Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune (PS3 Platinum)
Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is not exactly a horror game, but its special atmosphere, mysteries, gorgeous tombs, dark ruins of forgotten temples and even living deads should earn recognition from the majority of horror genre fans. There are not many games that would feed your imagination and exploration desire with the quality of a good adventure book. But is the game scary? Regardless its overall lightweight and bright tone, there are plenty of moments that would please the dark side of your heart.
Story-wise Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is very enjoyable and captivating modern day tale with surprises and twists. The intention of Naughty Dogs (the creators of Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune) was to create a purely pleasing experience- and they fully succeeded with this. The main hero Drake Nathan is a descendant of the explorer Sir Francis Drake and so he inherits clues how to find El Dorado (Grail Cup of every treasure hunter!). And the adventure begins leading Drake from one clue to another through the exotic island’s ungles, ancient puzzles and secrets, modern pirates and their traps, ruins of old fortresses, palaces and churches, secret tombs with unexpected inhabitants- you name it! But Drake is not alone in this dangerous journey- he’s accompanied by his friend Victor “Sully” Sullivan and journalist Elena Fisher- beautiful and brave girl. That’s a blast adventure that ends with interesting twists.
From the very start the game strikes with its visual awesomeness and continues to deliver the same quality through all the game. Attention to details is phenomenal- even old junk in dark corners consists of interesting and highly detailed objects. Every piece of texture is polished to perfectness and so it adds a great deal to the overall captivating atmosphere- masterfully re-created surfaces often was keeping me just wondering around. Naughty Dogs exploited their strength at visuals fully- striking landscapes, interiors of ancient ruins and hideaways would thrill every romantic soul.
Animation art is worth a separate praise here- Drake moves so naturally and swiftly that you’re getting pleasure just from controlling it. Naughty Dogs put all their efforts to make Drake’s behaviour as human as possible- and they succeeded with that so much that it often feels more like a film than a game.
Sounds and music are simply brilliant like everything else in Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune. The instrumental score is of top film quality and adds a lot to the strong emotional impact. Sound design here shows off the true advantages of interactive arts. One could even say- hearing is believing. Oh yes, there’s no lack of subtleness here!
If you never played Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune then you missed a lot- that’s one of the best games of all times. Let’s hope that the upcoming film adaptation of Uncharted will live up to the expectations and the original high production values. In either case, I strongly believe that Uncharted 2 will be the best interactive adventure in 2009.