Drake’s still a hero to treasure

YOU can’t teach an old dog new tricks, but Naughty Dog specialises in them. The California developer has made an art of transplanting well-worn cinematic techniques to consoles, resulting in some of the most popular games of the last decade. The popularity of one series, in particular, is off the charts.

Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection is Naughty Dog’s homage to Tomb Raider, Indiana Jones and Syphon Filter. If archaeologists analysed its origins, they would find equal parts National Treasure and Prince of Persia.

In short, Uncharted is the best amalgam of adventure-cinema and gaming we’ve ever seen. This is a brilliant collection, then, but it’s also a series that, surprisingly, has become dated very quickly.

Like some idol sitting on a dank temple altar, time has passed it by. In short, the cinematic elements and the gaming elements have started to look at odds.

For the uninitiated, Uncharted primarily follows the story of Nathan Drake and his ragtag band of treasure-hunter opportunists, as they travel to locations all over the world in search of ancient secrets and artefacts.

Drake himself claims lineage to the famous explorer Francis Drake, but a paternity test would surely show Harrison Ford to be the father, having had a fling with Lara Croft in some dusty Yemen tomb.

Drake is gaming’s most charismatic and likeable lead character, without exception. Whether in cutscenes or during gameplay, his quips and pep talks are one of the series highlights. You really feel as though you have stepped into the hiking boots of a Hollywood hero.

The peripheral characters are equally magnetic, mainly due to the sharp writing and intelligent homages to cinematic pacing. It’s a beautifully directed game.

Nathan Drake is the perfect companion on your journey over crumbling monuments and long-lost civilisations.

When he is hanging from the ledge of an Aztec pillar, or leaping from building to building in a Cuban city, or urging himself forward through a scorching Rub’ al Khali desert ruin, then Drake is an incredible avatar and Uncharted is a brilliant game.

When he is fighting atop a speeding train, or hijacking a tank through a Tibetan village, the combination of cinema and gaming is perfect.

When he is solving a deadly puzzle designed by Amazonian tricksters, pulling levers and pushing blocks, then Drake is doing what he was born to do.

These elements of Uncharted are unparalleled in their entertainment, the best examples of big budget gaming and cinema meeting halfway, colluding on the borders of consoles and celluloid.

It’s not perfect, however. To put it simply, it’s the shooting bits that don’t work. At least a third of the series is spent hiding behind corners and pillars, mowing down hundreds of henchmen in the quest for treasure.

The combat itself is polished, with some of the slickest third-person gunfire out there, but it just doesn’t fit into the cinematic world Naughty Dog has created. Even though the shooting is satisfying and a welcome change of pace, it feels strange – even wrong – for Nathan Drake and his friends to be killing hundreds of people in their quest for riches.

Cinema can address this disconnect with subtlety, using humour or a lack of realism, but gaming has a harder job.

When Drake cocks an AK-47, pops out from behind cover to headshot three guards, then shortly after makes a light-hearted quip about something insignificant – well, the disconnect is that much more tangible for you having performed the action.

Indiana Jones wouldn’t be the same if he were shooting hundreds of henchmen and Nathan Drake is worse off for it.

For that reason, Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection is beginning to feel like one of its own artefacts, standing still in a world that has moved on.

Developers have started to address this disconnect between story and gameplay more and more in recent years, with Naughty Dog themselves having done so brilliantly with The Last Of Us.

While this collection does add one new feature (the ability to pause gameplay and take screenshots to share online) and it also offers access to the Uncharted 4 multiplayer beta, aside from that the games are untouched.

The disconnect between characters and gameplay may seem out of time, but everything else about this trilogy makes the experience worth treasuring.