Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception

Genre: Action-Adventure
Year: 2011
Developed by: Naughty Dog
Published by: Sony Computer Entertainment
Platforms: PS3
#124
Feeling Like: Unsullied

“I’ll play ten Uncharteds if they keep this up.” – the final line of my Backloggery review when I finished Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception.

That opinion still holds, though we’re not quite at ten. Yet.

Naughty Dog knew they’d have to go big if they wanted to surpass Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. As they grew more familiar with the technology, the graphics took another leap and, as a result, so do the enormously successful set-pieces. I don’t know if there’s a single developer that does them better. I was constantly in awe of what I was seeing, usually while trying frantically to keep Nathan Drake alive against the accoutrements of a drowning ship, or collapsing temple. Even Sully seemed exhausted after we got out of that one.

There’s another reason why Uncharted 3 is terrific – more of Sully, my guy!

You can never go wrong with Sully. Voiced by Richard McGonagle, he is easily my favorite part of the series. He’s like if Cliff from Cheers was a hardened military veteran and even more of a scoundrel. I never felt like he was a father figure, more like an uncle that would slap me upside the head when I needed a course correction. Seeing the origin story between him and Nate’s meeting was really cool and served as an excellent tutorial.

Not that I needed a refresher on the mechanics; you crouch behind walls, you shoot guns, you melee guys who get too close and throw grenades when their body armor is in the way. Simple. Sprinting through crowds, riding various vehicles and careening down crumbling architecture is old hat at this point, but because everything is perfect on a technical level, they all feel that much more impactful.

There’s the usual quips and the dialogue is genuinely funny at times. The writing is snappy and sharp, although every character seems to embody stereotypes from any heist movie you’ve seen, they’re all enjoyable enough that I didn’t really care. It makes a huge difference that they’re motion captured as well, no more uncanny valley or wax figure look like we saw in Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune. It’s marvelous to see how far Naughty Dog came in just four years from a development standpoint. Can you imagine a triple A studio on this kind of streak, today?

An incredible run. Thirteen straight years of high quality, award winning titles. I don’t know if they can continue to keep this up, but it was clear that at least for a decade, Naughty Dog was one of the best creators of games in the world.

I knew this going in, of course. That’s why Dave R and Lipsit and I all purchased it for our respective PS3’s and played a lot of multiplayer. It wasn’t the easiest thing to coordinate schedules (they’re both in Nova Scotia) since we were all working full-time at this point, but it was worth organizing a session when we could. I don’t know how far we got, but I’m guessing Dave told me what to do and I died often while battling waves of incoming enemies. Usual fare, but welcomed.

The airplane crash and the subsequent scenes in the desert are the most iconic moments from the game. It’s no wonder the movie used falling out of a plane as the key action scene, though the end one with pirate ships was something that could have been plucked right from the games, but wasn’t. Props to the filmmakers for that one. It may not be quite as innovative as the train scene from Uncharted 2, but there’s really nothing quite like soaring through the air, and desperately grasping onto some cargo to delay your plummet. Oh, and there’s a few thugs soaring towards you. Scenes like these are why I play video games in the first place.

I liked the shift in tone, as well. Nathan is seeking treasure, sure, but his allies begin to question why he’s so adamant this time. They’re all getting older, so why keep putting their bodies on the line? Why is this worth this kind of risk? There are more than a few character moments that caught me off guard, for the better. It’s easily the most mature take on Nathan, Elena, Sully and the rest. That being said, the dissonance still exists; these people are murdering people by the scores every level, yet there’s no fallout from a psychological standpoint.

But it’s an action movie, and unless you’re steering into First Blood territory, the goal is not to examine the role of violence on the human mind, the goal is to play a handsome rogue with over the top sequences of bombastic destruction while hunting for ancient civilizations.

Mission accomplished.

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