Wednesday 23 Jul 2008

If the premise of this game intrigues you then you should buy it and play it. There’s not much that needs to be said – I can’t recommend it enough if you’re in the least bit interested in action/adventure movies. In fact, this is an Indiana Jones or National Treasure experience in game form, and arguably does just about everything better than those movies do. As such, it’s an advertisement for where gaming could take us, and shows the potential for it to be a more engaging form of storytelling.

Nathan Drake is an everyman, a sort of reluctant hero. He’s a bounty hunter out to make a quick buck by helping a documentary film-maker called Elena Fisher find Sir Francis Drake’s coffin and an interesting story. Being an opportunist, when he finds a notebook left by Drake he ditches Elena and flies off with his friend and business partner Sully to find the treasure Sir Francis mapped. Of course, it’s not so simple; Drake’s notebook is really just a set of clues that send Nathan all around the Caribbean in search of El Dorado (what else would a bounty hunter be searching for?)

The Shooter’s New Clothes

The mechanics of Uncharted are closely related to those in Tomb Raider and Prince of Persia, with everything happening in the third person (meaning we see Nathan on screen as we control him). As in those games you find yourself climbing ropes, shimmying along ledges and generally doing what we call “platforming.” There is, however, also quite a bit of shooting as the trail heats up – fellow bounty hunters (called pirates since they’re the bad guys) also want to find this golden city. The shooting is reminiscent of Gears of War with its cover system – press X and Nathan will hide behind the nearest post or pillar, press L2 to lean out from your hiding place and press R2 to shoot. This makes it easy enough to get the hang of and it turns out to be a really fun aspect of the game play with its variety of tactics and weapons. You can also use melee combat if you get close enough to your enemies; it’s not a deep subsystem but it is enjoyable.

It is certainly a little surprising to find so much shooting and fighting in a bounty hunting game (as opposed to the expected platforming and exploring), but it’s not an unwelcome mechanic by any means. There are no real stealth sections in the game but it does benefit you to have a look around and plan your course of attack a little so that you have enough cover. The settings for these gunfights are often spectacular and cleverly designed to take advantage of the cover system. Nathan also has the metabolism of Wolverine himself, so a quick duck behind an old pillar is enough to restore him to full health after a barrage of gun fire.

Fortunately Elena is impervious to bullets so you never have to worry about her dying on you. Design decisions like these decrease any frustration that might creep in playing games of this type (frustration that is all too common in Prince of Persia or Tomb Raider games), as you’re always pushing forward. This doesn’t mean there is no challenge – there are sections that are still difficult to pass, but a forgiving health system combined with a well-placed checkpoint system and a hint system make Uncharted a relative breeze of a game. In case it isn’t clear: this is a good thing. If you want more challenge there’s always Crushing mode, and the hints can be ignored. It would be an absolute waste of a great story to make it too hard for the adventure-movie audience to enjoy to the end. That’s no slight on that audience – I include myself in it – for a game like this you really don’t want to have to repeat that sequence of wall jumps until your timing reaches 3 decimal points of precision.

Exploring and Platforming

Of course, the heart and soul of a game of this nature is the exploring and platforming, and both are executed well. Exploration is also guided by in-game cues, and it’s almost impossible to get lost as the progression is very linear. In fact, exploration is not really the name for the activity; it is better named puzzle solving and progressing as you do not perform any real exploration of your own. Nathan’s climbing abilities are put to the test regularly as he jumps, swings, climbs and swims; he does all this without breaking a sweat – I’m sure he must get tired, but he never responds to my button presses quickly.

On top of fighting, platforming and shallow-but-rewarding exploration, Naughty Dog have interspersed a number of other game play elements. One example is an on-rails section where Nathan must fight off chasing vehicles with a grenade launcher on the back of his jeep while Elena drives (yes, she finds Nathan again); another is a section involving riding on Jet skis and evading all the exploding barrels and enemy minions while driving upstream. They are the sort of elements you expect to see repeated and reused to flesh out playing time but Naughty Dog are content to use them once and be done with them. This philosophy means the game is shorter, but that it’s also jam packed with new ideas and sequences, never becoming repetitive. I’m happy with that tradeoff – in fact, I’d prefer to see it used more often.

The Big Surprise: An Actual Enjoyable Plot

The plot follows a typical adventure movie plot with twists and turns, betrayals and hostages, but also manages to develop the characters into believable people. Believable, that is, other than their tireless muscles, Drake’s incredible regeneration rate and Elena’s invincibility! Nathan Drake is not your typical action hero; he is rather an everyman who seems to mistakenly invite disaster wherever he goes. Elena Fisher is a competent, likeable and respectable accomplice. She happens to a female character that is not at all exploitative, something so rare in gaming it’s worth commenting on. There are numerous times when the game segues into cut scenes, but they are uniformly entertaining, not overly long and essential in fleshing out the plot.

Uncharted is the closest video gaming has come to the proverbial “interactive movie,” and is the first evidence that the concept might actually be an interesting one. Don’t expect high art or blow-your-mind ideas or oh-so-unique game play. Instead expect to be entertained much like your good summer popcorn movies entertain – with great production values, some decent acting, great action sequences, top notch graphics, special effects and an enjoyable story. On top of all that the game play is great fun and varied enough to lift Drake’s Fortune above the source material to be one of the best games on the PlayStation 3. It is certainly, to my mind, the best of its ilk.

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Contributor:	Peter

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