I could save us all a lot of time and just say that Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception is at least as good as its predecessor.
I could say it sparkles with witty character dialogue. I could say once the game gets going, set pieces that would be the climax of another franchise are a frequent occurrence. I could praise its vivid, captivating environments, its solid shooting mechanics and excellent encounter design, or even just the new and improved hand-to-hand combat mechanics spicing up the requisite pulpy brawls.
Ok, so I have. (Ha! I’m so sneaky!) If all you’re looking for is a verdict on whether to buy it, here you are: if you have any interest in spectacular action-adventure titles, do it. Now. Get off the computer and go buy it. I’ll wait.
Now that you’re back, Drake’s Deception has been the subject of some interesting discussion, as instigated by Eurogamer’s now-infamous review of Uncharted 3. Author Simon Parker’s opinion of Deception is muddled – while he starts off with open approval for the game’s sense of cinematic style, it quickly becomes a decidedly backhanded compliment. For Parker, Deception creates “a nagging feeling that your presence in the scene is an irritation rather than a preference.”
In other words, Parker argues that the dictated narrative is so strong the player’s emergent narrative is largely unnecessary.
Now, the first issue is whether a directed, linear narrative would necessarily be a bad thing. As discussed in a previous column, and demonstrated consistently over my past reviews, I’ve always felt directed narrative to be a valuable part of the gaming experience. Whether or not a game has a cinematic style, it’s not actually a movie. Player immersion creates a strong sense of identity with the protagonist few movies can evoke.
I’d watched others play Uncharted 2, but I only picked it up myself pretty late- months after it’d been released. I’d been badly injured in a skiing accident, and somehow the experience made me feel all the stronger connection to poor Nathan Drake, hanging grievously wounded off a cliff face. Sure, empathizing with a character is the goal of almost every work of fiction, but games, by placing the player directly in the protagonist’s shoes and giving them agency, even the illusion thereof, have a special power to make us feel for the character.
Drake’s Deception is, without a doubt, one of the most spectacular games I’ve played, much like its predecessor. It is passionately scripted, tightly-designed, and unquestionably beautiful. More notably, it’s one of those rare gems to engage not just as an interactive medium but as a story of its own. Drake may have positively unbelievable luck, but as characters he and his friends are anything but unbelievable; they’re larger-than-life but brimming with it. The friendships and connections between our heroes feel real and natural; the villains’ malice is almost palpable.
Are there issues? Sure. The most damning, to me, is a lack of enemy variety; the gunplay’s not spectacular but it’s solid and entertaining enough. Yes, the game is essentially a plot vehicle, but you know what? That’s not bad. That is, after all, what games are: vehicles for emotion, and all the tricked-out mechanical quirks in the world can’t make up for a hollow exercise.
Honestly, if this isn’t “daring design,” then I’m all for more conservative design. I’ve seen many “innovative” games that failed to engage me as much as Deception.
Second, and more importantly, it’s simply untrue. Drake’s Deception is linear, but it’s far from playing itself. Some of the illusion comes from the game’s ample stable of clever little contextual actions triggered as the player happens to come across them – grabbing a bottle to bash over some angry Englishman’s head is probably the most common. (The newly-emphasized hand-to-hand combat system is a big highlight here; even if it’s basically Arkham Asylum’s system, it’s got the benefit of being only part of the action.) This neatly preserves player agency while avoiding the classic isolated look of canned animations.
Then there’s the almost unparalleled level of player participation in Deception’s major setpieces. Other games would rely on pre-rendered cinematics or quicktime events; Deception directly requires the player to continue engaging well-defined core mechanics in context-specific ways, again blending core gameplay and spectacle in a natural and fluid fashion. If the much-vaunted Half-Life series deserved acclaim for not taking away control, Deception certainly should be praised as an example of almost peerless player agency even during climactic events.
It seems peculiar to complain about “more of the same Uncharted” when that still means such quality. The game’s disparate elements are still not “typical,” if nothing else they’re integrated almost seamlessly into the play experience. No, Uncharted 3 is not revolutionary in its core design, but what is still an industry standard is its creators’ incredible attention to detail and dedication to polish almost every component of the game until it practically gleams.
Drake’s Deception isn’t a sandbox. But that isn’t a weakness to condemn; sandbox design is not better design. We’ve all seen too many sandboxes struggle with direction and pacing, sacrificing storytelling power for relatively low-key “freedom” to drive around a largely static environment.
There’s still an excellent place for linear games, and Uncharted 3 continues the franchise’s legacy of being perhaps the purest demonstration of their potential.