Uncharted 3 Review

Posted By Yousif A. about 1 year, 6 months ago

Uncharted 3 Review

Uncharted makes me ill. It’s true! When the first game arrived at my door I suddenly developed a horrible case of the flu. In 2009 I suddenly came down with a terrible fever, the next day my review copy of Uncharted 2 turned up out of the blue (and how pretty it was). So when I was sent home from work sick a couple of days ago, it came as no surprise to me that Uncharted 3 was sitting on my door mat. I don’t mind this trend though, Uncharted is better than anything the doctor prescribes.

I consider Uncharted 2 one of the best games created this generation. The pacing was perfect, the acting phenomenal and the visual splendor unmatched. Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception had a lot to live up to. Could Naughty Dog really top a title that was given 21 out of 20 by PSM3?

Drake and Sully are at it again, but this time it’s personal. Going all the way back to when the two protagonists originally met, this adventure puts Drake up against the evil English in a race to discover the Atlantis of the Sands and the untold wealth contained within. Much like Jak 3, Naughty Dog have designed Uncharted 3 as a personal story, focusing more upon the characters relationships than the adventure itself.

This actually works out really well. Uncharted has always had excellent characterization and exploring the motivations and relationships of these well established personas results in a wonderfully compelling story. With all the credit I can give to Naughty Dog, even when they introduce a new ally, he is so brilliantly written and acted that you care for him instantly. However, with all the focus the writers have placed upon the protagonists, the antagonists suffer because of it. Both the main villains are so poorly developed through the story, you’ll hardly care about their goals.

It’s not just the villain’s personalities that are lacking substance, but sections of the plot too. There are a couple of moments in the game that look like they are going to develop into major points of interest, yet are never revisited or explained. The end of the Syria section stands out in this regard as it contains not one, but two of these moments with minutes of each other. These plot holes are so painfully evident due to the rest of the story being so masterfully delivered. Just ask yourself this question if you play the title: Why are there spiders? I’ll say no more.

I….what is he…..This isn't going to end well

As far as playing the game goes, expect the same deal as the second game. You’ll be shooting from cover, punching people in the face, and climbing over everything and anything to reach your goal. Close combat has changed again, this time working on the idea of strikes, counters, and holds assigned to different buttons. With new contextual combat maneuvers and the inclusion of goliath-like enemies, the fisticuffs in Uncharted 3 definitely top the previous titles attempts, brining Hollywood style action scenes to life with violent and often comical effect. Nothing says ‘owned’ like knocking out a guy with a fish.

Level design falls into two distinct opposite ends of the spectrum. In terms of visuals, Uncharted 3 throws a huge middle finger up at the competition showing beauty and detail unseen in any console game to date. Every single thing in Drake’s Deception has been designed with expert craftsmanship. Even when you enter a cave, it’s completely different from the cave you saw previously, with flora and fauna being used to create distinct new area. There is never a dull moment in Uncharted 3 and as the game progresses you are only treated to more and more graphical joy. The section in the desert is going to remain with me for many years to come as one of the greatest visual displays in a game this generation. How Naughty Dog managed to create something so deeply beautiful in an area devoid of…anything I’ll never know.

It would be a discredit to the team at Naughty Dog if I didn’t mention the lighting they use during the game too. It doesn’t matter if the light source comes from a torch (electric or flame), the sun or a light bulb, the use of light in Uncharted 3 is unlike anything that you have seen before and it serves to lift every detail. There are very few times in gaming where I find myself stopping in my tracks and saying ‘wow’, and Uncharted 3 managed to make me do it several times, mainly due to the lighting.

Unfortunately, you can tell that Naughty Dog pushed the PS3 to its limits with this title. Texture pop-up and jerky animations are frequently seen through the game. Somehow they have managed to hide the texture pop-up better than the UT3 engine, but you’re likely to notice it every time it happens once you’ve seen it the first time. Much the same way, when you see a guard excellently animated, looking over an edge at the end of a patrol path, suddenly jerk upright and slip back into his patrol route again like nothing happened, it kills an element of the immersion. I can’t help but think of the internet meme, ‘once you’ve seen it you can’t unsee it’. This is a minor quibble, but when you take so much effort to create astounding textures and fluid animations, it’s so much more obvious when it goes wrong.

Drake finds out how a London Pub crawl normally ends

Then there is that other end of the spectrum I spoke about earlier. Level design, not the details, but the layout, isn’t quite up to the same standard you have come to expect from the Uncharted series. Don’t get me wrong, Uncharted 3 is a brilliantly constructed game. I’d even go so far as to say that the boat level that many of you probably saw at E3 is one of the greatest technical achievements of this generation. The problem is these well crafted moments lack a je ne sais quoi. None of them quite match the excitement of the scenes in Uncharted 2. While the rushing water and capsizing tanker may be dramatically draining on the PS3′s processor, it’s not quite so dramatic for the player.

It’s hard to explain without sounding wholly negative throughout this review, but Uncharted 3 just doesn’t hit the same notes as the ones that came before it. The combat seems to get dull a lot quicker than the previous titles, which probably isn’t helped by the lack of new weaponry. There seems to be a heavy focus on stealth sections through the game, which was never a strong point for the series. When stealth sections go wrong, rather than game over, a large amount of enemies are called onto the map, which combined with the new AI (which is deviously smart) you’ll more than likely be seeing death and the checkpoint coming sooner than you would like. The new combat system, while excellent, is forcibly overused though the title with very little changing in each scripted encounter.

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