game was intended to not only be fun (duh), but also to show off the power of the PS3 hardware.  Many people missed Drake’s Fortune at first, only getting into the Uncharted series with the major hype its sequels have earned.  But every story has a beginning, and this one, while not quite AS good as its successors, is still well worth experiencing.

Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is a linear action-adventure game starring treasure hunter Nathan Drake.  Drake believes himself to be a descendent of Sir Francis Drake, and is on a mission to collect a treasure he thinks his ancestor was searching for centuries ago.  He brings long-time friend and mentor of sorts Victor Sullivan along for the ride, as well as TV journalist Elena Fisher, whose show is financing the expedition.  They dredge up a coffin which turns out to house not a body, but a diary belonging to none other than good old Sir Francis.  From here, we follow their adventures in search of the legendary treasure of El Dorado, all the while racing/fighting pirates and unsavory “businessmen” to the goal.

The gameplay in Uncharted combines third-person exploration and gunfighting.  The controls are pretty straightforward and easy to learn for seasoned gamers, with ample in-game tutorials to help you acclimate.  Drake can carry one pistol and one long gun at a time, switching between them with the D-pad.  You can obtain new guns from enemy corpses or just lying around the environment.  You can also use grenades, but this requires equipping them separately and using awkwardly mapped SixAxis controls to aim.  It’s needlessly cumbersome, which resulted in my ignoring grenades for the most part.

Gunplay is cover-based. As you can see here, good old "chest-high walls" are firmly in place.

When there AREN’T a bunch of armed goons trying to drastically shorten your lifespan, you’ll be taking your life into your own hands climbing cliffs, making crazy leaps over chasms, and exploring dangerous ruins.  Since the game is so linear, there’s no serious risk of getting lost, but the level design is of high enough quality that it remains entertaining nevertheless.  That’s also not to say there’s no reason to search the nooks and crannies of the world…there are 61 treasures hidden around (they look like little nondescript glimmers on the ground), just waiting to be found.  Collecting them (along with doing various other tasks such as beating the game on different difficulty levels and making kills with different guns) earns Trophies and corresponding in-game Medals that unlock bonus features such as making-of videos and cheats.

Lest a player get tired of the same-old gameplay, there are special set-pieces in place to change things up.  In one chapter, you man a mounted gun in the back of a pickup truck, fending off pursuant foes.  It’s a simple concept, but well executed and fun.  In a few other places, you’re put on a jet ski and made to ride along the river while shooting enemies along the banks.  This is a more bothersome juggling act, as you can’t shoot and drive at the same time, which gets even worse when the water starts moving faster.  It’s really not TOO hard, but it’s still not too much fun and leaves you wanting to get to land so you can move on with the game.

Being their first game for the new, powerful PS3 system, Naughty Dog put great visuals as a high priority.  Much of the game takes place in lush jungle environments, and the coloring and texture work still stands up pretty darned well.  That said, there’s not much visual variety in the game overall, so you’d better really like jungles and stone ruins or it’s going to get old.  Nothing that really detracts from the game, but it’s hard to ignore.  The voice acting is excellent thanks to great actors whose performance was recorded during mo-cap.  The music is also superb, combing unusual instruments with a more standard orchestra to set the tone of the game.  The sound effects are somewhat less impressive, with the gunfire in particular falling flat.

Yes, this screen is from gameplay, NOT a cutscene. I told you they did the jungle thing well.

Content:

Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is rated T by the ESRB for Blood, Language, Mild Suggestive Themes, Use of Tobacco, and Violence.  There’s very little blood in actual gameplay, instead being limited mainly to cutscenes.  The language is relatively mild with no F-bombs.  The mild suggestive themes are very mild indeed.  There’s a joke about finding a bride in a brothel, and that’s really the worst thing I can think of.  Use of tobacco is due to Sully’s cigar habit.  Violence…well, that would be the gunfighting, of course.  The story of the game includes a curse that exists with no attempt to explain its origins, and one location in which you fight and explore is a ruined church.

Conclusion:

Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune isn’t perfect by any means.  Control while climbing sometimes feels a bit too fast, grenades are a hassle, and there’s relatively little visual variety in the environments.  But the gameplay is still well executed on the whole, and the story is quality stuff, expertly performed.  A variety of difficulty levels help ensure that you’ll be able to find a challenge or just enjoy the plot to suit your taste.  I’m always an advocate of starting a story-connected game series from the beginning, and Drake’s Fortune is definitely still worth your time.