Greatness from small beginnings
Naughty Dog has without a doubt been one of the biggest contributors in terms of PlayStation’s success. They introduced the world to Crash Bandicoot in the nineties, arguably one of most recognized mascots of the PS1, and made a classic in Jak and Daxter, that is still acknowledged by many as one of the best PS2 games.
On November 16, 2007 “Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune” for the PS3 hit the shelves. It was a completely new chapter for Naughty Dog, not just because it was on a new platform, but also because it was the first time they told a story with human characters.
Inspired by a wide range of action and adventure stories in every form from pulp magazines to movie serials, Uncharted possesses the same kind of tongue in cheek dialogue and fun and adventure you would expect from such a story. But it also manages to equip its main characters with just enough charm and personality to make you appreciate and care for their relationship and well-being.
In the game we meet Nathan Drake, a modern-day fortune hunter, who finds a 400-year-old clue left behind by famed explorer Sir Francis Drake. A clue that may lead to El Dorado and all the riches that comes with it. Before Drake and his old friend Victor “Goddamn” Sullivan can leave for the treasure they are stopped by Gabriel Roman. Sullivan owes Roman money and the situation goes from bad to worse when Sullivan is shot and presumed dead. Nathan makes a narrow escape and the hunt for El Dorado begins. The whole expedition was originally founded by an ambitious young journalist, named Elena Fisher, and even though Drake and Sully tried their best to keep her out of the way, she managed to track Drake down and together the two of them must now work together to uncover the secrets of El Dorado.
Uncharted is an action/adventure game and that means lots of shooting dudes, some light puzzles just to mix it up a bit and finally a little bit of platforming. The shooting is cover-based and you quickly learn to use cover, simply because you have to, unless you want to die in a couple of seconds. The enemies have a remarkably tendency to hit you, even from the longest distances, so if you aren’t careful even just two or three of them can quickly become the end of you. On top of that the game introduces tougher enemy types with shotguns and grenade launchers that can kill you instantly.
The first Uncharted is maybe not a perfect game: The difficulty definitely has some hard swings, most of the time it’s not too bad though, but all of a sudden you may just hit a wall of bullets and die pretty much instantly. There are sections of the game that may test your patience a bit in that regard, where it will just throw enemy after enemy against you and if you aren’t careful some dude with a shotgun might sneak up on you and shot you in the back. Well game over buddy, you just have to fight through those 15-20 bad guys all over again… and again and again until you succeed.
Another small issue, even though I don’t find it to be such a big problem again, but still worth mentioning, is the number of bullets it takes to kill someone in this game. Most of the time it’s okay but once in a while it might take an entire clip or two to take down just one enemy, it seems pretty random when this happens, but it’s a bit weird when it does. So yes the game suffers from a slight case of the old bullet sponges, but you eventually adjust to it if you ask me. So let’s not make a bigger deal out of it than it actually is.
People seem to give the first Uncharted a lot of shit, for not being like Uncharted 2, but that kind of criticism is worthless if you ask me. How many franchises can you look at today and say that the first game was absolutely perfection? Mass Effect didn’t have the best first entry, Resident Evil sure as hell didn’t have that either. People seem to prefer the second entry a lot more in those cases too.
So when I see people say that they should just skip the first game and go directly to the second, it makes me a bit disappointed in the gaming community. Are we so focused on the new things that we can’t forgive a few beginner mistakes? Because in the end you are just cheating yourself of one great gaming experience, which might have a few issues, but if you can learn to look beyond that Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is a great little game.
Even with all its “problems” or “issues”, this isn’t such a big deal if you ask me though, Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is still a good game, and I have played through it at least 5 times by now. So if you are one of the few people who still haven’t given the Uncharted series a go, would you at least just consider giving the first entry a try. After all its easy to look back at it now and criticize it for its faults, with the sequels in mind, but if you can look beyond that I say you should definitely check it out, just have in mind that it’s an “old” PS3 game and that shines through in certain of the gameplay mechanics: including grenade throwing involving the motion controls and some balancing bits also involving motion controls, which aren’t the best moments of Uncharted, but every game has it weak points.
Nolan North is still great as Nathan Drake, and the banter between Sullivan, Elena and Drake is still just as good today as it was the first time around and the story actually holds up quite well for a game and so does most of the gameplay too.
