Uncharted: Drake's Fortune

Treasure hunter Nathan "Nate" Drake (Nolan North), accompanied by reporter Elena Fisher (Emily Rose), recovers the coffin of his self-proclaimed ancestor Sir Francis Drake, having located it from coordinates inscribed on a family heirloom: a ring Nate wears around his neck.[9] The coffin contains Sir Francis Drake's diary, which gives the location of El Dorado. Pirates attack and destroy Nate's boat, but Nate's friend and mentor Victor "Sully" Sullivan (Richard McGonagle) rescues the two in his seaplane. Fearing Elena's reporting will attract potential rivals, Nate and Sully abandon her at a dock.

Following the diary to the indicated spot, Nate and Sully discover an alcove that once held a large statue, and realize that El Dorado is not a city but rather a golden idol.[10] They find a Nazi U-boat, which contains a page from Drake's diary showing the statue was taken to an island. However, mercenaries led by criminal Gabriel Roman (Simon Templeman), to whom Sully owes a massive debt and his lieutenant Atoq Navarro (Robin Atkin Downes) intercept Nate and Sully. Sully is seemingly killed by a shot to the chest, but Nate manages to escape, encounters Elena, and flies with her to the island.[11]

On the way, anti-aircraft fire forces Elena and Nate to bail out and they are separated. After retrieving supplies from the wrecked seaplane, Nate heads toward an old fort to find Elena. Briefly captured by pirates led by his old associate Eddy Raja (James Sie), Elena breaks Nate free and they flee to the island's old customs house. After finding records showing the statue was moved further inland, they find that Sully is alive and accompanying Roman and Raja.[12] Nate and Elena find and rescue Sully who, having survived due to Drake's diary blocking the bullet, explains he was buying time for Nate by misleading Roman.

Searching through the tunnels of a monastery, Nate overhears an argument between Roman, Navarro and Eddy, revealing that Roman hired Eddy to capture Nate and secure the island, with the reward being a share of El Dorado. Following Nate's escape, Roman doubts Eddy's abilities and ignores his claim that something cursed on the island is killing his men, leading him to dismiss Eddy and his crew. Regrouping, Nate and Elena find a passage leading to a treasure vault, in which they find the body of Drake, assuming that he died searching for the treasure. They encounter a terrified Eddy and crew member, shortly before they are attacked by mutated humans who kill the crew member; despite Nate's efforts, Eddy is also killed when one drags him into a pit.

Nate and Elena escape and find themselves in an abandoned German bunker. Venturing into the base, Nate discovers that the Germans had sought the statue during World War II, but like the Spaniards before them, became cursed from the statue, causing them to become mutants. Sir Francis, knowing of the statue's power, attempted to keep it on the island by destroying the ships and flooding the city, before he too was killed by the mutants.[13]

Nate returns to find Elena has been captured by Roman and Navarro. Regrouping with Sully, he fails to stop them from reaching the statue. Navarro, knowing of the curse, tricks Roman into opening the statue, revealing it to be a sarcophagus containing a mummy infected with an airborne mutagenic virus. Upon Roman turning into one of the mutants, Navarro kills him and takes control of his men, planning to sell the virus as a biological weapon.[14] Nate jumps onto the sarcophagus and rides it as it is airlifted onto a boat in the bay. He engages and defeats Navarro and manages to sink both the sarcophagus and him to the bottom of the ocean.[15] Sully arrives, and after Nate and Elena display affection towards each other, they leave the island with several chests of treasure.[16]

During combat, the player as Nate (left) can use corners and walls as cover, then use blind or aimed fire from cover against his opponents.

Gameplay in Uncharted is a combination of action-adventure gameplay elements and some 3D platforming with a third-person perspective. Platforming elements allow Nate to jump, swim, grab and move along ledges, climb and swing from ropes, and perform other acrobatic actions that allow players to make their way along the ruins in the various areas of the island that Drake explores.[17]

When facing enemies, the player can either use melee and combo attacks at close range to take out foes or can opt to use weapons.[17] Melee attacks comprise a variety of single punches, while combo attacks are activated through specific sequences of button presses that, when timed correctly, offer much greater damage; the most damaging of these is the specific "brutal combo", which forces enemies to drop twice the ammunition they would normally leave.[17] Nate can only carry one pistol and one rifle at a time, and there is a limited amount of ammunition per gun. Picking up a different firearm switches that weapon for the new one. Grenades are also available at certain points, and the height of the aiming arc is adjusted by tilting the Sixaxis controller up or down. These third-person perspective elements were compared by several reviewers to Gears of War,[2][17] in that the player can have Drake take cover behind walls, and use either blind fire or aimed fire to kill enemies. In common with the aforementioned game, Uncharted lacks an actual on-screen health bar; instead, when the player takes damage, the graphics begin to lose color. While resting or taking cover for a brief period, Drake's health level, indicated by the screen color, returns to normal.[17]

The game also includes vehicle sections, where Drake must protect the jeep he and Elena are in using a mounted turret, and where Drake and Elena ride a jet ski along water-filled routes while avoiding enemy fire and explosive barrels. While players direct Drake in driving the jet ski, they may also switch to Elena by aiming the gun in order to use her weapon — either the grenade launcher or the Beretta, depending on the chapter — in defense, or to clear the barrels from their path.[17]

The game also features reward points, which can be gained by collecting 60 hidden treasures in the game that glimmer momentarily[4] or by completing certain accomplishments, such as achieving a number of kills using a specific weapon, performing a number of headshots, or using specific methods of killing enemies.[18] In subsequent playthroughs of the game, the player can use these rewards points to unlock special options; these include in-game bonuses such as alternate costumes and unlimited ammunition[4] but also non-game extras, such as making-of videos and concept art.[19] There are also several references to other Naughty Dog games, especially the Jak and Daxter series; this is done through the "Ottsel" branding on Drake and Fisher's wetsuits,[20] a reference to the species that mixes otter and weasel found in the game, and the strange relic found in one of the earlier chapters, which is actually a precursor orb from the same series.

The game is censored when playing on a Japanese console to remove blood, which normally appears when shooting enemies; this follows the trend of other censored console games in the region, such as Dead Rising and Resistance: Fall of Man.[21]

After completing Jak 3, Naughty Dog assembled their most technically talented staff members and began development of Uncharted: Drake's Fortune under the codename Big.[22][23] It was in full production for about two years, with a small team of engineers working on the game for about a year beforehand.[3] Naughty Dog decided to create a brand new IP rather than opt to develop a PlayStation 3 Jak and Daxter game—they wanted to create a franchise suitable for the new hardware, in order to develop such ideas as realistic human characters instead of stylized ones owing to limitations of previous hardware, as well as create something "fresh and interesting", although termed as 'stylized realism'.[3] Inspiration was drawn from various sources in the action and adventure genres: pulp magazines, movie serials, and more contemporary titles like Indiana Jones and National Treasure.[24] The team felt the sources shared themes of mystery and "what-if scenarios" that romanticized adventure and aimed to include those in Uncharted.[22]

A platforming segment, showing Nathan attempting to scale the outer walls of the Fortress.

The game was first unveiled at E3 2006.[7] From early previews of the game, inevitable comparisons of elements such as platforming and shooting between Uncharted and the well-known Tomb Raider series were drawn, earning the title the nickname of "Dude Raider".[24][25] However, the developers saw their game as concentrating more on third-person cover-based play, in contrast to Tomb Raider's "auto-aiming" play and greater puzzle-solving elements.[3] Other influences they cited include Resident Evil 4,[26] Kill Switch, and Gears of War.[27] Throughout the game's development the staff tried to remain flexible and detached from the original design concepts; attention was focused on the features that worked well, while features that did not work were removed.[5] The development team intended the game's main setting, the island, to play a big role in the overall experience. Feeling too many games used bleak, dark settings with monochromatic color schemes, they wanted the island to be a vibrant, believable game world that immersed the player and encouraged exploration.[22]

In designing the characters, the artists aimed for a style that was photorealistic.[24] The creators envisioned the main protagonist, Nathan Drake, as more of an everyman character than Lara Croft, shown as clearly under stress in the game's many fire fights, with no special training and constantly living at the edge of his abilities.[3][25] Director Amy Hennig felt a heavily armored, "tough as nails" protagonist with a large weapon was not a suitable hero, and decided a "tenacious and resourceful" character would portray more human qualities. Supporting characters (Elena Fisher and Victor Sullivan) were included to avoid a dry and emotionless story.[24] Fisher's character underwent changes during development; in early trailers for the game, the character had dark brown hair, but ultimately the color changed to blonde and the style was altered.[28][29] The writing of the story was led by Hennig with help from Neil Druckmann and Josh Scherr.[30] The lead game designer was Richard Lemarchand,[31] with the game co-designed by Hirokazu Yasuhara, a former Sega game designer best known for designing the early Sonic the Hedgehog games.[32]

The game went gold in the middle of October 2007.[3] A demo was then released on November 8, 2007 on the PlayStation Network[33] before its final release on November 19 in North America, December 6 in Australia, and December 7 in Europe.[34] The demo was first placed on the North American store, and was initially region-locked such that it would only play on a North American PS3.[35] However, this was later confirmed as a mistake, as the developers were apparently unaware that people from different regions could sign up for a North American account and download the demo; a region-free demo was released soon after.[36]

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune received generally favorable reviews from game critics.[45][46] Game Informer complimented the visuals and dialogue between the characters Drake and Fisher, calling them stunning and entertaining respectively.[29] They further added that the production values appeared high, citing the level of detail and musical score.[53] PlayStation Magazine echoed similar statements about the visuals and compared them to that of Crysis.[22][54]

The overall presentation of the game received unanimous praise from critics, who recognized the game's high production values, describing them as "top-notch",[55] "incredible"[19] or comparing them to those found in Hollywood.[18] When combined with the overall style of the game, this led many reviewers to compare Uncharted to summer blockbuster films,[2][56][57] with the action and theme of the game drawing comparisons to the Indiana Jones film series and Tomb Raider.[19][56] As part of the presentation, the game's story and atmosphere were also received well.[2][56] The depth of the characters was praised, each having "their own tone".[56] The voice acting was also received well, as the cast "nails its characterizations"; overall, the voice acting was described as a "big-star performance",[18] "superb"[57] and "stellar".[2] Game designer Tim Schafer, well known as the creator of the early LucasArts adventure games such as The Secret of Monkey Island, has also lauded the game, saying he "liked it a lot", and jokingly thanked it for teaching him a new fashion tip (Nathan Drake's "half-tucked" shirt).[58]

The technical achievements in creating this presentation were also lauded. The graphics and visuals were a big part of this, including appreciation of the "lush" jungle environments,[2][17][19] with lighting effects greatly adding to them.[57] The game's water effects were also appreciated.[55] Overall, many reviewers commented that, at the time, it was one of the best-looking PlayStation 3 games available.[49] Further to the graphical aspects, both facial animation and the animation of characters,[20][57] such as Nate's "fluid" animations as he performs platforming sections were noted,[2] although the wilder animations of enemies reacting to being shot were over-animated "to perhaps a laughable degree".[17]

Criticism of the game included some graphical issues, such as texture pop-in and screen tearing.[4][18] Of more concern were gameplay issues, including overall gameplay length being rather short, with reviewers completing the game in anywhere from six to ten hours,[55][57] and some disappointment with the "not particularly memorable" vehicle sections;[17] the inability to both aim weapons and drive the jet-ski was a well-noted issue.[2][55] Further, some "frustrating, repetitive slogs"[55] with regards to the "constant stream" of pirates and mercenaries,[4] and "moving from one infuriating firefight to the next"[19] towards the end of the game were cited as part of poorer elements of overall gameplay.

Shortly after the release of the game, Naughty Dog's co-president, Evan Wells, stated that Uncharted had been developed as a franchise, and so a sequel was likely.[62][63] It was later confirmed that the development team had put their work on the next installment of Jak and Daxter on hold to work on Uncharted 2 for release in 2009.[64] This sequel was revealed to be entitled Uncharted 2: Among Thieves in December 2008 by Game Informer.[65] A sequel to Uncharted 2, Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception was announced on December 11, 2010 and was released worldwide in November 2011.[66][67]

The fourth installment of the series, Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, which is set to be the last main installment in the series, was announced on 2014 and after two delays, one in late 2015 and the other in March 2016, was released on May 10, 2016.[68][69] A single-player-only remaster of the first three titles, titled Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection, was released for the PlayStation 4 on October 7, 2015 in Europe, Australia and New Zealand, and October 9, 2015 in North America, the United Kingdom and Ireland.[70][71] Two spin-offs for the PlayStation Vita, titled Uncharted: Golden Abyss and Uncharted: Fight for Fortune were released in 2011 and 2012 respectively.[72][73]

• Uncharted characters
• Regionally censored video games

• Official website