His best moments come when you leave him alone, or just propel him blindly, away from spiders, water, collapsing cities, whatever. Usually these firefights end when Sully tells us to “use the RPG!” to blow up a wall. But firefights feel obligatory and laborious-they consist mostly of attempting to aim an unforgiving reticule at two-inch targets that insist on darting back and forth. Those moments when you are more directly involved in Nate’s movements and decisions are your opportunities to say you played a part. You finish out the rest of the level, but it’s not the same. They understand that you’re doing your best your best is just not good enough. The developers are washing their hands of those moments. When things go so badly that Nate ends up dead-that’s all you. It’s clear that your death had absolutely nothing to do with Nate’s true story. The game cuts to black and white, and the checkpoint starts again, with the same people saying the same things.
Running full speed from a wall of concrete, you feel you have finally grasped the game, when you miss a gap. You guide Nate step-by-step as an entire city crumbles around him. The treatment of this event is so dismissive, so grating, and so passive-aggressive that breaking Drake’s fiction feels more like breaking trust with Naughty Dog. Nate’s body goes unnaturally limp, color evaporates from the screen, a stock musical cue plays, and those around you either mock or mourn your death, depending on their persuasion. Uncharted‘s reaction to our imperfections doesn’t make death less brutal, but more so.
Daring escapes are often interrupted by a sniper shot to the head, instantly killing Nate.įor a computer-generated man, he is remarkably attractive. Nate has a habit of running away from things and toward the camera-this raises the tension and gives us a clearer view of what menaces Nate, but makes it hard to see where he is going. Uncharted 3 is stunning to observe, but also feels strangely restrictive to interact with. When we direct our protagonist’s second-to-second actions, it’s obvious why the game is so anxious to take it away. You’re in control, but Uncharted is directing your every move, like your dad teaching you to hit a baseball off of a tee for the first time. While fighting a giant while being sucked out of a plane, hammer on X-sometimes press Triangle.
While moving through a tight crevice with a claustrophobic friend, press forward. Those moments leave players with only the most rudimentary control: While running from deadly spiders, press down. It’s nearly impossible to screw up the key moments in the game by making a wrong turn or messing up the timing. There are many moments in Uncharted 3 that exist to drive the fiction to a place of resolution, and they are barely played at all. And as with any perfectionist, you can see Naughty Dog’s disdain for the possibility of falling short. You can see it in the protagonist in the lovingly engineered waterfalls, oceans, deserts, and mountains in the inevitable resolution at the end of every Uncharted game. Nate has been created by developers that value perfection themselves. You can’t fault him for feeling invincible. We merely want to take a small part in this impossible dream, just for a little while. If he needs an airplane, one is made available to him. Most crucially, Nate has no job but doesn’t lack funds.
He has Sully, an older and experienced friend who follows him wherever he goes. He has the talent to carry out his lifelong dream of following in the footsteps of his ancestor, Francis Drake. Popular media like Uncharted are an easy form of escapism-a way to distract ourselves, or to feel excited about something removed from reality.
For a computer-generated male, he is remarkably attractive. We follow his every move, we hang on his every word, we laugh at all his jokes-but the more we want to be like Nathan Drake, the less we get to be him. He doesn’t give in to enemy intimidation. Rather than shrink in the face of danger, he expresses surprise and exhaustion, but never fear. Even though attempts are made within Uncharted 3‘s story to call into question Drake’s motives, we still play the game partially out of some desire to be like him. His obsession with adventure and risk propels both him and us toward a delightful danger, which we gladly experience through him. The Uncharted series, more than anything else, exists because of its lead character, Nathan Drake.