Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception (Another Nerdy Review)

I finally got to finish playing Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception over the weekend. Thankfully, my PS3 seems to be working just dandy thanks to Boyfriend's love of tinkering with things and some new thermal gel. Naughty Dog really seems to have outdone themselves as far as game-play and graphics go in this game. The cut scenes transitioned so seamlessly and beautifully into the game-play that there were, in fact, times when I didn't realize I was supposed to actually play. This was both amazing and had unfortunate consequences (i.e Drake death). The subtle and dry humor that was present in the previous Uncharted games was back with a sharpness that made me cackle with glee quite often, especially since some of the subtler jokes were throwbacks to the previous games.

(Warning: thar be spoilers ahead)

I was glad that Chloe had a smaller role in this game than in Among Thieves. I liked her character just fine, in small doses, but she got on my nerves after a while, so I was glad to see her back, but pleased that she had a minor role to play in Drake's Deception. I was also quite pleased with finally getting a more thorough back story on Nate and Sully by playing as young Nate and seeing how he and Sully first encountered one another. It was also nice to see Elena and Nate's story took a rough turn between the 2nd and 3rd games, but was resolved in the end. I also liked that the sub-plot focused more on Nate and Sully's relationship rather than the Elena, Drake, Chloe love triangle thing.

Overall, the narrative followed the usual Drake formula with twists and subtle reveals as to "what's really going on" but, I must say, as much as I wanted so badly for this game to be my favorite of the Uncharted franchise, it just wasn't. The story was seriously lacking towards the last 1/3 of the game. The climax felt rushed and was a bit lackluster. In the previous games, as well as this one, there was always an element of the supernatural involved and it was hinted at throughout the game until the big reveals came and Drake found out he was dealing with some sort of ancient evil that he had to defeat before it escaped and destroyed the world. Drake's Deception hinted at this supernatural element throughout, with the jokes about Marlowe's age seemingly alluding to her being unnaturally old, and that combined with the deep desperately sinister air of her ancient organization and the scene where (SPOILER) Carter shoots Talbot in the face, but then Talbot appears moments later to attempt to kill Drake et al, it all got very confusing, and made the supernatural element feel a bit like a red herring. Also, there were flesh eating spiders. Those were never connected to the rest of the story, they were just sort of there as an additional challenge. I kind of felt a little strung along, almost like the big reveal was cut actually out of the game at the last minute.

In one of the final cut scenes of the game before the final "boss battle," drake and Sully find Marlowe and Talbot drawing out the brass canister containing the Djinn that cursed/poisoned the water of the lost city with a giant crane. I was certain that they would successfully open the brass container and Marlowe would become cursed by the Djinn and Drake would then be forced to fight her as the final battle of the game. I imagined Marlowe either purposely or accidentally unsealing the brass tomb holding the Djinn and a cloud or tornado of dark purple-ish shapes with barely-discernible facial features swirling out of the canister and forcing themselves down Marlowe's throat. Marlowe would then writhe around in pain on the ground and possibly stumble into the water, then after a brief moment of stillness, she would burst out of the water creating a thundering vortex beneath her. She would then unleash hordes of the flesh-eating spiders at Drake, Sully and any other unfortunate bystanders. the spiders would devour her cronies and Drake and Sully would have to run and climb around the structure to find her weak spot to defeat the evil Djinn-Marlowe. THAT is how I envisioned it.

I don't know if something like this was originally in the plan, but for whatever reason, it just couldn't be done and the game designers went another direction, or if that was never the plan at all. I'm certainly not accusing Naughty Dog of being lazy, but I know that in game development, unexpected things can happen to change the game especially with a high-profile release. Either way, the final battle with Talbot was seriously way too easy and anti-climactic at best. I found many of the gun battles earlier in the game to be far more challenging and frustrating than the final boss battle with Talbot.
Even in the first two Drake games the final boss battle was very challenging and sometimes uber-frustrating to figure out the key to defeating the boss. With Talbot, it was a hand-to-hand combat battle that required some quick reflexes when the dodge or grapple icon would prompt you on the screen. Once I got the hang of it and found the pattern, it was quite simple, just tedious. I remember the final battle in Among Thieves to be far more challenging and difficult to figure out than this one.

Speaking of simple, I also found the puzzles and platformer elements of Drake's Deception not as mentally stimulating or elaborate as in games past. I found that I solved the trick or the key to the puzzle long before the characters would prompt the cut scene to move the game forward, so I would be stuck just waiting for a (non-Drake) character to walk over to an object and activate it so I could continue the game. Maybe my skills have improved and I just found it easier in this game than in the previous two, or maybe...yeah, we'll just go with that.
 

With all that critique being said, I want to make it clear that I still loved this game and had a great time playing it and I plan to play it again. It was just not my favorite of the Drake series. I have not yet played the co-op or multi-player missions yet, and I have heard good things about those elements of the game, and I look forward to them. I also have mad respect for Naughty Dog, they're a small company, but with the Uncharted games they have definitely helped pioneer gaming in the past decade. I also have new-found respect based on their reasoning for not making any single-player DLC for Dake's Deception. According to the game director, Justin Richmond, "There's a very specific reason, whenever we sit down and we think we should do some single-player DLC, someone pitches something and we realize-that's a five hour level. We would rather build out another game than we would do episodic content."

I can completely respect them not wanting to dial back their ambition and creativity. I hope this means that we may see a fourth Uncharted game in the near future, but I will look forward to anything Naughty Dog comes up with next.
So, is Drake's Deception worth your hard-earned $60+? If you love the Uncharted series as much as I do and really like collector's stuff/strategy guides, then yes, I think it is worth the price. If you're more of a casual player and just want to check it out, I suggest renting or buying it used.