Review - Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception

Review – Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception

Pros: Exciting game play with cinematic pacing.

Cons: Finicky controls can make Drake difficult to control.

Final Judgement:  Great stand-alone story line and incredible visuals makes Uncharted 3 a must for adventure gamers.

http://www.naughtydog.com/games/uncharted

Available for: PS3

It was two weeks before ‘Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’ was due out in theaters when I finally decided to sit down, for the first time, and watch the Trilogy in its entirety.  There I was, all innocent and excited, clutching the trilogy in my hot little hands. I watched Raiders, thoroughly impressed.  Upon the roll of the credits, I immediately stuffed Temple of Doom in to the DVD player. I hit play.  Then, as if God was punishing me for my hubris, a pre-diabetic Asian dwarf shoe horned his way onto the screen and Jones' love intrest was screaming like a bitch about the semantics of sinking and crashing. My expression faded from a smile of joy to a grimace of pain and disappointment. By the end of the second movie I was a broken man, I couldn’t bring myself to watch the third. I spent the next two weeks convincing myself that the new movie would be better; that it would redeem the cinematic holocaust that I had borne witness to. So I bought a ticket, sat in the theater and watched a movie about aliens and Harrison Ford surviving a nuclear bomb inside a fridge. Some days I still stare longingly out the window and sigh wistfully at what might have been…

Now I tell you this because I really like adventure stories.  I like tales of lost treasure and ancient conspiracies, especially ones that are at least superficially grounded in actual historical events. It’s why Uncharted holds a special place in my heart, Uncharted to me is what Indiana Jones should have been. Naughty Dog Games created the adventure game formula with the journeys of our hero Nathan Drake, his mentor Victor “Sully” Sullivan and his on again off again paramour Elena Fisher. Unlike Indiana Jones, which every second movie slaps us across the face with a dick, Uncharted just gets better with each game. Naughty Dog also crafted their stories to be stand alone with only an overarching side story involving Drake and Elena. You can pick it up, play and totally understand the characters and their relationships without having to play the other games.

They're back and looking for another lost city to destroy shortly after they rediscover it.

Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception follows Drake and crew as they travel around the world looking for the Lost City of Ubar or as Lawrenceof Arabia called it “The Atlantis of the Sands”. The plot begins with SirFrancis Drake, who was apparently searching for Ubar while he was supposed to be sailing in the West Indies during 1570 and 1571. A search which Drake promptly gave up on because he probably stopped and asked himself why a bad ass sea captain/pirate such as himself was spending all his time fucking around in the god damn desert. A desert which any scholar will tell you is the exact opposite of an ocean. Deserts and lost cities also have nothing to do with boats or stomping Spaniards, both of which were Drake’s bread and butter.

You really can't blame Drake, I mean, this Spaniard looks like a total douche.

The game purports that Drake was a part of a secret society working along with the Occult Mathematician / beard enthusiast John Dee for Queen Elizabeth 1 to execute her wishes.  The game also implies that hundreds of years later Lawrence of Arabia was murdered by the same secret society after he stumbled upon Drake’s trail while researching Ubar. Nathan Drake, the hero of our game, gets involved because he believes he is Francis’ descendant. As he works towards discovering the secret of Ubar the same shadowy group tries to take Drake out while simultaneously looking for the city themselves, which kinda makes their motivations a bit confusing. First they’re looking for the city, then they cover it up, then they kill Lawrence of Arabia for looking for it, then they start looking for it again while trying to kill someone else who is looking for it. Do they want to find or not?

"Gimmie that ring, I need it to find or perhaps loose a city... its complicated, you wouldn't understand."

Before I talk about the game play I’m going to side track for a moment.  As you may recall, in my introduction, I mentioned that Naughty Dogs gets many of the foundations for the Uncharted series from actual historical events. I’m no historian but I was able to verify some of the more interesting points about Drake, Dee and the lost city of Ubar used by Uncharted. Points which I thought were just spice added by Naughty Dog for the game but turned out to be historical fact! Pull up a chair while I rap at you about some of these historic nuggets from the Game:

·         Drake and Queen Elizabeth were quite buddy-buddy.  In fact, after he returned from his circumnavigation of the planet, a.k.a. “Operation Spanish Smack-down 1” during which time he accrued more ill-gotten booty from the Spaniards then the crown took in by itself that entire year, the Queen knighted him, gave him a jewel depicting her portrait (a very uncommon honour to be bestowed on a commoner) and then promptly declared his entire endeavour a state secret and classified all documents pertaining to his most excellent adventure. Think about that, a round planet is a relatively new idea and the dude just sailed around the god damn planet. The Queen’s response: good job… now don’t tell anyone.

"Good job bro... now everyone forget this happened."

·         In the game they cite John Dee as the original “007” and have documents where Dee signed his name with the image now synonymous with Ian Flemmings alcoholic British nymphomaniac. Dee actually did work as an informant to the Queen and signed his letters to her with two circles, as if to say he was the Queen’s eyes and a stylized number seven which he believed was a lucky number. Ian Flemming used Dee as inspiration for James Bond even though Dee, as far as I can tell, never played Baccarat or drove an Aston Martin.  

No shit! I can't make this stuff up!

·         Ubar or “The Atlantis of the Sands” is a legend of an ancient city that existed in the Rub’ al Khali desert and was destroyed by a supposed act of god. There is a great amount of debate about where the city was and the wealth that it contained.  However some archeological records have been found that mention the city as a trading partner, meaning this place actually existed and probably just got over embezzled,like how people say Meg Ryan is a totally great actress and then you watch Proof of Life.

See? Interesting stuff; now you know the secret origin story of James Bond. Feel free to use those facts next time you’re trying to impress some strange at the local bar… you’re welcome. Now back to game play.

Uncharted 3 keeps great pacing that always has Drake minutes away from his next harrowing escape or battle. The game creates a balance between puzzle elements, stealth situations and frantic gun fights.  The puzzle elements make you stop and think, without being frustrating, while the frantic gun fights have you dashing between points of cover while blazing away at enemies. Throughout the game there are climactic and dramatic chases as well as escapes that really manage to pull the player into the game.  

For example, the box art of the Game shows Drake among the wreckage of a crashed plane in the desert. The game sequence leading up to the crash has you controlling Drake as he fights for his life in the cargo hold of the plane. As the battle goes on, you and your opponents cause collateral damage to the plane causing  it to pitch and the difficulty level of the battle to steadily increase.  This continues until a quick time event occurs that has Drake getting sucked out of a hole in the fuselage of the plane over the desert.  Drake desperately works his way to an air drop cargo pallet that is free falling. As you get Drake to the pallet you have to mash the controller repeatedly to get him to cling to the cargo and manually deploy its parachute. Yes I know it sounds ridiculous and not based anywhere near reality, but the camera angles employed as you’re spinning through the air in a free fall over the desert mixed with a great soundtrack make the scene amazing and had me on the edge of my seat.

It's shit like this that makes me hate flying.

Uncharted 3 also features some excellent cinematography and directing that employs creative camera angles and zoom outs for dramatic effect. The graphics are also vibrant and well detailed.   Lots of care was put into little details such as pictures on room walls or items on coffee tables. Naughty Dog also put a lot of effort into the character models and faces, which move and convey emotion very well. Put together the visuals of Uncharted 3 and the game could very easily be mistaken for a movie as opposed to a video game.

Drake gives us his best "Magnum" look.

However with all the good that can be found in Uncharted 3 there is also bound to be some bad which, while not game breakers, were at times distracting.

The first issue I found was in a way linked to the excellent character models I just mentioned.  Uncharted 3 included an innovation where Drake now reacts dynamically to his surrounding environment. When Drake gets near a wall he will put his hand out to balance himself against it as he moves. It also means he will stumble or stagger if you run him over uneven ground, cower behind cover and generally look like he’s doing everything he can to not die. During the chase and action sequences this really adds to the mood and tension of the game.  It provides a more human and cinematic feel to the game. However, Drake is always doing this, even when he’s just on a Sunday walk in the market. When there is no rush and no one is trying to harm him, Drake runs around stumbling, looking over his shoulder and pushing off walls. When you aren’t in a life and death situation it looks silly and creates the opposite effect, killing the mood of the game. It would have been nice if they had made his movements context sensitive or included a button you could press to make Drake walk like a normal person.

The biggest issue I had however was that the controls could be a bit finicky during game play. I found the analog sticks to be a bit too sensitive which made precision aiming during gun battles tricky. When I tried turning down the sensitivity in the control options I found the aiming to be too sluggish.  After playing with the sensitivity sliders for a while I was disappointed to find that I was unable to get a happy medium. Drake was either hopped up on horse tranquilizers or on his fifth cup of coffee for the day. Eventually I just went with the default aiming sensitivity and made the best of it.

The finicky controls also became an issue during the aforementioned action sequences where Drake is desperately trying to avoid death.  There are moments of confusion as to what you are supposed to be doing or where you are supposed to be running. I found myself dying most of the time in these sequences.  Not so much because they were too challenging but because the game just wasn’t clear as to where I was supposed to be going. What looked like a path would turn out to be a cliff that resulted in instant death.  Sometimes the game just didn’t give enough cues or warning as to which direction you should be running in to avoid whatever apocalypse was going down around our hero.

Honestly, would it kill them to give you an arrow or sign to follow?

I have to recommend Uncharted 3 for both fans of the series and new comers alike. The story is what I’ve come to love about Uncharted and holds its own against similar games such as Tomb Raider and the other entries in the Uncharted series. The visuals are excellent and well detailed and the action sequences, while occasionally a bit unclear and finicky to control, are exciting and will draw you in to game.