It would be a lie to say that Nate can deliver dropkicks like no other, but he CAN deliver `em and plenty.
To be honest, Drake`s Fortune is not too original, in fact the storyline is a collection of all possible cliches of adventure movies that have come out in last 100 years. But, as everyone knows, people like see the same crap over and over and over again. I guess this is why people still go to Jean Claude Van Damme`s movies.
Anyway, the story is about an ordinary, grave-robbing, 16th century Spanish speaking and all-American-badass Nathaniel Drake, who believes that he is the grand-grand-grand-(...)-son of the legendary buccaneer Sir Francis Drake. Accompanied by Elena Fisher, an attractive and stubborn journalist, and Drake`s friend Victor Sullivan, also called Sully, Nate is on a trail of his ancestor`s hidden treasure. The Quest is taking them to an uncharted, once colonized island in the middle of Pacific Ocean. Unfortunately so are an army of armed-to-teeth fortune-seeking scum.
You might have guessed by now that it is nothing awfully new. I mean, look at the characters! Elena - typical female stereotype - is persistent and, of course, quite attracted to Nate. Sully has just got over his middle-age crisis, fell into million debts and just can`t keep his mouth shut about things you shouldn`t tell your creditors, who just happen to own a mercenary army. There is no point describing the villains - all three major cliches are present here and I don`t want to ruin the plot twists anyway.
The gameplay consists of two parts - Tomb Rider-esque platforming and puzzle solving and Gears of War action sequences. The first one takes about 1/4 of all gameplay. The first levels are pure platforming heaven diluted with some unoriginal and fairly easy, push-the-lever type puzzles. You can solve them in a few minutes, but to avoid any frustration, a "Hint" button appears and shows you the direction you should be focusing to. Sounds quite like Gears, huh? Sadly, the platforming is far from perfect as well. It uses the old "trial and error" method. Expect alot of dying, just because you didn`t see THAT ledge or THAT cliff wasn`t the one you should have leapt to. Very strange for a company who made platformer games for two console generations.
Then there comes the action part. There is alot of run and gun but even more stop and pop. Naught Dog has carefully copied the Gears cover system, which works well for the most part. Even though the action is uninspired and done before, it still stays dynamic and exciting. To make the adventure into an actual adventure, developers have put jumping sections between firefights. Not that great idea in fact. It breaks the rhythm and annoys you with at least few cheap deaths. There are also a vehicle and jet ski sections, which are pretty fun.
What I found really annoying was the level design. We get a lot of jungle and a lot of old ruins, which basically recycle each other. There is also some backtracking which doesn`t help the variety either. It is also quite obvious where to jump and where to fight. If you see a potential cover, draw out your gun and prepare for a battle. When an area is cleared, expect another wave of bloodthirsty cutthroats. About in the middle of the game you`ll eventually gain a reflex - "see a cover - get behind something - shoot - reload - wait for the next wave". While arsenal is not too big, weapons are satisfying to shoot. As in any other modern day shooter, Nate can carry only two guns - a pistol or revolver and a rifle, shotgun or grenade launcher. However you`ll mostly find using pistols and AK`s for the most time, since the majority of your opponents use them as well. To spice thing up, melee attacks are also included. There are two types of combos - 4 Square pushes and Square-Triangle-Square combo. And if the enemy is caught off guard, you can execute him with a single melee move - either braking his neck from behind or landing your feet in poor bastard`s face. After beating an enemy with your bare hands you receive twice as much ammo than usual, but otherwise the feature is quite pointless.
The opponents are only pirates and mercenaries (near the end you will encounter something more... intimidating). Luckily, Naughty Dog has put some effort into AI. Enemies will try to flank you and flush you out with grenades. In fact, I`ve never seen them doing something really stupid. Since Nate is not a superhuman (still he can give some handicap to Max Payne himself), using covers is essential and going head-on to a group of pirates is a bad idea unless you play on Easy. The AI really makes battles tougher and more exciting, I give a credit for that. But what I really don`t understand is the lack of wildlife. Jungle is supposed to be full of creatures, from birds to reptiles, right? The only animal I saw in Uncharted was a single bird. Duh.
To add replayability value, Naughty Dog has added Medal system - pretty much the same as X360 Achievements. Completing them, you`ll get lots of great bonuses - different outfits, videos about making the game, screen filters etc. If you have an Internet connection, the patch includes Trophy support. Unfortunately, they are not retroactive, so I you will have to start a new game and do the thing over again.
Everywhere I look, everyone`s praising the graphics. Well, not me. Textures sure look nice, character models, especially facial animations, really bring them to life, prefect corpse poses (I always squabble about that), there are no loading times between levels, only when starting the game. You can see how Drake`s shirt gets dirtier through the game, how his clothes get wet and dry up, how naturally he leaps, falls, rolls and shoots. What really looks bad is the jungle itself. The colour palette is bright green and only. Jungle is ALL types of green and brown. I realised that when I was still drawing comics as a kid, damnit! What needs a lot of work is fire and smoke. No exceptions here - when you shoot a barrel or blow a grenade you get a neat mini-nuke look. Not only that - invisible walls here and there, Nate freely walks through vegetation and levels are straightforward corridors. Despite various small quirks and glitches, Uncharted looks great. Period.
Drake`s Fortune pleases with good musical score and terrific voice acting. Each voice is unique and perfectly fit for the character. Guns and explosions are very authentic but the weakest point is jungle sounds. They are silent and feel lifeless.
To sum things up, Uncharted is a thrilling roller coaster ride while it lasts and a good start for potential series. Since PlayStation 3 lacks good exclusives like this, not getting this game is a punishable crime.