Beautiful visuals, Hollywood style production value, rock solid gameplay, Uncharted has it all. Where could you go wrong
Uncharted tells the story of treasure hunter Nathan Drake, an ancestor of the well known Sir Francis Drake, who is in the search of the lost treasure El Dorado. With the game set in the Amazon of South America, Uncharted not only displays the best visuals on the console to its date, but among the best across all platforms managing to compete with Gear's of War's Unreal 3.0 spectacle. Drake's Fortune beautifully renders the crisp vivid foliage around Nathan. Climb to the top of a waterfall or a hill, and you can see the setting sun in the background with the orange sun-lit trees of the Amazon. Waterfalls cascade down to the rivers below with realistic collision effects. The dynamic real-time shadowing, lighting models, and advanced water simulations all bring together what makes Uncharted's fantastic presentational value and breath taking sights, especially with the chicks. A neat addition Uncharted brings to the table is allowing players to actually see characters' clothing get soaking wet and gradually dry off after they've gotten out of the water. However, most games that deliver high end visuals often come at a price, whether it'll be a frame rate drop, or delayed texture loading; Uncharted suffers from the later. This doesn't happen often, but it is worth acknowledging. Certain surfaces will first appear muddy and bland like a roll of chains or a rusty control panel. Sometimes an entire scenery will be missing, only to appear a good three to four seconds later. This also occurs during the treasure hunt imbedded in the game. There are 60 treasures hidden throughout Drake's Fortune and each time you discover one, the artifact's image will appear on screen. A large amount of these artifacts will have their textures loading in real-time, some of which where the item itself doesn't appear after a few seconds. This shouldn't be much of a surprise as this is a very beautiful game.
Uncharted has a great sense of personality with its cast of characters. Nathan Drake is your typical charming after-shaved reckless kind of guy, who is accompanied by the persistent Elena Fisher. There are also others such as his old time partner Victor Sullivan, and his nemesis Eddy Raja who shouts my favorite line, "No one messes with Eddy Raja!" Parts of the reason for these well crafted characters are the voice talents of Nolan North (Nathan), Emily Rose (Elena), Richard McGonagle (Sullivan), James Sie (Eddy) and many others. These actors are the center of what gives these characters their distinct personalities. The voice acting is so well incorporated with the motion capture that one can't help but get the sense that this game is coming to life. Like when a frightened Drake says, "Oh s**t!" you can relate to how he's feeling. With its unparalleled visuals, full-body motion capture synchronized with talented voice acting, Uncharted presents a Hollywood quality cinematic experience.
Being that Uncharted plots a treasure hunting theme, many accused it of being a male version of Tomb Raider. But this is far from the case. Naughty Dog didn't just replace the sexy seductive Lara Croft with the handsomely charming Nathan Drake. While platforming bares resemblance to Tomb Raider, like the Prince of Persia series, Nathan brings the human quality to play as you can see the stress on his body as he barely makes that seemingly impossible jump. But what really sets Uncharted apart is the combat. Nathan doesn't just go gun-a-blazing; he takes a more cautious like Marcus Fenix in Gears of War. Using the cover based stop-and-pop combat system; Uncharted adds another component to the already high quality cinematic ride. Nathan can also engage in hand-to-hand combat in quick time events. If he approaches and enemy, the camera zooms in and quick-time buttons will show as the combat slows down. He can also take down enemies by sneaking up behind them and going for the silent kill; a great way to infiltrate enemy territory without being seen. The enemy AI will use aggressive tactics to push you back, keeping you on your toes and forcing you to watch your flanks. Often, they will also try to frag you out of your vulnerable positions. It's up to you to seek out cover as you move along clearing out enemies so that you can reach your destination, something that was quite prominent in Gears of War.
The only sore-thumbed weak spot in Uncharted are the jet-ski sequences. Most games add a vehicular component to the gameplay attempting to give it some flavorful variety. In these cases however, since they're not the focal point, they usually end up being nothing more than a thrown together element. Uncharted is no different. Jet-skiing feels like a haphazard zigzag ride up and down rivers and rapids. Turning is far too sensitive and becomes increasingly frustrating when you're riding against the currents. Throw in a few exploding fuel tank obstacles and some enemies on the docks, and players can't help but say to themselves, "I can't wait till this is over." Luckily they won't have to wait long as they are rather short and there are only two of them in the game. What is worth mentioning is that there's an on-rails jeep sequence the works well and looks spectacular. It would have been better if Naughty Dog used it again, or at least tweaked the jet-skiing controls.
Uncharted: Drake's Fortune managed to bring together so many elements in a game and do them all right, something many developers can only hope to accomplish. It holds rock solid platforming, frantic gun play with a well incorporated cover system, engaging characters brought to life with talented voice acting and fluidly animated motion capture, all coated in some of the best polished visuals to its date. With the minor technical issues aside, Uncharted is a welcomed new IP to the Playstation 3's library.