Review: Uncharted, Drake’s Fortune

That’s right – out of nowhere comes a new review. No first impressions – nothing. This was actually a rental and I was able to clear it in a weekend. I had always had my eye on this game and the fact that they offered trophies kind of sealed the deal for me. Don’t get me wrong, I was going to rent the game one day anyways but because I wanted to see how the trophy system worked it got bumped to the top of the list.

Now, in my opinion, jungle-themed games are kind of overdone. While I can’t think of many, oddly enough, I can’t help but think of Tomb Raider, Pitfall and Donkey Kong Country right off the bat. Remember, I said jungle-THEMED. So, I was kind of curious if this was going to be a re-hash of Tomb Raider or Pitfall and I’m glad to say it wasn’t and that I really enjoyed this game.

The game revolves around three characters: Nathan Drake, a treasure hunter who thinks he’s the descendant of Francis Drake; Elena Fischer, a reporter who was chronicling his adventure for the most part; and Victor “Sully” Sullivan, another treasure hunter who’s looking for treasure to help cover his debts. As the story progresses, you wonder exactly what each character is up to – well, except for Nathan because since you play the role of him you obviously know his intentions.

It sure seems like this is part of a cutscene right? Well, it's not. It's ingame footage.

The graphics were really well done. All the cut-scenes and even the ingame shots were pretty damn stunning. Especially when you had to use your flashlight. The “great view” shots were really well done, too. And when you were climbing high up … you really felt like you were high up there. Naughty Dog did a fine job making the jungle as realistic as possible.

The first thing I worried about shortly in is if this was going to take an “undead” turn. After noticing some out-of-place corpses, I couldn’t help but think that they were suddenly going to become animated. While I will say that there is only one form of odd creature in the game, the way they play it out actually works well with the storyline. So no, no weird twist at the end that involves undeads hungering for flesh.

The storyline evolution takes on a “National Treasure” approach where you’re constantly moving forward to find your treasure. While this is normally the ideal schematics of the game progression after awhile it seems to go into a “The treasure is here! No it’s not, but let’s solve the riddle to go to the real treasure room!” type of feel.

I would have been seriously pissed had this dead guy jumped out at me. Luckily, he didn't and all was well.

The gameplay overall was pretty fun. I actually really enjoyed playing this game. Nothing was too difficult, but nothing was also too easy. Your platform jumping were nicely laid out so you almost knew where you were supposed to go, but there also was that chance that you wouldn’t make the jump, or the leap. Many times I found myself swinging from a vine, getting enough momentum and jumping … but not making it. The next round you find out that you should have climbed the vine a bit then started swinging.

Various elements were also easily noticeable. The treasures gave off a spherical shine so you knew something was there while your weapons that were dropped off your enemies have a reflection. So you always knew where something was. My main worry was that the treasure collection that happened in-game was going to show no signs or clues of where it’s at, but I’m happy to say that’s not the case. With it working like that, you never really stay in the same spot looking to see if there’s some hidden treasure. It doesn’t hinder from the challenge either because although the game lets you know where it’s at, you still have to find a way to get there although some are around a corner that you may not see or in a corner.

Was I worried that combat was going to be a pain? Yes. Was it? No.

Another concern I had was combat but it turned out to be pretty enjoyable. It takes a first-person shooter turn which many gamers will find very recognizable. The only issue was that their dodging methods in the game could have been better. By pressing the circle button you duck for cover at the nearest ledge but many times I found myself trying to move around and accidentally exposing myself to gunfire despite following the instructions. In the beginning it wasn’t so bad but later on it became quite annoying. The cathedral battle had me really frustrated because one movement takes me out from cover and exposed me to 10+ guys shooting at me. Drake’s low health made it no better. By the way – I really like the idea of having the color fade from the screen when you’re about to die. It’s an instant response to how you’re doing with your health and you have no bar you have to look to. I believe this method is also being implimented into Mirror’s edge. But I really like the idea of a game with very little to no HUD.

The controls were really cut and dry. Nothing too great but nothing too terrible. Your D-Pad was a weapon selector, aimed with L1 and fired with R1. L2 was your first-person perspective which overall was pretty sluggish and R2 was your reload feature. Triangle was your action button, X was your jump button and Circle was your cover/drop off a ledge button. I really can’t remember what the Square button was used for. Like Condemned 2 and Heavenly Sword, they had button-sequences which were much more responsive than the other games.

Which brings me to a relatively anti-climactic final boss fight. I won’t ruin the story but I will say that the final person that you actually fight isn’t who you really think it is. And the stage leading up to it was a little frustrating. It was really all about luck for the most part. There is one point where you have to dodge or else you’ll die – no way around it. Made it feel kind of cheap, but boss fights are meant to be tough, albeit a little cheap.

Overall, though, I was really happy with this game. I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought it would. However, once the game was over … that was it. Outside of trophy collection there really isn’t much of a reason to go back. Had I not cleared it within a weekend I would have bought it – but I’m glad I didn’t. Another plague of the game is that it was really short. Although there were about 25 “chapters,” I was able to breeze through it over the course of the weekend on normal difficulty.

So now, let’s wrap up the review.

Graphics. The game had pretty environmental graphics and a lot of the grand shots were very pretty – like when climbing the giant tower or getting a look of the landscape at the top of a cliff. In addition, it wasn’t hard to find various objects that were of importance. However, facial animations looked a little dated and the objects that weren’t easily visible meant you die as you guess if you can reach the ledge or not. 7/10.

Music & Sound Effects. The music right off the bat reminded me of National Treasure. Nothing terribly memorable and the music during battles often repeated itself. Sound effects were the norm.  5/10.

Gameplay & Controls. The game ran pretty smoothly. They did a good job transitioning from exploration and first-person-esque shooter. The battles were actually really fun and exploration was pretty cut-and-dry. You always had an idea of where to go, but sometimes while ledge-jumping they fooled you and made you think you could make a jump, but then you die. Button-sequence responses were pretty good. Only one instance was it available to me and it had passed so quickly I didn’t even know I could do it until it was too late. 19/25.

Story & Presentation. Like Heavenly Sword, they took a theatrical take with it. Not alot of cutscenes, but enough to sit back and enjoy. Many times during the game you’d hear Drake talk to himself, which was a really neat touch – because I’m sure that’s what everyone would do when in the predicaments that he was in. The story took somewhat of a sour turn in the end but at the same time did a nice job of explaining why some of the not-natural stuff happened without going into the whole zombie genre (The zombie genre is a figure of speech, there are no zombies in the game). 16/20.

Fun Factor. I really liked this game, and I really liked playing it. I enjoyed all the characters and almost all the stages. As I stated before, I would have bought the game had it not been so short. 20/25.

Replayability. There is no online play and once you’re done your only other options are to unlock the other challenges and get all your trophies. So the replayability is there, but I really don’t know if you’d want to. 5/10.  72

Final Score: 72 pts., giving this game 3/5 invaders.